Nelson resident Rick Stewart has entered the race to win the Kootenay-Columbia member of parliament seat in Ottawa.
The People’s Party of Canada candidate says he wants government to shift away from what he calls ‘globalist and socialist attitudes.’ Stewart also says he sees as a lack of science in decision making as well as pandering towards special interests groups. According to Stewart, it’s a ‘rejection’ his fellow party members share and why he supports PPC Leader Maxime Bernier.
“I see a lot of leftist hypocrisy in politics today.” Voiced Stewart. “I want a government that respects all people equally and provides opportunity for people to work, raise a family, buy a house and take advantage of the opportunities this country gave us.”
Stewart says he and his party’s main focus is to reel the government in.
“Let people do their thing. They try to tax us into prosperity.”
Speaking on the rise of the Reform Party and the Canadian Alliance, Stewart says it’s natural for a break away group to form when a party veers away from their initial core values. The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada would eventually merge with the more right-wing Canadian Alliance to form Conservative Party of Canada, lead by former Prime Minister Stephen Harper. The situation with the PPC Party is entirely different explains Stewart.
“He was a sole voice within the [Conservative] Party with much different viewpoints and a lot of experience. On his own basically, because he didn’t have the support from the other Conservatives to break away and start his own party with his own policies. I think they are certainly common sense policies.”
When it comes to policy, he says a good idea is a good idea regardless of its source.
“I’ve heard [Green Party Leader] Elizabeth May come up with some good ones. She adamantly refuses to support shipping bitumen offshore through our waters and I totally agree with that. We can distill it and make it into other products, that if there was a spill, it wouldn’t be as disastrous as raw bitumen.”
Stewart worked for the Provincial Ministry of Forests for 14 years and was the Forest Health Officer for the Nelson Forest Region. He also worked as an environmental contractor in the oil and gas sector for 15 years. Well before his professional career, he dropped out of high school, served in the military for three years and later earned his Bachelor of Science in forestry while running forest fire suppression crews in the summer. Now he’s retired in Nelson in what he calls the best riding in Canada.
“This is the very best riding in Canada. I tease some of the other folks in the PPC about that from time to time.”
The federal election will take place this fall. Stewart’s opponents are New Democrat Party MP Wayne Stetski and Conservative Party of Canada candidate Rob Morrison.