THUNDER BAY – Alexander Vodden only drew 140 votes in the 2019 federal election campaign, but he didn’t let it discourage him from trying again.
Two years ago Vodden, the Libertarian candidate in Thunder Bay-Superior North, said he was a big believer in government stepping back from its hands-on approach to the lives of everyday Canadians, and that message hasn’t changed.
In particular, he’d like the federal government to reconsider its spending policy, which the Canadian Taxpayers Federations estimates has ballooned to more than $1.4 trillion.
The pandemic has only exacerbated the situation, Vodden said, adding the Libertarian brand takes the best of both sides of the political spectrum.
“Finances aren’t great in the country, you know. But I really dislike the social conservatism that comes with most right-leaning parties. I find being Libertarian is a healthy mix of both financial responsibility, while still maintaining a leftist social policy,” Vodden said, interviewed recently by Thunder Bay Television.
Topping his list of priorities is finding a way to bring industry back to Northwestern Ontario, particularly related to mining and forestry.
Without jobs, and good paying ones at that, the region will suffer, Vodden will said.
“Those industries are the bread and butter of this riding,” he said. “Indigenous rights are also playing a big role into it. We continually slow things down with the federal government’s interference, where really I feel we should be leaning toward giving the treaties the same sovereignty as we give our provinces.
Vodden said another area he’d like to see addressed is what he termed crony capitalism, a phrase he was loathe to use, but believes unfortunately it fits the reality of modern Canada.
He pointed to Bell and Rogers as examples of big businesses that have seemingly monopolized the country’s communication spectrum.
“This is costing Canadians ridiculous sums for your phone, internet, all these services,” Vodden said. “Yes, you’re helping Canadian businesses, but at the cost of thirty-odd million taxpayers who pay for this. It’s the same thing with food availability and the dairy quota system. You have roughly 60,000 dairy farmers in Canada, but our cost for dairy is well above the cost for neighbouring countries.”
It’s the needs of the few over the needs of the many, Vodden said.
“Things like this aren’t sustainable and their nationalistic policies that don’t help us move forward in a growing and global economy.”
Vodden, who calls Marathon, Ont. home, designs and builds water management systems for a living and in the past has suggested he’d be in favour of a private-public hybrid health-care system, pointing to Australia and Norway as examples of countries where he believed it’s worked well. He’d also like the country to revamp its income-tax system to make it more simplistic for average Canadians to remit their taxes each year.
