Good Sunday Morning!
It does feel like happy days. As newly elected leader of the Green Party of Canada, I had a great week. Here’s a quick update.
On Saturday night, I grabbed Jonathan’s hand so we took the stage together. We set out as we intend to go – committed to team building.
We invited all the other leadership candidates on stage in a show of solidarity and unity. Since then, we have been in conversation with all of them to explore how we keep them front and centre. This is particularly the case for Anna and Chad who ran an exceptional campaign. We are in frequent discussions with some great ideas in the hopper. Sarah Gabrielle Baron has accepted being nuclear critic on Shadow Cabinet. Simon Gnocchini-Messier is also keen to stay involved and is open to Shadow Cabinet. We are working through all our options and doing it together. We have a lot of moving parts in these decisions, but to the other candidates’ supporters, please know, we hear you!
Of course, rebuilding would be so much easier if we had resources (like money in the bank!)
Jonathan and I have joined in virtual meetings with the many Green Party structures and entities – Shadow Cabinet, Council, the Fund, and numerous sub-committees. The Tuesday night orientation for council, with Fund members present, chaired by vice-president Samuel Moisan-Domm, was just excellent. Volunteers who have been serving over the last number of months and years expressed real optimism. Many said they had never had a chance to meet each other and know things about each other. Even sharing for a few minutes each created a sense of connection with each other for the first time. While not yet approved, there is a lot of support for Jonathan and my proposal that we all get together in person soon. Council has not met face to face in three years.
Meanwhile, as promised, we hit the ground running. Over the last six days, we did national television interviews with CBC Power and Politics, CTV Question Period, Radio Canada, Les Coulisses du pouvoir, CPAC (English and French), national radio CBC The House, the former “Evan Solomon show”, print media galore (Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, Times Colonist, local Peninsula News Review), local and regional TV and radio in Victoria, Kitchener, Montreal, Halifax, Hamilton, and held our first scrum with Mike Morrice too! Opposition MPs react to climate adaptation strategy – November 24, 2022 – YouTube (beginning at the 4 minutes mark)
Jonathan and I are also making the upcoming by-election in Mississagua Lakeshore a priority. Green candidate Mary Kidnew and her local team are hard at work. Jonathan and I will join them on December 1 for some door to door and other activities. And we will return for the weekend of December 9-11. Please join us if you can, and please consider donating to Mary’s campaign. https://www.
We are also gearing up for the Conference of the Parties of the Biodiversity Convention. It will take place in Montreal from December 7-19th. Like the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Biodiversity Convention was adopted at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. Even though the secretariat for the convention back at COP2 in Jakarta (and I was there working on it) was placed in Montreal, Canada has never before hosted a biodiversity COP. Countries around the world supported Canada’s bid to have the U.N. Biodiversity secretariat in Montreal out of gratitude for Canada’s role in rescuing the treaty at Rio when Bush tried to kill it. The US government had been instructed by Big Pharma to kill it because it includes a commitment for “equitable sharing of benefits” from drug discoveries from the developing world’s biodiversity. When Madagascar rain forests yielded the drug that saved children suffering with leukemia, derived from the Rosy periwinkle, Madagascar received no benefit. As the US pulled away, Mulroney stepped up. Within 24 hours, Canada committed to the treaty, stopping a slide in support. But we have been riding on the 1992 legacy and doing little but being in the way ever since.
I will be on the Canadian delegation and Jonathan has credentials from the Global Greens. We’ll keep you posted!
I hope to see many local Greens later today at the SGI Greens AGM!
Thanks so much for all your support!!!
Love,
Elizabeth
P.S. More from this week in parliament:
Question on anchorages: Elizabeth May: Fix the problems in the Port of Vancouver and remove freighters from the Salish Sea – YouTube
Back to back debates on climate:
Mike Morrice: End fossil fuel subsidies and apply a windfall tax on record profits in the industry
Elizabeth May: The government’s targets are too little too late CBSA needs reform: https://elizabethmaymp.ca/
Saanich-Gulf Islands Greens
http://www.sgigreenparty.ca/