CKNW Editorial
for March 9, 2001

Yesterday's interview with Professor Ronald Cheffens, Professor Emeritus of constitutional law at the University of Victoria made pretty chilling listening to all of us who love our country and want to keep it together. For it is one thing to have deep felt grievances, quite another to be told by an expert that there is nothing we can do about it. The reasons we can't do anything about it are practical - the present system is the result of prime ministers and premiers subverting the system so that instead
of the executive being responsible to the legislature, it is quite the other way around. Since the Prime Minister, with an iron grip on the levers of government doesn't have to yield any power, he doesn't do so. In this milieu even the slightest reform, such as the occasional free vote looks like a revolution, so bad has it become. There are things we can do provincially but again only if the premier really wants change to take place. This is
why we must really hold Mr Campbell's feet to the fire on this issue.

But back to the federal scene. As Professor Cheffens explained yesterday we have so constipated the body politic with our amending formula – which is not an amending formula at all but a veto formula - we have in essence got it so that any amendment to the constitution must be unanimous. By way of private agreement amongst the Atlantic provinces, even tiny Prince Edward Island has a veto.

But, it is said by the federal Liberals who started all this, what could be fairer than having everyone the same.

The answer is that in order to have change to move with the times, such change must be possible. As long as one local interest can stymie the majority you have a constipated body politic which, if I may mangle my metaphors, leads to a pressure cooker with ever increasing pressure threatening an explosion. It should not be easy to amend the constitution but it must be eminently possible. In Canada it is impossible.

Let's look down the road a bit. Does anyone seriously suggest that we can go on like this forever? Will the public, especially the coming generations of British Columbians, forever accept a system where they are simply not represented in the governance of their country?

History teaches us not. History teaches us that while the public will put up with a great deal the point comes when it will no longer tolerate the intolerable. And often that moment is reached at a time when things seem rather peaceful.

If we cannot change our constitution and if no political party can bring about real reform, what is there to do?

We can, I suppose, wait for a change of government and hope that someone like Stockwell Day will bring in the necessary reforms. The trouble is neither Stockwell Day nor his party look very close to gaining power. And if they do, what's to say that they won't, like others before them, forget about their promises once they get into power under the old system. That's what happens of course. Once in power, those who have it become rather fond of the system that got them there and if they bring in any reforms at all, ensure that they are cosmetic only.

The public has got to gather its thoughts here and we must all understand what must be done. If we don't, we get seduced by pallid promised reforms like the occasional free vote in the legislature.

Then we must do something else I think ... and quite frankly I never thought I'd be saying this. Perhaps it was the frustration of dealing with Brian Tobin on Wednesday that pushed me over the top. I think that British Columbians have to start examining their options. I have not come to this point easily though I must remind longstanding members of the audience that back in 1992, when interviewing then Constitutional Affairs Minister Joe Clark ... this was during the debate on the Charlottetown Accord ... that if we gave everyone a veto then the only way BC could ever get any change would be to do what Quebec has always done so successfully - threaten to secede. You may recall the enlightened exchange where Clark said Rafe, you're wrong, wrong, wrong! To which I brilliantly rejoined no I'm right, right, right!
Well, sad to say, I was right.

If he did nothing else, Brian Tobin made that clear from the political side ... yesterday Ron Cheffens made it clear from the legal side.
I believe that we have almost reached, indeed if we haven’t already reached the point where a threat by BC to go it alone is the only message the Liberal Party, Ontario and Ottawa will understand.