Garth - 6 October 2008

WE ARE ALL ONE!

posted by Garth Turner on 10.05.08 @ 11:44 pm | 12 Comments


Spotted on a pole in Halton (a photo here of houses for sale in Halton, Ontario with zero down that didn't copy).

This is not ending well.

Day Twenty-nine (of the Canadian Federal election in 2008)

In the temple today, four local candidates (Tony from the Christian Heritage Party did not show up) stood in front of a few hundred men in turbans and women with covered heads and trolled for votes.

For white bread people like me, this is an unfamiliar environment. Shoeless, hair covered with a scarf, sitting on the floor, eating communally, straining to understand the ritual and so aware of being awkward or disrespectful, it is challenging. I could see that clearly as my candidate colleagues struggled with the apparent contradiction of making a political pitch in a religious place.

In truth, when I came to this Sikh community as a Conservative contender four years ago I felt exactly the same. I left the first encounter convinced it would be impossible for me ever to penetrate the many veils of this society.

But I was wrong.

These people put real effort into reaching out, into drawing me into their midst and making me understand what their priorities are. And my big discovery was this: They care about jobs, financial stress, house values and the economy.

So, while my Conservative opponent told them this morning how Conservatives love immigrants and minorities (she even took credit for Kim Campbell), I spoke instead about the industrial devastation now hitting Halton. In fact, four big operations with sizeable numbers of Sikhs employed, including Ford, have either closed, laid off, scaled back or announced downsizings. Hundreds of jobs around that Gurdwara have been lost, affecting thousands of people in as many families.

And in this, we are all one.

This weekend the global financial crisis which has enveloped the United States and which last week creamed the Canadian stock exchange, spread globally. Governments in Germany, Iceland, Italy and Britain are in the process of bailing out, nationalizing or propping up major lenders. In Japan Sunday night (Monday morning there), the stock market opened in a spiral of despair.

This week to come looks like it will be a pivotal one, as central bankers burn up the phone lines and economists huddle in Toronto to figure out what domino falls next. In a growing number of countries, governments are moving to guarantee private bank savings – a move designed to dampen panic and prevent a run before it happens. After all, these days, there is hardly a bank on the planet that could find the cash to pay off even half its depositors.

In Halton, real estate values have fallen by a tenth and on Friday came news of the first price collapse in the GTA in over a decade. Suddenly people are aware that recent homebuyers who took Ottawa up on its zero-down madness may owe more than they own.

So, how could this be more distressing? Factories that families depend on are closing here. The value of houses, where most net worth resides, is falling. Stock markets are erasing pensions, RRSPs and nesteggs.

This is why my friends in the Sikh community no more trust Stephen Harper than anyone else when he says Canada is not America, our fundamentals are strong and we should all take a Valium and vote Conservative.

I will say it again. We stand on the precipice of a chasm of danger. Look south to see what can happen to a middle class ignored. Do not fall for a siren song of complacency, and understand the Harper government had three years to prepare for the inevitable, yet squandered them.

I am sure Halton Sikhs appreciated it when Stephen Harper appointed a minister of multiculturalism. But they’d rather have had a competent minister of finance. Like the rest of us, they are awakening.

Next Tuesday I’m hoping for as many votes as there were Garth Turner signs growing in those fields around the Gurdwara. Demand truth.

posted by Garth Turner on 10.05.08 @ 11:44 pm | 12 Comments

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