I just wanted to throw in how sorry I am to see Sheila Fraser reach the end of her mandate as the Auditor General of Canada. For those interested, the speaking notes from her last speech can be found at this link. Like Peter Milliken, who will also to be replaced as Speaker of the House, she has set a standard for fairness that will be difficult to equal. I do not even know her political leanings; when the Liberals were in power, I assumed she was a Conservative. While the Conservatives were in power, I was not at all sure of that assumption.
Thank you for your service to the country, Ms. Fraser.
According to a wiki cite, PEI has 141,000 inhabitants, and 4 Members of Parliament. That number, 4, was guaranteed upon PEI joining Confederation as a province.
Ontario, from a similar cite, has 13,069,200 and 106 Members of Parliament.
The demographic shift is often remarked upon - at the time of Confederation, 1867, the overall population of Canada was roughly 80% rural and 20% urban. Now, that demographic is reversed and trending further - at least 80% (and growing) of the population is now urban, with 20% and shrinking being rural.
It’s unequal, and I’d love for that to be fixed too, but it’s nowhere near as bad as the Senate. At least right now the Senate is mostly a benign force in Canadian politics. If we start electing Senators they’re going to start to take their power seriously, and I don’t want that until we actual decide what powers we want the Senate to have, and how to apportion those powers.
We already know what the power of the Senate is. And if they were elected then no one should have a problem with them using the power that they have because at any time they could use it now as an unelected body. I’d rather have the representation than not. Sometimes it takes a prod to get things moving and electing Senators, which could happen without constitutional wranglings, could be that prod.
Otherwise, all we end up with is whinging.
The Senate’s current powers are largely theoretical, because it almost never exercises them. What’s going to happen if they were to start using it? How would a deadlock between the House and the Senate be resolved? We don’t just want to start messing with our Parliamentary system willy-nilly here.
Sure, the current Senate could start using that power. But, as the saying goes, Queen Elizabeth can do whatever she wants – once.
You may think it’s a misunderstanding. But to many Quebecers, it’s a given that the federal government will represent English Canada, given that English Canadians are the majority in the country. And English Canada’s interests are different and often at odds with Quebec’s. So that’s why they perceive a need to represent Quebec’s interests in the federal system. (This way, even if you ignore them, at least you’ll know what they are.) Or barring that, increased powers to the provinces or asymmetrical federalism.
By the way, I just “love” the comments in this article:
I get that all the time from English Canadians: if you’re a Quebecer first and foremost, it’s only because you’re unilingual and isolated in your own corner. If you just knew English, then of course you’d realise that Canada and its bilingualism, multiculturalism and openness to the world is much better than Quebec’s xenophobia and isolation and you’d feel a true Canadian.
I’m fluent in English, I’ve travelled in English Canada, the US and Europe, and despite this I feel next to no attachment to the land of maple leaves, Rick Mercers and Don Cherries. Explain that. I’m not hostile per se to that country (although what they say about us just pisses me off), but to me it’s clearly a different nation. Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t both be in the same federation, but it’s still an obvious fact. And speaking their language, and even living and working among them which I could do some day, isn’t going to change that.
[QUOTE=Spoons]
This may be a sidenote, but to follow up on your “US model” remark, do you think Canadians might support the idea of an equal number of Senators per province if it was also proposed that the Commons is where the people are represented, but the Senate is where the provinces are represented? This is my understanding (and I could be wrong) of how the US Congress was meant to work–and even if it isn’t, do you think such a model could work here?
[/quote]
The problem with this is that, while an interesting idea, it could change the balance of powers in unexpected ways. Right now, the provincial governments are responsible for defending their province’s interests. If the Senate is given the task of representing the provinces, could the provincial governments lose some power and some legitimacy? They don’t want that, to be sure, and their approval is required for Senate reform. (I don’t want that either for that matter.)
Denise Savoie
Andrew Scheer
Barry Devolin
Lee Richardson
Bruce Stanton
Merv Tweed
Ed Holder
Dean Allison
Are any of you familiar with any of these names? I only know Denise Savoie, who, being an NDP MP, is a bit of a long shot and Merv Tweed, who is the MP for my home town and about as stupid as they come. I have no opinion about any of the others - I just don’t know enough about them.
I’ve seen Lee Richardson speak. He didn’t come across terribly well. And this was in possibly the most Conservative friendly room ever (room full of landmen in Calgary)
He seems mainly decorative.
Don’t recognize the other names.
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your observation, but I will suggest that today’s English Canadians are the products of the success of those programs. History tells us that bilingualism was a very hard sell (see Bilingual Today, French Tomorrow, by J.V. Andrew, for an extreme example), and multiculturalism only somewhat less so. Heck, even the flag debate was rather contentious. There were a great many Canadians back in the 1960s and 1970s who were fairly conservative (in this context, meaning “resistant to change”), and who saw no reason to change the status quo: few opportunities for French-speakers outside of Quebec or in the federal government, and most immigration from Europe and the Anglosphere, whose cultures were similar. Regardless, any immigrant or French-speaker who attempted to live in English Canada was expected to learn English, to leave their cultures behind (except, perhaps, for traditions that took place out of the public eye, such as in the home or a house of worship) and adopt English Canadian ways.
How far we have come in forty-some years! Nowadays, English Canada expects its children to learn at least some French, and offers such programs as French Immersion to schoolchildren who show the aptitude and the desire to become fully bilingual–which is necessary for many (if not most) federal jobs; and, as you and I have discussed before, even some provincial ones in English-speaking provinces. And rather than staying frightened of the unfamiliar, English Canada has welcomed other people and their cultures from around the world. Along the way, it learned a few things–among them, that knowing more than one language is a good thing, and that it missed out on a lot that others have brought. I’d guess that most English Canadians would say that overall, bilingualism and multiculturalism have been beneficial.
Understand, I’m not playing this up as a better approach, and I will say that there have been, and continue to be, a few hiccups. But I think English Canada is better off than when it scoffed at the idea of needing to learn French to the degree required to use it with a native French speaker and worried about what weird things those non-European/Anglo foreigners might get up to.
I guess my point is this: the majority of English Canadians, having seen the benefits of bilingualism and multiculturalism, don’t understand why anybody wouldn’t want to avail themselves of them. I guess that if Quebec doesn’t want to; well, it doesn’t want to, and there’s not much we can do about that. (I’ll try to get them to turn down the religious-style proselytizing. :)) Anyway, I’ve been brief in my explanation, and for the sake of brevity, have spoken very broadly; but I hope you can begin to understand where the consternation on the part of English Canada comes from.
Well, does anybody feel an attachment to whatever planet Don Cherry comes from?
Seriously, I think we all feel an attachment to where we come (or came) from. I’ve travelled all across Canada a few times, and lived in Alberta for many years now, but to me, Ontario–specifically, Toronto–is mine in a way that Vancouver, Halifax, and Regina are not. Toronto’s oddly-shaped but instantly identifiable street signs, the “in” things Torontonians just “know” (for example, it’s always “The Danforth” and “The Lakeshore,” regardless of what the street sign actually says; and that very little of the “Carlton streetcar’s” route is actually on Carlton Street), memories of cruising Yonge Street in my youth–all these, and more, form my attachment to Toronto. I don’t feel the same way about Alberta–Edmonton’s Churchill Square is not Nathan Phillips Square, Calgary’s Kensington is no Yorkville, and Lethbridge’s Third Avenue will never be Yonge Street. I have an attachment to Alberta, yes, in the sense that I have a house, a job, and plenty of friends and activities here; but it’s not the same attachment that I have with Toronto.
So language aside (and maybe we can cast it aside, as you do admit to being fluent in English and travelling in English Canada), perhaps you feel the same way? That no matter where you go, you will never form quite the same attachment as the one you have with home, no matter where that home happens to be?
I think some kind of Senate reform is necessary. I don’t know what kind, though; and we did have some interesting suggestions earlier in the thread. But the idea that we’ve got a chamber of people who don’t seem to do much, many of whom are there as a reward for being loyal party members, just doesn’t sit well. The idea that once a bill has passed the Commons, the next two approvals (passing the Senate and Royal Assent) are rubber stamps, bothers me. Regardless of what (if any) kind of Senate reform happens, I’d like to see it as a place where prospective legislation is actually and seriously debated, and either passed after informed votes based on the debates, or sent back to the Commons if necessary.
From other threads, I’ve gathered that the posters from Quebec don’t care whether anyone outside learns French. In fact, they don’t care about those people outside of Quebec who speak French as their primary language. The whole bilingualism fiasco has been a waste of time and resources. The West’s primary trading partners are not with France, Quebec, or other French speaking people. We’d have been better off learning Spanish and Mandarin, or better yet, added another science course into the curriculum.
It’s a bit unfair to exclude language, because obviously Quebec and the rest of the country will have wildly different goals in terms of language policy. But we can find other interests. I probably shouldn’t mention the economy, even though it was long a complaint of Quebec’s government that the federal government’s economic policy favoured Ontario and especially Toronto at the expense of Quebec, because as a (former?) Albertan you probably have lots to complain about on this subject as well. But look at foreign policy, for one, where I’m convinced English Canadians are much more interventionist and pro-military than (at least francophone) Quebecers. I mean, you can find loads of surveys, about a wide variety of policy measures, where the majority of Quebecers lean strongly in one direction, while the rest of the country leans in the other direction. Can you find surveys where the majority of Albertans favour one option while the majority of other Canadians favour the other one? Yes, probably. But I’m convinced it’s not as common.
More precisely, most immigration from the Anglosphere and Germanic/Nordic European countries. (Southern/Mediterranean Europe wasn’t a priority either.)
By the way, there’s another one for you Uzi: Quebecers and other Canadians are not looking for the same kind of immigrants. Of course, that’s closely linked to language, and Quebec has its own (partial) immigration policy anyway.
But there’s the thing: this is not unique to English Canada. All Western societies have become immigrant-based societies, and that of course includes Quebec as well. But English Canadians seem to believe in their own exceptionalism (I guess they’re not the only people believing those kinds of myths), and look down on Quebec as if we were at best younger brothers who haven’t yet seen the greatness of multiculturalism and multilingualism. Just have any public debate on “reasonable accommodation” in Quebec, for example, and you’ll see plenty of smug English Canadians current affairs commentators claiming that it’s an obvious demonstration of the difference between both our cultures, your openness to the world versus our isolation and ethnocentrism. But it’s not. We both face the same problems, and we may not talk about them in the same manner; we may not emphasize the same eventual problems (as you can imagine, in our case language is a major consideration), but we solve them in quite similar ways.
We truly aren’t more isolated or more ethnocentric than you. We’re touchier about language, because it’s largely how we define ourselves in North America, but see that just as English Canadians are becoming proud of their partial bilingualism, educated young Quebecers are becoming trilingual.
And to be honest, and as I’ve said before, I just don’t see what’s so impressive about Canadian-style multiculturalism. We know that in immigration-based societies, immigrant groups won’t dump all their cultural baggage. They’ll retain part of it, and also adopt some from the society they now live in. It’s just how it works. But despite that English Canadians don’t seem willing to accept the concept of what I’d call “real” cultural diversity. My proof of this is how the existence of Quebec appears to mystify them. Don’t get me wrong, they accept francophones as an ethnic minority, with their own schools and the right to be served in their language in government, and even try talking to them with the French they’ve learned in school (all of which I’m not complaining about, I think it is good to open one’s arms to minorities), but then they figure out that (unlike francophones outside Quebec) Quebec francophones just don’t see themselves as an ethnic minority, and… and it blows their minds. English Canadians won’t ever consider thinking of Canada as a multinational country. To me that’s what it obviously is. Having more than one nation sharing a country, now that’s diversity. But it also makes things more complicated.
Perhaps, but then again, most places I go in Quebec, I feel that the people there are “my people”. Even when I’ve never been there. This doesn’t happen elsewhere in Canada. (Though of course Canadians are not all that “foreign” either. But then again Americans aren’t either.) It may be a language thing, but then again, even francophones in the rest of Canada are… different.
What I like about the Senate is that it’s a place where people who have something to say, who may be political activists, or community leaders, or the like, but who aren’t the “politician” type, can be appointed to do legislative work. A specific type of personality (or a lot of luck, as we’ve seen in the last election) is required for a career in electoral politics, and it means that most members of Parliament will be people of a similar character, who don’t necessarily represent all of the country’s population. That’s why I was happy when people like Roméo Dallaire, or Jean Lapointe, or Jacques Demers were named to the Senate (although the quality of the work they’ve done is debatable). They are definitely not the “politician” type, but they all had something important to say. Having an elected Senate would defeat this feature, but right now we have to trust the prime minister to appoint these kind of people to the Senate instead of using it to reward old partisans. And I don’t trust any prime minister to do this.
Sad state of affairs when a party wants to pass a bill to exempt a city from lawsuits becuase they want to bypass the public tender process. Keeping friends happy I suppose.
Yes, this is surprising, although it may actually be a means to put pressure on Marois to either change her leadership style or resign. Many are disappointed by her tenure as PQ leader, despite the 93% approval she got last month, and by the fact that the PQ doesn’t seem to rise in voting intentions as it should given Charest’s impopularity. There is apparently also grumbling among PLQ members who’ll also have to vote for the Labeaume-Péladeau bill (which I remember someone describing as a “Berlusconian” law, if that tells you something about the opposition it provokes), but of course the difference between the PQ and the PLQ is that the latter is much more “top-down”, so Liberal members are much more likely to hold their nose and vote as they’re told.
This said, I’ve heard commentators say that it’s much too late for Marois to be replaced as PQ leader before the next election, so they’ll have to make do with her despite the grumbling in the party. And some suggest that Charest might actually call elections as early as this fall, to take advantage of the PQ’s problems and to move before François Legault decides if he wants to come back into electoral politics after all.
There are apparently a half-dozen PQ members of the National Assembly who are thinking of resigning from the caucus if they’re not allowed to vote against the bill. In the case of Curzi, Beaudoin and Lapointe (three very well-known and important politicians, which is why it was such important news; Aussant OTOH I’ve never heard of), Marois had suggested they not be present for the vote, but it wasn’t enough for them, and after all the bill appears to be the straw that broke the camel’s back: they were already disgruntled, either because of Marois or because of her close political advisors.
Charest has decided not to include the provisions of bill 204 (the Labeaume-Péladeau bill) inside an omnibus law, at least not until this fall. Given that it’s certainly not out of any sympathy for Marois that he’s taking this decision, I assume that there was also dissension inside his party regarding the bill. As for Marois, she’s invited three of her four former members to rejoin the caucus, but not Lisette Lapointe.
Also, François Legault has been awoken from his lethargy by these recent events, and is apparently now fully intent on forming a new political party, in time for the next provincial elections, even if they are held this fall (although otherwise he’ll wait until next year). I read about it in Le Devoir, but apparently Legault’s also been interviewed by the National Post on this subject if you’re interested.
I also want to share a post from another thread, which I think illustrates what I was going on about the somewhat shammy nature of Canadian multiculturalism [post=13877223]here[/post] (and many times before). From [thread=610941]this thread[/thread]:
I said it’s an “illustration”, not “proof”, but I can just hear what that building designer was thinking. “See, here in Toronto we’re so open to all cultures that make up this great country, that not only do we not have a 13th floor in our buildings because 13 is unlucky in Western cultures, but we also do not have a 4th floor, because 4 is unlucky in Asian cultures! (And we even exclude 4, 13 and 14 from all floors for good measure.) Because, as you know, there are a lot of Asians here in Toronto, and we want them to feel totally at home in our great country while still following their ancestral culture which is worth so much to us. Ha! Here’s something you wouldn’t see Euros, Quebecers and Americans do! We’re open-minded and multicultural, dammit! Don’t you see? Why won’t you see!? Just look at the building!”
The thing with this is that I believe it fosters tokenism and a very superficial understanding and “appreciation” of other cultures. I wouldn’t say it’s “wrong”, but I think it’s not the amazing development that some Canadians seem to believe. (Even Spoons in his post which precipited mine.)
Actually it sounds like a business decision by the condo owner to ensure he gets tenants. Unless, of course, you have the provincial law demanding that the builder comply to your example. I suppose a municipal by-law might suffice but that wouldn’t really back up claims of a ROC wide shammy multiculturalism.
