Ask your candidates

Don’t hesitate to ask questions to the candidates who are seeking your vote. Their answers should help you in deciding who you will vote for. Here are some questions you could ask your candidates.

Government accountability

Would your party end the practice of privatization and contracting-out pending a full Parliamentary inquiry into the practice, including an examination of the value for money provided by contractors and the effect of contracting-out on the delivery of public programs?

How will your party protect Canada’s public services, environmental and labour standards and natural resources in the development of multi-lateral trade agreements?

Does your party support effective “whistleblowing” legislation covering the entire public sector that includes third-party recourse, protection in the collective agreement for unionized workers and recourse to the courts and agency established to oversee whistleblowing?

Quality public services

How will your party ensure accountability in health care and education?

Will your party scrap provisions in the Public Service Modernization Act that allow managers to hire without competition from those minimally qualified for the position?

What is your party’s position on how the surplus in the employment insurance fund should be used?

What will your party do to increase affordable housing?

If your party plans to decrease revenue through tax cuts and/or plans to increase spending in areas such as health care, what specific services does your party intend to cut in order to finance the tax cuts or increased spending?

Human rights

Where does your candidate and this party stand on same-sex marriage? What has your party done to combat discrimination against gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgendered individuals?

How does your party propose to combat racism in Canada? How would your party address security and terrorism without resorting to racial profiling and human rights violations?

Will your party direct all Crown Corporations and separate employers to meet their obligations under the Canadian Human Rights Act and to settle any complaints filed by the PSAC? Will your party be quided by the recommendations of the Pay Equity Task Force report and move quickly to introduce legislation to ensure that employers take action to provide equal pay for work of equal value so that employees and unions are not required to file complaints in order for the law to be enforced?

Where does your party stand on an omnibus Disabilities Act? What has your party done to promote equality for persons with disabilities?

What specific action will your party take to eradicate poverty among Aboriginal peoples and to recognize and act on their inherent, economic, employment, human and workplace rights.

Labour rights

Is your party prepared to apply the Canada Labour Code to federal public sector workers.?

Would your party adopt “anti-scab” legislation that applies to workers in the federal sector?

Collective bargaining

Is your party prepared to take steps to avoid upcoming strikes in the federal public sector by agreeing to negotiate and present substantive offers at the bargaining tables at Treasury Board, federal Agencies and Crown Corporations that actually respond to the workers’ demands?

Will your party acknowledge the average 20% wage gap for federal public sector operational workers and table a wage offer that address this gap?