Building a better future for us in the 21st century
Canada needs a new Federal Political Party
For decades, Canada’s major political parties have aligned with powerful financial and corporate interests rather than serving the needs of ordinary people. Decision-making has been captured by elites, lobbyists, and a technocratic political class. The voices of ordinary Canadians aren’t being heard.
Canada needs a new federal political party that is committed to making real changes to our society and renewing the set of opportunities that ordinary people once took for granted. CV21 is intended to re-position the concerns of ordinary Canadians at the centre of our political life.
CV21’s seven visions are the foundation for a 21st century society that works for everyone – not just the elites. Each vision is designed to correct the imbalances of the past and create a sustainable future. CV21 proposes to:
1. Legislate the ideas of ordinary Canadians through Citizen Assemblies;
2. Reduce the influence of banks, hedge funds and foreign investors on our economic choices;
3. Replace the enrichment of corporations with community wealth building and citizen empowerment;
4. Provide a guaranteed livable basic income to all our vulnerable populations;
5. Treat housing as a human need rather than an investment opportunity;
6. Deliver restorative justice to Canada’s Indigenous people; and,
7. Require corporate financial models to account for damages to human beings and the natural world.
A future fit for us all
No person acting alone can achieve what is required to change our world. However, a lifetime worth of professional, political, educational and international experience has equipped me to take on the task of working with others to build a new political movement. I have experienced, seen, and read enough to know that the portents of severe disruption ahead are not illusions. The resolve to do no further harm, and preserve the public interest, are what is most needed now. Collaboration and cooperation, not competition, must be our goal. As my partner and I raised three children, I feel closely connected to the formidable challenges that younger Canadians now face in securing an education, landing a decent job, finding an affordable place to rent or, eventually, buying a house, all the while retaining their physical and mental health. Life has always had its share of adversity, but it has become unnecessarily hard these days.
Canada urgently needs to carve out a different future for itself, but it won’t come from placing further misguided faith in a largely financialized corporate market economy, driven by commodity extraction and real estate. That is a recipe for more exclusionary economic growth and a compromised future for younger Canadians. It is time to return a sense of equity to the lives of the average person; a baseline of livable income, housing, food, and medical care within the context of a natural world that can sustain the ecological demands we have increasingly placed upon it. CV21 will be about tapping into the wisdom and talents that reside in all of us – crowdsourcing to use a more modern term – so that we can fashion a society, economy and physical environment that is befitting of a place with so much innate potential.
Time is of the essence…
The present moment calls out to Canadians to give new political movements an opportunity to show how we can do things differently and still prosper and thrive. A different economic model and system of governance can be built. The current one has ceased to be about ordinary folks. CV21 will be about you, about a bottom-up process that places a premium on citizen involvement, and direct input into the decisions taken collectively in our name. CV21 has enshrined a commitment to seven major principles/policies which are the bedrock on which the new party is founded. Let’s build a new Canada together; one that traverses our present difficulties and looks to chart a brighter and more hopeful future in the 21st century.