CanPol: Thread of the Year Edition

[notyoueither]

Yes, that persnickety Constitution.

43. An amendment to the Constitution of Canada in relation to any provision that applies to one or more, but not all, provinces, including
(a) any alteration to boundaries between provinces, and
(b) any amendment to any provision that relates to the use of the English or the French language within a province,

may be made by proclamation issued by the Governor General under the Great Seal of Canada only where so authorized by resolutions of the Senate and House of Commons and of the legislative assembly of each province to which the amendment applies.

[Ben Kenobi]

Senate reform shouldn't be an "ah ha! Now's our chance to screw Ontario and Quebec!" type situation. And if it's presented as such, guess what the response from the currently most populous area of the country is going to be?

Yet that has been the position of KH in this thread, that any increase in representation of the west and maritimes will shaft Ontario and Quebec.

The idea of the equally proportioned senate is an essential part of an elected senate, you can't tear the two of them apart. The whole basis for electing a senate is based upon the concept of increasing regional representation, and keeping the Senate as is, will only further exacerbate the problem.

[Ben Kenobi]

43. An amendment to the Constitution of Canada in relation to any provision that applies to one or more, but not all, provinces, including
(a) any alteration to boundaries between provinces, and
(b) any amendment to any provision that relates to the use of the English or the French language within a province,

may be made by proclamation issued by the Governor General under the Great Seal of Canada only where so authorized by resolutions of the Senate and House of Commons and of the legislative assembly of each province to which the amendment applies.

Thank you NYE. I was curious if there was a provision in the constitution that dealt with this specific instance. Say if the Peace River region wished to join Alberta, they would have to gain the support of both legislative assemblies and the commons.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Yet that has been the position of KH in this thread, that any increase in representation of the west and maritimes will shaft Ontario and Quebec.

The idea of the equally proportioned senate is an essential part of an elected senate, you can't tear the two of them apart. The whole basis for electing a senate is based upon the concept of increasing regional representation, and keeping the Senate as is, will only further exacerbate the problem.

It already is equal by region, Ben.

[Ben Kenobi]

the BQ is becoming the party of people who want anyone but the Liberals.

I've heard from the most patriotic of my Canadian-Quebecer friends, who never voted for the Bloc before, that they are considering it now simply to make the Liberals lose more seats here.

While the BQ is a party devoted primarily to seperation, it is also seen locally as the party most representative of all quebecers, seperatist or not.

Then a Conservative Bloc alliance will work quite well. Strange, it used to be Conservatives and the Bleus, now it would be Conservatives and the Rouges.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Thank you NYE. I was curious if there was a provision in the constitution that dealt with this specific instance. Say if the Peace River region wished to join Alberta, they would have to gain the support of both legislative assemblies and the commons.

Funnilly enough, that has been a topic of discussion in NE BC, but if federalism works the way it should (and it has in this case) people from BC should feel no need to join another province for purposes of infrastructure and transportation.

The situation of Quebec and Newfoundland re hydro is unique, as far as I know. Pretty disgusting too, given how people in Quebec are spoon fed how their province has been hard done by in Confederation.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by notyoueither


It already is equal by region, Ben.

The problem is that is is not equal to the power apportioned to it, due to the anitquity of its appointments process.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Then a Conservative Bloc alliance will work quite well. Strange, it used to be Conservatives and the Bleus, now it would be Conservatives and the Rouges.

That's about what it's gonna take for a stable government to spell the Liberals. God help us all when the Liberals get that into a campaign.

[Ben Kenobi]

Funnilly enough, that has been a topic of discussion in NE BC, but if federalism works the way it should (and it has in this case) people from BC should feel no need to join another province for purposes of infrastructure and transportation.

I'm from the region, grew up in Northern BC, in Prince George to be more specific. For the moment I am living here until I can afford to go elsewhere. That's why I brought up this topic in particular because there is considerable public sentiment towards becoming part of Alberta.

The reason being is that in reality folks in Northern BC are more similar to folks in Alberta, then we are to our own British Columbians. When they made us a province, there wasn't much settlement to speak of, and it seems to me that the borders no longer reflect the political reality. We want to join Alberta, since we feel our interests will be better represented there then in the Lower Mainland which condescendingly calls us the 'heartland'. Everything is to go to Vancouver so they can make money off of it, while we get the scraps.

I don't see this desire to change provinces as a defeat of federalism either, we ought to be able to call for this change in order to better establish the idea of a province. After all, the 'distinct culture' of each province is the reason why they gave the provinces control over certain things.

[notyoueither]

People from Prince George want to join Alberta? That's out there. I can't see it ever happening. That triangle of people living in the Peace Country have, or had, a reasonable argument. They are the other side of the Rockies from the rest of BC. They would get better service from the Alberta side of the border, they think.

Prince George joining AB makes about as much sense as Edmonton joining BC.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
After all, the 'distinct culture' of each province is the reason why they gave the provinces control over certain things.

No it isn't.

We have a federal system, with strong provincial powers, because that was the only way to get the original 4 to agree to join together. BC, PEI, then MB, SK, AB, and finally Newfyland 'benefitted' from the original arrangement.

Were we to be constituted like most European countries, the provinces would not really exist in any meaningful way. We'd have a massively powerful central government and then cities.

[notyoueither]

The position of the provinces in Confederation is also why Trudeau couldn't just go ahead and ram his ideas for Constitution through Parliament and then send them off to Westminster for approval (which likely would have been granted).

The Supreme Court said that he couldn't do anything that affected provincial powers without a substantial consensus among the provinces. That was why Loughheed and Levesque held the hammer. There is very little possibility that the Constitution could have come home had 2 of 10 provinces, with others committed to support them, said no.

[Flubber]

So will we get some time off now from the campaign and see it resume on January 2??

Although frankly it hasn't seemed to have even started here yet. Perhaps that's because I'm in Alberta where many are predicting a 28-0 shutout. But its all irrelevent to the conservatives if they don't win over enough people in Ontario. Haroper has moderated his stances a LOT but the question is anyone listening??

Oh and Martin annoys me . . . How many times does Harper have to say " I WILL NOT USE THE NOTWITHSTANDING CLAUSE"

The other thing is that the Liberal were in power for 12 years and IT WASN'T THEM that permitted gay marriage , it was courts that did it province by province until government was forced to deal with the issue. Marriage was (wrongly IMHO) denied to homosexual persons for years and years under the Liberal governments but now that its politically convenient, the Liberal jump on it as issue where "denial of rights" would be catastrophic or something. Ahh hypocrosy!!

[Flubber]

Whats going on here? A scant few posts lately ??? has Christmas cheer blunted our desire to rant on and on and on and on about Canadian politics.

[Richelieu]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
That's why I brought up this topic in particular because there is considerable public sentiment towards becoming part of Alberta. The reason being is that Alberta has tons of oil and money and we want some of it.

Corrected.