Commentaire 16 – commentaires et rétroaction

Paula Ogg

During these very challenging times in Canada, I am very disappointed to see a proposal to change the boundaries for the Ontario electoral districts.

These changes do not reflect our rural communities, First Nations communities, small businesses, or heritage communities. Rather, the new boundaries seem to ensure that there are more urban citizens in every districts to ensure more Liberal seats.

Many things have changed since the 2019 population census.

First, many people have left the country and some have left the province for Alberta.

Second, it seems that the new boundaries have a mix of urban, rural, and indigenous to meet some kind of a DIED - diversity inclusion equity and decolonization quota.

Third, the election win every cycle seems to be dependent on how the big urban centres of Toronto and Montreal vote; therefore, we never truly have representative government.

Personally speaking, each riding should be very community focussed; for example, a rural centre or an indigenous centre so that their unique needs are met. In great big massive urban centres like Toronto that have a great deal of population, they do not necessarily need more voting power because their needs are the same. They need one MP who will represent their urban needs and then several assistant MPs to deal with the population numbers. We have one urban community whose needs are extremely different from the rest of the country determining how the entire country is to be run. For example, the excessive gas tax the entire country pays funds the Toronto Transit Commission and the GO Transit. This is absurd. Meanwhile, the government cannot get clean drinking water to indigenous peoples.

I am not pleased to see these proposed boundary changes. I would like to see ridings that represent the unique heritage needs of each community so that they are represented fully in the House of Commons, not some diversity blend that favours urban needs.

This proposal needs to be withdrawn. A proper assessment of recent population demographic change needs to be done. Then, ridings need to represent regional heritage communities not diversity blends.

Sincerely,

Paula Ogg