WHY SHOULD YOU TRUST ME?

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Why should you trust me to deliver on my campaign promises?

1. My life-experience has prepared me for the task. I was raised in a family in Scotland that instilled in me a strong work-ethic and deep convictions about the importance of public service in pursuit of the common good. All my life I have worked hard in this pursuit, learning how to work successfully with others who have begun with very different starting-points in addressing issues of common concern. This has been true of 

• my professional life as a university and college teacher, 
• my community life (e.g., as president for seven years of our local youth soccer association in eastern North Vancouver), and 
• my political life (e.g., as a Policy Chair in my local EDA and then as a BC member of the National Policy Committee). 

I believe that in each of these areas of life I have had a good reputation as a hard worker, effectively reasoning with and liaising with other people of goodwill to achieve positive outcomes.  But just as importantly, I also have a reputation for confronting people uninterested in the common good and unconcerned about the rights of others, if those rights interfere with their own ambitions and goals. 

2. There are no personal obstacles to my achieving my goals. What I mean is this:

• I am now retired from full-time, paid employment, and I therefore have plenty of time to devote to the hard work of being a National Councillor – both “at the centre” (in NC meetings and committee work) and “on the ground” among the EDAs in British Columbia. 
• I have no personal need for a position on National Council, nor any political ambitions that might be enhanced by serving in this position. 
• Nor have I any vested financial interest – the kind of interest that a lobbyist might have, for example. 

In other words, there is nothing in all this “for me” that might distract me from fulfilling my promises or tempt me to compromise my principles. 

3. I already have “a track record” of pursuing these goals. It's easy enough to make promises during an election campaign. But how can you tell whether these promises reflect something deeper than simply a desire to get elected or re-elected? 

One way of discerning this is to look at what candidates did before they began to run – their voting patterns, for example, or what they previously advocated for. 

For example: no candidate in the current National Council election in B.C. is likely to succeed without saying they are going to “do something” (if elected) about the nomination process and about grassroots participation more generally. But what have they previously done?   Personally, I've been “doing something” substantial about these matters for some time now - and you can read more about this by clicking on the link at the top right of this page.

My campaign promises are not merely a way of getting elected to National Council. They arise out of long-held, serious convictions about how National Council should function.

To learn more about my background and life experience, click here.  To learn more about my track record politically, click here.