Green Party suits Westmount best, says Daoust

“I really had no prior attachment,” he says. “Since then, though, I’ve come to believe that the values in Westmount, the city, and the Green Party are very similar.”

Daoust explained, saying that he appreciated the way the town of Westmount operates. “Everything is done at a very grassroots level,” he says. “There are no party affiliations in local elections, letting people vote according to what they think is best for their community. It’s a better political morality.”

That way of thinking, of returning power to the voters, is something the Green Party supports. Daoust says one of the central tenets of the Green Party platform is the decentralization of power. That includes electoral reform, especially in Quebec. “In 2003, Jean Charest said he would make changes to the electoral system. Nothing happened,” says Daoust. “Nothing happens because the system benefits him and his party.”

Daoust describes the current electoral system, commonly referred to as the “first-past-the-post” system, as archaic. “We’d very much like to see something more proportional in place,” he says. He uses his own riding as an example of where the electoral system effectively disenfranchises voters. “The Liberals have held this riding since before I was born,” he says. “In the lat election, voter turnout for this riding was below 50 per cent. Those who vote Liberal don’t feel the need to vote. Those who vote for a party other than the Liberals don’t feel their vote counts.”

A Green government would be work to re-engage people in the political process, says Daoust. By breaking down decision-making to a local level, people will want to take part. “We want localized democracy,” he says. “By letting people have more of a say in the taking of decision, we believe it brings a greater degree of respect for their environment, and I mean that not as an ecological environment, but for their social environment.”

One way of winning back the confidence of the people is setting fixed election dates. “Right now, these elections are autocratically set up on us, with no input from the population,” says Daoust.

The current election campaign as a cynical move on the part of Liberal leader Jean Charest, believes Daoust. “It’s scare tactics” he says. “Charest is using the threat of this economic crisis to get his precious majority. There are other issues that need to be addressed.”