The Conservative Party of Canada has been accused by critics of instilling fear in the hearts of Canadians through its campaign to "get tough on crime."
It's also instilling fear in Sandra Finley's heart, through what she sees as a "Big Brother" approach to collecting data on unsuspecting Canadians.
The Green Party candidate for Saskatoon-Humboldt was convicted last year of refusing to comply with the most recent federal census. Although she received an absolute discharge, Finley has nevertheless appealed her conviction, arguing that the law that requires Canadians to answer the census is unconstitutional - that it violates our right to privacy guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Finley's main objection to the federal census, however, is the involvement of American aerospace and military contractor Lockheed Martin. Lockheed Martin is one of the world's largest manufacturers of military hardware and weapons, including landmines and cluster bombs, both of which the United Nations has sought to outlaw. It is also the manufacturer of the controversial F-35 fighter, 65 of which the Harper Government intends to purchase.
The Harper government has pegged the cost of the F-35 purchase at $75 million per plane, but critics (including U.S. defence analysts) have estimated that the final cost will be double that.
Finley said while she understands the need for national defence, and she recognizes the value in conducting a national census, she cannot understand why an American military corporation would be involved in compiling census information.
Lockheed Martin is also involved in the compiling census information in the U.S. and Great Britain, she noted.
"Of course they say they won't actually have access to our personal information, but do you really believe that?" she asked. "Why would we have a company that makes landmines and other illegal weapons take part in compiling information about our citizens? That is the essential question."
Finley also said the current census is far too intrusive, including such questions as where a person works. She sees a parallel between the kind of information now being compiled by the Harper government, and what happened during the era of the Second World War, when Germany began using punch card systems and pre-computer technology to compile detailed racial profiles of its citizens. We all know where that led.
"When you see a government moving toward a detailed profiling of its citizens, that is one sign of a police state," Finley said.
Finley is hopeful that in raising Canadians' awareness of such relationships between government and the so-called military-industrial complex, we can begin to resist what long ago became a move toward a "corporatocracy" - a system in which corporations have more power, and more rights, than the people themselves.
"What we have now is a situation where the government is serving the interests of very large corporations with very large amounts of money," she said. "And in that form of government, the public interest is lost.
"You do not have a democracy if corporate interests are running the show behind the scenes. That, to me, is a central issue that needs to be addressed."
Finley - who was elected to the University of Saskatchewan senate in 2010 - sees one of her most important roles as a Green Party candidate, and as a prospective MP, as educating people about what's really going on in the halls of power.
One reason she ran for the U of S senate was her concern about the increased corporatization of our education system.
She noted that here and elsewhere -especially in Europe - the Green Party has played an important role in rallying opposition against governments who put corporate interests first, and who seek to insulate themselves from the people they claim to represent.
Unfortunately, Canada's first-past-the-post electoral system tends to marginalize political parties (such as the Greens), who exist outside the mainstream, Finley said.
Even with nearly a million people voting for the Greens in the last federal election, they did not win a single seat. Nor did our giant media corporations allow Green Party leader Elizabeth May to take part in the upcoming federal leadership debate.
In a corporate-controlled political environment like that, real change is difficult - albeit not impossible, she noted.
Finley pointed to the various democratic movements in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere as positive signs that people are beginning to stand up for their rights. Protests have become much more common in North America as well, she said.
"As a society, we have some very serious issues to address," she said. "But if you look around the world at what's happening, it makes me think that this is a very exciting time in our history.
"There are more and more people who realize we'd better do something. And they are starting to mobilize."
