Riding Suzuki support
Suzuki, Axworthy, Hervieux-payette and May support her
Profiling Liberal candidate Joyce Murray; also, Marc Garneau, out to ‘ungag’ scientists, go to Mars,
Joyce Murray has momentum.
Last week, famed environmentalist David Suzuki threw his support behind the Vancouver MP in her bid to become the next Liberal leader, thanks to her calls for a sustainable economy.
It was a significant endorsement for Murray, but it wasn’t the first — or last.
Former foreign affairs minister Lloyd Axworthy and Liberal Sen. Celine Hervieux-Payette are standing behind her, and even Green party leader Elizabeth May has saluted her.
Most notably, however, are a number of online advocacy groups that have been calling on members to support Murray because she wants to work with New Democrats to defeat the Harper Conservatives in the next election.
Yes, Murray appears to have come a long way from being among the top tier of candidates largely because she actually has a seat in Parliament. But does her message of green economic growth and electoral co-operation appeal to mainstream Canadians — or simply a small but vocal group of environmental and anti-Harper activists who don’t represent the mainstream?
“Well, we’ll see who’s supporting me,” she said in an interview with Postmedia News. “But I can tell you that people in suburban Canada are interested in my campaign.”
Murray has long occupied the space where business and the environment meet.
She and her husband turned summer jobs planting trees in the 1970s into a multimillion-dollar business that employs more than 500 people and has planted more than 900 million trees. Her first foray into politics was in 2001, when she was elected to provincial office and named B.C. environment minister, a position she filled until 2005.
She failed to get elected federally after running for the Liberals in the B.C. riding of New Westminster-Coquitlam in 2006. Instead, it took a by– election in the riding of Vancouver-Quadra in 2008 to get a seat in Parliament, which she has held ever since.
Murray says she initially supported interim Liberal leader Bob Rae running to become permanent leader. When Rae opted against the idea last June, Murray decided to do so instead, with the intention of championing a message of green, sustainable economic development.
She accuses the Conservative government of intentionally misleading Canadians by saying protecting the environment necessarily means having a poor economy.
“He’s not being truthful,” she says. “He’s losing a lot of respect, and it’s time for an honest conversation on how to move ahead in a way that is effective for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but also good for our economy.”
Murray makes no secret of her respect for former leader Stéphane Dion, whose “Green Shift” plan was introduced as the country was going into recession and ultimately turned voters away from the Liberal party during the 2008 federal election.
She believes times have changed enough for Canadians to now see the need to take action against climate change. “Since then we’ve had very, very costly floods,” she says. “We’ve had droughts that have cost crops across North America. We’ve had storms and climate anomalies.
“People see how expensive they are. I think it’s a different time right now and people are hungry for vision and for leadership and how we can have a thriving 21st-century economy that’s based on protecting and restoring the environment.”
That’s what drew Suzuki to her campaign.
Similarly, her proposal to work with the NDP and Greens during the next election is not only unique among all Liberal candidates, it has also attracted a fair amount of attention and support.
Murray says it would be a one-time deal aimed at kicking the Harper Conservatives from power so the “progressive parties” could change Canada’s first-past-the-post electoral system.
Online advocacy groups like Leadnow.ca and Avaaz have been encouraging their members to sign up as Liberal supporters so they can support Murray’s electoral cooperation idea.
But what if the Liberals are the junior partner in a government with the NDP: How would she manage differences in views on free trade, Quebec separation and even electoral reform?
“I can work with anyone,” she says. “That’s what cooperation is about. You look at the things you agree on and you don’t focus on the things you don’t disagree on.” This is the third in a fourpart series. Tomorrow: Justin Trudeau