When Bradford resident Brent Fellman realized he wasn’t comfortable voting for any of the political parties in the upcoming provincial election on June 2, he decided to do some research. What the president of the Innisfil Minor Baseball Association found was a party that represented him well in the New Blue Party of Ontario.
“I don’t see a lot of differences between the political options,” said Fellman. “With the provincial politics the way they are right now, it’s almost completely shifted to the left side of the equation. The Liberals and NDPs are far-left parties and now the Progressive Conservatives lean left anyway.
“To me, the PC Party isn’t really a conservative party, and I’ve always been a conservative supporter. I don’t find they (the PC Party) support my conservative views anymore. I was looking around for other options and that’s when I heard about the New Blue.”
Without a candidate in York-Simcoe, Fellman decided rather than wait for someone else to step into the role, he could be the one to run for the people in the area who feel the same way he does about the current political options.
“The reason I chose to actually run with them is because they have an organized approach and they plan on running candidates in almost every riding in Ontario (they currently have 112 of 124 ridings filled),” he said. “They basically want to replace the PC Party, that’s their goal.”
Along with serving as the president of the Innisfil Minor Baseball Association, Fellman has coached basketball, hockey, and baseball for years in the community and serves as a teacher for the Simcoe County Board of Education in the winter while working road construction in the summer.
Although not officially the candidate for York-Simcoe yet as he awaits to be ratified by Election Ontario, the New Blue Party of Ontario has made Fellman their representative for the riding.
“To get ratified, I have to get signatures for Elections Ontario and so I’ve been calling people I haven’t seen in years and getting into discussions,” he said. “The experience so far has been great. I’ve been meeting a lot of new people too and connecting with people who have similar viewpoints.
“It’s funny how when you start talking to people you can see how frustrated they are with the direction things are going. There are a lot of like-minded people who do not approve of all these mandates and lockdowns. It’s been a terrible experience for a lot of people and they don’t really have a voice.”
Potentially representing York-Simcoe, Fellman knows the Bradford Bypass is one of the hottest topics for the area and he plans to prioritize ensuring that if built, every environmental precaution possible is taken.
“I’ve been investigating the Bradford Bypass. It looks like it’s probably inevitable, but I was talking to the environmental controller there and asking her how it could be assured that it’s good for the environment,” he said. “It’s going through sensitive areas by Lake Simcoe and I want to know how the environment will be protected. Also, I live close to where it’s being built and noise will be an issue.
“I’m encouraging them to not use concrete barriers and to use land mounds so that trees and vegetation can grow. I think you’ll get a better sound barrier that way too. We have to look at the aesthetics of the area, the environmental impacts, and make sure the materials being used are up to date. A lot of the planning was done a long time ago so we need to make sure they’re up to date with environmental procedures.”
One of the pillars of the New Blue Party’s platform is to stand against the current government moving into another lockdown if the pandemic were to see a spike in cases again.
“The main reason I got involved in this is to make sure human rights are protected,” Fellman said. “COVID mandates would be a major focus because one of the fears is that the government will end up shutting down businesses again at some point. We’re concerned they will institute lockdowns again if there’s a new variant, and what I’ve heard from businesses is that this can’t happen anymore.
“We have to live with this now and businesses have no more room to deal with lockdowns. The ones that survived the last two years are in severe debt. We can’t close things down anymore."
The New Blue Party of Ontario describes itself as an “anti-establishment centre-right political party,” and was first formed in 2020. It’s led by Jim Karahalios, the husband of Belinda Karahalios, the Party’s first Member of Provincial Parliament (she currently serves the riding of Cambridge).
Originally elected as a member of the PC Party, Belinda Karahalios was expelled from the Party’s caucus in July of 2020 by Premier Doug Ford after voting against Bill 195, the Reopening Ontario (A Flexible Response to COVID-19) Act—a Bill that would expand the government’s emergency authority during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Belinda Karahalios called the Bill an, “unnecessary overreach on our parliamentary democracy.” This ultimately led to her and her husband Jim Karahalios forming the New Blue Party of Ontario—it was officially registered as a party by Elections Ontario on January 7, 2021.
To learn more about the New Blue Party and Fellman’s candidacy, the York-Simcoe New Blue Party Facebook page can be found here.
