August 22, 2019

Our Time Newsletter 5

Election campaigns are fast-paced and constantly changing, so we want to make sure you know what’s going on. This week: call on the CBC to host a climate debate and get your candidate nominations in by September 1.

Key Action & Message of the Week:

Our key message this week is: The election is coming. This is Our Time.

There are three things happening this week: 

  1. We’ve launched the first step in our candidate endorsement process. We need your help nominating candidates who are bold leaders, green new deal champions and running people-powered campaigns. Over the next two weeks, local teams are meeting with candidates to decide who they want to nominate. Click here for more info, and to see the nomination form. Nominate a Candidate
  2. We’re continuing to ratchet up pressure on the CBC. Teams continue to deliver petitions to local CBC offices and meet with executives, and we’re finalizing plans to mobilize during the official debates on October 7th. Click here to make sure you’re plugged into that.  
  3. We’re getting ready for the Global Climate Strikes this fall. Teams are starting to canvass for the strikes and plan for campus walkouts to join the massive climate strikes that will be happening across Canada on September 27th. You can find more information about the strikes here, and expect a lot more to come in the coming days. 

  1. Highlights from across the country:

    We’re changing the debate: Over 50,000 people across the country signed the petition calling for a leaders’ debate on climate change. And last week, the majority of these names were delivered to CBC studios across the country.


    Thanks to you, we’ve built out a massively successful campaign calling for a climate debate — and our call has reached millions of people across the country. Check out the full story and timeline of our campaign.

    Letters to the Editor: Together, we’ve published dozens of letters to the editor in papers big and small, from coast to coast to coast. Click here to read some of our favourites. 

    Read the letters to editors

Election State of Play:

 

We’re all waiting to see if the latest SNC Lavalin news will impact the national polls but overall, the race seems to remain a statistical dead heat between the leading parties.

Perhaps the biggest election news this week was the story about Elections Canada and the rules around discussing climate change during the election period. There’s a lot of misinformation and confusion out there, but we think this episode of CBC’s Front Burner does a good job of clarifying things. You’ll see here in my (many) tweets about this, that the crux of the matter is how Elections Canada defines an election issue. We have a solid plan for ensuring the Our Time campaign complies with the election rules, and we will keep a close eye on this as it develops.


Tools and Resources:

There are two webinars coming up next week that you won’t want to miss.

Grounding the Green New Deal in Climate Justice
Monday, August 26th at 7pm ESTAn all-star lineup of organizers and activists from a cross-section of movements will share why a Green New Deal for Canada must be grounded in racial and economic justice, and Indigenous Sovereignty.  We will release the lineup in the days to come! In the meantime, register here.

Our Time to Strike for Climate – w/ Bill McKibben
Thursday, August 29thJoin us for a conversation with Bill McKibben, student climate strike organizers and Our Time leaders to hear about the massive Global Climate Strike coming up this September, and how young people across Canada with Our Time are mobilizing their communities during this whirlwind moment and channeling all that energy towards getting out the climate vote for the 2019 Federal Election! Make sure you register!

Our Time Candidate Meetings + Endorsement Toolkit

If you and your team want to nominate a local candidate for an official endorsement from Our Time, we have all the information and resources you’ll need in a great toolkit we’ve created. It includes how to reach out and arrange a meeting with a candidate, how to conduct the meeting and ask the right questions to assess their potential, how to decide whether or not to nominate the candidate, and the endorsement selection process that follows! Check out the toolkit here. 

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