Pierre Poilievre tours Vancouver Island with campaign style stops

The leader of the federal Conservatives is touring Vancouver Island, making his pitch to voters ahead of the next election.

Pierre Poilievre was on Vancouver Island Tuesday in full blown campaign mode, touring two blue collar businesses and mining for votes ahead of a federal election expected in weeks.

“I think Vancouver Islanders are ready to have a common-sense conservative government that will crack down on crime, axe the taxes, incentive more home building,” he told CTV Tuesday.

The Federal Conservative has already paid multiple visits to the island as leader, even though his party doesn’t hold any of its seven seats. His party has 14 MPs in B.C.

“When you’ve got a party riding this huge wave of popularity - both nationally and provincially - he’s got to like that he’s going to turn at least half of this island blue,” said UVic political scientist, Michael Prince.

Poilievre weighed in on Tuesday on U.S. president elect Trump’s taunts of taking over Canada with economic force.

“[I’d] make it clear every day and every way that Canada will never be the 51st state - we are a proud independent sovereign country,” he said.

On Trump’s looming tariff threats, he didn’t say specifically whether he’d support export bans on Canadian goods or energy - like premier Eby has suggested – but did say he’d push back.

“First, I’m going to pass massive ‘bring it home’ tax cuts that incentivize businesses to hire more people and build more here in this country,” he said.

“I will retaliate against any tariffs the Americans impose on us to deter them from attacking our economy.”

Poilievre was asked whether a Conservative government would continue with current Federal funding for B.C., including for childcare.

“We want to know what has actually reached the people on the ground. Sure, there’s lots of spending, but who’s actually getting the money? We want to make sure the money doesn’t just get eaten up by bureaucracy,” he said, noting he’d rather put the money in people’s pockets and let them decide how to spend it.

Poilievre will be in B.C. until Friday.