The People’s Party of Canada (PPC) led by Maxime Bernier is seeing a further uptick in the polls, as the 2021 election campaign enters the final stretch.
Support for the party has been rising in the polls, with polling aggregator 338 Canada putting the national vote for PPC at 6.1 percent as of Sept. 15. Provincially, the party has the most support in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, where its vote projection rests at eight percent, followed by Alberta and Ontario, each with seven percent.In a campaign stop in Oakville on Sept. 16, speaking to a crowd of around 300 people, Bernier stressed his determination to fight for “freedom” and emphasized his opposition to mandatory vaccine passports and other COVID-19 restrictions.
“This country has been one of the freest countries in the world in the last 164 years, and now we’re losing our freedoms, we cannot take for granted our freedoms anymore,” Bernier said. “And we know that without freedom, there’s no human dignity, there’s no equality of rights, there’s no economic prosperity.”
“We’re fighting for our Western civilization, we’re fighting for our way of life, we’re saying ‘no’ to that ‘new normal.’ There’s no ‘new normal.’ We just want to go back to our life before COVID-19,” he said.
While on the campaign trail, Bernier has put the most focus on issues of vaccine mandates and lockdowns.
“Because we’re fighting for liberty of freedoms, more people understand now, that what we had the last 19 months, is something we don’t want anymore. No mask mandates, no lockdown, no curfews,” Bernier told a crowd in Aylmer on Sept. 15.The PPC promises to repeal vaccine mandates and regular testing for federal civil servants and workers, and repeal vaccine passports for travellers.
Bernier campaigned in Ontario on Sept. 15 before flying to Alberta for the rest of the week, with a campaign rally planned in Strathmore on Sept. 17 with Ontario MPP Randy Hillier.
