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Canadian alliance

Tory/Bloc partnership would help wrest power from Ottawa

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper should form an alliance with Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe with both agreeing on an action plan to put this country right-side-up again.

That’s what many readers from coast-to-coast are telling me.

Harper and Duceppe should forget about their differences on economic, fiscal and social policies for a while—those will work themselves out as this scenario unfolds, as you will see—and simply concentrate on a huge devolution of federal powers and responsibilities to the province.

Basically put, roll back the encroachment that Ottawa under Lester Pearson, Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chretien made into areas of provincial rights.

OK, OK—if some provinces, such as Saskatchewan, still want to be under the thumb of Ottawa, let them remain so. But if other provinces, especially Quebec and Alberta, want to regain their freedom from non-stop federal interference over the past several decades give them the option to do so.

Recall, when Canada was born, it was the provinces which were pre-eminent. The provinces came before Ottawa, which was simply to be a ‘post office box’ for the provinces.

The relentless centralization of power in Ottawa mainly by Trudeau—power grabbed from the provinces—and the almost dictatorial power of the Prime Minister’s Office—under Chretien and now Paul Martin—has hardly been beneficial to the nation.

In truth, it has been ruinous.

In my column “Happier apart” (May 17), I spoke of conversations with a large number of Quebecers on the subject of Quebec independence and the growing mood of alienation in Alberta. Even though all my Quebec respondents were sovereigntists, when I mentioned the idea of a Harper-Duceppe alliance many thought it a concept worth pursuing. Even some who declared themselves to be long-term, diehard sovereigntists.

Oh, we know Martin’s Liberals will howl at the suggestion of a Conservative/Bloc alliance.

Yet, it is the Liberal government’s and Liberal party’s own actions that have caused the rise of the Bloc in Quebec.

It was Trudeau’s heavy hand that spurred the election of Rene Levesque’s Parti Quebecois to power in 1976. If the Liberals had left Quebecers well alone to run their own affairs, the independence movement would have remained just a small group of radicals with some poets and singers echoing their dreams.

Martin’s hypocrisy would be further noted by the fact Transport Minister Jean Lapierre—Martin’s Quebec lieutenant—was a founder of the Bloc and a Bloc MP before being wooed by the Grits.

So, Martin himself sees nothing wrong in making useful alliances with sovereigntists.

A real devolution of powers might even make formal independence pointless.

Quebec would, in effect, have basically most of the powers it would as an independent nation, but still the benefits of being part of the larger, world nation.

On economic, fiscal and social policies, Duceppe and the Bloc are far to the left of Harper and the Conservatives.

So what?

With a devolution of powers, Quebec could more or less do what it wants in these areas, without, naturally, expecting Ottawa to subsidize them.

Alberta would likewise be able to take the reins in these areas.

Quebec, a beautiful place for a honeymoon, the sanctum of gay marriage in Canada. Alberta the sanctum of traditional marriage.

Prominent U.S. conservatives such as William F. Buckley and Patrick Buchanan have argued a federal government should rule only over several obvious areas: Foreign policy, defence, a criminal code and the maintenance of a stable currency (Not that Liberal Ottawa has maintained a stable dollar. It went in free fall to 63 cents, and is now in free fall again).

All else should be left to the states, or, in our case, the provinces.

Another aspect of this devolution might well be the judiciary, and the appointment of judges. The disturbing revelation that the Liberals checked the political donations to the Liberal party made by lawyers aspiring to be appointed to the bench is surely one more reason these powers in Ottawa should be curtailed or removed and transferred to the provinces.

On provincial election night in Quebec in 1976 when the PQ won its stunning victory, Levesque stood before cheering crowds of people and declared, “Now, we can build this country we call Quebec!” Maybe Harper and Duceppe, arms around each others’ shoulders, might one day be able to stand together before cheering crowds and declare, “Now, we can rebuild this country we call Canada!”

In, of course, whatever shape both sides agree on.

Paul Jackson
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