2021 COWICHAN I MALHAT I LANGFORD ELECTION CANDIDATES
LIA VERSAVEL
Green Party of Canada https://liaversaevel. wixsite.com/mysite
Lia.Versaevel@GreenParty.ca I’d like to tell you why I am hoping to represent you as your MP in Ottawa. As a lifelong lover of science, I have studied Climate Change in depth. For the sake of our children, grandchildren, and many generations to come, we must reverse these trends. We need liveable communities where we can locally access goods and services. We need a basic, liveable income for all. The TransCanada Highway has choke points in several places, yet a rail corridor and the ocean is at our eastern seaboard. We can learn much from indigenous cultures. We can create infrastructure for vehicles that do not rely on fossil fuels. We can return to the local production of most of our food and support the distribution of produce throughout every community in our area. Medical services can continue to be provided via remotely, as they have been in the North for decades. We can reduce our importation of cheap goods from overseas, and rely on local production and craftsmanship. This will also reduce marine traffic using the waterways around the southern gulf islands as free parking lots. We can increase our wood fibre value by adding a manufacturing component instead of shipping out raw logs. We can halt the logging of ancient forest ecosystems. We can stop fracking and serving as a back door to the export of coal. I am a mediator and work full time in Advocacy for Cowichan Women Against Violence Society. It’s so gratifying to work with women and their families in their time of need. I’ve worked in three countries, visiting dozens more, have raised three children and know how privileged I have been as a first generation Canadian, child of WWII refugees. I have known poverty, as well as a comfortable standard of living. Join me and let’s turn another swath of the Island Green!
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MARK HECHT
People’s Party of Canada www.markhechtppc.com mark@markhechtppc.com
Dear Cowichan Valley residents, I would like to introduce myself and extend an invitation to stop by my campaign office at the corner of Ingram Street and Canada Ave. I am a former university instructor and writer with a passion for freedom, protecting the environment, and common sense. A great concern for the erosion of our democracy, the rise of cancel culture, and obvious corruption in government has propelled me into politics. Like many Canadians, I have a deep love and appreciation for our great country and wish to see it prosper. As a candidate for the People’s Party of Canada, I am proud to stand with the only federal party that is against vaccine passports and believes that the right to choose what is best for oneself, should be respected by our government. Having worked for the Nature Trust of BC in natural habitat management, among accomplished biologists, hunters, and the wisdom of elders, I wish to see our natural environment, including the Cowichan River, restored and vibrant. Homelessness and drug addiction need a new approach and our youth need to be offered visions of a bright future, instead of despair. I look forward to meeting you and hearing how we can work together to reunite Canadians.
WE MUST VOTE ACTION ON
Every election has important issues. This election the mother of all issues, intersecting with every other issue and affecting everything that matters in our lives, is the climate emergency. This June’s “heat dome” smashed high temperature records, causing over 500 heatrelated deaths in BC. Widespread forest fires and smokefilled skies here in the Cowichan Valley and across the province immediately followed. The fires continue. The climate crisis is at our doorsteps. Last month the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released a rigorous review of the science showing the Earth on an accelerating path to 1.5 degrees of global heating by the early 2030s, with more and worse heat waves, floods, droughts, and storms to come. UN Secretary General António Guterres called the report a “code red for humanity”. He said, “the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel burning and deforestation are choking our planet and putting billions of people at immediate risk.” The report also said that if top-emitting countries like Canada respond to the IPCC’s alarm bells with aggressive efforts to curb carbon emissions, the worst climate outcomes remain avoidable. To stay below 2°C this century global emissions must peak sometime in the middle of this decade. In other words, we need to elect federal leaders
