It's been a precedent-setting election campaign for the Greens as they saw their leader, Elizabeth May, participating in the televised federal debates for the first time ever and popular support surge compared to the last time Canadians went to the polls, in 2006.
For Toronto Centre Green Party candidate Ellen Michelson, the fall vote represents another first - her first ever campaign. Michelson, a retired Toronto teacher, picks up the reins from Chris Tindal, a two-time former candidate in the riding and now a party strategist and media spokesperson.
Speaking exclusively with
CityNews.ca on the roof of her campaign headquarters the Good Tymez Café on Dundas St. E., which Michelson jokes supporters want to rebrand the 'Green Tymez Café,' she explains that voters have been very receptive to the party's platform.
"It's been very exciting. There's been so much support," she enthuses. "The Green Party brings smiles to people's faces. You say, 'Hi, I'm Ellen Michelson, I'm your Green Party candidate.' And people say, 'Oh, that's wonderful, so glad you're doing this.' (Not everybody is) a Green Party supporter but so many people, as we knock on doors or as we go down the street, are just so happy to see us."
Michelson commented that the voters she's spoken to were impressed by May's performance, notably in the debates.
"People stop us, and that's one of the things they talk about, saying 'Didn't she do well in the debates? So excited she had that opportunity.' So we've been getting a lot of positive feedback about that," Michelson notes. "There's been tremendous progress, huge steps forward (in this campaign)."
In fact if you're looking at numbers popular support for the party is about double what it was two years ago, and at the dissolution of Parliament the Greens even had an MP: Blair Wilson in the B.C. riding of West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, who was elected as a Liberal then sat briefly as an Independent before joining the Green Party.
"I think the message is getting out there and people can see what the Green Party has to offer the country, and how much of the difference it will really make to Canada," Michelson says. She contends the days of the Greens being considered a one-issue party are long gone.
"People are aware now that we have a full platform, fully costed, and all the different important issues relate to one another."
The Toronto Centre candidate, who's running against Liberal incumbent Bob Rae, Conservative David Gentili, and the NDP's El-Farouk Khaki, says the contentious and much-discussed issue of strategic voting to unseat the Conservatives is a "non-issue" in her riding, where Rae is a clear front-runner. However she did speak on the matter, calling it a "fall-back" position for parties worried about their own numbers.
"They say, 'Just once, hold your nose and vote for us,'" she explains. "And it's nice now to have the Green Party as so important that people can vote with their minds and their hearts for what they want."