It is unfortunate, but American President Donald Trump and his trade war are the number one issue in the federal election campaign.
So says the candidate for the Green Party in Hastings-Lennox and Addington-Tyendinaga Mike Holbrook.
Holbrook appeared on Meet the Candidates with Lorne Brooker on CJBQ Thursday.
Holbrook said there are so many issues Canadians care about but the threats from President Trump have dominated the campaign just as they did in the recent provincial election, in which he also was the Green’s candidate.
One good thing coming from the Trump-caused crisis according to Holbrook is that it has given Canadians perspective, something that also happened during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Holbrook says both Covid and the trade war showed Canadians how vulnerable they are to external threats.
Audio Player“So in the case of Trump, it’s showing a problem that’s been building up for decades of us being over reliant on the United States for the health of our economy.”
Holbrook went on to say that the Green Party’s ideas have evolved over the years and include real solutions to the everyday problems many Canadians face and especially, increasing rates of poverty.
“The big problem is income inequality but while some parties try to claim that we’re broke or poor, that is most definitely not true. Canada has the lowest debt to GDP (gross domestic product) rate in the G7 and the government has room to help people be able to lead decent lives.”
Regarding the debate about the necessity of pipelines to ship oil east, west, and north and not just to the south, Holbrook said his party is dead-set against pipelines, however, personally he’d be okay with them if there was no government money involved and they were built only by the private sector.
“Pipelines are incredibly expensive and it could take 15 years or more to get them built so they are in no way a solution the serious problems we’re facing today.”
Holbrook says there’s a better way.
Audio Player“I think increasing our capacity in terms of solar and wind for example, backed up by storage systems, is much quicker and it’s also very cheap and becoming cheaper all the time.”
Mike Holbrook is a construction worker and has five grown children and two grandchildren.
Listen to the full interview below:
Audio Player
