Campaign sign truce cuts Kingston clutter
Last Updated: Thursday, December 1, 2005 | 2:26 PM ET
CBC News
Most parties fielding candidates in Kingston and the Islands have agreed to use fewer signs and keep them off public property.
Sounding a sour note on the deal is Blair MacLean, campaign manager for Conservative candidate Lou Grimshaw, a retired army officer.
Only helps the incumbent, Tory says
Public property, Kingston, Ontario.
"The agreement signed by the parties is only in the interest of the Liberal candidate, who has the name recognition that we are trying to seek," MacLean told CBC News.
That candidate is Peter Milliken, speaker of the House of Commons and the area's Liberal member of Parliament for 17 years.
MacLean, who ran unsuccessfully against Milliken in 2004, said his party believes that displaying signs is a democratic right to be exercised across the country. Kingston should be no different.
But Green party candidate Eric Walton said it will be different, partly because voters were overwhelmed by too many signs last time.
"Once people have seen the name of a candidate on a sign 100 times, they don't need to see it 1,000 times. It's a waste of resources," he said.
A temporary truce in Montreal riding, too
Even if the Tories don't go along, the riding's roadsides and intersections may be a lot less cluttered this time. And Kingston isn't the only place with a sign truce.
Candidates in the Montreal riding of Outremont agreed to hold off putting up signs and posters for a couple of weeks to avoid confusing the area's voters, many of whom face a provincial byelection Dec. 12.
"Also, practically speaking, there won't be any posts left in Outremont," Liberal candidate Jean Lapierre told the Canadian Press.
