Local Green Party candidate Mike Schreiner must have a shot at winning the Guelph seat in the upcoming provincial election, otherwise David Suzuki wouldn’t have been in Guelph on Saturday.
“I told Elizabeth (May) that I’m willing to try to help the Greens, but I don’t want to waste my time unless the candidate has a shot at winning. She said ‘the best person for that is Mike.’”
Those were the opening remarks from Canada’s most visible environmentalist and environmental activist Saturday at a Green Party Earth Day Rally at the Hanlon Convention Centre.
Suzuki was just one of the party's rock stars at the three-hour event, attended by roughly 800 people.
National Green Party leader Elizabeth May was there and singer/songwriter Sarah Harmer performed, along with some local artists.
“If there is a Green in parliament, I will know that there is at least one person, one party, that will make every day Earth Day, and that’s what we need,” Suzuki said.
“It’s absolutely absurd that we’ve got a Green Party,” he said. “The idea that Greens are just this special interest group … as if the environment can be ignored by the other parties is absurd.
“But we’re going to have to wait until everybody comes on-side and in the meantime, thank goodness Elizabeth is there and thank goodness you’re making inroads at the provincial level,” Suzuki said.
“The problem that we face with politicians is politics. Politics imposes a terrible burden on politicians who are elected, because once elected, immediately, their highest priority becomes re-election.”
He said we need some element of vision that goes beyond the electoral cycle and the Greens provide that.
He spent much of his 40-minute talk discussing environmental challenges facing Canada and the planet.
“We are at a critical moment. Our species, human beings, have suddenly become so powerful, that we are the major force shaping the properties of the planet,” Suzuki said. “No other species in the 3.9 billion years that life has existed has had the enormous power that we have today.
“The Greens are the vehicle with which the education goes on,” Suzuki said.
The local Greens smell blood in the water. They have a strong candidate in Schreiner, a town engaged in environmental and social issues, longtime MPP Liz Sandals is retiring, the Liberals and Conservatives are at each other’s throats and all of the other local candidates have little to no experience in politics.
“This election is not about Mike Schreiner. It’s not about the Green Party of Ontario. It’s about you and the community that all of us want here in Guelph. That is what we are fighting for,” Schreiner said.
“Greens across the world and across Canada are showing people that we can do politics differently,” he said, putting people and planet first.
“People tell me it is time to take on the status quo …. That change starts in Ontario, right here in Guelph.”
Saturday’s three-hour event began with performances by Alysha Brilla, and Guelph artists Joni NehRita.
After remarks from Schreiner, Suzuki spoke for 40 minutes and then May spoke. Harmer capped off the day with a short performance.
Donations were collected at the end “to help pay for the room.”
Earlier in the day May and Suzuki had joined Schreiner at the Rotary Forest Earth Day tree planting event near Guelph Lake Conservation Area.
At the Hanlon Convention Centre event, May touched on various national Green causes, including the fight against the pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast.
May said she doesn’t think there should be political parties.
“And that’s why we’re incorruptible. Because we’re not in it to see our party get bigger, and more powerful and have more control. We want to see the people that elected us have more power and have a vibrant and healthy democracy.
“We are committed in every instance to listening to our community and voting the way our constituents and our community wants us to vote,” said May, who will be back in Guelph the first weekend of May to campaign with Schreiner.
“We want everyone to get out and vote so that we have the Green breakthrough in Queen’s Park that Ontario needs, that Canada needs and that the planet needs,” she said.
