Two pieces, one from the party, and one from the Barrie candidate:

The following is an editorial, a third page of the whole editorial page in the April 11, 2011 edition of the National Post and was written by John Shaw, the Vice President of Political Action, Libertarian Party of Canada:

The Libertarian party: Smaller government, more freedom

Most people, most of the time, know best how to manage their own lives. This may be intuitively obvious to many Canadians - and to the Libertarian Party of Canada - but apparently escapes many other political parties. Year after year, especially if there is an election, those other parties enter a bidding war, offering more and larger programs in exchange for your votes, programs that seek to manage your lives, often with unintended consequences and few net benefits.

The Libertarian approach is different. We do not promise to endlessly expand spending and impose new restrictions on personal action. Our goal is to leave Canadians as much responsibility for their lives as possible. Given the challenge of taming the leviathan of big government, we aim to return control to the individual as fast as practicable with the least dislocation to society. We are not anarchists, as some label us, but we do propose that much of what is currently done by government does not -or should not -be done only by government. The Libertarian platform includes:

Ending the war on drugs Current drug enforcement policies have cost thousands of lives and billions of dollars. The Harper government's recent expansion of that war, with the support of the Liberals, will damage the lives of even more people. If drug dependency were treated as a personal medical problem, for those suffering from excessive drug use, there would be far less harm to society. The only role of the government with respect to drug use would be regulating against fraud.

Ending war, in general NATO, as with our military, should be used only for defence from attack. We would limit participation in NATO to our original mandate as written, not as perverted by those who use it to support the invasion of other countries. Aging military equipment would be replaced as needed but only with equipment designed for the defence of Canada, not with fighter jets intended for offensive use in other countries.

Full choice at the ballot box Democracy is the best way to choose representation, but sometimes the ballot offers no real choice. Voter participation declines as the distinctions between the major parties diminish. We would add "None of the Above" to the ballot at all federal elections. NOTA would be listed alongside the names of other candidates on the ballot, so voters would have a real choice even if candidates and their parties failed to meet your standards. NOTA votes would be recorded and reported as a vote so there would be no confusion as to Canadians' intentions, as there is now with a spoiled ballot.

Legal reform It is not possible to move to a more libertarian society without improving the most basic libertarian documents, the Constitution and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, so they offer true legal protection from excessive government. A Libertarian government would open negotiations with the provinces to add property rights and other limits on the powers of government with the aim of ratifying these changes with a binding referendum of the people by late in the mandate.

10-for-4 Our bottom line spending cuts average 10% annually, for each of the next four years. Last year $57-billion was transferred to other levels of government, an increase of $16-billion in just five years. We would reduce these transfers by 25% each year with the plan to eliminate most transfers in the second mandate. Taxes would decline proportionately after the deficit is eliminated in the first year. We would replace the current maze of complex tax breaks and special favours with a single flat tax. The people who support endless expansion of government may decry this reduction as too rapid, but it would only roll spending levels back to those of 2004, after four years. The second mandate will continue this reduction trend.

It is far too risky to continue down our current path of big spending, big government, and excessive regulation. Canada came through the recession far better than many countries, due to spending reductions that produced a surplus to buffer us against tough times, but that buffer has been squandered by the Harper government and their coalition of big government supporters in the other three major parties. It is time not only to turn the ship of state around, but to shrink it, if we are to ensure the prosperity of future generations. For that and the other reasons listed above, we ask that you please support the Libertarian Party of Canada.

-John Shaw

Why I am a Libertarian

I had been, like you, angered by stories of government waste. They take our money with the force of law, and then, they waste it, and when there isn't any more to take, they borrow more in our names, and waste more. Then, while we suffer inflation and a devalued dollar, and more taxes, government does it, again. And they keep doing it, to enrich themselves. As the sign on the desk of the former leader of the Libertarian Party, of the USA, Republican Congressman, Ron Paul, says:

"Don't steal. The government hates competition."

The Libertarian Party was introduced to me by Libertarian candidate Paolo Fabrizio, at about the same time I was hoping for Ron Paul to get the nomination for the Republican Party in the USA. Paul, by the way, is a real Republican, in that he respects the American Constitution, and does not want to invade other countries and be the world's policeman, as America cannot afford it, as we cannot afford to be in Afghanistan.

What Canada has been doing can be described as collectivism, which is, the government takes from all, and then decides how the money is to be redistributed to everyone else, in the name of the common good. Yet needless war produces debt, the welfare state redistributes poverty, not wealth, and government meddling in the marketplace is discriminatory, and favours those with friends in government. A dollar taken from you, and then given back to you, with a lot of fanfare, does not return as a dollar; the government always takes a cut for itself. This deliberate policy to tax, waste, borrow, spend and tax again leaves the average person too poor to afford the necessities of life. If you really want a government that tends to things we need, and not those that the government wants, for itself and its own employees, then that government is Libertarian.