Vancouver Courier
for August 12, 1998

The Annual Premiers' Conference has just ended with the usual guffaws from the media who magnify the minutiae and relish in comparisons with yesteryear. How did this year's fed bashing and the wish list of goodies demanded from Ottawa compare to previous years? Who's the rising star? Who dominated? And who's fading fast? We hear about the golf games and the fishing trips - I've never heard of any premier especially accomplished at either sport but apparently they're now obligatory agenda items. And we learn that left and right, young or old (they're mostly pretty young these days), east or west, rich and poor they're all really fine chaps who all put Canada (their version of course) above all else.

I well remember my first Western Premiers' Conference in some godforsaken prairie town. Premier Bill Bennett took me to a private dinner with Alberta Premier Lougheed, who was a big name and a Bennett hero at the time and a man I certainly wanted to impress. I was seated opposite Mr Lougheed when Bennett cracked a funny (quite unknown to all but those who know him well, he is a very witty man) just as I was taking in a mouthful of lovely red wine. The witticism struck me so quickly that I snorted the wine through my nostrils onto my dinner in front of me. Bennett blanched, I was sure that my days in cabinet had ended just as they'd begun, but Lougheed acted as if nothing had happened.

I recall a First Ministers' Conference, complete with Pierre Trudeau and entourage, when I got Bennett mad as hell at me. Sterling Lyon, Premier of Manitoba, was prone to flights of oratory spiced with historical references. On this occasion he said "and, Gentlemen, as the Duke of Marlborough said, 'publish and be damned'" and which point my stage whisper, caught by an unexpected open microphone, boomed across the room "it was the Duke of Wellington".

On yet another Western Premiers' meeting Peter Lougheed joked across the table to Premier Bennett that he'd trade two of his cabinet ministers for Rafe Mair whereupon Bennett shot back "you can have him for 'future considerations'"!

But I come to the defence of these meetings. The only reason there are high expectations is because of the endless tail chasing which happens when the media gets into the act. It's the old question - do the TV cameras come because there's a riot or does the riot happen because that's where the TV cameras are? Because there is going to be a meeting, the media is interested. Which means they must be set on the right path by the politicians. The media know that this is happening so automatically concentrate on the issues the politicians want to play down. In the result, the conference held and the conference reported on appear as two different events.

It's true that the whole exercise seems to become a series of photo ops. The communiqué, read by the Chairman, is drawn up, in the main, before the conference is even held and is only adjusted so as to mask any differences which have surfaced.

So why do I think these annual bun tosses are important?

Because these (mostly) men have a chance to drink a beer together, dine in small groups, play golf and fish together and - here is the best part - escape their officials. (This sometimes has calamitous consequences as in Edmonton on 1986 where the Premiers, over a liquid lunch without officials, decided to settle Quebec's constitutional questions before all others, leading to Meech Lake and Charlottetown, but this is an exception.) The premiers need advice but they also need time to be politicians assessing and articulating the political realities of dealing with people - not bar graphs, incomprehensible jargon and gray faced thinking. They need the opportunity and time to communicate with each other not through official circles, not through 10 second sound bites on the 6 o'clock news but one on one, in small groups or all together in private.

Public sessions are wastes of time. Let me give you a hypothetical example. Suppose Ontario Premier Harris wants to impress upon Premier Bouchard that Quebec separation has a huge price. Can anyone imagine him saying, before the TV cameras, "look you dumb bugger, where the hell will you sell your farm produce if you separate? Not to us - we'll buy from B.C. instead!" But he can say that in private.

Now I'm not talking about making secret deals to be sprung later on the public as happened with the 1981 Patriation of the Constitution exercise. I am talking about the simple dynamic of provinces, through their leaders, getting to know one another. I'm supporting a process where leaders can frankly discuss the nations realities without being publicly interpreted by an editor's blue pencil or a TV producer's scissors.

That annual opportunity in itself makes the Annual Premiers' Conferences well worth the money.