UNVACCINATED GREEN CANDIDATE SAYS IT’S FOR ‘HEALTH REASONS’

Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

PARRY SOUND-MUSKOKA — The unvaccinated Green Party candidate going door-to-door says he’s “not anti-vaccine.”

And he “might get it eventually.”

We caught up with Marc Mantha yesterday as he was delivering food for Gravenhurst Against Poverty.

And we asked him why.

“That’s absolutely right,” he said without hesitation.

“The reason is for health reasons. But I am working that out with getting more information. And working with my doctor.

“So eventually I might be able to do it.”

He said he’s “not anti vaccine, but it’s personal choice for everybody.”

He didn’t elaborate or say exactly what his health reason was for not being vaccinated.

Unvaccinated party candidates across the country have been a contentious issue on the campaign trail.

Green Party candidate Marc Mantha, who is campaigning and doing GAP deliveries, says he’s unvaccinated “for health reasons,” but he is not opposed to vaccines and “might get it eventually.”

The first-time federal candidate said “it’s an insane world,” adding “that the one thing I wanted to do was keeping helping GAP.”

He said he is “energized by the people and the interaction.”

And he says he’s been able campaign door-to-door.

“Oh, yes!

“In fact, my campaign manager usually checks with me before the people go out with the door hangers, just because I might have already done that street already.”

He said he’s been “really busy at it since the very beginning.”

Mantha said “it’s a really short time frame to work with and it’s really challenging.

“We may not have the resources of the big political party, but we have a lot of heart.”

He said as usual climate is always the big issue for Greens.

“All of the issues are inter-related, so you can’t just fix one because it’s tied to the others.”

He said “climate change and mitigating climate change presents so much opportunity to the riding of Parry Sound and Muskoka in terms of prosperity. And all of the things, by shifting all the things that cause the climate crisis and make it worse and shifting it to programs that make it better.

“Inherently it’s sort of like budget neutral. You’re just shifting resources to things that are going to make a difference in the community. Mental health, the housing crisis and whole list of other ones.”

Mantha said the housing “is a crisis, absolutely.”

“We need to also get a way of analysing that determines the individual riding’s needs are, too. Because it’s a crisis, absolutely.”

Parry Sound and Muskoka has “been falling behind constantly year-after-year, losing two to three available units for every one that’s added. We’ve never been getting ahead.”

Asked about more broadband, another relenting challenge for successive local members of Parliament and a driving force behind incumbent Scott Aitchison’s campaign, Mantha said “I’m going to look a little more in to that.”

And how the broadband is out in Ryde where he lives?

“I’m on satellite — it’s slow, but it works. And it’s fairly consistent. Sometimes when the weather is really bad I’ll lose a little bit. But it’s been pretty good.

“Broadband, I think, needs to be deemed an essential service. Because people who are vulnerable don’t have transportation.”

See the full video interview below.

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