The federal election is heating up. Literally.
With Conservative leader Andrew Scheer stopping by Abbotsford on the weekend, the summer barbecue fundraising circuit is in full swing – as is the summer election.
For the next three and a half months or so, you’ll hear non-stop about how terrible the Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, and Greens are. If you speak French, you’ll hear about how bad the Bloc is, too.
Summer is a lazy season, and the major campaigning will ramp up in September.
But it would be nice if our leaders gave us the credit that we might be able to absorb a little serious policy discussion right now.
We know the serious issues facing Canada, from climate crisis to housing to an aging population, not to mention perennial issues surrounding health care, drug costs, crime, and immigration.
The parties typically roll out their policy platforms and budgets during the official election campaigns.
Fortuantely, those campaigns last just a few weeks. Unfortunately, that doesn’t give you a lot of time to absorb, for example, a policy outlining how Party A’s ideas about reducing child poverty differ from Party B’s plans.
It would be nice if all the major parties would make all their platforms and policies widely available over the summer. And not just the short feel-good bullet-points you can find on their pre-campaign websites right now.
Post the boring stuff! Charts and graphs, long dense paragraphs full of footnotes and links to economic studies.
Are Canadians going to haul it off to the lake for the weekend to read?
Probably not. But at least give us a head start, because we’re definitely not going to read all that stuff during a six-week campaign.
– M.C.