Harry Smith Is Coming for Stephen Harper

[Oscar]

Harry Smith Is Coming for Stephen Harper

[ http://thetyee.ca/News/2015/03/21/Harry ... ign=210315 ]

The 92-year-old anti-austerity campaigner, a UK sensation, sets his sights on Canada.

By Jeremy J. Nuttall, March 21, 2015 TheTyee.ca

A sparkling-clean nation where everyone willingly paid their taxes is the Canada that Harry Leslie Smith remembers choosing as a place to raise his family and live his life decades ago.

Now, at 92, Smith has become a sensation in the United Kingdom for his opinion pieces and memoir Harry's Last Stand, in which he draws parallels between his brutal childhood in the U.K. and where the western world is headed today as government austerity grips many of its countries.

Smith, who splits his time between Canada and Yorkshire, was recently asked by the U.K. Labour Party to be a spokesman for its campaign in advance of the May 7 election. He now finds himself in the midst of a gruelling speaking tour, travelling through 30 cities in 50 days, to rally the fight against austerity and corporate greed.

When that's done, Smith told The Tyee, he will be returning to Canada to do the same, in a ''full-tilt'' effort on his part to help oust Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

''He is really, to me, the worst prime minister that ever existed,'' Smith said over the phone from Manchester, pausing for a drink of water. ''Since Harper has come into power, everything has gone downhill. He has one consideration, and that is to let the rich get richer and the poor fend for themselves.''

Smith said the ''epidemic'' of child poverty in Toronto, government service cutbacks, and tax loopholes used by corporations are some of the most concerning threats facing the country today.

- - - SNIP - - -

Smith said he will tour the country in the run-up to the Canadian election, delivering speeches aimed at youth about the perils of austerity and attacks on government services.

He said young people in Canada need to realize their futures are at risk if they don't oust Harper and vote in someone with ''compassion'' who cares about them.

His upcoming speech at the Broadbent Institute's Progress Summit, starting Thursday in Ottawa, will touch on some of these themes.

Smith was originally to appear in person to deliver a speech at the progressive conference, but the request for him to support the Labour Party pulled him back to England, and he will now speak via video.

The touring will begin once Smith returns to Canada, and he said he's ''looking forward to seeing the back of that monster,'' Harper.

He stressed that warning young Canadians about their inaction risks the return to an uncivilized, brutish reality -- one festering with poverty and indifference to those drowning in it.

For Smith, that reality is long ago, but not forgotten.

''We were a generation of people who received nothing and we had to fend for ourselves to improve our standard of living," he said. "But it was much easier for us than it is for the young people of today.”

- - - -

Jeremy J. Nuttall is The Tyee's Parliament Hill reporter in Ottawa.

[Oscar]

Six Wisdoms from Tyee's Evening with Harry Smith

[ http://thetyee.ca/Tyeenews/2015/07/09/6 ... ign=090715 ]

Anti-austerity campaigner continues his Canadian tour. Here's a taste.

By Jes Hovanes, 9 Jul 2015, TheTyee.ca

'Austerity will spell the end of democracy, unless we the people take back our right to a dignified life through the pragmatic protection of the social welfare state.' - Harry Leslie Smith

MORE:

[ http://thetyee.ca/Tyeenews/2015/07/09/6 ... ign=090715 ]