CKNW Editorial
for March 10, 2000

I like the Honourable Stephan Dion. I agree with the government's Clarity Bill as I suspect most British Columbians do. But he scares hell out of me. He is, after all, the minister in charge of national unity in this country and he betrays absolutely no understanding of feelings on this coast. Moreover, he uses the Trudeau Jesuitical approach to questions by posing one of his own that’s incapable of a "no" answer. Trudeau, when questioned about the transfer of parliamentary power to the Supreme Court of Canada by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms would reply by asking "don't you want rights?'

Mr Dion response to my assertions about B.C.'s woeful representation in a system, which is badly dysfunctional, is to talk about wheat in Saskatchewan.

I want to talk a bit this morning about why I raise these issues about governance and the lousy system we have with such passion. I do so because I see my country drifting apart. I do not see, at this time, a vibrant separation movement here but I see one coming. And it's coming because of drift. The federal Liberals simply drift along knowing that if they continue to be a strong force in Ontario and Quebec they will win office. It bothers them not a bit that British Columbia has no real power in that government. It never occurs to them that a system that awards 100% of the power to a government that gets 50%+1 of the seats based upon 40% of the popular vote badly needs fixing. It never crosses their mind that British Columbians are thoughtful, loyal Canadians seeing their province gradually but surely moving away from the country into a separate existence.

I want to make this point too. I feel passionately about this subject not for my generation - we have passed the time when any change will mean anything to us. I try to speak for my children who are now all in their late thirties or forties - and their children, my grandchildren. They are the ones who will see their country disintegrate if changes are not made and soon.

Let me tell you why no changes will take place. It goes back to Charlottetown, Meech Lake and before. And it is the question of the amending formula.

In order for there to be change in how the country is run, there must be the opportunity for change. Until 1982 it was always thought that every province had a veto over constitutional change but that was changed when the Supreme Court of Canada, dealing with the Patriation of the Constitution, decided that Quebec did not have a veto ... that a change simply required substantial agreement. The 1982 Constitution cut the Gordian knot by providing a formula whereby Canada could amend its constitution.

Let me pause here to observe that this was indeed an amending formula because it did not give vetoes but set out the rules whereby the constitution could be changed. This is a very important distinction for in reality, if any province or region has a veto there will never ever be any change that adversely affects its interest. A veto for all in essence means, in the reality that is Canada, that you will never have the kinds of reforms British Columbia sees as necessary because they will always be adverse in interest to Quebec or Ontario, or both and will be vetoed. This is why the 1982 formula gave hope.

Jean Chretien dashed that hope when he, reeling from near defeat in the Quebec Referendum in 1995, passed a Commons Resolution saying that the Federal government would not approve of any amendment to the constitution if any of four regions asked him to nix it. Those four regions, after a firestorm of dissent came from BC, was expanded to five, BC being one. This was a disastrous decision, which was directly contrary to the spirit of the Constitution. And what it did, in effect, was to stifle all constitutional debate right across the country.

Why? Because there is no point putting forward constitutional reforms when it is clear that Quebec will veto them. Any change to the Senate, the House of Commons, or the Supreme Court of Canada will not pass Quebec City so what's the point of talking about them? The Chretien Resolution has, in effect, constipated the Canadian body politic.

This has created a pressure cooker. And for a long time, the steam building up in BC will be ignored. And then, someday, it will burst.

When? It's hard to know. But during the lifetime of our younger fellow citizens, BC will catch and pass Quebec in population yet its representation in the House of Commons, the Senate and the Supreme Court of Canada will not match that reality. You will then see Quebec and Ontario, in an effort to maintain their ancient privileges, working together to maintain the status quo ... which they damn near got with Charlottetown in 1992. There will be another attempt at a Meech/Charlottetown type solution – be ready for it because it will but thinly mask an attempt to cast in stone majority political power in Central Canada no matter what the populations figures say. This you can bet on.

Mr Dion represents the status quo which includes dealing with the ancient Upper Canada/Lower Canada debate as if it were the only unity problem in the country. I try very hard to speak for British Columbia but I try to speak for Canada too. The Federal Liberal Party doesn't understand what I'm saying and God knows that half-wit leading the Federal Tories doesn't understand. We will continue, unless things change dramatically, have a federal government run of, by, and for Central Canada only and as BC increases in importance and population, that can only last so long before there is an eruption.

This is not understood by those who perpetually govern us and that indifference could well be the undoing of the country.

To hear Mr Dion display, as Unity Minister, his abysmal ignorance - an ignorance shared by his leader and his colleagues - is sad beyond words.