Brigitte Pellerin in Canada’s Journal of Ideas:
If politicians chose to take federalism seriously, they would not spend their time and energy dreaming up national economic or social programs that always seem to pit one part of the country against the others.
Canada was created as a federation for a reason. We should try letting it work as intended sometime.
FOR EVERY DOLLAR spent on the myriad social spending programs which entangle Canada, only 15 cents actually goes to poor people. The rest goes to the middle and upper classes, and ‘administration costs’.
Do you not find it strange that Canada was formed at a conferance in PEI and it didn’t join.
Canada died 24 June 04 and the turkey’s we got now cannot resurect it.Our problem is politicans. The biggest oxymoron ” honest politician”.
I grew up hearing that Canada was a Confederation not a Federation. I was even told that Confederation happened in PEI. Could my teachers have been wrong and Trudeau correct?
One of the reasons Harper is becoming popular in Quebec is because he is beginning to return to the idea and practice of the original confederation much to the dismay of the socialist elites in Ontario.
Actually Ontario and Quebec have used Ottawa as a choke or throttle on the development of the rest of the nation since the National Policy of John A.
Their trick is slow down, or impede a regions development, like the Maritimes where it took 25 yrs for east coast oil to come ashore, until the only true Canadians, Ontario and Quebec, can get the majority slice of the economic action.
The Canadian Wheat Board remained compulsory after WW II because Ottawa used it to transfer massive amounts of Prairie agricultural wealth to Ont and Que.
In actual fact, Trudeau’s NEP tornado on the western oil industry was mickey mouse compared to the 50 years of destruction of the West by Ottawa thru the CWB.
As a lady once said, No problem is ever settled until it is settled right.
CANADA IS NOT NOW WAS NEVER INTENDED TO BE A FEDERATION!! WE ARE A CONFEDERATION IN CONSTITUTION AND CONVENTION!
I fundamentally disagree with everything MsPellerin has to say…including her historic revisionism.
However the true architect of Canada;s constitution ( the BNA act) was Lord Monk…a skilled and visionary parliamentarian he saw that power corrupts and concentrated power corrupts absolutely….they gave the provinces sovereignty within right so the federal governing body would never get too big or intrusive for the country to manage.
I also reject Pellerin’s assertion that left to their opwn “devoces” provinces would pursue their own interests…well duuuukhhhh…I hope so…and secondly it is easier for the people to control a local government to assure compliance with popular will than it is a isolated unaccountable cabal 200 mile away.
Federalism is for republics…we are not a republic we are a consentual confederation and it makes us freer than Americans in many ways…it makes us closer to the swiss way of governing.
If anything there should be more decentralization as Ottawa “progressives” are now actively pursuing a transnationalist UN one world agenda which threatens our sovereignty and our individual democratic empowerments.
I trust my provincial government far more than the feds…because I can make a bigger racket if the local polis screw me.
BTW: Centralized power was the keystone of 2 of the worlds worst political ideals…communism and Fascism…2 control freak feudelist systems which differ only in the method of stealing private productivity.
Even the republic which have a autoratative paramountcy of federal government over many issues, still concede state’s rights effectively creating a division on power and stopping it from concentrating in one governing body.
I don’t know where Ms Pellerin is coming from with her cheer leading for centralized governance but I suspect she has no idea that centralized power has been the most disasterous experiment in governing mankind has ever created. It is a concept at odds with the premise of free independent societies.
Nothwithstanding the scaremongering of some by comparing Canada to centralized fascist and communist states, Canada’s confederation structure already makes us the most decentralized nation in the developed world. We are far far away from the unitary states of much more populous nations and we don’t even have an equivalent of the US interstate commerce clause which would be of great benefit to the economy.
Our highly regionalized and very decentralized constitutional structure makes sense given the wide expanse and regional disparities. But for all its benefits, it does put us at a distinct disadvantage in the world at large and it is very much more costly and inefficient, with a ton of expenses relating to overlapping jurisdictions, duplication of government administrations from province to province (14 Ministries of Health in Canada, 1 in France and 1 in Italy (the best two healthcare nations in the world (which also both allow private health insurance but that is another story).
There is a somewhat sublime balance in our constitution: the provinces have significant expenditures but the feds hold the purse strings. That should keep each other in check. Time gone by, the federal government and provincial governments used to bring each other to court over jurisdictions. Seems to me that is more sensible than Harper’s musings about constitutional reform.
If the provinces don’t like federal incursions into provincial jurisdiction than don’t take the federal money. It’s pretty simple. And that was the genius design of the constitution.
What many are ignoring is that the deep structural organization of Canada has changed.
The governance structure set up by the Liberals post WWII was a structure that acknowledged that the population and economic base of Canada (pop 11 million) was focused in Ontario-Quebec (8 million, 4 million each). The rest of the country (3 million) was irrelevant and focused in resource extraction rather than manufacturing (fisheries on the east, wheat in the prairies). The structure that was set up was a centralist govt focused around these two provinces.
Post WWII immigration changed the demographics. And as post WWII economics moved out of basic resource extraction and into manufacturing – the economic mode changed.
Quebec francophones moved off the rural farm and into cities – and began to insist on more francophone powers. Quebec’s economy had been run by anglophones because of that rural-urban split. But when francophones finally moved off the farm – this changed. This was the 1960-80 period.
Francophones required urban employment and political power – and they were angry at its non-existence. The federal govt responded by a massive influx of federal bureaucratic head offices in Montreal and Hull and increasing the size of the federal bureaucracy to employ urban francophones, by setting up industries in Quebec, by funding universities to employ francophones and so on. The money for this came from Ontario and the West. And, Quebec francophones politically empowered themselves within language rights.
In Ontario, the massive immigration influx meant that the Liberals had to develop new tactics to maintain political control of these new people to maintain that money that was maintaining Quebec. They did this by multiculturalism, which isolated new immigrants.
The tactics were geared to maintain the centralism of Canada, focused around Ontario and Quebec. The Liberals have never been able to move out of this basic structure – a major fault.
They set up Quebec as fragile, as unstable, with its people as consistently threatening to break up the country because Ottawa’s Liberals and the old economic domination of anglophones in Quebec were slow to empower francophones. And they set up Ontario as enslaved, defined as the Savior of the country by its House of Commons primacy of seats and its willingness to ‘placate’ Quebec with massive funding of industries, city infrastructure (Montreal’s subway system), roads, education (Quebec has more universities than Ontario but only 2/3 of the population) etc.
Essentially, they were setting up Quebec as financially dependent on the federal government, reducing francophone economics to small businesses. Quebec’s massive taxation, its unions focused around a worker rather than entrepreneurial population, contributed to this moulding of Quebecers into an economy dependent on federal money and big federally funded corporations.
Then, they maintained control over the immigration influx into Ontario by setting up a balkanized and dependent immigration population who were made to understand, clearly, that they could ‘keep their culture and beliefs’, ie, they could live – within the Liberal policies of multiculturalism.
The Liberals have ignored changes to this centralist structure of control of the population.
The east coast fisheries collapsed and instead of enabling local adaptations, depopulation and reorganization, the Liberals made the east dependent on bureaucratic makework projects (such as the gun registry located in the maritimes).
The Liberals have totally ignored the West, to the extent of defining it as ‘unCanadian’ and ‘more American’.
Indeed, the 1980’s era of Trudeau saw Ottawa’s Liberals deliberately reduce the power of the West by crippling its economy with the NEP and Wheat Board – which took Western profits to pay for funding the big industries in Quebec.
The Charter, the definitive doctrine of the Liberals, set up this basic Liberal structure of Ontario-Quebec and Ontario as balkanized and sealed this structure into law. But – Canadian demographics and the economy have changed beyond the Charter’s outline of Canada.
Quebec’s francophones have matured and are able to take control of their own economy; they aren’t dependent on the control by funding head offices and industries of Ottawa. The Liberals are still operating in the old ‘sovereignty or else’ mindset.
And Ontario is fed up with placating Quebec – and fed up and frightened by its own balkanization. It has been brainwashed to accept all immigrants as ‘equal’; all beliefs and behaviour as ‘equal’ – but – people may not articulate it, but they know this is untrue.
And – the economic dynamics of Canada have changed. The West has emerged, both demographically and economically. The West has the same population as Quebec – but 11 fewer seats in the House of Commons.
Quebec and Ontario are no longer equal in population as they were a generation ago. Ontario has surged forward to 12 million, while Quebec has only 7 million. Quebec is no longer dependent on federal jobs but is able to employ its population and develop its own industries. Ontario is in trouble, ideologically and economically and must break out of being the Slave of a central govt. The West is ‘there’ and can’t be used as a bank for eastern interests.
Canada’s basic demographic and economic structure has dramatically changed. Its political structure must adapt.
“Nothwithstanding the scaremongering of some by comparing Canada to centralized fascist and communist states, Canada’s confederation structure already makes us the most decentralized nation in the developed world.”
BS Ted…Switzeland is the most decentralized…as for “scaremongering….show me where the concentration of national power has ever produced anything but a tyranny or corruption.
“If the provinces don’t like federal incursions into provincial jurisdiction than don’t take the federal money. It’s pretty simple.”
Typical revisionist pap. And rewriting realities is always “simple” for partisan sycophants.
The fact is that the feds vacuum the revenues out of the province in remittance process( quite unconstitutionally according to the SCC in Refina VS Lord Nelson 1950) and redistibution of this ill-gotten gain was devolved to patronage payola under librano federal patronage broker cartels.
I can see the howls fro Federal collectivists if Alberta decided to arbitrarily pay for its own health care, pensions and police force and kept the revenues to fill these bugets remitting the remainder to Ottawa….McSquinty and Cherest would be whining for the feds to go into Alberta and steal more equalization.
Ted…you confederal and constitutional insight must come from the fact you suffer from rectal-cranial dysplasia. ;-P
The scaremongering, WL, is implied in warning that any further centralization will lead to fascism or communism. With maybe the Swiss as an exception, there are no other less centralized countries in the western world, including the US. You may not like the nanny state that has developed in the west but the US and Britain and others sure have been around a very long time and resisted falling into a totalitarian state.
So the very very decentralized Canada is even less likely too despite your scaremongering.
WL: who’s revising history now?
The constitution is pretty clear. It allows the federal government to raise income taxes, but not the provinces. The provinces are not without revenues: they can tax civil properties and do so (at least outside of Alberta) or resources like Alberta. If they are overspending their own tax base and whining to the feds for more, is this Ottawa’s fault or the provinces?
In answer to your question Ted the fault lies with Ottawa. Years ago Alberta had a very effective Medical system where the people paid some of the expense and the government paid the rest. Ottawa taxed the people of Alberta and told the provincial government that unless they adopted Medicare that money would never return. After much soul searching Premier Manning adopted Medicare. Then Premier Lougheed tried to reign in health spending by putting a $5.00 user fee per visit to a doctor. Again Ottawa with held money until that fee was removed. As for your assertion that the provinces overspend have you looked at the federal debt lately?
no, ted, canada is not decentralized; the US is decentralized. Their states have powers that no province has.
Harper is acknowleging the basic structural change that has occurred in Canada. Canada began as decentralized in theory, but, with the economic base in Ontario-Quebec, that power moved to centralize. And, after WWII, centralism became a political strategy.
As I outlined above, centralism became a political and fiscal tactic for dealing with the changing economic mode of Quebec francophones and for dealing with the changing demographics by immigration, of Ontario.
That’s over. Canada is too large, geographically, to be run by an isolated clique in the Ottawa-Montreal corridor. Canada is too economically diverse to be run with the West as The Bank, Ontario as the Old Bank-Appeaser – and the rest of the country with their hands out. And- Quebec has changed and grown. Ontario has been decimated by multicultural balkanization.
Decentralization is the rational, intelligent mode to govern Canada.
By the way, ted, you claim that the provinces don’t have the power to tax their citizen’s incomes? Since when? How come Ontario workers pay Ontario as well as federal income tax? Did you know that Quebec collects its own income taxes?
If Harper is successful in gaining a majority the next election, it will be primarily due to the fact he respects provincial jurisdictions.
The Bloc dropped like a rock because it’s energizedd precisely by the Trudeau centralization, the ‘all are equal, but we are more equal that others’, an unsurprising tactic considering Trudeau’s Roman Catholic background.
And, since the Liberal Party were the authors an promoters of this encroachment into provincial jurisdictions as defined by the BNA Act, the Quebec electorate will also punish them.
Quebec never signed onto Trudeau’s repatriation of 1982 and that has proved to be a wise move, therefore they are subject only to the BNA Act, of which they were a willing signatory.
Quebec should be lionized, not vilified, for standing up to the France-style centralization attempts and Trudeau’s attempts to turn Canada into New France, which was perpetrated by thugs like Chretien.
ET:
Have you ever read the Constitution or looked at the political structures of any other country?
Canada is far far far more decentralized than any state in western world except for the Swiss and we are probably, on balance, about the same as the US – their states have some significant powers (like criminal) that our provinces don’t, but their federal government has some significant powers (like interstate commerce) that our federal government doesn’t.
And you’ve completely made up the history of federal-provincial relations. From the very beginning there has been an argument about whether the BNA meant to set up a strong centralized government or strong decentralized confederation. Our first Prime Minister – a guy by the name of Sir John A. Macdonald – considered it to give a very strong central role to the federal government. It didn’t just happen under Pearson and Trudeau.
Personally, like I said, I think the genius of our Constititution is that, rather than the checks and balances embedded within Congress the way it is in the US, our checks and balances are along federal-provincial lines. We have seen an oscillation back and forth between strong central government and strong provincial government. What is happening now is part of a long long long argument. You could argue just as strongly that with today’s interconnectedness, communications, globalization, etc. that there is even more of a need for a stronger national government than back when we were these disparate regional, agrarian-based self-contained economies. Jim Flaherty, for example, is finally taking on the bizarrely decentralized matrix of provincial securities regulation that suffocates our markets in a way the US would never tolerate, in favour of a single regulator; that would be hugely centralizing and hugely beneficial.
The point is, with each back and forth, the basic Constitutional framework has been shown to basically work.
Now Harper muses about Constitutional changes that are not needed. Like this guy doesn’t have anything else to do? No, this, like everything he does, like the many many many broken promises and abandoned principles, are all geared toward one thing: more power for him and his majority dream.
We responded to Martin’s ludicrous notwithstanding constitutional hail mary by laughing at him and seeing it for the desperate political ploy for votes that it was. This is no different and deserves the same fate.
Set you free:
“Quebec never signed onto Trudeau’s repatriation of 1982 and that has proved to be a wise move, therefore they are subject only to the BNA Act, of which they were a willing signatory.”
Can you tell me which provinces “signed on” to the Constitution Act, 1982? Seems to me there are only two signatures there the last time I looked: Elizabeth’s, Trudeau’s and the Registrar General.
Quebec’s signature was never necessary and they have accepted the Charter and the rest of the Constitution Act 1982 by, among other things, arguing in its favour in court and accepting court decisions not in the government’s favour based on the Charter. Including PQ government’s.
Your lauding of separatists is stunningly ignorant. Levesque and co. were not defending the BNA, they wanted to separate, or in the interim as a stepping stone throw out the BNA and grant more powers the BNA did not give them.
typo: that was obviously meant as three signatures.
ted – we’ve had this argument before. I continue to disagree with you – and yes, I’ve read the constitution and know about the structures of other countries.
The US is more decentralized than Canada; its constitution, for example, gives all ‘unstated powers’ to the states, while Canada’s does the opposite.
We haven’t seen an oscillation between strong central and provincial govts. Canada, when set up, was primarily, economically and demographically, made up of Ontario and Quebec. The 1940 population of 11 million had 8 million of that split between Ontario and Quebec. The post WWII rise in immigration sent most of that to Ontario.
The movement of francophones in Quebec from rural to urban changed the economic and political infrastructure of that province.
Provincial differences (securities regulation) are something that can be worked out within and by the provinces; it doesn’t have to be a central authority. BUT – I think that a central govt should deal with communications, transportation, defense, foreign relations.
Your empty rhetoric about Harper is just that. What many, many, many promises broken? And kindly remember, that a leader has to adapt to contextual realities. No political party or leadership is worth its salt if it defines itself up as pure ideological rhetoric and refuses to adapt that rhetoric to reality. That’s found in communist and fundamentalist states. Perhaps you prefer that mode of governance.
My account of the structure set up from 1960 and on, as a centralist governance focused around Ontario-Quebec, and the balkanization of Ontario, is, in my view, valid. The economic and demographic nature of Canada has changed, and centralism is disastrous.
The electronic global network makes the case, not for centralization, but for decentralization. That is the nature of the complex network; that it consists of aspatial multiple nodes and hubs that can interact with each other without a central authority.
Your sneer at Harper because he wants a majority is juvenile. Do you think that he should instead want a minority? When the Canadian system of governance privileges UNELECTED patronage appointments as having the dominant authority, by virtue of number and power?
Think of the Liberal dominated Senate, judiciary, civil service. In our system, the elected representatives must get a majority simply to deal with the massive unelected appointees in power. Perhaps you think this system of patronage is better than the US and Australia? I disagree.
Australia, for example, long ago dropped the unelected Senate. It is far more democratic than Canada with its massive patronage set.
So- I’ll continue to disagree with your desire for a centralist govt; Canada is too large and diverse. And local power is always best in dealing with issues – not a far-off bureaucrat sitting in Ottawa-montreal.
The structure of Canada has changed, ted. Get used to it.
Actually, ET, you’ve once again decided to substitute your assumption of what I believe for what I say. I’m not arguing a strong central government or a weak central government is better or worse (calling it disastrous is silly rhetoric that belies the economic powerhouse that we currently are).
I am merely pointing out, as someone who spent years looking at this both as an academic and as law student, that the fedederal-provincial fight over jurisdictional boundaries and over whether the intent was a strong or weak central government has been fought from the very moment that Canada was established in 1867. Even the drafters of the constitution bickered horrendously over what it was that they were creating. As I said, there is equally strong arguments on both sides – the opinion of MacDonald, our first PM and a father of confederation, should have some weight in the argument after all.
And while you are right about the presumption given in the US (to states) and Canadian (to the feds) Constitutions, the powers of the interstate commerce provision is very significant and something that the federal government in Canada would love to have and in fact would benefit Canadians enormously. Our current system allows some trade and employment barriers between provinces that we don’t allow with foreign countries!
“Your sneer at Harper because he wants a majority is juvenile. Do you think that he should instead want a minority?”
Having trouble reading again? I sneer not at his desire for a majority, but at his constitutional musings in order to get that majority. Harper is just Martin in younger skin: he’ll do anything and say anything to get more votes. Don’t like my strong opposition to distinct society? OK, I’ll give you nation. Don’t like opposition to federal transfers and programs like the Atlantic Accord? OK, I’ll promise to keep it, then I’ll transfer more money to you and then I’ll break that promise to get a different accord. Don’t like my promise of fiscal restraint? OK, you did and so did I, but my polling shows me that you’ll be more likely to vote for me if I dump millions and millions of dollars on you. Don’t like that I didn’t give a crap about the environment before I got elected, didn’t believe in climate change and opposed carbon emission reductions? OK, I’ll come up with not one, not two but three environmental plans to reduce carbon emissions.
That’s not even grazing the surface of his broken promises: where is that hard wait time guarantees in at least 5 areas (and before you say “that’s not fair, it’s hard to get things done, remember that Harper announced that he DID get this promise done which was a lie)? where is the independent accountability commissioner? where are the increased Sask. border guards? where is that never going to tax income trusts? where is the 5 year ban on lobbying that was promised (and abandoned once Conservative staffers started joining lobby groups)? Where is the promise to allow individual citizens to make complaints to the ethics commissioner (he promised it would be in the Accountability Act)? Where is the ban on “blind management trusts”? Where is the disclosure of Harper’s largest donors or the groups who paid off McKay’s $400,000 campaign debt? What happened to the promise not to compromise on getting the full $5B stolen from Canadian lumbermen by the US?
I could go on. And on. And on.
Sheesh. You’d think this guy had been in power for 13 years or so. Meet the new boss, same as the hold boss but on steroids.
You are indeed arguing for a strong central govt, ted. Your words are “a need for a strong national government” – and you belittle those states that are decentralized.
I agree that the provincial trade and employment barriers aren’t helpful.
You do indeed sneer at Harper’s desire for a majorityl Your words are “broken promises and abandoned principles are all geared toward one thing: more power for him and his majority dream”.
That’s a contemptuous statement.
There’s no comparison between Harper and Martim. Harper has principles; Martin (and Chretien) had none.
The ‘Quebecois as a nation within a united Canada’ was a necessary reaction to Ignatieff and Duceppe’s political agenda of ‘Quebec as a nation’. Kindly note the difference – and kindly understand why he had to do it. Or would you have preferred the Liberal/Bloc Motion?
The Atlantic Provinces were offered an either-or fiscal arrangement to get them out of dependency.
The climate motion was necessary because the people wanted it – but Harper hasn’t changed his rejection of the Kyoto Accord, his rejection of money transfers. His Clean Air Act is to clear up pollution- something Kyotoism is indifferent to. And, if you are a leader and the population wants something – you have to acknowledge that you are elected by THEM. You aren’t a dictator; the people have the power. That is the basis of a democracy.
You obviously prefer a totalitarian dictator who gives ‘the finger’ to the electorate.
No federal govt can change health care wait times; they can give more money to the provinces to do that (which he did) but health care is a provincial issue. In case you’ve forgotten.
The independent accountability commissioner, as you very well know, was indeed named by Harper, but the Liberals/NDP/Bloc screamed against it. Remember? That’s why he needs a majority. Remember?
You know perfectly well that he had to tax income trusts when the banks and other services started to move their monies into income trusts to avoid paying taxes. That would have resulted in an enormous loss of income and the govt would have had to raise personal taxes. Almost all financial experts in the country agree that Harper did the right thing.
Perhaps you prefer a leader who ignores the changing contextual reality and permits the people to suffer the results.
The accountability act was held up for a year by the Senate – and drastically revamped. Put the blame where the blame belongs, ted, on your beloved Liberals.
That’s disgusting. The US didn’t steal 5 billion from Canadians in the softwood dispute. The federal govt, under the Liberals, was SUBSIDIZING the west coast lumber industry by their low stumpage fees. That was the crux of the problem. Of course, your beloved Liberals didn’t inform the public about this illegal subsidization. They instead, with their tactic of anti-Americanism, which they use to bolster their own power, blamed it all on the ‘greedy Americans’. Just as you are ignorantly doing.
But, the Canadian lumber, subsidized by the federal govt, with the result that the BC lumber people were making over 300% profits, enabled them to dump cheap cost lumber in the US – which harmed the US foresters, who cut their lumber on private farms – rather than public lands. That was the problem. So, the US quite rightly put up tariffs against this cheap lumber.
So – your claim is false – and disgusting in its ignorance.
Your extreme bias for the Liberals has closed your mind to FACTS.
Sheesh yourself.
ET, to paraphrase Reagan, “there you go again”.
Where do I say a strong central government is better or worse than a weak central government?
Where do I belittle decentralized countries? That reading problem of yours keeps kicking in. On the contrary, I praise strongly the balance Canada has in its very decentralized nation. Our federal government doesn’t have nearly the same powers as Germany, UK, France or almost every single other western democratic nation. There are good reasons for this and we benefit. Our federal government doesn’t even have many of the strong powers that the us federal government does.
Far from ridiculing decentralized countries, I like our decentralize country.
You, obviously, don’t.
Quite the red herring, ted. The issue is not between a ‘strong central govt’ vs a ‘weak central govt’. Remove the adjectives. The issue is basic: between centralization and decentralization.
You, yourself, very clearly said that you favour a NATIONAl govt, ie, a central govt vs a decentralized one. You belittle Harper’s agenda of decentralization.
Haven’t you read your history books? Don’t you know that the federal govt has, since the 1950s, intruded more and more into provincial affairs?
I’m in favour of decentralization and a reduction of federal powers to the basics: communications, transportation, defense, bank, foreign affairs. pretty much the rest can be left up to the provinces.
There’s no comparison possible to be made with your examples of Germany, France, etc, which could all be, spatially, swalloed up within one province in Canada. The reality is that Canada is geographically and ecologically a very large and diverse area; it can’t be governed from one central authority; issues have to be dealt with at and by, the local level.
You like our ‘decentralized country’? Since it isn’t decentralized, then – you like its centralization. Heh.
How about one large independent state in Western Canada, with the central office is in Calgary,, and where “Kilowatts” (aka energy,) are the standard currency. One barrel of crude equals “X” amount of kilowatts. “X” would replace “dollars.”
Five bucks says that the last two people on this planet will be fighting over energy, as they grasp each other’s throat for the last remaining “kilowatt.”
Sorry Johnny but out west when we form our own nation our currency will be based on real western traditon cattle ranching. The lowest currency will be the calf. 5 calves in the heifer. 10 calves in the steer. 25 calves in the cow. 50 calves in the bull. 100 calves in the corral.
Just think there will be no more complaining about the stink of feedlots because everyone will know that that stink is truly the smell of money.
Ted:
How about a country that has a strong federal government and strong provincial governments?
Your line of argument, at least the way I read it, is about the tug-of-war between provinces and the feds.
The way I see it, this is more about a division of responsibility.
For example, a hockey team has one goalie, two defencemen and three forwards on the ice (penalties excluded).
To me, it seem absurd to give the goalie a role as the team’s top scorer, just like it would be ridiculous to tell a centre his primary responsibility is not the playmaker, but the guy who has to stop the other team from scoring.
Canada is no different.
The federal government has its area of expertise, the provinces have their own areas of expertise.
As long as everybody’s doing their job and not trying to compensate for some perceived weakness of how another guy is doing his job, the team does OK.
When you’re busy doing somebody else’s job, the quality of your own job will suffer.
It’s quite simple, really.
No, ET, Canada is decentralized.
Our federal government has, compared to most other countries in the world, including all of Europe (other than the Swiss), Russia, China, etc.
The powers that our federal government have, decision-making, spending, etc., are limited by our Constitution. Unlike most other countries in the entire world, our governance is split and we apportion much of our governance to the province. This is basic Confederation 101. Not even that. We learn this stuff in high school.
Your comment that we couldn’t be a unitary state like most of the world shows you either don’t understand what I am saying or are deliberately obtuse. OF COURSE, we can’t have a centralized government like those countries. That is the very reason we have a decentralized government, where much more power is given to the local regional body (provinces) than regional bodies anywhere else.
Argue if you want that the federal government has been encroaching too much on provincial jurisdiction, but to say that Canada is a centralized country is a ridiculous statement that show a complete misunderstanding of the fundamental basics of our system of governance. Even as it encroaches, the federal government is using the tools given by the Constitution and is not doing the actual work that remain in provincial jurisdiction.
To say as well that this battle is a relatively new thing and to completely ignore the fights from Ontario and Quebec provincial governments against the national railroad and MacDonald’s National Policy and Laurier’s version of it, is clear proof you are just making things up to fit your current antaganism toward the federal government.
So yeah, I belittle Harper decentralization agenda. I don’t think we need Constitutional change to accomplish even his firewall dreams. Indeed, his arguments have progressed from the federal government keeping to its jurisdiction to musings about Constitutional changes.
BTW, set you free, I agree about strong federal and strong provincial governments. I haven’t ever advocated for weak provincial governments. Again, this is what I see as the genius of our Constitution. Unlike all centralized nations in the world, it enshrines specific and exclusive sovereignty to a non-national governing body. Huge and significant powers are pushed down to the provinces that most countries, even the US, couldn’t comprehend.
Your hockey example is a good one because while each player has their role and function, at the same time everyone plays defence: if the goalie moves out to stop the puck and an opposing player passes it off, the centre doesn’t say ‘well, I’m not the goalie so I’m not going to try to stop the puck from going in the net’.
Doesn’t mean he’s a goalie. Just means he’s helping out the whole team.
It’s quite obvious, really.
ted – you were the one who brought up Germany, France, UK, etc.
Canada is NOT decentralized; Harper is attempting to take it back to its original model of BNA decentralization – a mode that had been gradually eroded by the centralist ideology of Ottawa within the view that Canada was made up primarily of Ontario-Quebec. There is no need for any constitutional change to make this transition. You are totally ignoring the centralization of financial and economic control that took place in the federal govt from the 70s on – and particularly under Trudeau and Chretien.
However, I’d like to see the Charter, that deranged Liberal document that relegates individual rights to the dustbin and privileges group and hereditary rights (gender,ethnicity, religion) – I’d like to see it scrapped. It’s a travesty of injustice.
Of course I brought up those countries ET. They are centralized countries. Canada is not and has never been. It’s sort of right there in the definition of centralization.
Centralization: more powers and decision making made by a central authority.
Decentralization: more powers and decision making made away from a central authority.
Canada: the Constitution establishes broad, exclusive jurisdictions that are not seen in almost any other country. Huge swaths of powers are devolved or decentralized from the national central government to regional provincial governments. That is the very definition of decentralized authority. It’s not just constitutional law, it’s plain old English.
No other country in the western world devolves as much power away from the national central government except the Swiss and arguably the US. Even in the US, while the states have stronger rights than our provinces, the federal jurisdiction is immensely larger than the Canadian federal jurisdiction. I’ve mentioned interstate commerce already, which can’t be understated in its importance, but you also don’t have the Canadian federal government enforcing civil and human rights violations charges against individuals outside of its own direct dealings. In the US, the federal government has very broad and extensive and sweeping powers of that sort.
I mean, I’m totally baffled at how you can conclude we are a centralized country. I do get that some people think that the federal government is using its tax raising powers to influence/force provinces to undertake policies outside of federal jurisdiction. But the question of whether the federal government is bumping up and stepping over a jurisdictional line here or there is an incredible distant issue from whether the federal government is actually taking over all of s.92 jurisdictional roles.
To take up set you free’s analogy, it’s like calling the hockey coach a player because he writes plays on a piece of paper and threatens to bench you for a shift if you don’t follow the set plays. It’s still the player scoring the goal, giving and taking the body check, controlling where he skates on the ice.