Canadian Federal Election 2015

Throughout the 2015 Canadian federal election campaign each party has addressed a spectrum of issues from foreign affairs to the lagging economy. However, there are three issues in that have not been addressed adequately and warrant the attention. These three issues are: the doubling of the length of the campaign period, youth unemployment, and lastly, Canada’s response to the Truth and Reconciliation Report. All three issues are directed at different populous within the voting community but also have indirectly impact all Canadians. By doubling the length of the campaign, Prime Minister Harper has increased the costs of the campaign directly for all parties and candidates and indirectly for the public purse. By doing so he has given his party the advantage of being able to outspend others. The two remaining issues, while also extremely important, have their most direct impact on minorities within the voting public, on youth from the ages of 15 to 24, and on Canada’s Aboriginal peoples. Regardless of the directness of the impact on these two populations, these issues nevertheless have an indirect impact on Canada at large. How the parties campaign on them and the eventual government addresses them will have an impact on Canada’s economic, social and political future for decades to come.

While the issue of increasing the length of the campaign on the surface seems harmless, the underlying truth is that such action has serious implications for all voters, and for all electoral competitors, parties and candidates. On August 2nd, Stephen Harper and the conservative party called for a federal election effectively launching the campaign six weeks early, doubling of the usual five week election campaign. Not only does the length of the campaign increase, but the campaign budget skyrockets from 21 million dollars to 54 million dollars. Mr. Harper insists that such action remains in the taxpayers’ interest by saying he wants the parties campaigns to be funded by themselves rather than the taxpayers. However, once you look under the veil, the elongated campaign will end up costing taxpayers millions. The longer campaign in fact means that parties are able to spend more money at the taxpayers’ expense. The Canadian taxpayers reimburses parties for fifty percent of their election costs, as well as reimburse political candidates sixty percent of their campaigning expense .

This is an important issue to me as I am part of a larger collective of undecided, and for the most part uninformed voters. This election campaign in which the Conservative government extended, has provided them with the advantage of being able to outspending and out-campaign the other parties. The Conservatives will be able to, “pummel the NDP and Liberals with TV commercials, while those opponents run low on funds.” I consider this to be a key issue as I do not want the election to be won by political attack ads and billboards swaying uninformed voters, but rather for the political platforms of each of the parties to do so. Furthermore, Canadians should take issue with this as well. By unleashing a longer campaign in the height of the summer, the Conservative government also gave rise to an ethical issue. In 2007, the Conservative government past the fixed-election law in order to offer transparency when calling an election, prohibiting party leaders from calling one when it best suited them. Yet, by calling an election early, which best suits the Harper government, it also betrays the essence of this law. The Conservative government under Stephen Harper is “cheating” the system and cheating the Canadian taxpayer. Canadians should begin to inform themselves on this issue to understand how the Conservatives are treading the lines of ethics in order to out spend, and out campaign, at the financial expense of the people they say they are supporting.

Youth unemployment over the years has been on the rise and is an important issue that party leaders should be directly addressing in order to engage and attract younger voters. Historically, the youth unemployment rate has been higher than that of adults; however, the gap is widening. The unemployment rate for youth aged 15 to 24 in 2012, was at 14.3 compared to that of adults at 6% between 25 to 54 . Opposition parties are beginning to understand this new reality of high youth unemployment rates and only beginning to put forth policies to help youth in a very volatile job market. While, the Conservative government continually talks about job creation, little is mentioned about creating more opportunities for youth. The NDP has pledged up to $100 million annually over four years in order to facilitate the creation of over 40, 000 jobs for youth. The Liberals have also pledged $1.5 billion over four years to help 125,000 young people find jobs in the market force. While youth, of course have growing pains when first