GUEST COLUMN – Show responsibility and respect for Canada by VOTING

By LYNNE STONIER-NEWMAN
Guest Columnist

Lynne Stonier-Newman here, requesting you VOTE in this critical election for Canada, our valuable country.

What the total number of voters does is demonstrate how we prize our democracy and helps to refresh Canada’s out-dated governance. Each vote empowers the newly elected and re-elected MPs to prevail against the imbalanced United States government. Yes, that worrisome U.S. administration currently and lustfully looking north.

A large voter turn-out on April 28 points out how we Canadians treasure our vast country’s richness, water and people. Because of how the total number of Canadian voters matters, will you please encourage your friends, family and neighbours to vote … even invite them to come with you to the polls if the process of voting is new to them.

We need to stop the recent trend of Canada’s overall voter turn-out percentage going down … and down.

Are you aware that in the 2021 federal election, there was a deplorable voter turn-out of only  62 per cent? Four people out of every 10 Canadians did not vote. Why? I think it’s lack of education about how much each voter matters.

Currently, loud negativity is flooding social media and many conversations … and according to psychologists figuring out what one believes in and supports is harder than being critical.

And that knowing what one’s against is easy. But being against something is not action and never actually creates change.

Stats report “being against” is more widespread now than it’s ever been previously. Perhaps negativity is contagious?

A vote is your voice … you marking an X  for the candidate of your choice counts. It helps affirm how much Canadians care about our country.

And … even if you, your family and your friends find none of the candidates 100 per cent satisfactory, please sort through your opinions and choose.  Make your decision and go to the polls.

Because if we all become moochers who say “my vote doesn’t really matter,” and expect the “they’s who do vote” to choose our government, our democracy becomes weak, fragile. And, eventually, a myth and vulnerable to outsiders. Voters are what keep a democracy healthy.

And in these worrisome times of the United States government’s threats and tariffs, Canadians cannot risk being indifferent.

Voting also helps recognize our electoral power, our trust in the Members of Parliament to govern efficiently and across political parties’ artificial lines, to respect each other’s strengths and work together. Public gnashing of teeth and rehashing past history for media goes nowhere, it’s like spitting upwind.

And delays what matters, stalls protecting our Canadian future.

Way back in 1864 during Canada’s confederation era, the fact that cooperation produces good governance was accepted. When Prince Edward Island’s premier and his fellow Maritimers accepted amalgamating was necessary if they didn’t want to be gobbled up by the United States. The American Civil War was ongoing and there was deep instability within that supposed  democracy. While some Americans moved to Canada, many others — including a number of elected U.S. officials — coveted Canada’s lands and minerals who strategized how to make their northern neighbours part of the United States.

The colonists understood their vulnerability, especially as the British Empire’s subsidies to their colonies that provided Canada’s military and naval protection, was being decreased every year. The Province of Canada’s (the future Quebec and Ontario) legislators were as worried and requested that their delegates attend the Maritimes’ convention to plan how to amalgamate.

It was agreed they could come except for the Prince Edward Island premier, who added a condition. “Your delegates may come but only if PEI’s Leader of the Opposition can still attend. As I am, he is elected by the PEI voters to listen before deciding whether to vote yay or nay on behalf of Prince Edward Islanders.”

Voting is the core of democracy.

Now 161 years later, three elected women on the District of Logan Lake council recently demonstrated how they’re helping to raise future voters. Recognizing that children are like a garden whose roots need cultivating for them to become responsible adults, they reached out to some of the youngest members in their community.

To mark 2025’s International Women’s Day, Logan Lake’s mayor and two councillors invited the Embers (formerly called Brownies) as guests to the council chambers. They welcomed the five- to 10-year-olds and answered the little girls’ questions. They chatted about what the council does and how being elected means they help decide how to keep Logan Lake a fine place for people to live, work and play.

I believe they’ve planted sturdy seeds in those children and helped ensure those little ones will eventually become voters … and perhaps, when adult, run for electoral office.

That story motivated me to ask some of the eligible young members in my extended family, “Will you vote on April 28?”

It could have been considered intrusive by those young people but it wasn’t. My question was welcomed and I learned all of my young people do vote and they knew that their parents do.

Does your family? Your friends? If not, why not start? Please encourage all voters to mark his or her X.  Each vote helps to ensure Canada has a modernized, dynamic, hard-working and perceptive government.

Even if within a household, one person will be voting Conservative and the other Liberal, each vote recognizes that individual’s responsibility to Canada. If eight of 10 Canadians vote, that  80-per cent turn-out proclaims our loyalty to Canada and sends a powerful message to our threatening neighbours like Trump and his Trumpees.

Let’s cherish our democracy and protect our country’s independence. Please, VOTE!

Lynne Stonier-Newman is a resident of Kamloops. She’s a social marketing and communication consultant, and a B.C. historian and author.