Call her the great Green hope.

Despite a strong showing in the 2004 and 2006 federal elections, the Green Party was still confined to the margins of politics in Canada. Their leader had been excluded from the television debates and coverage of the party’s platform and campaign events was limited to the digest section of major newspapers, or ignored altogether save for the independent and local press.

Then Elizabeth May announced she was running for the Green Party leadership. It was a moment that captured national attention in a manner the party had rarely been able to between election cycles.

“My launch as a candidate for the Green Party got more media coverage than the announcements of five Liberal Party leadership candidates combined,” May told the Fitzhugh in an interview from her Ottawa home. “Hopefully, the media will continue to show interest.”

May is not a household name, unless the household in question is full of committed environmentalists or conservation-minded Canadians. The former executive director of the Sierra Club of Canada recognizes as much.

“I don’t have the national recognition of a David Suzuki… I mean, I’m not delusional, but I do have the advantage of having decades of exposure to the media and in the media. If I’m elected leader, I’ll bring the party credibility right away.”

It’s this sense of credibility that May believes to be key to her strategy to achieve a long-held goal for the Green Party — electing a Member of Parliament. Unlike her most significant opponent, two-time Ottawa Centre candidate and deputy party leader David Chernushenko, May hopes to put MPs in the House of Commons in the next election. Chernushenko advocates a more gradual, two-election strategy.

“I think we have to achieve that much faster,” May said. “We can’t afford a two-election cycle plan, especially if the Harper government forms a majority in the next election. If that happens, so much damage could be done to the status quo and many programs I value and I think Canadians value. I’m burdened by a much greater sense of urgency.”

Achieving that end will involve much more than simply saying it must be so, and May has ideas about what needs to happen in order to get there.

“We need to be in the next debates, we need to be polling at much higher levels before the next writ is dropped,” she said.

May cites current poll numbers that put the Greens at 9 per cent, roughly equivalent to the Bloc Quebecois. She wants to see that figure up to at least 15 per cent, equal to the low ebb of estimated NDP support during the last election campaign. Convincing more Canadians that the Greens are a party worth voting for depends on maintaining a sense of enthusiasm and momentum, May said. With that in mind, her post-leadership election plan calls for a series of policy conferences that would take place all over the country.

“These conferences would not only improve our platform, they would provide the greatest nexus for the brightest and best policy minds in the country,” she said. “I want to invite these people to present papers and policy suggestions in a public session so that gives our members grist for the mill and sets the Green Party apart as an exciting option for all Canadians, one that takes a different approach.”

Even if she is elected leader of the party, May won’t have the final word on strategy, whether in terms of policy conventions, or regarding election plans. That power rests with the national council, which is also being selected by party membership at the August convention where May, Chernushenko and third candidate Jim Fannon will go head-to-head. The leader will have some sway, however.

“I’ll advocate for an approach towards election readiness right away, but it will be a plan that can last over the course of two years,” May said. The push for election preparation as a first priority comes from a very practical consideration. The current Conservative government is a minority, and delicately balanced Parliaments rarely last for an entire four-year term. Even if it might benefit the Green Party to avoid a quick election sometime this fall or winter, May has her fingers crossed.

“For the sake of the country, I hope Harper has less than two years,” she said.

May might direct plenty of righteous anger towards the Conservatives, but she’s not pleased with the state of Canadian politics in general.

“Focus is sadly lacking in federal politics,” she said. “The Green Party represents a new politics, where we move past the old definitions of left and right. My favourite quote about this is from Bill Good from CKNW Radio in Vancouver… he said ‘it’s not about left and right, it’s about right and wrong.’ That’s how I’d like to position the Green Party of Canada.”

May’s background with the Sierra Club of Canada puts her in a good position to comment on the current state of the national parks system. She doesn’t paint a pretty picture.

“I don’t know how many people noticed that the words national parks didn’t appear anywhere in the Conservative election platform,” she said. “It’s a concern for us. If nobody in government cares about the national parks, then no one cares about completing the system and protecting the existing parks.”

Under May’s direction, the Sierra Club opposed the creation of the Parks Canada Agency, and traveling further back in time, was against the inclusion of Parks in the federal Heritage ministry. These high-level decisions about the most efficient way to manage the parks has had a discernable impact on their operations, May said.

“There are some subtle and some not so subtle things that happen when you ignore that the primary purpose of national parks is preserving ecological integrity,” she said. “The tourist revenue they create has to be secondary.”

Much like Chernushenko, May is a believer in the “buffer areas” approach, a policy plank for the Green Party that calls for the creation of protected areas around national parks. Had such a policy been in place already, the Cheviot mine project would never have gone ahead, May observed.

“Now there’s this scar that’s now on this landscape which is considerable and it will never go back to the way it once was.”

National parks and the environment is just one area that May feels the traditional political players are ignoring, and if she’s elected leader, she promises to hold those federal faces to account. Anytime she’s not organizing one of her planned series of policy conventions, which she hopes will be monthly events, May intends to be in Parliament.

“Of course, I’ll only have a seat in the gallery for now, but I’ll have regular press conferences, and with Harper ignoring the media, maybe they’ll have the time to interview me.”

But what if she’s not elected leader? May admits that her level of involvement with the party would be uncertain in that case.

“I’d want to be actively involved, but my first priority if not elected would be to get a job because I’m unemployed right now and surviving on a loan,” she said. “I was unable in my previous role (with the Sierra Club) to play an active, partisan role as a party member, but after becoming one, there’s no going back.”

She might be an Ottawa resident now, but whenever the writ is dropped, May plans to run for Parliament in Cape Breton, her original home. This would be an example of her intended approach to the question of the central party identifying candidates to run in certain key ridings. 

“I’m sure there are high profile people out there who can be persuaded to run for the Green Party,” she said. “The dream scenario, no doubt, would be to have David Suzuki running in Vancouver.”

Still, May believes it’s vitally important to have strong local riding associations running grassroots campaigns and local candidates throughout the country.

“I want to see a great slate of candidates all across the country that are supported with locally-run campaigns,” she said. “That reflects the Green Party ethic much more than centralization.”

For these campaigns to run smoothly, May knows they need two things — money and people.

“We could be doing much more fundraising before elections,” she said. “The $1.79 per vote we earn is a good base, but we need to build from that.”

As for membership, the Greens have blossomed from 5,000 strong before the leadership campaign to a total of more than 8,500 today. It’s growth like that that has May convinced she could lead the party to the promised land of Parliament.

“I don’t see any reason why it can’t happen.”