Vaccine passports won't fly with the Northern Ontario Libertarian Caucus (NOLC) says its local spokesman.
The party says it unequivocally condemns passports or certificates that would be used to restrict individual Ontario citizens that are not vaccinated for Covid.
"We respect individual fundamental rights," Northern Ontario Caucus Chair Dave Lewington told BayToday, "even if we personally don't agree with the choice of the individual."
Lewington says the NOLC is concerned by news that the Ontario NDP is pushing the passport option.
See: Bring in vaccination certificates demands NDP
And: Feds to roll out vaccine passports for foreign travel
"They talk about wanting to help Ontario residents overcome systemic barriers, but then they fail to realize the brutal hypocrisy in their own statement when the very nature of the system they are promoting is to implement government-imposed systemic barriers onto any unvaccinated Ontario citizens.
"That's hypocritical, not right, not ethical, and not moral," said Lewington.
"We allow individuals to make all kinds of choices to put themselves in harm's way. If we are going to try to rationalize vaccine certificates are we going to look at every age classification of Ontario residents and say if you are 50 years old, and statistically speaking, driving on the road is a higher risk for you than dying from COVID? Are we going to stop everybody who is older or younger from that cutoff from driving on the road?"
Lewington believes it's a dangerous precedent.
"We stand against government prejudicially discriminating against any minorities, and we condemn the NDP for leading the charge to discriminate against one minority group while claiming to be a party that will stick up for the rights of minorities. If you are an unvaccinated citizen, your life and culture matter less to a party like the NDP or Liberals that both promote implementing systemic barriers like a vaccine certificate."
Lewington, who owns a farm in Lavigne, west of Sturgeon Falls. calls the NOLC "a small group" trying to get established in the north. He says although the OLP does not have a candidate set for Temiskaming-Cochrane yet, they do have candidates ready for next year's election in many other ridings in the province.
He adds he "may consider it" if the party executive would like him to run.
