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Using “freedom” as a rallying cry, Pierre Poilievre took aim at various ‘gatekeepers’ while campaigning near Edmonton for leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada.
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Following a meet and greet in Calgary earlier in the week, Poilievre spoke to a packed event hall, which overflowed into a banquet room, at the River Cree Casino and Resort, just west of Alberta’s capital.
After criticizing vaccine mandates and passports, the Ontario MP for Carleton supplied a few of his policy points as part of his bid to take on federal Liberal leader Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the next election.
Among them, he proposed eliminating political, financial and regulatory “gatekeepers,” such as the Canada Infrastructure Bank, a Crown corporation charged with funding infrastructure projects using $35 billion from the federal government.
“We don’t need another bank,” Poilievre said.
Poilievre said he would also create a “pay as you go law” to create a sense fiscal responsibility.
“If a minister wants to bring an extra dollar of spending, he’ll have to find an extra dollar of savings to pay for it,” Poilievre said.
He also said he would “axe the federal carbon tax,” “unleash the production” of Alberta’s energy sector, and repeal bills C-48 and C-69, which bans oil tanker traffic off the coast of northern BC, and affects the timelines for energy projects respectively.
While many of the policy proposals were met with applause, the crowd appeared to cheer the loudest at the suggestion that the federal government defund the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to the tune of $1 billion.
