When the 2006 Platform was released this past Monday, many were surprised to know that we've expanded beyond the traditional environmental issues and into other equally as important issues, of course all of it striving for a better way of life for all Canadians. The Green Party has been founded on 6 principles (Ecological Wisdom, Social Justice, Non-Violence, Participatory Democracy, Sustainability and Respect for diversity) and the new platform clearly promotes each.
Much of the media as of late has been focusing on our stance of how we believe the election process should be handled, which of course is a more proportional representation of government. In fact, the Globe and Mail website right now has a poll on their front page asking it's viewers their opinion on this very topic (http://www.theglobeandmail.com is the address if you want to voice your opinion. It's on the right hand side).
To clarify, a Proportional represented government would be a move away from traditional way of electing individuals whereby the majority wins in each riding to a equal way of representing parties. This is achieved by electing seats based on the total number of votes. For example, last election the Green Party had 4.4% of the popular vote. If we had a Proportionally represented system that would mean they would get 4.4% of the seats, which makes absolute sense. At least the nearly 600 000 people that voted for the Green Party last time around would now have representation at the highest level. It's a fair way to do things and it makes sense to me to use it.
That's only one issue however and we have a vision for much more than that. Below is the key topics found in the Green Party Platform
Download the GPC Platform 2006 in pdf - 793 Kb