Garth Farquhar Green Party MLA Candidate
It was a cosmic coincidence that this was also the birthday of Rachel Carson, author of “Silent Spring” and the environmentalist who brought public awareness to the deadly effects of DDT.
The Green Party leaders shared their concerns and mandates with the public, with party leader David Coon noting that this point in history is an exciting time.
“The ground is shifting”, he said, “things are changing. People are truly tired of the status quo. Green Party values align with the values of most New Brunswickers, and this will be an historic election.”
Garth took the stand and began by describing the journey that brought him to this point of running for political office on the Green Party Ticket.
“We are very fortunate in NB to have good, clean water and the fracking industry will compromise this most valuable of resources.”
“It also became obvious that the promised financial bonanza is just a con job. The number of jobs created by fracking has been greatly exaggerated, and in fact, most of the work will be done by experienced workers brought in by the companies. In fact, it is speculated that more jobs will be created by repairing road damage caused by the heavy truck traffic.”
“The biggest con of all is the myth that royalties from this industry will pay down our deficit. Gas companies will not have to pay significant royalties for the first few years, and perhaps none at all if they do not make a profit. Why is the government pursuing such an environmentally and financially risky policy?”
“ I am also deeply concerned by the Crown Forest issue. Not only are we not making any money from our valuable Crown Lands, we are actually paying big companies to cut our wood!”
“As we head into this provincial election, there is one overwhelming global issue that affects us all, and that is the rapid climate change brought on by burning fossil fuels.”
“The combustion engine has allowed ease of travel and transportation of goods that has dramatically changed our world. Nearly all of our food is now grown far away, and our consumer goods are made wherever environmental and labour standards are the lowest.”
“The pipeline that is coming through our valley will carry a million gallons of crude oil a day. Very little of it will be refined in Saint John; most of it will be shipped to countries with lax environmental standards.”
“Against this background, we witness polar ice caps melting, California is a tinder box and the Balkans are drowning. Two years ago this spring, NB had July weather in March causing rapid snow melt in our clear cut forests which resulted in a flood that rose over the river banks and lapped at the doors of this very restaurant.”
“Einstein defined insanity as making the same mistake over and over and expecting different results. In our province, voting for the same two parties over and over again has not produced different results.”
“The one percent keep growing richer, our debt continues to escalate and our rural communities are disappearing before our very eyes.”
“I heard one person say he wouldn’t waste his vote by voting for the Green Party.”
“My answer is, Don’t waste your vote on the intellectually bankrupt parties….VOTE GREEN!”
Dave Coon went on to say that our values have been turned upside down. Taking care of the land, air, water and most importantly The People should be our primary goals.
Our governments have become disconnected from good sense. We need to make our families and communities central to government, not big business and corporations. The Green Party is about doing politics differently. We need a functioning legislature, and our MLAs should be our legislators. Right now, if an MLA feels he can’t vote with his party, he stays away, removing himself from the voting process altogether!
There is currently no written job description for MLAs. We aim for transparency in government, opening the books to public inspection and scrutiny, a Sunshine Law, letting light in on the process.
Our MLAs need to work together to manage our money and government, not score political points.
It takes guts for politicians to say no to corporations but we must manage our natural resources as a trust for the future.
It’s time for something different. Why are we the have not province? We’ve lost farms, ranches and industry because of bad government policies.
Look at how much employment and work would be generated if we just began growing our own food again!
We have doubled our provincial debt over the last 8 years, and we should be the richest per capita province in Canada based on our natural resources. All of our money goes to corporate welfare programs. We are not against Big Business, but corporations should not influence government.
We need community based health care. We say that our health and our children are our first priorities, but our actions do not reflect that.
It is clearly time for a change!
