Here’s where ‘minority’ voters matter most
Under the awnings of one- and two-storey buildings along Victoria Drive, fruits and vegetables spill out of family-owned grocery stores.
In a mid-afternoon queue for the bus, there are Chinese and South Asian students, an elderly Chinese woman with a cane, a woman wearing a hijab, and a South Asian father with a small child in one arm and another firmly in the grasp of his other. An older Chinese man says hello as we pass on the street.
This is Vancouver South, B.C.’S most diverse riding. It’s one of 10 where the so-called “visible minority” is the majority.
Here, 79.7 per cent of residents identify as belonging to a visible minority group, according to data compiled by Andrew Griffith of Environics.
By the next census in 2021, Griffith says, there will be at least 10 more ridings like it. By then, Statistics Canada also plans to replace the awkward, 30-yearold term “visible minority.”
Harjit Sajjan’s campaign office is next door to Steve’s Barber Shop. The India-born Liberal incumbent won with 48.8 per cent of the vote in 2015 and was one of four Sikhs in Justin Trudeau’s cabinet. Half a block away and flanked by Indian and Vietnamese restaurants is Conservative Wai Young’s campaign office. This race is a rematch. Last time, the Hong Kong-born Young was the incumbent and got only 33.9 per cent of the popular vote.
No single ethnic group dominates in Vancouver South, unlike some other B.C. ridings. Chinese are the largest group at 39.8 per cent. But with the Ross Street Temple and Punjabi Market long-established features in the community, it’s unsurprising that South Asians are the second-largest group at 14.3 per cent, followed by Filipinos at 12.2 per cent. The remainder is made up of Southeast Asians, Latin Americans, Japanese, Africans, Koreans and Arabs.
It makes door-knocking an interesting challenge, as does finding multilingual volunteers. Sajjan’s and Young’s teams include volunteers who speak more than a dozen languages. Among them, Mandarin, Cantonese, Fujianese, Punjabi, Hindi, Urdu, Russian, Ukrainian, Arabic and French. Both Young and Sajjan said it is bread-and-butter issues that they are asked about most often. How will my kids be able to afford to live here? How will I be able to afford retirement? Will I be able to afford to keep running the family shop?
For new Canadians, immigration is key. Will my adult son or elderly parents be allowed to join us in Canada? Are their chances hobbled by the number of refugees being admitted or asylum seekers who show up at the border?
Immigration can be as polarizing in ethnic communities as everywhere else.
Born in China, Alain Deng is the People’s Party candidate in Vancouver South. He fled the Conservatives because People’s Party leader Maxime Bernier is promising to cut immigration by 25 per cent, and limit it to economic migrants and refugees chosen by Canada rather than by the UN High Commission on Refugees.
For security reasons, there also needs to be “very strict vetting of the background of refugee Africans and immigrant Africans,” Deng said in a video interview with Justright Media.
The other candidates in Vancouver South include Sean Mcquillan for the NDP, which received just 14 per cent of the vote in 2015, and Judith Zaichkowsky for the Greens.
Because of family ties, questions about Canada’s foreign policy come up more frequently than they might in other ridings. Sajjan has been asked about Ukraine, China, and the Hong Kong protests.
In response, the defence minister sticks to the Liberal talking points, adding that at every opportunity, he raises the cases of two Canadians jailed without trial in China.
Young said she hasn’t been asked about the Hong Kong protests when she goes door to door.
“People know that I was born in Hong Kong. They know we (Conservatives) don’t support violence. People also know that it’s a very complex issue and nobody wants to treat it frivolously in a short conversation on the doorstep.”
Cutting across Vancouver South’s ethnic lines is religion.
The Muslim population is significant enough that it is one of 12 B.C. ridings and one of 73 across Canada where the group Canadian-muslim Vote says it can impact the outcome.
The non-partisan organization was formed to mobilize the vote because, traditionally, Muslims have been reluctant to vote since many are from countries where there is no democracy or where politics is viewed negatively.
“We’re trying not to suggest where or how people should vote,” executive director Ali Manek said in an interview from Toronto.
“We wanted to demonstrate how close this election is ... not to encourage strategic voting, but to hammer home the idea that the election is very close and the necessity of minority groups to participate has never been greater.”
Nowhere in B.C. is that more true than in Vancouver South.