PRESS RELEASE: All-time low in Voter Turnout Should be a Wake-up Call

10.07.2014

Fox Creek, AB - July 10th

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The by-elections held last week have officially set a new low for voter turnout with less than 20% turnout in the two Alberta races. Part of the reason for this is believed to be the election date which was set to occur right before Canada Day. While by-election turnout is generally lower on average the government should try to avoid making the problem worse. The Pirate Party of Canada believes that it was irresponsible to pick such a date to hold any type of election and wants stricter laws regulating when by-elections can be scheduled for.

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Currently, the Prime Minister can have a by-election set for any date provided it is not more than 180 days after the vacancy occurred. This allows the governing party to pick a time that is strictly to their advantage (as some have suggested occurred in this instance). While by-elections usually have a low turnout it is hard to deny that the timing of these by-election made it even worse.

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“Canada should be committed to limiting the manipulation of the electorate through cheap tricks”, says James Wilson, Leader of the Pirate Party of Canada. “Can we not agree on something as simple as making elections as fair as possible?” If elected the Pirate Party would introduce legislation banning the holding of by-elections from five days before, and five days after, all national statutory holidays.

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The Pirate Party of Canada is a federal political party focused on thoughtful information policy reform, genuine democracy, civil liberties, and the freedom of the Internet. You can find out more online at www.pirateparty.ca .

Category: Elections, Fairness, Newsroom.
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>>>Pourquoi le Parti Pirate?<<<

Why Pirate Party?

1. Open Democracy

One of our main founding principles was Open Government. This means an Open Data policy with proactive disclosure and free access to government data. This will allow anyone to scrutinize and catch any error, negligence or corruption early on. Open Government also means increased transparency, and giving constituents real voices. This can be achieved with electoral reform .

2. Mincome / Basic Income Guarantee (B.I.G.)

Unemployment and income inequality is on the rise and we risk a breakdown of social cohesion without a system for resource distribution as we face increased automation. We're shifting from a bureaucratic culture of constant work-demands to a culture of passion, joy, and learning for the sake of learning.

Mincome will lead to cost savings and create a sustainable economy. See our press release for how that can be achieved.

3. Autonomy and Decentralization

We believe that the world works best when individuals are making informed decisions. It is our goal to get all information to all people, so they may be more informed voters, consumers, participants, and teachers. We do not need to force information culture & the hacker ethic onto people we can simply allow them to choose access. We believe the right to choose our identity, name, and appearance is inalienable.

4. Copyright and Patent Reform
Copyright and patent's main purpose was for propagation of culture and innovation. Our current copyright and patent laws are continuously being corrupted due to lobbying by copyright and patent monopolist. These monopolist refuses to innovate and provide wider access and pass on the savings from the new lower distribution cost. Instead the copyright and patent terms keeps getting extended to benefit the few to the detriment of the public interest. The opposite should happen. Copyright and patent terms should be shortened since our new information infrastructure (i.e. the internet) have brought us cheaper and faster means of distributing media contents and information. Mandatory licensing, owner's rights to a non-DRM product, open access to research data and shorter copyright term are some of the natural changes that is needed if we want to create a more open and progressive society. This will ensure future artist and innovator are not hampered by patent and copyright gatekeepers who uses rent seeking law for anti-competitive purposes.

Human beings increasingly have a moral duty to share information with one another. Libraries are stuck in the last century, enforcing artificial scarcity on digital content. If libraries were upgraded for the modern age, we would no longer need filesharing. And let's face it, watching and listening to whatever you want to is fun. It breaks down arbitrary global borders of access and creates a global culture defined by people- not by corporations.

At the Pirate Party- we believe more information leads to better decisions. We believe that more voices leads to better compromises. We believe in Canadians.

Our democracy need a serious upgrade and Pirate Party aims to change politics to the way it should be.