With Canada's federal election coming up on Monday January 23, progressive political forces across the country are speaking out on the threat of a Conservative Party victory.
www.ckln.fm
David Orchard is a fourth generation prairie farmer, from Borden, Saskatchewan. Trained as a lawyer, he has worked as a organic farmer raising wheat, oats, barley, canolda and alfalfa crops without herbicides, pesticides, chemicals or GMOs, since 1975.
In 1985, David Orchard was a founder of "Citizens Concerned about Free Trade" to resist the Free Trade Agreement with the US. That effort was almost successful; the group forced an election on the issue in 1988 in which more than half of Canadians voted for parties opposing free trade. However, the pro-free trade Conservatives won a majority of seats and the FTA later gave way to NAFTA.
In 1993, David Orchard authored the best-selling book, "The Fight for Canada: Four Centuries of Resistance to American Expansionism", a book described by US historian Howard Zinn as "...devastatingly accurate...a fine piece of research and written with the kind of clarity that makes it accessible to a large public, which it deserves."
He ran twice for the leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party, before leaving after the Party's controversial merger with the Canadian Alliance in 2003. In this interview, he tells the story of the merger and explains why he is campaigning for the Liberal Party today, on the issues of Canada-Quebec unity, relationships with the First Nations, Canadian independence from the US, and agricultural policy.
He joined CKLN's Kristin Schwartz by phone in Toronto.
![<?php echo $config['site_title']; ?>](/static/images/rp-navimg.gif)
![Support the <?php echo $config['site_title']; ?>](/static/images/support.png)
