In Canada today, there are a number of small parties running in the current federal election. Among these is the self-described hard-right populist People’s Party of Canada (CPP) founded in 2018 by Maxime Bernier. Bernier was once a member of Canada’s Conservative Party, but left due to differing views with the party on a number of policy issues. Overall, he believed that the Conservative Party had strayed from some of its traditional right-wing beliefs. In its first election in 2019, the CPP received 1.6 percent of votes, placing it well behind other small parties, such as the Greens (6.5 percent) but well ahead of others, such as the Christian Heritage Party (0.1 percent). Currently, the CPP does not have a seat in the national parliament. Recent polls show that the CPP could get slightly more than 6 percent of the popular vote, but again the party is not expected to win any seats, including that in the riding where Maxime Bernier himself is running.
The primary difference with the emergence of Donald Trump in the Republican Party is that Bernier decided to offer his ultra-right views by forming a new national party. However, many of the same positions taken by Trump’s followers are reflected in the CPP’s platform. Bernier is attempting to appeal to a portion of the Canadian electorate who are disgruntled with the current political establishment in Ottawa, be it Conservative or Liberal, and are simply angry about the current state of Canadian society and big governments. Like Trump, Bernier is in favour of reducing immigration, preventing refugees from entering Canada illegally, promoting the construction of pipelines, denying the human contribution to climate change, pushing for a single national identity, moving away from promoting multiculturalism, eliminating foreign aid funding and repealing existing firearms laws. Fortunately, unlike Trump, Bernier has not to date raised issues about voter fraud or rigged elections.
What has really brought out the CPP supporters to the federal election are the restrictive measures taken by the federal and provincial governments to deal with the coronavirus pandemic. Bernier has referred to COVID-19 public-health measures and vaccine policies as being “tyrannical”. He has often told his supporters that: “People are fed up and they want to get back their freedom.” This is a common theme, declaring that government public-health measures are an attack on one’s liberties, especially when it comes to lockdowns, mandated vaccinations and vaccine passports.
What’s unfortunate about the participation of CPP supporters in the campaign is that their anger has gotten the better of their common sense and civility. Supporters have been part of a number of often-violent demonstrations protesting the other parties’ leaders, especially at events being held by the current Liberal leader, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The protesters have attempted to drown out the leaders at campaign stops and have revealed signs with vulgar and insulting slurs and graphics. What’s regrettable is that Maxime Bernier refuses to condemn the incivility and lack of respect shown by CPP supporters against the opposing leaders, and in particular the PM. In these difficult times, there is no doubt that there is a lot of pent-up anger among those whose lives and livelihoods have been negatively affected by the pandemic and some of the public-health measures that had to be implemented. However, given the severity of the pandemic, Canadian support for such measures and the current growing fourth wave, it doesn’t appear that the CPP will gain very much additional support.
Unlike in the U.S. with its firmly established conservative base in several regions, there is little chance that Canada will see a similar ultra-right populist administration in power anytime soon.
Maxime Bernier himself does not like to be compared to Donald Trump for obvious reasons. Unfortunately, his party has tended to politicize some of the more critical issues such as public-health measures aimed at preventing more COVID-related hospitalizations and deaths. Unfortunately, the anti-vaxxers now have a political means to promote their virulent opposition to such measures. By encouraging unfounded and unreasonable protests, Bernier does appear to have taken a page from Donald Trump’s agenda.
FROLITICKS 