Here we are, less than a week into the federal election campaign, and already candidates are springing into action.
Looking at the 70 or so days that stretch ahead of us, we’re sincerely hoping this campaign will be a good one in all three Burnaby ridings.
We’d like to see a campaign where all candidates are approachable and accessible – not just to us but to their voters. We want to talk to our local folks, get to know them, find out their opinions about the issues that matter to the people who live in this city. After all, we’re electing people to represent us in Ottawa; we need to know who they are and where they stand.
We’d like to see a campaign where all candidates, and their leaders, treat each other with respect. That doesn’t mean they have to agree on everything – or even on anything at all. It just means they have to treat their differences of opinion with the same kind of courtesy and politeness that we as parents try to instill in our children. Leaders or candidates who act like petulant toddlers are not the kind of people we want to send to Ottawa on our behalf.
We’d like to see a campaign where the party leaders show that Burnaby matters. We’d like to see the leaders in town, talking to Burnaby folks, and we’d like to know that they hear and understand the issues that matter in these three ridings.
We’d like to see a campaign that deals with real issues. We don’t want a campaign that’s full of personal attacks, insults and scaremongering. We want a genuine discussion about the issues that matter to the people of Burnaby and the people of Canada.
We’d like to see a campaign where the electorate gets involved. We want to see voters who give a damn, who get informed about the issues, who turn out at public meetings, who write letters to the editor and hold their candidates accountable on the issues that matter.
Most of all, we’d like to see a campaign where there are lineups at the polls. Not because the poll workers are inefficient but because there are just so darn many people wanting to cast a ballot that they simply can’t keep up with demand.
That’s our campaign wish-list. What’s on yours?
