Socialist Candidate for Toronto Mayor Kiri Vadivelu to Present Policies on Housing and Transportation

Socialist Candidate for Toronto Mayor Kiri Vadivelu to Present Policies on Housing and Transportation

The Municipal Socialist Alliance Toronto Mayor By-election campaign, featuring MSA candidate for mayor Kiri Vadivelu, will present its policies on housing and transportation today. Please join us on Saturday, May 20, 1:30 p.m. for a rally at Christie Pits Park, Christie subway station at Bloor Street West.

Kiri Vadivelu, a 37-year old tenants organizer, is running to be the next mayor of Toronto. He is the first Tamil-Canadian to seek the office, and the only socialist in the race.

Kiri says, "I believe good housing is a human right. Efficient public transit is a right. Climate justice is a right. So are fully funded public health services and public, quality Long Term Care.

But Toronto is in crisis, the product of a failed capitalist system that starves cities and puts private profit before people. Only radical socialist measures offer real solutions. The Municipal Socialist Alliance calls for immediate mass social housing construction, expropriation of giant landlords, and free public transit. We seek repair of our schools, and a cut of the police budget by at least 50%. We demand a climate justice agenda based on making the polluters pay to clean up their mess. We call for replacement of the "strong mayor" powers with a grassroots participatory budget process.

We insist on steep taxation of the properties of big business and the rich. It is time to tear down the waterfront blight known as the Gardiner Expressway and construct a pedestrian and bike friendly boulevard -- instead of investing billions more to repair the Gardiner. Increase green space to fight climate change. Repair the Science Centre in Don Mills. No private spa at Ontario Place. More park land, not parking spaces. "We will continue to protest violence perpetrated by Toronto police. We will continue to stand with marginalized communities. And we will continue to demand De-fund the Police.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford says don’t vote for anyone who wants to cut the police budget. We say: Don’t vote for anyone who voted for the police budget. Let’s build community power, working class power, from the bottom up. Organize and fight for fundamental change.

Several past and present MPs and city councillors are running for Toronto mayor, including so-called progressives. It is important to review their track record. They voted repeatedly to preserve capitalist power and privilege. Again, they offer vague slogans and vacuous themes. “An Affordable, Safer and Caring City.” Who doesn’t want that? But without militant mass action against the governments and corporations of the super-rich, nothing is possible. Struggle decides, not careerist politicians. Fortunately, there is a working class radical alternative to the same-old, same-old. I represent a united front of social justice activists and the left, the Municipal Socialist Alliance. We are building a grassroots movement for revolutionary change. We strive for a Workers’ Government at every level -- a vital step towards the socialist transformation of society.

Join us. Vote Socialist. Vote Kiri Vadivelu for mayor!"