Victoria 2015-05-19 minutes

Minutes/Summary from Victoria, BC Meeting Meeting Time & Date: May 19th from 7:30pm - 9:30pm Location: Starbucks @ 1959 Fort St Attendance Numbers: 4 Notable Attendees (candidates, council members, etc): Shawn Gray, Vice-president

=Agenda=


 * 1) Platform & Policy Discussion
 * 2) Updates from Federal level
 * 3) PPCA Tasks (to be proposed)
 * 4) PPCA Victoria Tasks (due next mtg)
 * 5) Potential PPCA Victoria Events
 * 6) Set next meeting date/time

=Minutes=

Recall

 * Need a mechanism to recall MPs
 * Since MPs are not able to be held to account by their constituents, they often follow party lines & ignore constituents' positions
 * This makes MPs unaccountable to their local constituents outside of an election
 * Some way to recall an MP and force a by-election should be established to ensure proper representation
 * Later discovered Bill C-269 from the 2nd session of the 36th Parliament: []
 * Did this pass? Why is it unknown?

Accountability

 * Senate residency report currently blocked due to "privilege"
 * Any/all reports should be required to be public except where secrecy is required for privacy/national security
 * Require a one-stop shop for
 * Every MP's vote
 * Every MP's contact
 * How taxpayer $$ is spent
 * Must be searchable & accessible

Advertising

 * Should implement a cap on Annual Government & Party Paid advertising
 * This would limit the amount of propoganda released by various parties & force more efficient use of taxpayer's & donation's funds
 * For government advertising, a non-partisan review board should be required
 * Would limit partisan advertisement under banner of the government
 * How do we ensure non-partisan appointments to the board?

Electoral System

 * System requires major changes
 * FPP no longer represents Canadian interests
 * Should present Canadians with several options for future governance

The Senate

 * What about the Senate?
 * Change or Abolish?

E-voting

 * Issue with security
 * Problems with Vote Tampering
 * Hash/Private Key?

Decentralized ID Systems

 * Certificate signing
 * PGP/GPG tap ID-cards?
 * Central body approval, everyone is a certifying authority
 * Tied to a single e-mail?
 * How to prevent multiple cards/keys?

Plain-Language Bills

 * Bills should be in plain language
 * People need to be able to understand what they're reading
 * Perhaps the PPCA should perform Translation
 * Party-related
 * Show votes
 * Plain-language version of current bills

Omnibus Bills

 * Must abolish Omnibus Bills
 * Too easy to hide unrelated changes

Proper & Effective Costing

 * Budget overruns for projects are a huge problem
 * Must better evaluate the ROI & costing of a project
 * See long-gun registry, military fighter jets, naval disintegration as evidence of issue

Science & Evidence Based Platform

 * Experts collect & report findings
 * Party takes findings & move forward with it
 * Science & Evidence publishing
 * C0
 * Open Access
 * Everything available unless needed closed (national security/privacy issues)

Jobs & Economy

 * Need to focus on a diversification of the economy
 * Avoid all eggs in one basket (Oil)
 * Should engage in Progressive Economics
 * Employee turn-over rates
 * Incentivise low-turnover / Tax high turn-over
 * Companies that invest in their employees have lower turnover
 * Lower turnover rates aid in employment stability
 * Employment stability increases home ownership & consumption, thereby further aiding economy
 * Focus taxes on non-productive activites
 * Robin Hood tax
 * Targets Bay St & Bankers
 * Taxed based on # of transfers/trades
 * How many trades/day in Canada? What would the revenue become?
 * Subsidize industries we want growth
 * Small business (under 300)
 * Green Energy
 * Local Manufacturing (3D Printing)
 * Local Agriculture
 * Research Dollars for public good, not restricted to economic production based

Overcoming Voter Apathy

 * Requires building trust
 * People feel disconnect with representatives
 * Local Referendums
 * Town Halls
 * Regular Communication
 * E-contact Simplicity
 * System Apathy & Obfuscation
 * Don't feel locally represented
 * What you see is what you get
 * Local Business. Local Platform. Local Representative.

Updates from Federal level

 * VPN for donation in the works
 * Shawn to notify once launched
 * T-shirt project in Vancouver
 * If quality matches, becomes available for donations
 * Shawn to notify once launched as shirts will be needed

PPCA Tasks (to be proposed)

 * Transparent Law Website proposal for Fed-level
 * Begin translating law from legal-speak to plain-speak
 * Focus on laws that people deal with regularly, but are frustrating
 * Focus on laws people want to understand
 * Should follow through on this project whether elected or not

PPCA Victoria Tasks (due next mtg)

 * Create Materials
 * Each person to physically develop & bring something to the table next meeting that can be used to locally grow our base
 * Shawn Gray to Launch Facebook page for PPCA Victoria
 * Shawn Gray to Update Wiki with minutes

Potential PPCA Victoria Events

 * Cryptoparty
 * Linux Install party
 * Open Datathon
 * Wiki Editathon

Next Meeting Date/Time
Tuesday, June 2nd from 7:30pm - 9:30pm Location TBD

Return to Local Meetings - Victoria