Derek Lee Liberal Town Hall 2010

On Feb 9 2010, the Recession Relief Coalition sponsored a Town Hall meeting at the Church of the Holy Trinity in downtown Toronto. Each of the federal political parties were invited to tell us what they intend to do to alleviate the devastation caused by the recession on the thousands of Canadians who have permanently lost their jobs and are facing a lifetime of deep poverty. Prior to the meeting we submitted a questionnaire to each party seeking information about their plans in this area of concern. The Conservative Party was the only party to ignore our questionnaire and they also failed to attend the meeting. This lack of interest in the suffering of Canadians indicates an arrogant and elitist attitude that is unacceptable from our leaders.
Derek Lee (Liberal), Tony Martin (NDP) and Rebecca Harrison (Green) spoke to us and we had a panel of advocates as well. Avvy Go (Colour of Poverty Colour of Change Coalition), Laurell Ritchie (CAW National), Gerda Kaegi (Canadian Pensioners Concerned), Laurel Rothman (Campaign 2000 Federal), Peter Clutterbuck (Social Planning Network of Ontario) Michael Shapcott (National Housing and Homelessness Network)
You will notice that the meeting was disrupted by an inebriated and extremely angry guest in the audience. Initially I was angered by this behaviour, but upon further consideration, perhaps this type of disdain and anger at our political leaders of all parties is justifiable and even necessary if we are to achieve any modicum of social justice in Canada, for polite discourse has certainly failed to attain any meaningful response.

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