NDP candidate Melissa Atkinson targets Yukon's 'ABC' vote

"You don't go around breaking treaties, you don't introduce legislation that undermines our agreements. It's time for change," Melissa Atkinson concludes, to a round of polite applause from a crowd of about two dozen at the Carcross Community Centre.

Yukon's NDP candidate may be new to politics, but she's now had many weeks on the campaign trail tohone her message.

She's planning to visit every community in the territory before Oct. 19.As a relative unknown, Atkinson needs to convince even the partyfaithful that theNDP is still the choice, in a battlenow dominated by so-calledABCAnyone But Conservative voters.

But for some long time New Democrats of the region, this vote is troubling.

"I hope I can vote for you, but I don't know yet," Jim Borisenkotold Atkinson in Carcross.

"We have to get rid of the Conservatives at all costs, and until we get proportional representation, I have to vote strategically," he said.

Atkinson's heard it before and no doubt will continue to hear it right up to election day.

"You have to remember, the Liberals voted, signed, sealed and delivered for Bill C-51," she shotback to Borisenko.
"That's selling your civil rights down the river."

"And with the ABC vote," Atkinson continued,"the NDP have said they would form a coalition. With the Liberals, it's a flat out no."

Lawyer, 'proud Yukoner'

Atkinson,"a very proud Yukoner," isa lawyer ofHan, Kaska, Tlingit heritage and a member of theTr'ondk Hwch'inFirst Nation.

Her 15-year lawcareerhas included10 years as a Crown prosecutor for the federal government and twoterms chairing the Yukon Human Rights Commission. Forthe past five years, she has workedas a legal aid lawyer in Yukon courts.

She feelsthe extra long campaign is giving her more time to get her name out there.

"We've got more forums coming," she said. "People I don't even know are coming up saying 'I saw the posters' with my giant head, I heard you on the radio, I've looked at your Facebook. So you know people are trying to figure it out."

Atkinson dismisses the Liberal Party'sclaims to represent"realchange."She points to past Liberal cuts to funding forhousing, education, and the CBC, and said theConservatives then followedsuit with more cuts.

"If you are truly looking for change, the strategic vote is to vote for the NDP," she insists.

Atkinson bristles at the suggestion that Liberal candidate Larry Bagnell lost the 2011election in Yukon primarily because a popular Green Party candidate split the vote, allowing Conservative Ryan Leef to win.

"The real reason Larry lost is because people told him, 'don't sign that long-gun registry.'That's his legacy," Atkinson argues.

"He has to live with that because if you come back and you say, 'I voted with my party line', that speaks volumes.
That's how you get omnibus bills, that's how you get Bill C-51, where people's civil liberties are being trashed. That should send everybody the message about where Justin Trudeau stands."

'Not the kind of Canada I want'

Atkinson has said herlegal background and experience with the Yukon Human Rights Commission tells her thatBill C-51 is "scary."

"If you speak out against the government, if you are going to protest the Peel, if you are going to protest about tuition hikes,you are on the list," Atkinson said.

"That's not the kind of Canada I want, that's not the way I have practiced law the last 15 years, that is not what people have fought long and hard for our freedoms to mean," she said.

"I hope I wake up on October 20th with Tom Mulcair as our Prime Minister and myself as the Member of Parliament for the Yukon."