Innisfail Mayoral Candidate Stands up for Small Businesses Being Ruined by lockdowns

Innisfail mayoral candidate Glen Carritt is taking a political stand in the small Albertan town against overbearing lockdown measures by actively running against them in his campaign.

Carritt is both an Innisfail town councilor as well as the president and founder of the pro-oil and gas advocacy group United We Roll, which has organized trucker convoys to Ottawa in order to protest the carbon tax, and various other climate change policies from the Liberal government.

Now Carritt is focusing his efforts on helping to save small businesses in Innisfail by running for mayor in order to ease the restrictions and the severity of enforcement of lockdown orders in the town.

The issue became particularly important in Innisfail after the barbershop Blades to Fadez announced that in spite of lockdown orders which are obligating them to stay closed, they were going to open up due to the risk of going bankrupt during the lockdown.

In a post on Facebook, the owners of Blades to Fadez stated that:

After abiding by all mandatory rules set in place and applying for the promised government grants, we received nothing…Our lives have been severely impacted by a closure of personal services and yet there was not one documented case in our industry.

Regardless of the outcome of new or lifted restrictions, we will stand up for our (livelihood). I consider this a mandatory mental health service.

Just a day later Carritt himself moved to support them, rallying the community online to support Blades to Fadez’s ability to maintain their business.

This is a risk as Carritt, being an Innisfail town councillor, could potentially be held responsible for encouraging people to break the lockdown orders, but in an interview with The National Telegraph Carritt said, “I’m not encouraging anyone to break the law but I am simply supporting a small business owner who would go bankrupt if they didn’t open up in a safe manner.” 

Although for context the entire Innisfail town council except Carritt supported a violation of lockdown and social distancing orders back in June when they encouraged the BLM protest on the 13th.

Along with Carritt’s support for small businesses in Innisfail he also put out a letter on Facebook addressed to Alberta Premier Jason Kenney laying out his problems with the way the lockdowns are imposed on businesses without evidence they are exasperating COVID-19 transmissions.

When speaking to The National Telegraph Carritt highlighted the need for COVID-19 lockdown to recognize that life for the vast majority of Alberta’s cannot simply stop in order to abide by the government’s rules.

Carritt explained that “Premier Kenney needs to consider all the hard facts and get these businesses open so they don’t have to make the decision between breaking the law and survival.”

Carritt does have support within the community, when a local Alberta paper had negatively covered his support for Blades to Fadez many commented online in support of him.

One comment read, “So to change the narrative of this article, the headline should have read… ‘Glen Carritt – A Man Standing up for His Town and the People that Live There!’…Has a way better ring to it.

Some residents of course do not like small businesses trying to reopen. Carritt maintains that, although laws should be followed, small businesses cannot be sacrificed in order to not rework the laws to be more sensible.

Carritt just this morning resigned from the Innisfail town council citing a conflict between not being able to encourage businesses to open while on the council and knowing that the businesses need support or they may not make it through the lockdowns if the community does not organize for them.

Carritt said that “Everybody feels there’s going to be no end to this, and quite frankly, these people are going broke. They have to start taking care of themselves. I encourage more people to do the same.”