Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont 2011

Candidate's Application
NAME/NOM: Brent Schaffrick

PROVINCE: Alberta

RIDING/CIRCONSCRIPTION: Edmonton--Mill Woods--Beaumont

PARTY INVOLVEMENT / PARTICIPATION DE PARTI:

I have been following the European Pirate parties activities for several years, and was looking for a party with similar values in Canada. Then I found your party. I read through your platform, and decided that it agreed with my own.

POLITICAL EXPERIENCE / L'EXPÉRIENCE POLITIQUE:

I have a BComm from the University of Alberta. My current hobby is reading economic blogs (itulip and zerohedge).

I ran for municipal office last fall in Edmonton, and came in third out of six candidates. That was the first election I had been involved in, and I learned too late that the two candidates that beat me started their campaigns and door knocking 5 months earlier. Had I known the process in full from the beginning, I believe I would have won.

As far as Canadian Federal politics go, I used to vote Conservative. My approach to life is still financially conservative, but I find I have little to nothing in common with Mr. Harper's version of Conservative government. To me, the Liberal party is the other side of the same coin. Both major parties represent whoever gives them the most political donations, and neither strive to represent their constituents. The NDP just doesn't seem to offer me anything.

And yet, I believe we as individuals can make a difference. I am choosing this election to try and make a difference for the country I live in. I want a representative in parliament that will put the wishes and desires of his constituency ahead of his own. I cannot find that in another candidate, so I feel the need to step forward and become the person I wish to see in others.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST / CONFLITS D'INTÉRÊTS:

None.

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT / PARTICIPATION DE LA COMMUNAUTÉ:

Edmonton--Mill Woods--Beaumont is a very mixed riding, with immigrants from many different backgrounds living here. I have lived in this riding for several years, and am familiar with local issues. I use the local recreational facilities a lot, and have several friends in the City of Edmonton that will be willing to help me campaign occasionally.

PLATFORM / MANIFESTE:

The Pirate Party of Canada's core values are copyright and patent reform, privacy, and open government. I agree in general with the Pirate Parties core values. I am willing to argue specifics about innovation incentives versus benefit of the majority with others, but in the end I completely agree that the current system as it stands is not working for the betterment of Canadians. I believe completely in open and transparent government, and one of my biggest concerns is the current pay system just to get basic statistical information from Stats Canada.

My personal biggest issue is accountability. I believe that candidates should be representing their constituents to the best of their ability, and not just representing those that provide the largest political donations. If chosen as the Edmonton--Mill Woods--Beaumont candidate, I will bring up campaign donations and financing as my first platform belief. When I ran for Municipal Office, this was the biggest issue that almost everyone I talked to agreed with me on, and I would like to continue in that same vein.

My second biggest issue is using public money to bail out private corporations. In Canada, we are almost one year off the peak of a huge housing bubble (larger per capita than the US bubble). Two years from now, our government is going to be pressured to bail out our big banks, who are making a lot of "declaration of self employed income" loans to people that can barely afford them at "emergency low" interest rates. This is going to end badly. I would rather it end badly for bank bondholders than for Canadian taxpayers.

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Director's Evaluation
(where applicable, include Director's interview/evaluation)

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Official Agent Information
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Official Auditor Information
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Event Dates & Information
(info on any events, volunteer meetings, battle planning)

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Collateral and Advertising Materials
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Volunteer List
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Voting Results
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Post-Election Reports
Lessons learned from my Federal Campaign

1.	Start early in the election cycle. In general, to talk with people and explain our party we have to actaully stop and talk with people. I realize other parties can run from door to door, spending only 30 to 60 seconds per person and win. Other parties have been around a long time, and their platforms are well reported in the MSM. Our party is new and our viewpoints are new.

2.	Expect to spend 1 to 10 minutes per person. About once a day you will find a person that really wants to talk, and that will take 20 to 30 minutes. In general, putting flyers in peoples mailboxes seemed mostly ineffective, while talking with them gave the best response. As there are 40,000+ households to visit, and you can visit between 1 and 2 hundred in an evening, we need to start the door to door process 5 to 6 months before the election is called. That was not possible this election, but will be posssible next election.

3.	Evenings are the best time to talk with people. In my constituency, during the day, maybe 1 house in 20 had someone answer the door. After about 5pm, everyone is home for supper, and this is the best time to visit. Or rather, the only time. That applies on weekends as well. During the day on weekends, most people seem to be out shopping or visiting, but again, most of them are home in the evenings. You can meet people until 9 to 9:30pm, when most people start going to bed. Because of this, if you are running in the election, consider that as your “job” during the election. If you can save up the money to take a few months off before the formal start, that would be even better.

4.	Listen to your constituants. Our most appreciated policy is the "regional platform" idea. I spent the first week getting signatures asking every constituent what their single biggest issue was. About a third listed "healthcare" and another third had some variation of needing assistance or help just for daily life. The remaining third were evenly divided between crime, environmental issues, education issues, and other issues. I wrote up these concerns as my regional platform and seemed to receive a good response.

5.	Be prepared to explain our parties name. "The Pirate Party" seemed to have a general negative connotaion, with the negativity increasing as the voters age increased (in general). However, after explaining our history, and that the Pirate Party has historcially been something of a "Robin Hood" organization that stands up for the rights of citizens against the corporations, the negative connotation can be turned into a positive one; but to get that response you need to be able to explain our parties history quickly and cheerfully.

6.	People want to hear what you are going to do to help them. In general, people will not vote for issues that do not impact them directly. People want to know what you will do to make their lives better. Make sure, when you write your flyer, you explain not just our policies, but how our policies will make Canada and your constituents lives better in some way.

7.	Running in an election costs money, a lot more than the $1000 you will be handing to elections Canada. Along with this, it costs more money to run a good campaign than you are allowed to donate to yourself during the election. During the election year, you are only allowed to donate $2100 total to yourself. This will not cover the costs to print and mail a flyer to every household. If we had Electoral District Associations set up, we could be donating money to those entities for the 3 years prior to the election ($1000 per year), giving us more money during the election to spend on flyers and signs. ''[editorial note: The present inflation-adjusted contribution limit is $1100 per calendar year to all political parties combined, $1100 to all candidates combined, and $1100 to all electoral district associations combined.] '' 8.	Be prepared to spend several full days filling out paperwork for elections Canada once the election is over. Elections Canada has a short course on the paperwork, but it is still very time consuming to do it all.

9.	Do not get discouraged when you get a poor reception. Everyone has an off day, most likely you will run into one to two people per evening that are having bad days, and they will say hurtful words. Smile, say “thank you for your time” and go to the next house. Sometimes you will have streaks of assholes in a row, but sometimes you will haev a nice streak of considerate people that take the time to hear you out. Both will happen repeatedly. Get used to it.

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