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Cardinal Rules

Educator and community activist Lewis Cardinal, who came within 200 votes of an upset win in the contest for a Ward 4 council seat in the 2007 Edmonton municipal elections, has announced he plans to seek the federal NDP nomination in the Edmonton Centre.

"Edmontonians have seen what can happen when they unite behind a progressive voice in a federal riding," Cardinal said, referring to the victory by the NDP's Linda Duncan in Edmonton Strathcona in the last election. "I believe that I can be that voice."

If successful Cardinal, who is well known in the city for his years of human rights and anti-racism work, will face an uphill battle in the riding, which Conservative Laurie Hawn captured in the 2006 contest after four razor-thin victories by Liberal Anne "Landslide Annie" McLellan. In the 2008 election, Hawn was reelected handily with almost 50 percent of the vote. The NDP was a distant third, with candidate Donna Martin capturing 15 percent of ballots in a riding the NDP has never won.

"This is not going to be easy," Cardinal admitted at the press conference to announce his candidacy. "By selecting Edmonton-Centre, I am well aware of the opposition and the challenges that we’ll face."

Breaking His Own Law?

A Federal Court in Ottawa will hear a challenge to the legality of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's 2008 election call on June 8, exactly one year after the election campaign began.

Democracy Watch, an Ottawa-based citizen's group which brought forth the application during the 2008 election, says that Harper's advice to Governor General Michaëlle Jean to dissolve Parliament and call an election violated his party's fixed election date measures which Conservative's 2007 Bill C-16 added to the Canada Elections Act because the government had not lost a vote of confidence in the House of Commons. The group also says the election call violated section 3 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which includes the right to fair elections. Harper's law set a fixed election date of October 19, 2009.

"Overwhelming evidence shows that the intent and effect of the fixed election date measures prohibits the Prime Minister from calling an election before his governing party has lost a confidence vote in the House of Commons, something that did not occur before Prime Minister Harper called the current federal election," said Duff Conacher, the coordinator of Democracy Watch. "The clear intent of the fixed election date measures is to make elections fair for all political parties and citizens wanting to participate in the election by letting everyone know well in advance when it will happen."

Conacher added that one of the main goals of the application is to prevent future prime ministers from calling snap elections.

This Ain't What Democracy Looks Like

A new report by the advocacy group Public Interest Alberta says that Alberta has the least democratic political financing laws in Canada, including no limits on campaign spending, contribution limits which are double those of the next least restrictive province and no bans on corporate or union donations. The report also points out that the province has no financial rules for party nominations or leadership races.
The full report is available on the group's website at pialberta.org. V

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