Today my little team canvassed London Road. There were five of us doing the work of five thousand.    

It’s hard work.

I’ve got to tell my life story in two minutes. Explain why I am running in another two minutes. And then ask permission to put my lawn sign on their property.

Five minutes minimum but often I am on the doorstep for 15 minutes.

There are no shortcuts.

Engaging with the voters takes time

I explain. I listen. I engage. The voters have got to get to know me.

I make my case to an entranced listener who, at the end of my spiel, asks penetrating questions before saying they don’t take signs. Not for anyone. I scream inside silently.

This happens more than once.

I meet a man who warns there are dangers in elected office. He says he was threatened many years ago when he blew the whistle on a man who was dumping toxic water into Lake Ontario. He was threatened. He is told it only takes $20,000 and we’d make sure your brains would be blown out.

I laugh at this. I tell him I wear an invisible Police Officer’s uniform. No-one is going to threaten me.

I spend as much time with the voters as it takes.

Speed dating

This is not speed dating. It’s gotta be slow and measured.  

People want to know who I am. Why am I running? Why am I knocking on their door? What am I going to do for them?

I’ve got to answer these questions head on. Without appearing weird or confrontational, impatient or bored.

Breathless

Our new Conservative MPP, Dawn Gallagher Murphy, breathlessly boasts that she knocked on 25,000 doors in the Provincial election campaign earlier this year. She says her team knocked on 5,000 doors in three days!

That is 5,000 doors in 4,320 minutes. Or 52 seconds per door.

Whoa!

Not so fast, Dawn. Don’t rush. 

Take it slow. Get to know your voters.

Ford appointee and Office Manager

Dawn probably gets through the preliminaries by saying she was a Ford appointee and worked as the former Office Manager for Christine Elliott. And she is pure PC.

But that would have taken at least 45 seconds, leaving very little time for anything else. No time to ask the voters for their opinions on anything. 

And what about Tom? 

We know he keeps a list of past contacts, going back to 2018. And four years later he wants to get to know them again.

Gordon Prentice 5 October 2022