Author: Doug Rutherford

Note: This is the first of my submissions to CBC’s Your Take blog.

People often have a little trouble grasping the expanse of the Yukon, a single riding located in the northwest corner of Canada. We are 85 times the size of Prince Edward Island, the smallest province, yet have less than one quarter of their population. People of First Nations origin represent about 25% of the population.

The topography of the Yukon is as varied as one can expect. The eight highest mountains in Canada are located in the St. Elias Mountain Range, located within Kluane National Park (a UNESCO World Heritage site). Above the Arctic Circle, tundra abounds, along with the Porcupine Caribou herd, one of the largest in North America. Subarctic boreal forest also covers much of the territory. Large lakes and rivers are common. The Yukon River, with a length of 3,185 km, is the second longest river in Canada. We do things big here.

There are 14 communities in the territory, ranging from Watson Lake at the gateway to the Yukon on the Alaska Highway to Beaver Creek, the most westerly community in the country, to Old Crow in the north. That being said, our total population, from the December 2010 estimate, is just under 35,000. (I realize that there are towns with a smaller population in many parts of Canada. Consider that Whitehorse, the capital city, has an estimated population of 26,000, if you include the surrounding bedroom communities.) Think in these terms: there are two moose and six caribou for every person in the territory. We also have a grizzly bear for every family of five.

A number of prominent Yukoners have served in the House of Commons, including George Black, He served in the House from 1921-1935 and 1940-1949. In the period between , the seat was held by his wife, Martha Louise Black, during a period of illness. He was Speaker of the House following the 1930 election and reputedly kept a .22 caliber pistol in his chambers to hunt rabbits on Parliament Hill. 

In 1957, Erik Neilson was elected as the Yukon MP and served until 1987 when he resigned. He held a variety of cabinet positions, including Deputy Prime Minister, President of the Privy council and Minister of National Defense.

From 1989-1995, the member was Audrey McLaughlin. She was the first female leader of a political party with a seat in the house and the only federal leader to represent a riding in one of the territories.

I also find it interesting that most people from outside the region often don’t know where we are. The usual response that makes the lights come on is “we’re right next to Alaska.” I do explain that Skagway, AK, is about 2½ hours drive away. I try not to tell them that I have to drive south to get there…

I was wondering how long it would take for the first major screwups to take place. So far, there’s been a few doozies, and, of course, from more than one party.

Last week, Ryan Dolby, the NDP candidate for Elgin-Middlesex-London, dropped out of the race. His reason was that, fearing a Conservative majority, he was withdrawing to throw his support behind the Liberal candidate in hopes that he would be able to defeat the Conservative Party’s Joe Preston. Fred Sinclair has since been named as the new NDP candidate for the riding. That can’t have left a good feeling in the NDP election team room.

Then, it got worse. Mustafa Rivis, who was running for the NDP in Mississaugua-Erindale, dropped out of the race. In this case, he announced he was switching allegiences to the Conservative Party, hoping Prime Minister Harper got a majority in the election. Ouch.

One would think those issues to be problems, but now, we have the issue of Conservative Party staffers checking out the Facebook pages of rally attendee applicants. Two students were ejected from a rally in London, ON. According to the staff member that ejected one of them, this was due to them having a picture of them with Michael Ignatieff taken earlier in the week. The second was prohibited for having an NDP bumper sticker on his car (and I’m still curious how that fact was known). Several veterans were prohibited from attending a CPC rally in Halifax and two other students were prohibited from attending one in Guelph.

Dimitri Soudas from the PMO hastily apologised to the two students from London. The RCMP have also stated that they will no longer remove people from Conservative rallies unless for security reasons. The Prime Minister has stated that this is the result of decisions made by party staff.

Other tacky things have happened. Yvon Lévesque, the Bloc  Québécois candidate in Abitibi–Baie-James–Nunavik–Eeyou. He informed Jack Layton that his star candidate in the riding wouldn’t win because he’s “an aboriginal candidate.” Suffice to say, M Lévesque has apologised although the NDP did call for his resignation.

And, despite my comment that parties probably vetted internet comments made by their candidates, some seem to have slipped through the cracks. André Forbes, the Liberal candidate in Manicouagan, also turns out to be the founder for l’Association des Droits des Blancs (the Association for the Rights of Whites). One can surmise what type of group this is easily by its name. He has publicly refered to Innu people as “featherheads” and made several other rascist statements. This showed up this morning and by the afternoon, M. Forbes was the former candidate, having been fired by the party.

So, this is the Coles Notes version of the gaffes to date. Don’t worry. Elections bring out the worst in people so we can sadly expect more.

Yup. That’s a title.

I have been accepted as the Yukon Citizen Blogger for CBC’s Your Take for the election. What this will totally entail is still awaiting clarification. That being said, despite the fact that I am now forced to be incredibly profound, or at least as incredibly profound as I get for the duration of the election, I am really looking forward to this project. As mentioned previously, I find elections to be incredibly entertaining and this one has proven to be as much so as any other.

You might have noticed that I don’t have a lot to say on the election today. I’m using the CBC as an excuse as I did spend a bit of time on the paperwork for this project and did also have to teach a class this afternoon. I am also getting a review of a draft of a play back tomorrow evening and I’m a little paranoid over that.  So for today, this is all you get… besides, tomorrow there should be lots to say about social media and political parties peeking at your social media when you attend a rally.

I’ll admit that, while the title is a bit more dramatic than the content of today’s blog post, it is catchy.

This morning, Prime Minister Harper stated his party’s plan to eliminate the long gun registry, a program seen as intrusive into the rights of Canadians and a waste of money. He did mention that the previous attempt to do so was a private member’s bill but that it had the support of the party. The Prime Minister also stated that this was the platform of the party since its inception, calling it “wasteful and inefficient” in Welland, ON, today.

I’ve found this to be an interesting issue in Canadian politics. The first reason is the switch of Stephen Harper’s allegiances. When Bill C-68 was introduced, he was a moderate supporter of the legislation, and had been quoted in Hansard as saying on June 12 1995 in the House of Commons, “From my own personal standpoint I believe there are elements of gun control and specifically of this bill that could be helpful.” In Hansard, he stated that he supported the bill on first and second reading based upon a survey of his constituents.  However, a second survey of his constituents between second and third reading of the bill indicated that the mood had changed and he was voting against the bill. His change of heart has received little comment and when you mention it, few people I’ve talked to have either heard of it and some refuse to believe it.

The registry is liable to be an issue here, given our rural location and a large First Nations population, many of whom are subsistence hunters to so degree or another. I’ve heard a number of complaints regarding Larry Bagnell supporting Candice Hoeppner’s private member’s bill to abolish the registry on second reading but voting along party lines on the whipped vote to defeat the bill. Yes, people are visibly and vocally unhappy with his decision. However, all of the people I know who feel this way either vote Conservative anyway or don’t vote at all… half of the latter because they don’t want the government to know where they are.

What we often fail to realize (and yes, I’m not a big fan of polls with a small sample size) is that, during the voting on Hoeppner’s bill, the National Post reported that 66% of Canadians supported retaining the long gun registry. Only one province, Alberta, had more support for abolishing it than retaining it. The poll did not include representation from the North, but why would you expect it to? The Statistics Canada October 2009 population estimates put the total population of the three northern territories at 109,642. There are more than 33 million people in Canada. We have three seats in the House of Commons out of 308, or less than 1%. Given overwhelming support for the gun registry last October, our chances of having anything to say about the matter, to quote Bogart, “don’t amount to a hill of beans in this big world.”

One of the things I find interesting is that ethics have not been made a huge issue in this election. This is in consideration of the fact that the non-confidence motion that brought down the government was part of an historic motion of finding the government guilt of contempt of parliament.

None of the other parties really seem to be hammering the Conservative Party. Also, the Bruce Ross affair seems to just becoming more and more grisly, as it now turns out that the PMO was aware of his now five criminal convictions, as well as having been disbarred by the Law Society of Ontario, before hiring him as the Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff.

Needless to say that Prime Minister Harper is downplaying the contempt charge, saying it was a motion of parliament passed by the opposition and the Canadian public doesn’t care. This seems a somewhat bizarre comment to make. It makes one wonder whether or not legislation passed by the opposition is actually valid. As well, I think most of us really don’t want the Prime Minister telling us what we care about.

I am also quite amazed that the contempt finding has  not resulted in serious commentary by the national media and more amazed that there weren’t serious reprecussions within the Conservative party. The resignation of Stephen Harper as the leader of the party is the least the Conservatives should have called for and where do you see editorial pieces calling for the same.  It seems that most are simply too afraid to call out the PM for fear of some retribution or another. I guess that it’s chicken for dinner tonight again.

So, how might we increase the voting rate in the territory? Why aren’t people interested in making the effort to vote?

There is a bit of difficulty in determining the rate of voters who actually turn out. According to Elections Canada, our rate was reasonably low. According to the National Post, quoting Elections Canada, our rate was the highest of the territories in the 2008 election with an eligible voting rate of 63.7%.  However, turnout for Yukon voters in the 2004 election was 58%.

So, how can we improve on these figures next time around? We could probably begin by looking at who doesn’t turn out to the polls, and this is a relatively easy question to answer. Voters above the age of 38 are the first group where more than 50% actually vote. Younger voters, such as the 18-21½ (24%) age groups and 21½-24 (29%) age groups are seriously underrepresented in the final vote.

Green Party candidate, John Streicker has asked the other candidates to issue a joint press release on combining efforts to increase the rate of youth voting.  Do I think this will have much effect? Not really. That being said, a far more important effort is coming. The Bringing Youth Towards Equality group (BYTE) is organizing an all candidates forum on youth issues. I suspect that people of the actual demographic group trying to increase youth engagement will probably have far more chances for success and I look forward to seeing how well this works.

Can an election be made interesting to youth? Heck, can this election be made interesting in general? Given the shortage of platforms finalized and no real statements so far on local issues, I’m waiting to see something happen.

The first planning for a candidate forum seems to have gotten underway. Earlier this evening, I attended a meeting at the Boardroom of Nakai Theatre to begin the framework for the Arts Issues candidates forum. This was quite a popular and informative event during the last election and looks to be equally as good this time around.

This provides people within the arts community and candidates to determine who sits where on a variety of issues. The format will be a group of pre-selected questions, moderated questions, followed by questions from the floor.

There are still a few issues to firm up on this. For example, two possible dates are being considered and organizers are waiting for candidates to reply to the possible dates. April 19th is looking like the optimum date for the event. It will be held at the Old Fire Hall. I’ll provide more details as they become available.

OK. The slate seems full, or at least as far as the major parties are concerned. There’s still time before the deadline (21 days before Election Day), so we may see an independent or someone from one of the smaller parties. For example, we had candidates here for the Christian Heritage Party and Marijuana Party in the 2004 Election. Running will be:

• Larry Bagnell (LPC) – Incumbent
• Ryan Leef (CPC)
• Kevin Barr (NDP)
• John Streicker (GPC)

Now that everyone has been nominated, we can at least expect a broader variety of campaign signs. So far, the Green Party is miles ahead and the only party to have signs up. The fact that their candidate is a repeat from the last election does give them a bit of an up on the Conservatives and NDP.

In case you are curious, or your memory needs refreshing, the results of the last election were:

• Larry Bagnell (LPC) – 45.80%
• Darrel Pasloski (CPC) – 32.66%
• John Streicker (GPC) – 12.83%
• Ken Bolton (NDP) – 8.70%

(Source: Elections Canada – http://www.elections.ca/scripts/OVR2008/default.html)

So far, what are the issues? That’s a good question, since the only ones that have put forth anything in the way of a policy-related statement is the Green Party. John Streicker has called for a more respectful parliament and an increase in voter turnout.  Since nine of the provinces and territories had a higher voter turnout percentage in the 2008 election, that might not be a bad idea.

There is a lot to be said, by the way, for compulsory voting. After all, we pay a pretty cheap price for living in Canada. You really only have three civic duties. :

• Voting (which isn’t mandatory)
• Jury duty
• Filling in the census

The last one, of course, is a topic for another day.

There are strange things done in the midnight sun… although, it’s the end of March and there’s really only light in the sky until about 9:30.

Up until last Friday, the only words you heard at work involved elections. Non-confidence, economy, contempt, etc., everything related to the possibility of an election. Only two parties had even nominated candidates, and one of those was the incumbent who said he was running again. There was a huge push on to get people in place for the next week.

My Twitter account has vibrated from comments from here and there on this scandal, that candidate, this issue and coalitions past and possible.

Saturday, the writ fell (loud noise with echo in background). Related to elections, that’s about the only loud noise we’ve heard here. I’ve seen two campaign signs in the last two days and they’re both for the same candidate. I drive towards downtown from the largest populated area of Whitehorse and I head towards downtown on one of the two ways to get there. Local radio has had nothing really related other than national news and local newspapers haven’t carried much other than notice of the candidate nominations.

At lunch time, I bring up the upcoming election and the attitude has moved from nothing else to talk about to, “Oh, that’s right. That’s coming up, isn’t it?”

So far, there’s been no mention of a candidates’ debate on general issues, although there is an effort to organize one on the arts. No one has flung out one of those really juicy issues for everyone to pounce on and put their personal seal on it. In short, all’s quiet on the northern front.

I realize one party, the NDP, has yet to nominate their candidate, although this is supposed to happen tonight. Maybe, after all are present and accounted for, there may be more issues than wondering if the Leafs are going to make the playoffs or not. And, when that’s the biggest issue during an election, do we really have to ask why 40% of elibible people don’t vote….