Editor's note: BarrieToday is providing our readers with profiles on the federal candidates in the Simcoe-Grey riding, which has boundaries that abut the City of Barrie's western edge. The riding includes Essa Township and the village of Angus. For more local coverage on the federal election, visit our Canada Votes 2021 page.
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Nationalism and a desire for less government brought Adam Minatel to the People’s Party of Canada, and nearly two years of pandemic-related restrictions helped him decide to run for the local MP's seat.
“I just want choice, I’m not anti-anything,” said Minatel, the Simcoe-Grey PPC candidate in the Sept. 20 federal election. “I’m running because I truly want my freedom of choice back. I want to live my life without government interference. I’m running so my children can have the same freedoms I had two years ago.”
The 33-year-old father of three lives in Tottenham. He is married to a nurse and he works as both an electrical foreman and a motor control instructor for the Joint Apprenticeship Council.
He joined the PPC two years ago as a member because he said the party platform aligns with his own beliefs.
“There is no conservative party but the PPC,” he said. “If you want your freedoms, if you truly want Canada back, we’re the only party bringing that.”
Minatel is advocating against government mandates and vaccine passports.
“No more mandates,” he said. “No mandating masks on my children when I don’t want them to wear a mask … I don’t want them coerced into getting a vaccine they don’t need. It’s my decision, I would like to give them my values and explain to them what’s going on and what this is.”
Minatel said he is not against vaccines, but refers to himself as pro-choice.
“I would like our country to have the freedom to choose,” he said. “If it’s the wrong decision, we pay the consequences, but no more coercion.”
He said he wants the choice to walk into a store without wearing a mask.
"It's money and it's freedom, that's what I stand for," said Minatel.
The local PPC candidate is frustrated by government spending.
“I don’t want the government to be spending my money abroad,” he said. “I’m a nationalist, and I believe in Canada helping Canadians first, before you spend money in foreign countries.”
He said the free market should dictate the economy and the current government spending is contributing to inflation, which is destroying the Canadian dollar.
“I don’t like that the media is extremely biased and paid for by the government and they are just given money on a weekly, monthly basis by the federal government, and it destroys free enterprise,” said Minatel. “There’s no reason why we have to keep spending money. Allow the free market, the free people to dictate the economy.”
The PPC was formed by Maxime Bernier in 2018 after he resigned from the Conservative Party of Canada.
There were no PPC candidates elected in the 2019 federal election, but that hasn’t deterred Minatel.
“It seems like it’s structured in a way that people won’t think we’ll win, so they don’t vote for us because we can’t win. But that’s not true. We have a lot of support,” said Minatel. “Anybody who goes in – Trudeau, O’Toole – they’re all the same. We’re the only one different.”
Minatel is one of six candidates running in the federal election for Simcoe-Grey. The other five candidates include Terry Dowdall (Conservative), Ken Stouffer (Christian Heritage Party), Lucas Gillies (NDP), Nick Clayton (Green Party), and Bren Munro (Liberal).
The federal election is Sept. 20, with advance voting beginning Sept. 10.
