With the Canadian federal election less than two weeks away, only one of the top six parties has definitively opposed COVID vaccine passports and vowed to repeal them if elected; Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada.
The other parties – Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party of Canada, Erin O’Toole’s Conservative Party, Jagmeet Singh’s New Democrat Party, Yves-François Blanchet’s Bloc Québécois, Annamie Paul’s Green Party of Canada – have either expressed support for vaccine passports or not made a definitive statement on the issue.
The People’s Party’s COVID policy takes a strong stance against vaccine passports and includes a plan that details how the party intends to repeal and oppose vaccine passports and mandates if elected.
“Governments don’t want to admit that they were wrong and are imposing increasingly authoritarian measures on the population, including vaccine passports,” the People’s Party states in its COVID policy. “Both the vaccinated and the unvaccinated will suffer under a regime of segregation, constant control, and surveillance. It is illusory to believe that the virus can be eradicated. We have to learn to live with it, without destroying our way of life in the process.”
The People’s Party also notes that “both the vaccinated and the unvaccinated can get infected and transmit the virus, which negates the rationale for segregation and vaccine passports.”
If elected, the People’s Party has promised to:
- Repeal vaccine passports for travelers
- Repeal vaccine mandates and regular testing for federal civil servants and workers in federally regulated industries
- Oppose vaccine mandates and passports imposed by provincial governments and support individuals and groups that challenge such measures in court
In addition to this strong stance against vaccine passports and mandates, the People’s Party has also vowed to promote an approach to the pandemic that “guarantees the freedom of Canadians to make decisions based on informed consent, and rejects coercion and discrimination.”
The People’s Party also promises to not follow the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO) – a group whose recommendations have been used by Big Tech to justify the mass censorship of debate and dissent on a wide range of COVID-related topics.
To achieve this, the party vows to fire the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada Theresa Tam if elected and replace her with “someone who will work with provincial agencies to implement a rational approach to the pandemic, instead of following the recommendations of the World Health Organization.”
Bernier has consistently reiterated the People’s Party’s strong stance against vaccine passports by displaying banners with a “No Vax Passports” slogan during campaign stops, speaking out against vaccine passports, and attending vaccine passport protests.
“Vaccine passports are inefficient, unconstitutional and immoral,” Bernier told True North in August. “They will not prevent the spread of the virus because we now know that vaccinated people can also spread it. They would create two types of citizens with different rights. I don’t want to live in a ’show-me-your-papers’ society. If that happens, whether you are vaccinated or not will be irrelevant. Everyone will lose their freedoms and suffer in a surveillance and police state.”
By contrast, Trudeau’s Liberals have promised a $1 billion COVID-19 proof-of-vaccination fund to assist provinces in developing and implementing their own systems. Trudeau has described provincial vaccine passports as an “interim measure, that will perhaps last a year or so” before federal vaccine passports are promised to support businesses that are sued for forcing vaccine passports.
O’Toole’s Conservatives and Singh’s New Democrats have also expressed support for a federal vaccine passport while Blanchet’s Bloc Québécois supports vaccine passports for international travel.
Paul’s Green Party has yet to make a definitive statement on vaccine passports. In August, Paul questioned the Liberals’ motives in announcing a plan for mandatory vaccination two days before calling an election and called for information on “how the plan will accommodate people with legitimate reasons for not getting vaccinated.”
Local Green Party candidates have given conflicting answers on vaccine passports. Simcoe North Green Party candidate Krystal Brooks stated “I believe vaccine passports should be mandatory for essential workers to decrease the spread” while Kootenay-Columbia Green Party candidate Rana Nelson said “We, as in the Green Party, are not going to force vaccines.”
