‘Sleeping with an elephant:’ What will a Republican or Democrat win mean for Canada?

Blake Tait says he’s still healing from being outed by his school’s guidance counsellor when he was 14.

Feeling safe at his school in Saskatoon, he started telling people he was transgender. But he felt uneasy when his guidance counsellor set up a meeting for Tait to tell his family.

His parents were supportive. His mom’s ex-husband, whom they lived with at the time, was not, leading to four years of emotional abuse that manifested in alcoholism, drug misuse and a suicide attempt.

“He kicked me out right after I was discharged from the psych ward,” said Tait, 24.

On Thursday, Saskatchewan Party Leader Scott Moe said banning “biological boys” from sharing change rooms with “biological girls” would be his party’s first order of business if it’s re-elected on Oct. 28.

Tait is one of many LGBTQ+ advocates who say the campaign promise is hateful and puts transgender youth at risk.

“If this legislation had existed when I was a kid, I would not have survived high school and that’s the fact of the matter,” he said. “School was my one safe space, the only place where I felt I could be authentic.”

Moe has said the promise for a change room policy came in response to a complaint that two biological males had changed for gym class with girls at a school in southeast Saskatchewan.

NDP Leader Carla Beck accused Moe of stoking fear and division with voters and making vulnerable kids more at risk.

Moe’s promise also comes one year after the Saskatchewan Party government passed a law requiring parental consent for children under 16 to use different names or pronouns at school.

Beck told reporters this week her party would repeal the law if it wins the provincial election, a move Moe said would take away parents’ rights to be involved in their children’s lives and allow teachers to “keep secrets from parents.”

Most kids don’t want to hide from their parents, Tait said, but those who do typically have a reason.

“It is entirely out of safety and safety concerns,” he said. “It’s a rare story, but it’s a story that still happens.

“It’s a harmful narrative to say that kids want to hide from their parents and it’s a harmful narrative to say that schools are keeping things from parents purposefully.”

Heather Kuttai, the mother of a gender-diverse child and a former commissioner with the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission, said Moe is targeting transgender children to bring in voters because they are an “easy target.”

“He did it before, and he’s just doing it again,” she said. “It’s a direct attack on the rights of trans adults and children.

“When they hear this kind of rhetoric, even just the talking about it, it’s harmful. It sounds hateful and mean, like you’re not valued, like you don’t matter.”

Prince Albert Pride posted on social media that organizers feel “saddened, fearful and frustrated” by the proposed change room directive and that the group was not consulted.

It said transgender youth are being treated as “political pawns.”

“Forcing trans girls to change with teenage boys will not keep anyone safe,” it said.

“It will put trans and two-spirit youth in harm’s way, and at greater risk of assault, sexual assault and bullying.”

Tait said a change room policy is a distraction from real election issues like health care, and it could have a long-lasting impact on gender-diverse youth and their ability to exist “in their most authentic form,” Tait said.

“(We) need queer and trans folks,” said Tait.

“We bring light, we bring joy. And to me, it feels like we have a government that is trying to erase us.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 19, 2024.

VANCOUVER – Polls are now open in British Columbia, where voters in today’s provincial election face a choice that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago.

The B.C. Conservatives, whose party won less than two per cent of the vote last election, stand on the brink of forming government or, at least, becoming the official Opposition, with Leader John Rustad challenging New Democrat incumbent David Eby to be premier.

Rustad’s unlikely rise came after he was thrown out of the Opposition, then known as the BC Liberals, joined the Conservatives as leader, and steered them to a level of popularity that led to the collapse of his old party, now called BC United — all in just two years.

Mike McDonald, co-host of the Hotel Pacifico podcast on B.C. politics and a former chief of staff for then-premier Christy Clark, said he was expecting a “very close, nail-biter” election.

“We saw that in 2017, where the fate of British Columbia’s government was decided on one seat in the Comox Valley that was won by (the NDP by) 189 votes,” he said.

“The real message here for British Columbians is, if you want to see a particular outcome in this election, you’ve got to get out … and vote.”

More than a million already had, even before polls opened. The advance voting record was smashed, with more than 28 per cent of all registered electors voting early, potentially putting the province on track for a big final turnout.

Many of those who vote today will face a soggy election day, with the south and central coasts of B.C. being drenched by an atmospheric river weather system that is also bringing high winds and the threat of flooding. In the north, the first big snowfalls of the season are expected.

McDonald said the inclement weather in some of the province’s largest population centres may play a role if the race between the NDP and the B.C. Conservatives is as close as polls indicate.

“So that would favour the voter base that’s more resolved, that’s more committed, more motivated to turn out to the polls,” McDonald said.

He said there had never been a B.C. election where more than two million people voted, a milestone that could be breached this year.

“That can be a good sign for the opposition (Conservatives), but we also have to look at the fact that people are turning out because they don’t want the Conservatives,” he said. “It’s a much more polarizing election this time, and that may be inducing NDP voters to get out as well.”

It has been a strikingly negative campaign.

Eby, who has depicted Rustad and some of his candidates as extremists and conspiracy theorists, said Friday that he had “left nothing on the table,” and had “no regrets about the campaign.”

Rustad, who did not make himself available to reporters in the final days of the campaign, has called Eby a serial liar.

“The 2024 B.C. election mirrors the same nasty polarization seen in the U.S. presidential campaign, with the B.C. NDP spending most of its time attacking Conservative candidates over indefensible racist and sexist remarks,” said Jeanette Ashe, a political science faculty member at Douglas College. “This left little room for the B.C. NDP to address the real issues BCers care about, like affordable housing and health care.”

But on several fronts, the NDP and the Conservative platforms have overlapped.

Both are pledging tax breaks, with Eby promising a cut worth $1,000 for most households and the Conservatives promising the “Rustad Rebate,” which would eventually make up to $3,000 a month in rent or mortgage payments tax deductible.

Eby says he’ll scrap the provincial carbon tax if the federal government drops its requirement for the tax, and will instead shift the burden to “big polluters,” while Rustad says he’ll scrap the carbon tax completely.

And both parties say they support a greater emphasis on involuntary care to deal with the province’s overlapping crises of homelessness, mental health and addictions.

Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau has said there is little to separate the two main election contenders, citing involuntary care and their stances on the fossil fuel industry.

Her party, which is hoping to retain a presence in the legislature where it currently has two members, is promising a “windfall profits tax” on oil and gas companies, as well as investment in infrastructure and climate action.

On one matter, all three parties converge: their platforms would result in big first-year increases to the deficit, pushing it to about $9.6 billion under the NDP and Green plans, and near $11 billion under the Conservatives.

Regardless of the election outcome, it has been a stunning rise for B.C. Conservatives and Rustad, brought about in large part by the Shakespearean fall of Official Opposition Leader Kevin Falcon of BC United, who pushed the self-destruct button on his own party less than two months ago.

Falcon had thrown Rustad out of the party in 2022 over his online backing for a climate-change skeptic. But it was Falcon who paid the price.

BC United support cratered following a disastrous name change from the BC Liberals that Falcon had championed, and in late August Falcon stood beside Rustad and ended United’s campaign in order to avoid vote splitting.

That triggered fury from some United legislators who went on to run as Independents, either snubbed or unwilling to join the B.C. Conservatives. If they win, those Independents could hold the balance of power if the election is close.

Ultimately, McDonald said the 2024 B.C. election would be remembered for the “shakeup” of the province’s right-leaning political landscape.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 19, 2024.

Montreal skateboarders are rallying to protect a Do-It-Yourself skatepark known as Project 45 from what the city has said are plans to redevelop the space but skaters fear are plans to demolish what makes it unique.

Skateboarders say they built Project 45 themselves more than a decade ago in the borough of Villeray–Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension on land belonging to the city of Montreal but with the blessing of Le TAZ, a nearby indoor skatepark.

Skateboarder Marie-Pier Hamelin says skaters have recently learned the city plans to demolish the skatepark and rebuild it, but the city has told a different story.

The City of Montreal has not responded to The Canadian Press’s requests for comment, but told other media outlets this week that the plan is not to demolish Project 45 but redevelop its infrastructure, which it says has reached the end of its life and does not meet municipal safety standards.

Hamelin launched an online petition to preserve the skatepark in early October and has gathered about 6,000 signatures so far.

She says skateboarders welcome investment from the city to restore and expand the skatepark but want to preserve the unique space cherished by the skater community.

Skaters are gathering at the skatepark this afternoon to show their support for Project 45 and put pressure on the City of Montreal.

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