Canada needs to decentralize
Confederation: 1. an organization which consists of a number of parties or groups united in an alliance or league. 2. a more or less permanent union of countries with some or most political power vested in a central authority. Historians will tell you Sir John A. MacDonald, George Etienne-Cartier and George Brown (our founding coalition) had every intent on Canada being a federation right from the start, but used the word confederation to bamboozle us into this unification. Which brings us to WEXIT and the reminder that we are indeed a confederacy. Or are we?
It seems that in the past few years, the word confederation has reared its ugly head more and more in the media, particularly with the west’s animosity towards Ottawa. Andrew Scheer, Scott Moe and Jason Kenney have been making great use of this word recently, when not that long ago, it was nearly an archaic word in reference to Canada’s current status. It’s back! Why? Our current system has broken. Western alienation, inter-provincial politics, regionalism and partisan voting are tearing us apart. Which is sad considering people in Saskatchewan do not have disdain towards New Brunswick, nor do people in Manitoba have contempt for British Columbians and so forth. It is clearly the system we use for our political process which is causing the rift, not the people.
There are other countries which have similar problems with regionalism and to combat this they have greatly decentralized their political system. Germany is prime example. Being unified for military, coast guard, inter-provincial highways, air transit, national security, etc. is definitely necessary. But perhaps provinces could decide every aspect of their province for themselves, not just healthcare and education. I mean, what do bureaucrats in Ottawa know about B.C. forestry, Alberta energy or N.S. fisheries? Sure, our current “federal” system works great for Ontario and Quebec who combined make up 59 per cent of parliament (198/338). If a party is going to form government they better pander to those provinces. Quebec even has a federal party that only runs in Quebec! No wonder the separatist days are over in Quebec, it could not get any better! Furthermore, Ontario has 121/338 seats, talk about calling the shots!
As the west becomes increasingly fed up with our so called confederation, after providing more to the coffers than the east for over 20 years now, the only logic is to decentralize, not break up. WEXIT is no joke, as protests in Alberta and Saskatchewan have been large, with Scott Moe and Jason Kenney even whipping up their version of a declaration of independence. (How American of them!) It only seems logical that each province completely control their own destiny and make Ottawa the ruler of foreign policy and interests of national security. Otherwise, this beautiful family is going to fall apart and it will not be amicable. Not civil-war messy, but I do not want to deal with you anymore messy.
Tony Odo
Duncan