Larry Gratton is the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) Member of Parliament (MP) candidate for the Ponoka-Didsbury riding.
He became involved with the PPC after reading their platform and found that he aligned with the policies.
Gratton’s background includes working in skilled trades, small business, and cattle farming, as well as over four decades as an advanced care paramedic and manager for the City of Calgary and the provincial health authority.
Gratton was asked a series of questions, which have been presented to all candidates.
This is one installment of our Meet the Candidate series.
Here are his responses:
What are the main issues you’ve heard from constituents?
People are talking about the cost of living, over-taxation, and the realization that our provincial jurisdiction is being overridden by federal government overreach in many areas.
Healthcare dollars trickle down to Alberta. It's our own tax money that goes to Ottawa, but it's fed back to us with strings attached.
Any programs or any money that comes from the federal government to the provinces has strings attached. The programs have to be done the way the federal government wants them to be done, even though it's our own money, and the program in question may be a provincial jurisdiction.
The big thing in Alberta is that we all realize we need our energy products to be available across the country and be able to be exported to the world.
Notwithstanding the green agenda of the federal government. Alberta’s energy is quite clean and if it was exported to countries that still burn coal for their energy, we would help to reduce the carbon footprint that certain people seem to be worried about.
We're being restricted in the ability to do that, by a philosophical agenda against energy.
How do you plan to address inflation, and the cost of living?
Our party is proposing to eliminate the GST.
Removing the GST and the extra taxes that have been added to our fuel would go a long way to reducing the cost of living for households.
Nobody should kid themselves, although the present government has stopped collecting the carbon tax, that didn’t eliminate the tax, and it can be turned on again at any time.
How will Central Albertans be affected by U.S. tariffs, and how will you mitigate the impact?
Every consumer is going to experience the impacts.
Particularly the price of automobiles and things that use our raw materials like steel and aluminum cost will increase.
We’re proposing that since the U.S. is demanding it, the free trade agreement needs to be opened up.
We're as disappointed as everyone else that the U.S. President is bullying us and demanding that it be opened up right now instead of waiting for the contract to end in 2026.
Canada has not necessarily followed the letter of the contract ourselves and even though we're in a free trade agreement, we impose tariffs, restrictions, and workarounds to avoid free trade.
Our proposal is that it be renegotiated, but everything's on the table.
Free trade would benefit Canadians because the price of things that are supply managed now would decrease between the provinces, things like milk, eggs, and poultry,
With a push to purchase Canadian-made goods, are you considering any type of support for local businesses?
That would have to be done in an orderly manner.
Level the playing field and open up the market.
Farmers have big investments in their quotas and you can't just pull the rug out from under them.
It would have to be done in an orderly way to change the structure, and that would involve buying their quotas back.
As far as any other support, we have to wait and see what is needed and where exactly.
How do you plan to support Alberta’s oil and gas, and agriculture sectors?
We need an energy corridor across this country, which means a pipeline going from Alberta to eastern Canada where we have some major refineries.
We do have the Trans Mountain pipeline that was expanded and it's functioning, but it was a boondoggle because it was going to be done with private money.
Ultimately, it is going, but it doesn't have enough capacity. We still need more capacity to export our natural gas, to reduce the world's dependence on coal.
For the agriculture sector, opening up free trade within Canada and worldwide for Canadian goods will help our agricultural sector.
What is your plan for healthcare?
Our plan for healthcare is to repeal the Canada Health Act, the authority for delivering healthcare services, what those services should be, and give that authority back to the provinces where it belongs under the constitution.
Eliminating the GST at the federal level will give the provinces the capacity to draw a little more tax from people to pay for healthcare.
By repealing the Canada Health Act, it would give the provinces the liberty to deliver in different ways. If they wanted a public-private partnership or some other innovative way to deliver healthcare more efficiently, they would be at liberty to do that without being held to a rigid rule.
People seem to be afraid of the boogeyman of private healthcare delivery, but private healthcare delivery is available to Canadians right now.
If they want to pay for something out of pocket, they just go to another province and get the service. By repealing the Canada Health Act, it will allow provinces to deliver services people want in a different way.
How will you support seniors?
The most support seniors need is financial. By reducing their taxes particularly income tax on pensions. That's an onerous bill for seniors.
As far as health support and housing, when the federal government stops meddling in that, the provinces will be able to do a better job.
A large segment of seniors would be veterans and people who've served the country, and that's an area where the federal government has failed.
Returning to the previous model of pension support for the veterans will help them immensely.
Is there anything else you would like to add?
There is an overriding issue of Canadian sovereignty and freedom for our citizens, and how we've been governed.
For many years now, by liberal and conservative governments, we go back and forth but nothing actually ever changes.
A best-case scenario for Alberta is a conservative or even liberal minority government with PPC MPs holding the balance of power over the government and making sure they govern in the best interests of Canadian citizens.
If some true conservative PPC MPs had that influence we would see some radical changes and improvements in life for Canadians.
The federal election is coming up on April 28, 2025.
Sign up to get the latest local news headlines delivered directly to your inbox every afternoon.
Send your news tips, story ideas, pictures, and videos to news@centralalbertaonline.com.
CentralAlbertaOnline encourages you to get your news directly from your trusted source by bookmarking this page and downloading the CentralAlbertaOnline app.
