Juno News - Are vaccine passports suppressing participation in civic life？

Vaccination passports have been introduced in the midst of an election and many people are wondering how this might affect their right to vote. Is this a good or bad thing? In this episode, I discuss the introduction of Vaccination Passports and why they are a concern for democracy and civil liberties.

00:00:00.000 because a handful of provinces have introduced vaccine passports in the midst of an election

00:00:08.880 many people are wondering how this might affect our right to vote elections canada made it clear

00:00:15.160 right away that proof of vaccination would not be required in order to cast a ballot but that

00:00:20.920 doesn't mean that the vaccine passports aren't interfering with election activities because i

00:00:26.900 would argue that they are firstly people's party of canada ppc leader maxime bernier because he is

00:00:34.180 not vaccinated he chose not to get the covid vaccine he was not able to campaign in pei

00:00:40.140 nova scotia or newfoundland and labrador as he would be subject to an 8 to 14 day isolation period

00:00:47.120 which is just not feasible with such a short campaigning window so that means people in

00:00:52.580 those provinces who wanted to meet maxime bernier attend one of his rallies or events hear him speak

00:00:58.980 hear his ideas they were not able to do so and likewise bernier was unable to connect with potential

00:01:05.760 voters in that region simply because he does not have a certain vaccination and the option of rapid

00:01:12.280 testing is for some reason not being offered i was reading my local newspaper the other day

00:01:17.220 and it announced what day the all candidates meeting in my local riding would be which is good

00:01:23.620 news to me as i like to attend these events get informed and hear what these candidates have to say

00:01:29.380 and this event is occurring in mid-september but i thought wait september 13th is the day that the

00:01:35.620 vaccine passports come into effect in british columbia and the vaccine passport applies to indoor

00:01:41.460 organized meetings so i asked the the chamber of commerce because they are the event organizers

00:01:47.320 if they would be requiring proof of first dose vaccination to attend this all candidates meeting

00:01:53.300 and they said yes you will have to sign a declaration uh saying that you have your first dose

00:01:59.360 so because i uh made the decision not to get the covid 19 vaccine i will not be able to attend that

00:02:07.180 election event i won't be able to hear these candidates speak and you know these are the

00:02:11.920 people who are vying to represent me in public office i won't be able to ask a question won't be

00:02:17.540 able to try to talk to them or their their party representatives face to face after the event

00:02:22.360 none of that and many will try to argue that i'm perfectly welcome to tune into a live stream

00:02:28.040 however you know a virtual event just does not provide the same opportunities to directly ask

00:02:35.020 questions or speak to the candidates and you know i have always maintained that virtual events cannot

00:02:40.800 replace in-person events in any scenario really um because you don't get the same kind of feeling of

00:02:47.400 community um you don't get the same opportunity to assess the feel of a room um and express yourself

00:02:54.440 that kind of thing so you know i ask the people who are pro-mandatory vaccination

00:03:01.680 is it really okay with you that because someone made a health decision not to get the covid

00:03:08.080 vaccination or they made a personal risk assessment uh not to get the covid vaccination is it okay with

00:03:14.200 you that they should be denied full participation in democracy because i also came across two other

00:03:21.280 election all candidates meetings in quebec that are requiring proof of vaccination and identification to

00:03:26.980 attend the event and there are two or three total in british columbia uh that are requiring vaccination

00:03:33.780 and likely more to come as more all candidates debates are being organized and so i asked elections canada

00:03:40.520 if they're concerned about this um and they're not because they said that all candidates meetings are

00:03:46.360 privately organized events and it has nothing to do with them however i talked to civil liberties lawyer

00:03:51.980 james kitchen and he said that just because these events are privately organized it doesn't mean that

00:03:57.640 the charter doesn't apply in the context of a political debate section 7 and 8 of the charter can apply

00:04:05.120 and vaccine passports could be violating the charter so i i wrote an article about this um i'll link it in

00:04:12.240 the description here so you can check it out but what i'm getting at here is that we are so early in the

00:04:17.040 introduction of these vaccine passports and a lot of people are predicting that these things are going

00:04:22.680 to be sticking around or they might evolve into a larger program and you know if already within the

00:04:30.680 first few few days and weeks of these vaccination passports we're already seeing um you know some

00:04:37.720 people being denied participation in civic life you know denied the opportunity to participate in

00:04:43.200 democracy um what else is going to come of this that's my concern but uh you can let me know what

00:04:50.520 you think in the comments i'm lindsay shepherd with true north if you enjoy true north's coverage and

00:04:56.260 commentary please consider supporting us at donate.tnc.news otherwise i will see you next time thanks bye

Juno News - September 04, 2021

Are vaccine passports suppressing participation in civic life？

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