Join us in Uptown Waterloo Sunday Afternoon for the 2016 Open Streets launch!
The Waterloo Region Greens invite you to drop by and say “hi!” at our first ever Open Streets information booth! Grab a WRGreens sticker and sign Elizabeth’s electoral reform petition!’
Walk
bike
scoot
skateboard
or fly down to check it out!
There’s always lots to do
see
and listen to!
If you’ve never been to an Open Streets before you’re in for a treat!
Ontario Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner has been sharing GPO’s ideas for restoring trust in the integrity of our system by reforming political party funding rules.
Some of these Green ideas have been incorporated in Bill 201, currently being considered by the House. Clearly our message is gaining traction, since the Liberal Government took the unprecedented step of inviting Mike to participate in the drafting new legislation by speaking to the Standing Committee on General Government today.
“The Liberal bill reflects many GPO priorities, including eliminating corporate and union donations, limiting third-party advertising, and introducing a per-vote allowance to finance political parties.
However, there are still some glaring omissions that need to be addressed, and Mike’s presentation is making sure these are still on the table before the bill gets past..
—Becky Smit, Executive Director, GPO
This afternoon Mike told the Standing Committee on General Government what the Ontario Green Party likes about Bill 201:
Then he outlined the significant revisions the GPO would like to see in Bill 201:
You can read the full text of Mike’s presentation to the committee:
at gpo.ca/how-fix-elections-finances-bill
We can help by:
Green Party of Ontario leader MikeSchreiner will address the Ontario Finance Reform Committee
Follow live tweets:
#ONnotforsale
#RestoreDemocracy
#onpoli
follow @OntarioGreens
or keep track on Facebook
An easy way to follow live twitter chats
go to Tweetchat
and type #ONnotforsale in the search bar
I haven’t used this for a long time so I don’t know how well it works now… it aggregates live tweet stream and automatically adds the hashtag…
update: unlike Twitter now, retweets don’t fit, so you need to manually edit them (and if yoy do change RT to MT for “modified tweet”
Visit the Waterloo Greens Info Booth!
The Waterloo Region Greens kick off the summer festival season with an Infon Booth at the awesome Kitchener Tri-Pride Celebration. Hope to see you there!
Referendum talk is beginning to overshadow the real need of getting our everyday democracy into the hands of voters. Referendums work only with an engaged citizenry that is informed by a fair and unbiased media.
Truth is, every referendum on electoral reform has been sabotaged by misinformation from elite power brokers who like our flawed voting system, which promotes their will over the citizens at large. They are the ones that oppose real democracy.
To claim reform needs a referendum is to believe all major decisions should have a true majority of citizens’ consent. That’s what we’d routinely have for every decision, if we had a government with proportional representation (PR). Globally, most democracies have changed to PR voting systems.
A dozen committees and commissions already conducted in Canada all conclude that PR is needed for a government that really represents voters’ intentions. I don’t want smoke-and-mirrors propaganda derailing the public from what is in their best interest. I don’t need a referendum hijacked, again, by big money and the elite to keep our biased system that mostly works for them.
I just want a real democratic institution with proportional representation that reflects the will of the people it is supposed to serve.
David Weber
Kitchener
David Weber was the Kitchener South—Hespeler Green Party candidate during the 2015 federal election. This letter appeared in The May 25th, 2016 Record
The Waterloo Region Greens are pleased
to invite you to the
Kitchener Public Library
85 Queen Street North
Kitchener, ON
N2H 2H1
for our FREE Showing of the documentary
hosted by the Kitchener Centre Green Party
Voting Reform Presentation and DiscussionUnderstand our options for voting reform with a presentation by FairVote Canada WRC followed by a discussion. This was highly requested by people from our past events, and is a perfect event to invite others who would like to join and learn. The presentation format will make this very accessible. (Hosted by the Green Party of Waterloo.)
I am so tired of excuses. Money isn’t real: it is merely a symbol that only has meaning because we believe in it. Our environment, on the other hand, is real.
Guest Post by Leslea Smith
I read the “leap manifesto“. It’s not radical. It’s not outrageous. It’s common sense, logical, and shows very clearly how transitioning to greener energy options, isn’t just good for the planet, it’s good economic sense.
We have a country that’s huge.
We have huge areas where wind & solar power generation can be done very easily.
And thanks to the work of Nikola Tesla, we know that we can move the electricity these devices create, to where it’s needed, with minimal loss.
The wind turbines near me, in Halkirk Alberta, provide energy to the grid, to power places like Calgary & Edmonton. The energy could go to California, thanks to the way AC power works. Halkirk supplies Alberta. But the simple fact is that it could power Toronto just as easily.
There’s NO reason at all, that we can’t produce 100% of all our…
View original post 281 more words
As the 2015 election fades into memory, I am continually astounded to see how much Green Party Policy is being discussed… Apparently people were trying to convince Tom Mulcair to embrace the Green Party education policy as a means of retaining leadership of the NDP Party — although not as Green Party Policy. I tried sharing the link to the Green Party of Canada press release but there’s something wrong with the link, so in the interest of reminding people about this awesome GPC policy, I’ve chosen to reproduce it here.
September 16, 2015(OTTAWA) – Green Leader Elizabeth May (Saanich – Gulf Islands), unveiled the Green Party’s Youth and Education Strategy that includes a plan to abolish tuition fees for students and their families. The strategy would also implement a debt-forgiveness program for student debt above $10,000.
“We must invest in Canadian youth and the skills, training, and education that is necessary to create jobs,” said May. “Young people are faced with the challenge of finding a job after they finish school, in a tough economy, while battling student debt. The Green Party is committed to investing in youth and removing barriers, like student debt, so young Canadians can find stable, sustainable jobs.”
The Green Party’s National Student and Education Strategy will:
● Immediately cut tuition fees for students and their families without adequate financial means, and remove the inadequate 2% cap on tuition for all First Nations and Inuit students.
● Abolish tuition fees for post-secondary education and skills training for Canadians by 2020 through constructing a system of federal grants collaboratively with the universities and colleges.
● Eliminate any existing or future student federal debt above $10,000.
● Abolish interest on new student loans and increase available funding for bursaries.
● Create a national Community and Environment Service Corps, which will provide $1 billion/year to municipalities to hire Canadian youth.
● Help students and their families through the Guaranteed Liveable Income (GLI), to ensure no person’s income falls below what is necessary for health, life, and dignity.
“In these times of high youth unemployment, heavy student debt is a burden that keeps young Canadians from being able to start their post-academic lives on an even footing,” said Gord Miller, former Environmental Commissioner of Ontario and Green Party candidate (Guelph). “The debt forgiveness program and our plan to eliminate tuition fees by 2020 represents positive change for students and their families.”
“I am pleased to be here with Elizabeth today in Guelph to make this announcement,” continued Miller. “Our plan will make education more accessible for students. These critical investments in trades, apprenticeships, and education will ensure that all young Canadians have the skills to build a successful future.”
“It is a bold idea, but we can and must afford it. We can implement this investment in our youth through common sense measures like eliminating subsidies to fossil fuels and restoring the corporate tax rate to what it was in 2009,” concluded May. “We don’t need to continue with the status quo; we can do better.”
The Green Party was the first party to release a fully costed platform, available here.
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For additional information or to arrange an interview, contact:
Julian Morelli
Director of Communications
Green Party of Canada
cell: (613) 614 4916
office: (613) 562 4916 (224)
julian.morelli@greenparty.caOr
Debra Eindiguer
Green Party of Canada
cell: (613) 240 8921Or
Kirsten Strom
Executive Assistant to Director of Communications
t: 613.562.4916 (200)
Toll Free 1.866.868.3447
kirsten.strom@greenparty.caAttachments
Photo Credit
I stitched three photos together to create this awesome panorama photo (so the original is absolutely huge), but you can download it in a variety of sizes from Flickr here. And if you’re interested in more photos from the education announcement you’ll find them in my Flickr album
GPC Education Announcement Panorama by Laurel L. Russwurm is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) License
wrgreens 