For the first time since 1986, Saskatchewan has it’s first candidate running for the Communist Party of Canada, Jeremy Fisher. He is currently running in the Saskatoon, University riding and spoke with the University of Regina Journalism School to discuss his campaign and message. His chances may be slim, but data from Innovative Research, suggests that the majority of Canadians support shifting away from capitalism. He has a modest goal in the race; to beat the Green Party candidate.
Fisher’s journey on the campaign trail has not been all sunshine and roses. He has dealt with several unfriendly people, but he is optimistic about changing their minds. Fisher said, “I really do believe that, especially the people that are you know, like f-you, you communist, and if they didn’t know, I was bad, and I actually met them in real life, I could talk to them about, ‘hey, aren’t you sick of not really making that much.’” He also said, “people that work in a fossil fuel industry have to use things like EI quite a bit. They get laid off a lot and I think a lot of people forget that, that’s a social program and that’s one of the things that we want to push forward.”
In specific, Fisher expanded on the platform more and explained that the Communist Party has a lot of common ground with the same people who reject it. He said, “for example, with EI, we think it should be 90% of your income and you and it should be non contributory. So, your employer should be paying for the whole thing and you shouldn’t be paying a dime. Like, that’s something that I could break bread with anybody over.”
In this election, Jeremy is looking to garner more support for the Communist Party here in Saskatchewan. He feels like even if they can achieve a benchmark of 300 votes, that would be a good start to build a base not only for future elections, but for more local initiatives that would build a stronger community and start a conversation.
He said, “we’d really love to see more membership more volunteering, and just overall more class consciousness.”
University of Regina Professor, Simon Granovsky-Larsen, who specializes in Latin American politics, thinks that a Communist future in Saskatchewan is not likely or at least anytime soon.
Larsen said, “Saskatchewan would have been a traditionally pretty strong home base for a grassroots communist base 100 years ago, or 80 years ago, but I think that not only has communism as an ideology, and a form of political organizing, fallen out of favor generally in the West; I think that the neoliberal ideological revolution has been so extensive in this part of a country that center left parties have a much harder time, let alone a radical left party.”
At the time of this article, Fisher is currently at 92 votes in the Saskatoon, University riding. He is trailing the Green Party candidate by 278 votes.
