Canada: Beyond Grudges, Grievances, and Disunity 9780228018438

Table of contents :
Cover
CANADA
Title
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
Preface
Introduction
1 Acadians: Victims of an Unwanted War
2 Quebecers: Victims of History
3 Maritimers: Victims of Confederation
4 Western Canadians: Victims Searching for a Voice
5 Ontario: Victimhood Is in Its DNA
6 Indigenous Peoples: Canada’s True Victims
7 Victims Meet Victims
8 Are There Others?
9 Play “Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” and Make Me Feel Canadian
10 Why?
11 Victims No More
12 Canada: We Have a Problem
Epilogue
Notes
Index

Citation preview

canada

CANADA Beyond Grudges, Grievances, and Disunity

D O N A L D J . S AV O I E

McGill-Queen’s University Press Montreal & Kingston • London • Chicago

© McGill-Queen’s University Press 2023 ISBn 978-0-2280-1762-2 (cloth) ISBn 978-0-2280-1843-8 (ePdF ) ISBn 978-0-2280-1844-5 (eP UB) Legal deposit second quarter 2023 Bibliothèque nationale du Québec Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free (100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Donald J. Savoie Institute, Université de Moncton.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts. Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Title: Canada : beyond grudges, grievances, and disunity / Donald J. Savoie. Names: Savoie, Donald J., 1947– author. Description: Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20230154484 | Canadiana (ebook) 20230154514 | ISBn 9780228017622 (cloth) | IS B n 9780228018445 (eP U B ) | I SB n 9780228018438 (ePd F) Subjects: lcS h: Regionalism–Canada. | l cS h: Public institutions–Canada. | lc Sh : Reparations for historical injustices–Canada. Classification: lcc jl27.S28 2023 | ddc 320.971—dc23

This book was typeset in 10.5/13 Sabon.

Dedicated to the memory of Noah Augustine

Contents

Preface | ix Introduction | 3 1 Acadians: Victims of an Unwanted War | 21 2 Quebecers: Victims of History | 40 3 Maritimers: Victims of Confederation | 60 4 Western Canadians: Victims Searching for a Voice | 82 5 Ontario: Victimhood Is in Its DNA | 102 6 Indigenous Peoples: Canada’s True Victims | 120 7 Victims Meet Victims | 141 8 Are There Others? | 157 9 Play “Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” and Make Me Feel Canadian | 176 10 Why? | 188 11 Victims No More | 202 12 Canada: We Have a Problem | 223 Epilogue | 244 Notes | 253 Index | 303

Preface

I saw that something was not quite right about Canada in the spring– summer of 2021. I had recently collaborated with colleagues from Western Canada to explore Western Canada’s place in Confederation. They were well-known and widely respected scholars, with some even asking whether the Western provinces should leave Canada because of Confederation’s continued unfairness towards the region. I contributed a chapter to the book in which we asked fundamental questions about Canada’s inability to accommodate regional interests, other than those from Ontario and Quebec.1 In the fall of 2020, violence erupted between Acadians and Mi’kmaq over access to the fishery. Boats were vandalized, vehicles were torched, lobster pounds ransacked, and a fish plant burned to the ground. Federal Cabinet ministers called the events “alarming” and “disgraceful.”2 A United Nations committee asked Ottawa to respond to its criticism that the federal government had not properly intervened to deal with the violence against the Mi'qmaq fishers.3 I was taken aback by these developments. Quebec decided in May 2021 to tighten the province’s language laws. It tabled legislation to define Quebec as a nation with French as its official language. The legislation runs counter to Canada’s constitution, but Quebec premier, François Legault, explained that the province will invoke the notwithstanding clause to protect it from legal challenges.4 Though some observers challenged the legislation in the media, the rest of Canada mostly shrugged. The leaders of Canada’s three national political parties did not see any problem with the legislation. The reactions would likely have been vastly different as recently as twenty years ago.

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covId-19 hit some regions harder than others. At the outset, the federal government decided to distribute vaccines on a per capita basis. The decision favoured heavily populated provinces, notably Ontario, but much less so provinces with fast-aging populations such as Newfoundland and Labrador. When the pandemic first hit, it was clear that seniors were particularly vulnerable. Despite the decision to go with a per capita criterion Ontario had difficulties managing the pandemic in the early months and the provincial government, in concert with Ottawa, came up with reasons to redirect more vaccines, from provinces that were better able to deal with the pandemic, to Ontario. Suddenly, even Ontario felt that, somehow, it was being shortchanged by Confederation. The revelation that between 1863 and 1998 more than 150,000 Indigenous children were taken from their families to attend residential schools led Canadians to reflect on Canada’s painful history. The discovery of the remains of 215 children in unmarked graves at a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia, stunned many Canadians. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the discovery a “dark and shameful chapter of our country’s history.”5 I saw many Canadians and Canadian regions essentially arguing that they were victims. Nothing new here but the call was heard more often and it became more intense. I decided to take stock and to see if the victim label applies to all Canadians and all regions. I did what I have often done in the past when trying to make sense of things – attempt to get to the bottom of it and write a book. However, this book is different from my earlier ones. I tell a story about my country, often by drawing from my personal experiences, starting with when I was growing up in a small hamlet in eastern New Brunswick, to things I learned in my long career in academe, and while serving in several capacities in government. I also benefitted from numerous insights that I heard, over the years, from a number of Canada’s political and business leaders and I make use of them in this book. I consulted the relevant literature, and I was able to draw on my earlier publications, in particular, my work on the Maritime provinces. I also had numerous discussions with family, friends, and colleagues when working on this book, far more than I ever did in the past when working on my earlier books. I had some of them read parts or all of the manuscript. I benefitted greatly from their suggestions. Some made the point that I was raising issues that would make readers uncomfortable. Our son Julien, who has always been a keen observer of politics and public policy, told me: “Papa, this is not your standard, cold

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and detached academic study of government bureaucracy or economic development – there is a personal side to it.” He warned me that people who will read the book will react and not always positively. Julien is right. Those familiar with my work will see that, this time, I bring a number of personal experiences into the discussion. Because of this, readers will note that the book does not contain nearly as many endnotes as my earlier work does. I felt that drawing on my own personal experiences and discussions with friends, together with the published work of some of the leading scholars of Canadian politics and federalism, would help shed light on the challenges confronting Canada. I define Canada from the perspective of growing up in rural New Brunswick and coming of age when governments decided that the time had come to expand the scope of their activities and to help Acadians and other groups become full participants in Canadian society. This book then is how I see Canada, what we have done right, and what we have done wrong. I maintain that we have done more things right, than wrong. But there is one thing that stands out among the ones we have done wrong, going back even before Canada was born, – our dealings with the Indigenous peoples. It is a wrong that we need to attend to with a sense of urgency for Canada to be fully at peace with itself. I am well aware that the term “victim” is provocative, a point some family members, friends, and colleagues made time and again. One urged me to employ the term “unfairly treated,” making the case that no one, no group, no community, and no region wants to carry the “victim” label. I still opted for victim because I want to promote a debate among Canadians about how to go about making our country stronger. I think that it is important for Canadians to take stock of what works, what does not, who benefits from the country’s national political institutions, who does not, and how collectively we can make them better. I hold that Canada has benefitted more Canadians, more groups, more communities, and more regions than it is assumed. It is important for Canadians to have l’heure juste on issues confronting our country and I hope that this book helps in setting the record straight on national unity issues. The reader will note that, aside from one glaring exception, Canada has been able to help individuals, groups, and regions shed the victim label, though they may well not wish to acknowledge it. Acknowledge it or not, Canada has helped groups, communities, and regions make the transition away from victimhood. The above is why I wrote this book – to tell Canadians that the country’s political institutions are key to our country’s future. They have helped individuals, groups, communities, and regions develop to their potential.

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Their work is not done. Our political institutions are now confronting important challenges and I see many Canadians losing trust in them. Public opinion surveys support this view.6 The solution is for all of us to work to make them better – throwing the baby out with the bath water is not the solution. My hope is that this book will motivate more Canadians to get involved in public life. In brief, Canada’s future is tied to individual Canadians taking ownership of our collective problems and challenges and looking for ways to strengthen our public institutions. I want to thank the many who helped me with my research while working on this book. I had numerous discussions with a wide variety of people from my neighbours, colleagues in the academic community, business leaders, government officials at all levels, and friends. I asked many questions, tested many ideas, and pushed the people I talked to, to share their views on Canada and its future. All happily answered my questions and willingly shared their thinking. Whenever I struggled with an issue, I called on several widely respected experts for help. In all cases, they responded with insightful observations. I owe a special thank you to Linda for once again putting up with my insatiable appetite for work. She continued to support my work despite my desire to sacrifice evenings and weekends to my writing. And, once again, I want to thank Céline Basque and Ginette Benoit for helping me bring the manuscript into its final form. Donald J. Savoie Université de Moncton

canada

Introduction

I have long believed that Canada offers more advantages to its citizens than any other country. But do not only take my word for it. A recent study ranks Canada first among seventy-eight nations for “Best Countries Overall.” The United Kingdom was ranked number eight, Australia five, the United States six, and France eleven. I note that Canada got full marks in the “Quality of Life” and “Social Purpose” categories.1 Canada remains one of the world’s most peaceful countries and many Canadians view peacekeeping as an important part of their country’s identity. Canada is home to the world’s ninth-largest economy.2 Its banking system ranks second in the g20 and sixth out of 141 countries.3 It is also home to top tier health-care and educational facilities. The country has enjoyed a remarkable degree of political and economic stability. Canadian society is tolerant, much more so than our neighbours to the south. John Ibbitson believes that “Canada can make an honest claim to being the most open-minded and open-hearted place on earth.”4 Many Canadians have a different take on their country, at least when it comes to national unity, their place in the Canadian family, and how Confederation has dealt with their region’s economic interests. Nova Scotians were asked on two occasions whether they wanted to be part of Canada – twice, they said no. Quebec decided to remain a part of Canada by the narrowest of margins in 1995.5 An Environics Institute survey carried out in 2019 prompted the Globe and Mail to write about a “rising political alienation in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Atlantic Canada – resentment that Ottawa ignores at its own peril.”6 A special Senate Committee report issued a “wake up call” to the Canadian government, arguing that “for far too long, the Arctic and northern regions have been neglected by Canada.”7 Many Indigenous

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peoples view themselves as victims and rightly so. Other racialized Canadians also see themselves as victims, as do many women and now even white males. Canada defies logic on several levels and it remains a difficult country to govern. For one thing, its political structure runs contrary to North America’s economic geography with its north-south economic pull. Canada was not born out of revolution. Revolutions in the United States and France forced the political and intellectual elites to think of new approaches and define new institutions that correspond to the country’s political and economic circumstances – that is what revolutions are good at. Canada was born out of a compromise between Ontario and Quebec. The other Canadian regions either did not exist in 1867 or were smacked into line by the Colonial Office in London and the political leaders of the old Canada during the negotiations. More compromises were to follow, with the result that today we do not have one Canada but many Canadas. How, one may ask, can Canadians view themselves as victims, given that the country ranks number one in the world for “quality of life” and that many aspiring immigrants keep knocking on Canada’s door to come in? I answer that question by looking to history and to our national political institutions. Canada, in 1864–67, was short on home-grown intellects to shape the country’s political institutions. Only one of the thirty-three Fathers of Confederation present at the Quebec Conference had a university education, in contrast to the fifty-five leaders in Philadelphia at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, where more than half did. The best that our Fathers of Confederation could do was to import British political institutions lock, stock, and barrel. This is what they did. The fact that Canada was to be a federation, while Great Britain was not, was viewed as a detail that would only pose a temporary problem. Sir John A. Macdonald, for one, was convinced that in time Canada would evolve into a unitary state like Great Britain and he was hoping this would come sooner than later. The Founding Fathers in the United States wrote a bold and inspiring second paragraph in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The preamble of the United States Constitution begins with the words “We the People.” In contrast, the preamble of Canada’s Constitution reads: “with a

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Constitution similar in Principle to that of the United Kingdom.” The Fathers of Confederation saw that British institutions had met the test of time and were convinced that they would provide the new Canada precisely what it was looking for – “peace, order and good government.” They paid little attention to the fact that British institutions operated in a unitary state. They also could hardly look for inspiration to the south, the United States, where a civil war was raging at the time they were meeting to establish the terms of the British North America (bna ) Act. The American Civil War was fueled in large part by regional tensions. As is well known, the old Canada was a failure (circa 1841 to 1867) and more is said about this period below. The governance structure designed to manage difficult linguistic, cultural, and religious tensions misfired time and again. The Canadian Encyclopedia summed up the era of the old Canada in this fashion, it “became increasingly unstable. It lurched from one cobbled-together government to another, in an atmosphere of seething resentments and fears.”8 The old Canada or the 1841 Act of Union failed, at least in part, because it forced Lower Canada into a union with Upper Canada, without its consent. The old Canada laid the groundwork for the new Canada. Canada continues to struggle to make Confederation arrangements that were conceived between 1864 and 1867 to fix the flaws in the 1841 Act of Union, work. Canada is a paradox. The world sees Canada as a country full of promise, known for its political stability and largely free of corruption, fairly tolerant of minority groups, and proud of its cultural diversity. And yet many Canadians, Canadian regions and communities view themselves as victims. We need to understand why and how Canada has been dealing with victimhood. This book is about Canada, viewed from the perspective of someone who grew up in a tiny Acadian hamlet in New Brunswick. Acadians have had a particularly difficult history going back 270 years. I long believed that Acadians were Canada’s hardest hit victims. I no longer believe this. I hold that Acadians have been able to make the transition to become full participants in Canadian society. To be sure, other countries have victims, but victimhood is not as widespread elsewhere as it is in Canada. In the United States, Black Americans are victims, but New Yorkers or Californians do not consider themselves as victims to the extent that Atlantic Canadians, Quebecers, Western Canadians and now even Ontarians view themselves as victims. The Government of Canada has also shown a far greater willingness to

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apologize to groups for historical wrongs than other Western countries. I also argue that Canada outperforms other nations in helping victims make the transition to full participants in the country’s political and economic life. Though regions, communities, and many Canadians view themselves as victims, we are Canadians because we do not want to be anything or anybody else. Nothing wrong with that. My work has taken me to every corner of the world: Africa, China, Australia, South and Central America, Western and Eastern Europe, and Russia. I met many people abroad who would have liked to have been born somewhere else, but I have not met many Canadians outside Quebec, and perhaps Alberta, who wanted to be anything else than Canadian. And yet, the victimization of Canadian society is evident everywhere – in regions, in communities, and among individuals. I explain why Canada’s political, judicial, and administrative institutions have contributed to the victimization of Canadian society. It only takes a moment’s reflection to appreciate that if Canadians had, from time to time, the luxury of a fresh start in defining their national political institutions, things would be vastly different. The Senate, for example, would not survive in its present form. Western and Atlantic Canada would introduce changes that would give them a more powerful voice in national institutions. The deal struck in 1867 had a number of flaws other than those related to the Senate. The Constitution’s division of power between the federal and provincial governments, for example, became outdated shortly after the Confederation deal was struck. It will be recalled that two Atlantic Canada colonies – Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland – took a look at the deal that the Fathers of Confederation had struck and quickly walked away. Nova Scotia became part of Confederation without its consent. The colony only entered the Canadian family because it was not up to Nova Scotians to decide. There was nothing to prevent Nova Scotia to hold a referendum on the question, but superior political authorities, notably the Colonial Office, decided that there was no need for a referendum. There is plenty of evidence to make the case that had a referendum been held, Nova Scotia would not have agreed to join Confederation. Western Canada did not have a voice in defining national institutions. To be sure, if the negotiations were held today, Western Canada would make certain that Canada’s political institutions would look different than they do now. The Canadians drove the negotiations to the point that the seventy-two resolutions, which became Canada’s Constitution, were

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already in draft form “before the Canadian delegates had ever disembarked at Charlottetown.”9 Ged Martin summed up the negotiations: “the Maritimers were smacked into line by the British, acting on appeal from the Canadians.”10 The key players among the Fathers of Confederation went about their work with single-minded purpose. Democratic concerns were not top of mind. Indeed, if today’s democratic requirements applied between 1864 and 1867, Canada would not have been born or, more likely, would not look like it does today. The Constitution that the architects of Confederation came up with did not even meet the most basic requisites of a federal system and the tactics employed would hardly satisfy today’s democratic requirements. Richard Gwyn, in his sympathetic biography of Sir John A. Macdonald, described him as a “scheming opportunist” and added that he “hadn’t so much created a nation as manipulated and seduced and connived and bullied it into existence against the wishes of most of its own citizens.”11 This then is how Canada was born. One hundred and fifteen years later, nine out of ten provinces signed on to the 1982 Constitution Act. This time, Quebec, rather than Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, did not, and it has still not formally approved the enactment of the act. One can easily appreciate why non-Canadians would be puzzled by this state of affairs. Canada is indeed a difficult country to govern. I maintain that Canada continues to thrive despite the many shortcomings in its national political institutions and the tendency of Canadians to see themselves as victims. Our history and the shortcomings in our national political and administrative institutions have taught us the art of compromise. Canadians also recognize that the alternative to Canada, in whatever form, is worse. I assert that this, more than anything else, continues to strengthen Canada’s national unity. I argue that Canada’s Constitution and its political institutions amplify rather than attenuate Canadian victimization. However, they have also enabled Canadians to manage the issue better than other countries. Canadians have learned to assess their level of victimization by looking to the alternatives. Many Quebecers and Francophone communities outside Quebec, for example, know full well what would await them if they became part of the United States. Ontarians, perhaps more than other Canadians, will strongly resist any effort to see the province become an American state. It is in their dna , going back to Laura Secord and the War of 1812. George Grant’s Lament for A Nation was widely applauded in Ontario, but much less so in the other regions.12

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Ontario’s economic strength is explained, in part, by not being another US state. The province’s automobile sector would exist in a different form, or not exist at all, if Canada and the United States had not signed the Auto Pact. Ontario’s intelligentsia has, over the years, led the efforts to define a Canadian identity.13 It has been a struggle. Statistics Canada also decided to contribute to the debate and carried out a study on the matter in 2013. It concluded that: “A strong belief in Canadian shared values was most prevalent in Ontario, where the population was generally more likely to feel to a greater extent that Canadians shared a common set of values.”14 Sir John A. Macdonald, the lead architect of Confederation, did what Canadian politicians have done since they first ran for elected office. He represented the interests of his region well in the negotiations and later in his work as prime minister, to Ontario’s economic benefit. New Canadians are likely to believe “to a greater extent” that Canadians share specific values.15 They could live somewhere else, but they decided to come to Canada. They may have been victims in their old countries, but not in Canada, where they moved to for a fresh start. Michael Wilson, former Finance minister in the Brian Mulroney government, told me that he had an eye-opening experience very early on in his political career. He spoke before a gathering in his constituency, Etobicoke, a suburb of Toronto, where he employed the word “freedom” on three occasions. The reaction, he said, was markedly different between “old stock” Canadians and new Canadians. Old stock Canadians, he reports, had a somewhat “blasé” reaction to the word, while new Canadians reacted very positively.16 Old stock Canadians take freedom for granted and look to their national institutions to do more than promote freedom. They bring their history, their families’ histories, and their sense of community to the fore when they think about their Canadian identity. Les Plaines d’Abraham, for example, are never far from the minds of many Francophones. For old stock Quebec Francophones, it represents a sore that has never healed.17 For many old stock Anglophones, it represents an important event that changed the course of history in the British North American colonies. For new Canadians, it represents just another military conflict that belongs to history, not to today’s challenges. Acadians long regarded themselves as victims, pointing to the 1755 Expulsion of the Acadians to make the case. A number of Atlantic Canadians believe that the Confederation has dealt them a bad hand. They have a point, as I and others have long argued.18 A great deal has also been written about Western alienation. Suffice to note here that

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Western alienation is rooted in Western Canadians’ discontent with political representatives and how national political institutions decide.19 Many Quebecers also view themselves as victims and their ties to Canada remain uncertain. Ontario, meanwhile, appears to be the one region that is happy with its standing in Confederation, but one should be careful not to push this view too far. Ontario has long considered itself a victim to the economic dominance of the United States and, increasingly, a victim of Confederation, as we will see in chapter 5. It was Ontario that launched the fair share federalism campaign some thirty years ago. Canada’s growing culture of victimhood is not without challenges. The culture makes it more difficult to resolve political, economic, and social conflicts. It also makes citizens more entitled and less willing to accept responsibility. Public opinion surveys point to a growing polarization in Canadian politics. One survey, for example, reveals that: “1 in 4 Canadians hate their political opponents.”20 Most individuals who view themselves or their communities as victims are rarely in a forgiving mood. Does this suggest that Canadians should reject all claims that regions, communities, and individuals are victims? No, because some are truly victims, mainly as a result of past government policies, notably Indigenous peoples. And yet it is worth repeating the point that Canada, better than other countries, has been able to assist victims of war, history, and misguided government policies to make the transition to full participants in society, as this book argues. Politicians, from Sir John A. Macdonald to Justin Trudeau, have lamented Canada’s inability to find unity and purpose. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau argues that “there is no core identity, no mainstream in Canada.”21 I can think of no other president or prime minister in the Western World who would make such a claim. Margaret Atwood suggests that “there is no new ‘Canadian’ identity ready for him [the immigrant] to step into.”22 Marshall McLuhan observed that “Canada is the only country in the world that knows how to live without an identity.”23 Ramsay Cook summed it up best when he wrote, “the question of Canadian identity is not a ‘Canadian’ question at all but a regional question.”24 If Canadian identity is a regional question rather than a Canadian national question, how then are Canada’s political institutions addressing this? The Washington Post described Canada as having an “exaggerated loyalty to English institutions and undue attention to French grievances” where immigration is high and “assimilation discouraged.” It adds that Canada’s atonement for its history of dealing with its Aboriginal communities has taken the form of “political speeches” and

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“new self-government treaties.”25 This environment runs the risk of adding fuel to the victimization of Canadian society, at least, from an American perspective. The institutions defined in 1867 looked to the two Maritime colonies to become, somehow, the honest broker between two nations still warring in the bosom of a single country and a federal system that was federal in name only. The thinking was that the two Maritime colonies would be called upon, from time to time, to break the impasse between Upper and Lower Canada. It has not, however, worked out as envisaged. No matter – Canada has survived for 155 years and this book seeks to understand why. The book makes the case that there are powerful forces that overshadow strongly anchored regional identities. It argues that Canadians know intuitively that they share an identity; that they want to be nothing else but Canadians; and that Canada has learned to work around a rigid Constitution and national political institutions ill-suited to the country’s socioeconomic circumstances and geography. This, in turn, has produced a distinct Canadian political culture that values tolerance, different perspectives, compromise, gradual change, as well as the incremental adaptation of our federal structure.26 This political culture has enabled Canada to thrive and to rank at the top for its quality of life on the world stage. Our written Constitution may be rigid, but Canada has learned to sidestep it whenever its political leadership decides it necessary. Governments have, for the most part, also been able to accommodate or rather attenuate regional or other tensions by coming up with government programs – many of which, by design, show little respect for jurisdictional boundaries. The result is that Canada has developed a hybrid form of federalism that is particularly Canadian. Hybrid federalism has contributed to the victimization of Canadian regions, but it has also helped some of them and certain groups to make the transition away from victimhood.

Un d e rS t a n dIn g canada How our Constitution evolves and national political institutions decide can tell you a great deal about Canada. History is also key to understanding how Canada works. I am not an historian, but I have always valued their work.27 Knowing the past does not tell you everything about the future but ignoring history is fraught with danger. Not knowing history also runs the risk of seeing our challenges and problems out of proportion to what they actually are.

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I am an Acadian-Canadian or a Canadian-Acadian, either one works fine with me. For a long time, I believed that no other people had a tougher history than Acadians, as previously mentioned. We were the true victims in New Brunswick and in Canada. For those who may not be familiar with this part of history, British soldiers (circa 1755–63) rounded up French settlers in communities around the Bay of Fundy, burned their homes and crops, and expelled them from their land. Many were put on boats and sent off to far away lands. Many perished at sea, others made it to Louisiana, to English colonies or the Caribbeans, and still others, back to France. Some escaped through the forests and made their way to New Brunswick. I have always been told that this is what my Savoie and Collette ancestors did. Most Acadian families were separated, never to be reunited again. Over eleven thousand Acadians were deported, and thousands died at sea, of disease, or of starvation.28 I recall, as a young boy, the local church and a handful of community leaders erecting a tall white cross firmly anchored in cement across the road from our house to commemorate the 1755 Grand Dérangement. Even back then, I would have much preferred celebrating victories rather than Le Grand Dérangement. We were celebrating the expulsion of my ancestors from their land and to this day I am still at a loss to understand why we would come together to celebrate a sad event, an event where my ancestors were brutally removed from their homes and scattered to the four winds. I became convinced that we were the victims and that English Protestants were the villains. I recall a young woman from our village marrying an English Protestant from away. We all expected her to hang her head in shame, if she ever came back to the village. She never did return to SaintMaurice. I could not shake away the thought that she would never be fully accepted in our village again and, much worse, that she would be tortured in hell for eternity. That was the price to pay if you married an English Protestant. How, I thought, could anyone be so misguided? But things do change. I too married an English Protestant. I continue to return to my home village and my family and friends continue to welcome her. Time will tell whether I will be tortured in hell for eternity. If I am, I am convinced that it will not be because I married an English Protestant. Today, I am much more familiar with the history of the Roman Catholic Church. I now believe that I would have accompanied Martin Luther when he nailed his ninety-five theses on the church door at the Wittenberg Castle in 1517, in which he attacked the power of the Pope and pointed out that the Church was ignoring those who were poor and suffering.

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My family left my natal village when I was twelve years old. As I began to read history, I discovered that Acadians were hardly the only victims either in Canada or elsewhere. Think of African-Americans. Think of what the English did to the Scots after the battle of Culloden that took place only nine years before the Great Expulsion. After Culloden, many Jacobite supporters were executed, others tortured, and many of the wounded were slaughtered. Women were raped and properties were burned to the ground.29 Think of what Oliver Cromwell and William III did to the Irish. Think of the Holocaust. At home, think of our First Nation communities who are still confronted by violence, bigoty, disorder, and mismanagement. For them, their tortured history never ends. Canadian history is not free of victims. I am ashamed of what my Canada has done to the Indigenous peoples down through the ages to this day. Quebec has long viewed itself as a victim of history, going back to La Conquête de 1759–60. The Maritime provinces remain convinced that Confederation has dealt them a bad hand, which explains their economic challenges. Western Canada has taken aim at national political institutions for their inability to give weight to its concerns and perspective. There is a widely held view that Ontario has benefitted far more than any other region from Confederation and Canada’s economic policies. But things are changing even here. In addition, Japanese, Chinese, and Black Canadians can also point to a number of historical wrongs that governments committed towards their ancestors. Why write this book? I do not take Canada for granted and I continue to insist that our public institutions need to be reformed. Though I hold up hope that one day Canadians and their political leaders will move to introduce change in our national political and administrative institutions, I am not optimistic. I fear that fundamental change to the way our national institutions operate will only come about if Quebec leaves Canada with a bang (unlikely) or by stealth (more likely). Political leaders who have it in their power to introduce change see no reason to do so. The institutions work well from their perspective, and so, why change? In light of this, I hold that the best medicine to strengthen Canada’s national unity is to communicate with one another about the state of our country. This is my contribution. My hope is that other Canadians will make a similar effort. I owe this much to my fellow Canadians. Canada has given me far more than I will ever be able to give back to it. I was awarded a Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) that I will have held for nineteen years. My work has taken me to every province and every territory in Canada’s

Introduction

13

North. What’s more, though I was not in the ring, I had a ringside seat to key moments in Canada’s development: the patriation of Canada’s Constitution, the introduction of the National Energy Program (neP ) and the overhaul of Canada’s regional development policy. I had, from time to time, access to some of Canada’s most important policy makers and I never failed to probe, to ask questions, and to take notes. As I explained in the preface, I draw on numerous life experiences in writing this book, far more than is the case for my other books. I have had many fortunate moments in my career that brought me close to the action, at times, because I am an Acadian and a Maritimer. The population of the three Maritime provinces combined amounts to little more than 1.9 million compared to 6.4 million for the Greater Toronto Area alone. The Maritime provinces are much like the old television sitcom Cheers, where everybody knows your name. This is especially true if you raise your head above the parapet in whatever sector you work in. I have had numerous contacts, over the years, with many of the premiers of the three Maritime provincial governments, federal Cabinet ministers from my region, many members of Parliament, and a number of business leaders from Atlantic Canada. I published three books on the latter, one about Harrison McCain, another about K.C. and Arthur Irving, and yet another about John Bragg. Three of them were or are good friends. I participated in several transition to power exercises in Ottawa, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. I write this to tell the reader how my work and personal experiences came to influence the book’s contents. I was working in Ottawa for two Cabinet ministers and a central agency when the federal government decided to bring home our Constitution in the early 1980s. I hasten to add that I was only a bit player, if that, in this process. I was consulted (I was only one of many and I was certainly not the most important voice) about the equalization clause that was included in the Constitution Act, 1982. I also had a brief one-on-one meeting with former Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau in 1982 about the state of federal-provincial relations. To be sure, I benefitted far more from this brief discussion than did Trudeau père. I am not trying to be modest here – these are the facts. I knew most of the key players working on getting our Constitution home, but I was not one of them. However, I was a keen observer, as the events unfolded. I recall accompanying Allan J. MacEachen to Cape Breton in 1981. Several Cabinet ministers and Liberal members of Parliament, at the time, told me that MacEachen had given the most powerful speech they had ever heard on Parliament Hill at a caucus meeting in 1979, making the case that Pierre E. Trudeau should return as leader of the Liberal

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Canada

Party of Canada (lPc ) in the upcoming 1980 general election. It will be recalled that Trudeau resigned as leader of the party in November 1979, after his government went down to defeat to Joe Clark in the May election. However, before the Liberal Party could select a new leader, the Clark Government fell in December 1979 on a budget vote. MacEachen was one of Parliament’s great orators and on that day, he was in full flight, making the case that Trudeau should reconsider his resignation as party leader. Trudeau then requested time to consider it. I told Mr MacEachen what I had heard from some of his Cabinet colleagues and backbench Liberal members of Parliament about his speech and that, by all accounts, it was a remarkable tour de force. I went on to enquire about why Mr Trudeau had asked caucus for time to reflect on the question. “Surely,” I said, “he knew that you would be making the appeal and you knew what his decision would be, as you rose in caucus to make the call to your colleagues.” MacEachen responded, “Bella figura, bella figura.” He saw my puzzled look and added, “Just for show, just for show.” When we landed at the Ottawa airport on our return, MacEachen turned to me and said: “What we talked about today is like a tin can, it is sealed.” I never reported this conversation until now. As it was widely known in his day, MacEachen did not play fast and loose with information, and I never believed for a moment that he was the one that led the charge to introduce access to information legislation in Ottawa. I now write this because I think that historians and history should know. Several years later, MacEachen taught me a lesson in Realpolitik. I had published The Politics of Public Spending in Canada, that generated a number of reviews in the popular press, in which I outlined my lunch theory of government spending in the Canadian context – I return to the theory later in this book. Members of the Liberal caucus in Ottawa had invited me to make a presentation on the state of Canada’s public finances. I rang the alarm bell, making the case that the government would have no choice but to cut spending and or increase taxes. At the end of my presentation, MacEachen spoke up: “Now that we heard from the good professor, can we talk politics.” I got the message. The Liberal Party was in opposition and looking at a general election a year or so down the road. Jean Chrétien led the Liberal Party to a resounding victory in 1993. The party tabled its Red Book, full of election spending promises during the campaign. It said little about the cost of servicing the government debt and ever growing government deficits. However, once in power, the Chrétien government had a change of mind. It unveiled a sweeping program review exercise after the

Introduction

15

Wall Street Journal published an editorial on 12 January 1995 called “Bankrupt Canada?” and argued that “if dramatic action isn’t taken in the next month’s federal budget, it’s not inconceivable that Canada could hit the debt wall and … have to call in the International Monetary Fund to stabilize its falling currency.”30 Partisan politics and sound public policy do not often meet during election campaigns. I was informed that during the discussions leading up to the 2011 election, a sitting Liberal mP made this revealing observation: “If we have to keep our promises, it means we won.”31 The overriding goal is to win the election and if difficult issues need to be resolved, they can wait until after the election is won. I was asked by Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1986–87 to consult Atlantic Canadians and produce a report on the establishment of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (acoa ). I wrote the report after consulting premiers and federal Cabinet ministers and leading representatives of the business community, as well as community leaders from the four Atlantic provinces. The Mulroney government accepted some 90 per cent of my recommendations. The acoa model has since been introduced to every Canadian region and it is still in place after thirty-five years. The previous longest-lasting federal government regional development agency model was in place for fifteen years – the Department of Regional Economic Expansion (dree ). I went to St John’s on 6 June 1987 to join Prime Minister Mulroney to unveil the agency for Atlantic Canada. I was told to be available to brief the prime minister and to be prepared to answer any questions that he may have about the agency and Atlantic Canada. To my surprise, the only question he asked was how Acadians were reacting to his proposed Meech Lake Accord. I was completely unprepared for that question, and I have no doubt that my answer was inadequate. I was ready to talk about my report and about economic development in Atlantic Canada; he wanted to talk about national unity. A general election was held the following year and Mulroney won a majority mandate. Looking back, I now accept that prime ministers always have national unity at top of mind, and Mulroney was no exception. Canada also gave me several opportunities to serve abroad and the experience gave me a deeper appreciation of my country. I went to Moscow on a few assignments to provide advice as Russia sought to underline the importance of a nonpartisan public service, as the country was making the transition from a one-party to a multi-party state – at least, that is what we thought at the time. I went to Bosnia and Herzegovina to help draft an economic development plan in the immediate aftermath of the civil war, and to China to help establish

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Canada

a regional development agency for Western China based on the acoa model. I went to Brazil for the World Bank to offer advice to the government on public finance and government budgeting and to Western Africa to review regional development initiatives. Frank McKenna asked me to chair his transition team when he first came to power in New Brunswick in 1987, and I was a member of the transition team for Liberal Prime Minister Jean Chrétien (1992–93) and for Progressive Conservative New Brunswick Premier David Alward (2010). I chaired the transition team for Nova Scotia’s New Democratic Party (ndP ) when Premier Darrel Dexter came to power in 2009. The reader will note that I have never had much interest in partisan politics or in looking to be closely identified with one political party in particular. My academic training and interest as well as my brief sojourn in the federal public service in Ottawa, if nothing else, made me into a nonpartisan political observer. However, like so many Acadians, I deeply admired former New Brunswick Liberal Premier Louis J. Robichaud. He led New Brunswick’s social reform by introducing bold new measures in every sector of provincial government activity. We also became very close friends and, at his request, I organized his state funeral. This was a very difficult, emotional moment for me, as it was for Acadians of my generation. Over the years, I had many discussions with Roméo LeBlanc, a former senior Cabinet minister and governor general and a close friend. He gave me numerous insights on how Ottawa decides, the role of Cabinet and of the prime minister, and who is able to get what, or obtain the most, when government policies and spending decisions are struck. I hasten to add that LeBlanc is not the Cabinet minister who told me that Cabinet is today less a decision-making body and more of a focus group to the prime minister. A number of journalists have picked up this focus-group analogy since I published Governing from the Centre. Many former Cabinet ministers and three former clerks of the Privy Council have also asked “which Cabinet minister told you this?” I have never revealed his or her identity. In 2019, twenty years after the book’s publication, I asked the former Cabinet minister if I could disclose his or her name. The minister thought about it for a few days and said no, and I respect the decision. Justice John Gomery asked me to head the research group for his Commission of Inquiry into the Sponsorship Program and Advertising Activities. This work gave me fresh insights into how Ottawa decides and why. I respected Justice Gomery but I am now willing to report that I did not agree with a number of his recommendations.

Introduction

17

Ted Hodgetts, the dean of public administration in Canada and a man for whom I had and still have a great deal of admiration, once suggested that I should write about my various experiences. He added, “I have a title for you – ‘A Gumshoe in the Corridors of Power.’” When he thought of me, he said, he pictures me quietly walking around the corridors of power in Ottawa trying to understand who is who and why they do what they do and then write about it. Jeffrey Simpson, in his review of my Governing from the Centre for the Globe and Mail, offered a similar image: “Although a full professor, Savoie darts around Ottawa all the time working his contacts like a seasoned journalist.”32 I decided to make full use of my gumshoe role, not to write about my various experiences, but rather to help Canadians understand better their country and how policy-makers have been trying to make it work. I am hardly the only Canadian to offer ideas on how to strengthen Canada and Canadian identity. William A. Macdonald made an important contribution through his Might Nature Be Canadian? Essays on Mutual Accommodation. Michael Ignatieff wrote a book about the importance of distinguishing the Canadian identity from the American identity.33 Jack Granatstein, in his Yankee, Go Home? looks to history to explain the anti-American feeling in Canada and points to elements that tie Canadians to Canada – including English-French duality, hockey, and Medicare.34 Granatstein joined a long list of Ontario-based authors who seek to define Canada’s identity by contrasting it to our powerful neighbour to the south. There are many more who have made important contributions to promote a better understanding of Canada.35 Mark Milke published The Victim Cult, where he explores how a culture of blame inhibits individuals and communities from assuming responsibility for their actions.36 However, I know of no study that looks at how the country’s political-administrative institutions have contributed to victimization and how some groups, communities, and regions have been able to make the transition away from victimhood. Ontario authors tend to define Canada’s identity in relation to the omnipresent American neighbour. They invariably look for things that can distinguish Canadians from Americans. Quebec authors are inclined to look to their province’s place in the Canadian family, measures to protect the French language and culture against the powerful cultural pull of English Canada, and the influence of the American culture and media. Authors from Atlantic Canada are likely to look to their region’s place in the Canadian family and their region’s economic woes, when exploring Canada’s identity. Authors from Western Canada, meanwhile, are much less concerned about the United States than their Ontario counterparts.

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Their focus is how best to give voice to their region in shaping Canadian values and national policies.37 The above makes the case that Ramsay Cook was right when he argued that the question of Canadian identity is a regional question. Victims in society is hardly a Canada-only phenomenon. There is now a wide body of literature on victims of crime but I have no interest in this issue. I deal with victimization from a much broader perspective. I am not alone. We have a fast-growing body of literature on the culture of victimhood, the culture of complaints, the culture of unfairness, microaggressions, the victim mentality, and victims of discrimination.38 Charles J. Sykes wrote a widely read book, A Nation of Victims: The Decay of the American Character, in which he takes dead aim at political correctness. He identifies several sources that have fuelled the growth of the victim mentality in the United States including aggrieved interest groups, don’t-blame-me permissiveness, the civil rights movement, and “washing away responsibility in a torrent of explanation – racism, sexism, rotten parents, addiction, and illness.” He adds that: “Americans have become obsessed with litigation.”39 Mark Milke’s The Victim Cult outlines a spectrum of victimhood from mild, to moderate, to very serious where narratives can give rise to acts of violence.40 In the United Kingdom, Frank Furedi argues that the culture of victimhood, which he ties to the institutionalization of vulnerability, has become a powerful political force.41 Authors in France also report on the country’s fast-growing culture of victimhood. Caroline Fourest writes about les policiers de la pensée and argues that the culture of victimhood now permeates the political discourse of both the political left and right. She maintains that the culture “invades our privacy, assigns our identities, and censors our democratic exchanges.”42 Canada is also not immune to the culture of victimhood. Apart from Milke’s book, Mathieu Bock-Côté’s L’empire du politiquement correct (the empire of political correctness) became the talk of Quebec’s political class. Premier François Legault has it on his reading list. Bock-Côté maintains that minority groups have grabbed a hold of the political agenda and now make it very difficult to pursue a collective identity and a policy agenda.43 Populism, grievances, and victimhood go hand-in-hand. Populist leaders can gain the support of voters by making the case that they were wronged by someone, notably the elites.44 Populism has deep roots in parts of Canada – notably in Western Canada and Quebec. I also remind the reader that Rob Ford brought populism to the Toronto City Hall between 2010 and 2014.45 Canada’s first-past-the-post electoral system does not favour the use of populist parties which may well explain their

Introduction

19

inability to gain a footing in all regions and at the national level.46 I maintain that Canada’s political culture also inhibits the growth of populism. There are, however, a number of signs suggesting that the culture of victimhood is increasingly visible in Canada’s political discourse. This book argues that the victim culture runs deeper in Canada than elsewhere because it is tied to the workings of our national political and administrative institutions, race, territory or space, and history. In other countries, the culture of victimhood can generate a political debate that calls for winners and losers. In Canada, the debate generates winners, losers, and victims. It will be recalled that what Lord Durham discovered in the pre-Confederation era was not a conflict of political opinion, but rather a conflict of race. In Canada, race is frequently tied to territory (e.g., Francophone Quebec) and designated reserves (Indigenous peoples) in addition to minority groups.

oU t l In e oF the Book The debate that dominated Canadian politics from the 1960s to the late 1990s no longer resonates as well with most Canadians. The debate was about Quebec’s place in Confederation or Canada’s two solitudes. Hugh MacLennan’s book by the same title gave rise to many discussions both in political circles in high school and university classrooms. In 1965, English Canadian John Porter’s The Vertical Mosaic was a must-read book for high school and university students.47 French Canadian students, meanwhile, shrugged opting to focus on how best to position their place in the Canadian family. The fact that Vertical Mosaic paid little attention to Quebec and that it was never translated into French did not help in bridging the two solitudes. Today, the debate is about how all Canadian regions fit in the Canadian family, how the Indigenous peoples can find their rightful place in Canada, how various minority groups can secure basic rights, how rural Canada can develop to its full potential and why urban Canada is not getting its proper share of government spending to update its infrastructure and accommodate the influx of new residents. Modern means of communication have enabled Canadians to compare their own well being and that of their communities quickly, at times, facts be dammed. The 24-hour news channels and social media continue to have a profound impact on how Canadians see themselves and their regions in the Canadian family. The book looks at the Canadian communities that make up Canada. It explores their defining characteristics, their histories, and how they

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relate to the broader Canadian family. It establishes a common thread that ties Canadians and their communities together. The important point is that Canada has been able to manage the victimization of its society because it has learned to compromise at key moments in its history. However contradictory it may appear, Canada’s national political and administrative institutions have on the one hand, fuelled victimism, and on the other hand, enabled political leaders to manage it and to help victims make the transition away from victimhood. Compromises often leave no one fully satisfied. But they work in the Canadian setting because the alternative holds no appeal. They also work because Canada’s political institutions are better at generating compromises than bold action. Canada itself was born out of compromise, not bold action. The book looks at victimhood from several perspectives. Canadian regions view themselves as victims of misguided federal government policies, while minority groups are convinced that they are victims to powerful forces which also include present and past government policies. We take stock of Canada’s victims, real and perceived, and assess how the country’s Constitution and political institutions have contributed to the victimization of Canadian society. We look to other countries to see how they deal with victims, again real or perceived. All countries have victims that result from wars, conflicts, and bigotry. Canada is no different. However, leaving aside how it has thus far dealt with its Indigenous population, Canada has a much stronger capacity than other countries to address historical wrongs, apologize for past misdeeds, and assist victims in making the transition away from victimhood. The book argues that this helps to define Canada and its national identity. It also explains, at least in part, Canada’s international standing and its high ranking for being one of the best countries in the world to live.

1

Acadians: Victims of an Unwanted War

I believe that my roots have shaped my thinking about Canada, as their roots have for other Canadians. Roots have a profound impact on one’s commitment to Canada – chances are that someone from Rosedale, Toronto, or Ottawa will feel a much stronger commitment to Canada than someone from Lac-Saint-Jean, Quebec. Roots will also have a decisive influence in determining if one thinks that he or she or their community are victims. At the risk of stating the obvious, Canada and its opportunities look different, depending on where one sits. As noted, I grew up in Saint-Maurice. It is one of New Brunswick’s smallest villages, located ten kilometers away from the nearest town, Bouctouche. The Roadside Thoughts website has this to say about SaintMaurice: “We have done a cursory search and if it was a community, we haven’t been able to find any evidence that it still exists.”1 The community still exists and the reader can take my word for it. I make a point of visiting it at least once a year. Saint-Maurice, at one time, had two one-room schools and a small chapel. It continues to lose population and it no longer has a school or a chapel. But Saint-Maurice is still there. There is, however, nothing in Saint-Maurice to entice people to move there. It is several kilometers from the Northumberland Straight and fishing area. The land is not suitable for agriculture and it is impossible to grow anything of commercial value. The local forest is only capable of growing small trees and it is incapable of producing anything more than firewood. Why, then, did my ancestors move to Saint-Maurice? I am told that they had first settled in Bouctouche on choice land on the Northumberland Straight, close to good fishing and better agricultural land. However, the British came and grabbed their land and forced them to move inland.

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It may well be that my ancestors knew that the English would never have any interest in Saint-Maurice because it held (and still holds) little economic potential. They moved to Saint-Maurice also because there was nowhere else to move to in the nineteenth century. We do know that Acadians moved far from more populated areas in order to avoid contact with the British. This continued until the late 1930s.2 I am not at all certain that this is why my ancestors came to Saint-Maurice, but in the tradition of oral history long favoured by generations of Acadians, this is what I have been told. It all made sense to me, growing up in the land that God gave Cain. Saint-Maurice is part of Wellington Parish, named after the Duke of Wellington, who defeated Napoléon Bonaparte at Waterloo. New Brunswick is named after the “mad king” George III who also held the title Duke of Brunswick, an area in north-central Germany. Though there was much more to George III, including his deep appreciation of science, he is best remembered for losing the American colonies and going mad. The debate continues on the causes that led to his madness.3 No matter, it was clear to Acadians who was on top, who won and who lost, and who ran everything in government and in business. My maternal grandfather was Napoléon Collette, who had Napoléon Bonaparte as one of his heroes. I recall that he held a deep resentment towards les Anglais who had carried out Le Grand Dérangement. He believed that if his community, his province and Canada had problems, it was all because of les Anglais. The road from Saint-Maurice to Bouctouche, where my parents went for groceries, was a dirt road which was not passable for a week or two in the spring when snow melted and turned the road into mud. Cars had to be put away. In case of an emergency, one had to get up very early and try his or her luck on the frozen mud road. Unless one returned early the next morning, one had to leave the car on the paved highway and walk some eight kilometers to get home. Winter months were not much better because the road to Saint-Maurice was one of the last on the list of roads to be cleared. I recall that the road was called le Chemin du Roy. Le roi was far removed from Saint-Maurice but I was told that it meant that the road belonged to the government. For a long time, I believed that the government or, rather, governments belonged to le roi ou la reine in far away Britain and that they had very little to do with us. It seemed that everything, including the road in front of our house, belonged to les Anglais. My parents had to send me to a private college run by priests in order for me to get a high school education since Acadians in Moncton did

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23

not have access to a French-language high school. Like everyone else, my parents paid taxes to support the provincial education system, but if they wanted their children educated in French, they had to pay to send them to a private school – a form of double taxation on the more economically vulnerable. In brief, it was easy for us to view ourselves as victims because we were. Home-grown businesses in Acadian communities were rare. Working in the forestry sector in neighbouring communities was an option and many able men in the village worked cutting pulpwood while others worked in Bouctouche, loading pulp on boats from far away England and Germany. Some worked as carpenters or labourers in the construction industry. Those in communities that dotted the coast on the Northumberland Straight were able to fish. Those who did not, had to relocate elsewhere to find work and many did. A good number of local residents went to the “Boston States” as New England was then often called. Some returned to the area, but most did not. Few were able to go to university and those who went were mostly males who studied law, medicine or dentistry, or became priests. Home-grown entrepreneurs were also rare. The few we had operated in the natural resources sector notably the fishery and agriculture. I recall that in the 1950s, E.P. Melanson operated a lobster processing plant in Cocagne, a fishing community not far from my own. We all knew he was an Acadian businessman who employed other Acadians, which was rare in neighbouring communities and mine. Still, he was regarded in my community as a Séraphin, a miser, not a role model to be emulated. Word got out in the late 1950s that he had run into serious financial problems. Bouctouche-born industrialist K.C. Irving called to offer a word of encouragement and urged him to battle back, as best he could. Melanson explained the problem: “I have these guys from Ottawa calling me about income tax. What the Christ is that?”4 There were five entrepreneurs in Saint-Maurice, one who ran the small local country store from his living room, two bootleggers, one who sold pulp, and my father who launched a construction business which remains active to this day. I note that it was Louis J. Robichaud, the lawyer who later became New Brunswick premier, who incorporated my father’s business in 1957. We had very little to do with governments – after all, they belonged to les Anglais, not to Acadians. The Roman Catholic Church, for the most part, ran our public schools and hospitals and looked after social services to the extent that it could. In brief, it was easy while growing up in Saint-Maurice to see ourselves as victims. History told us that we were pushed off our land more

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than once and that governments had little interest in us or our community. Acadians became victims long before I was born. We were victims of a war in which we wanted no part.

“ l a m aU dIt e gU erre” The rock band 1755 stands out among Acadian musical groups. Named after the year 1755 or the year that the Expulsion of the Acadians began, it is considered an “icon of modern Acadian culture.” One of the band’s best-known songs was “La Maudite Guerre,” described as an “Acadian lamentation.” Well-known Louisiana Cajun Zachary Richard authored the song.5 When the Seven Years’ War broke out in Europe, Acadians wanted no part of it. They were, however, unwillingly drawn into it. BritishFrench conflicts first erupted in 1754 in the North American colonies and were fuelled by “a struggle for global primacy between Britain and France.”6 There were many battles in the Seven Years’ War both in Europe and North America. In North America, the war edged closer and closer to Acadia and the British decided that something had to be done with the Acadians. French settlers first came to the New World in 1604, settled on rich farmland and became known as Acadians around 1730–40. Cut off from France, they established strong ties with the local Mi’kmaq nation. They witnessed several colonial wars, as control over the region shifted back and forth between Britain and France. The end of the War of the Spanish Succession and the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 turned Acadia over to the British, never to return to France. Acadians saw the occasion to sign off on future conflicts. They made it clear at every opportunity to both Great Britain and France that they wanted no part of any future wars between the two. They had carved out a new homeland and they consistently refused to pledge allegiance to either side, opting instead to sign an oath of loyalty on the basis of neutrality in 1727. In so doing, Acadians declared themselves “neutral French” and willing to abide by French or English laws, whichever happened to apply. They made it clear that they would not take up arms against anyone. This worked fine until conflicts flared up again in 1754 between Britain and France in the Ohio Valley. Governor William Shirley of Massachusetts contacted Nova Scotia Lieutenant Governor Charles Lawrence in Halifax (who became governor in 1756), recommending that they drive French troops and the French settlers out of Acadia. Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Monckton

Acadians: Victims of an Unwanted War

25

led two battalions and captured Fort Beauséjour. Lawrence actually supported the Monckton expedition without securing approval from London, using the British parliamentary grant allocated for Nova Scotia.7 He decided that the expulsion was necessary on military grounds.8 But what to do about the Acadians scattered all along the Nova Scotia coast? Governor Lawrence insisted that their oath of neutrality was no longer good enough. Acadian leaders were summoned to meet with him and they were told to take an oath of allegiance to the British Crown “without any Reserve or else quit their lands, for that Affairs were now at such a Crisis in America that no delay could be admitted.”9 Acadians continued to insist on remaining neutral, wanting no part in the wars between Great Britain and France. Their arguments were rejected, and the expulsion began in the summer of 1755 at Fort Beauséjour, later renamed Fort Cumberland, after the British captured it. Its impact is still being felt to this day. As recently as 11 September 2021, an Acadian wrote an article in L’Acadie Nouvelle declaring Charles Lawrence as “enemy number one of the Acadian people.”10 Acadians, like other victims, have a long memory. Some Acadians did make their way back to the Maritimes after the expulsion, but most did not. Those who did were never able to reclaim their land around Grand-Pré, along the Nova Scotia coast. British authorities decided to divide up the rich agricultural land that Acadians had made even richer through a series of aboiteaux or wooden sluice equipped with hinged doors that swung open at low tide to allow draining but then shut at high tide to prevent salt water from inundating the land. Governor Lawrence saw the potential. He wrote a dispatch to the Lords of Trade in London: “As soon as the French are gone, I shall use my best endeavours to encourage People from the Continent to settle their lands … and the additional circumstances of the Inhabitants evacuating the Country will, I flatter myself, greatly hasten this event, as it furnishes us with a large Quantity of good Land ready for immediate Cultivation.”11 British authorities in Nova Scotia commissioned Samuel Borden, a surveyor from New Bedford, Massachusetts, to survey the land and lay out plots for New Englanders to settle on the rich farmland that Acadians had developed before the expulsion. He was given a parcel of land as payment for his work. One of his descendants, Sir Robert Borden, who served as Canada’s eighth prime minister, was born in Grand-Pré in 1854.12 Other New England settlers also benefitted greatly from readily available rich farmland. It prompted an English correspondent in Halifax at

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the time to label the expulsion a “great and noble Scheme,” arguing that it was “one of the greatest things that ever the English did in America.”13 John Faragher borrowed the phrase for his widely acclaimed book A Great and Noble Scheme: The Tragic Story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from Their American Homeland. He explains that the expulsion enabled the settlers from New England to secure rich farmland on the cheap.14 The British won the Seven Years’ War and France lost all claims to Canada for good. Acadians lived through a very dark period between 1755 and 1960. Their goal was to survive and it required constant vigilance. Their ancestral land was lost forever and they had no territory to call their own. The centre of Acadian life shifted from the Minas Basin in Nova Scotia to eastern New Brunswick, where some of those who escaped the expulsion had fled. Acadians clung to one another and looked to the Roman Catholic Church for leadership. Though Acadians were by tradition farmers, they settled mainly on unwanted and unfertile land along the shoreline after the expulsion. It was the only land available to them. There, they learned to fish. However, they operated in a hostile economic environment. They were forced to exchange their catch for food in stores owned by merchants, under the truck system, without exchanging cash. Merchants would extend credit to fishers to enable them to buy food, clothes, and supplies for their boat in exchange for their catch. Some merchants exploited the fishers by asking too much for their goods while not giving enough for the fish. The merchants had both a captive clientele for their goods and an assured supply of fish.15 It is no exaggeration to write that many Acadians were in a state of near serfdom. I hasten to add, however, that the truck system in the fishery was not limited to Acadian communities. The British were reluctant to grant land to Acadians after the expulsion. When they did, they imposed strict conditions, including the requirement that the Acadians had to settle in small, isolated groups. British colonists and later the Loyalists claimed the best agricultural land, and in some cases they uprooted Acadian families once again to make room for the influx of Loyalists who arrived in the region in the aftermath of the American Revolution. Acadians lived in fear of the English-Protestants for many years after 1755. They never knew when they would return to push them off their land again. As noted, the Roman Catholic Church played a pivotal role in the postexpulsion era, but even here there were problems. The pressure from Irish Catholic bishops on Acadians to assimilate into the Anglophone community was as strong as it was from Anglophone Protestants.

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That said, the Roman Catholic Church took charge of many Acadian communities. The parish priest was king in his communities, the unquestioned master of the parish, commanding tremendous respect and power. The church ran things, from education, health care, welfare, and even the economy, to a large extent. It permeated most activities, commercial or otherwise. Acadians respected their parish or village boundaries, rarely venturing to other communities. Because of history, Acadians became an inward-looking, church-dominated people, fearing the outside world. The thinking was that the outside world made us victims by stripping away all our possessions and scattering us all over the 1755 map.

a c a dI a n S a n d c o nF ederat I on Acadians were nonfactors and, in the end, a nonfactor in Confederation debates. They were described as “uneducated half savages” and their views were abruptly dismissed out of hand by the majority.16 No Acadian, or for that matter, no Francophone outside Quebec, were present at Charlottetown, Quebec, or the London conferences. The rights of Francophones, to the extent that they mattered at the time of Confederation, were not expected to extend beyond the boundaries of the future province of Quebec.17 But Acadians could vote and they were strongly opposed to Confederation.18 They saw or were told by many in the Roman Catholic clergy that the language provision that the Fathers of Confederation had agreed to would not apply to them. We know that Acadians voted against Confederation on two occasions – in 1865 and again in 1866. As Léon Thériault explains, we have a lack of documents dealing with Acadians and Confederation, so that, we do not know in any detail what motivated them to vote against Confederation. What we do know is that the local Roman Catholic clergy came out against Confederation and, given their strong influence in Acadian communities, one can assume that the Acadian population followed the advice.19 We also know that Acadian leaders did not follow the lead of Quebec Francophones Cartier and Langevin in supporting Confederation. An observer suggests that, even as early as 1864, Acadians understood that their interest did not always square with Quebec’s interest.20 They soon saw that they were right. Quebec took control over education while in New Brunswick, the Legislative Assembly passed in 1871 the Common Schools Act designed to provide standardized education in the province and to make all schools nondenominational. The teaching of Roman Catholic catechism was thus banned in New Brunswick.

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Acadians survived after Confederation by clinging to one another, by living in small isolated communities, by limiting contacts with the outside world, by looking to the Roman Catholic clergy for guidance in all things, and by looking simply to survive rather than play a leading role in politics and business.

t h e a w a k e nI ng The election of Louis J. Robichaud as premier of New Brunswick in 1960 changed everything. I note, for example, that the Saint-Maurice road was chipsealed only after Robichaud became premier. The 1960s also represented a new beginning not only for Acadians but also for other Francophones outside Quebec. We suddenly came in fashion. The Nationalist Movement in Quebec was fast gaining strength and the federal government responded with measures to strengthen Canada’s Francophone communities everywhere in Canada. In 1968, Pierre E. Trudeau, a Quebecois who believed that French Canada meant something more than just Quebec, became prime minister of Canada. He concluded that the best way to fight Quebec separatism was to show Quebecers that a strong and vibrant French Canada could flourish in all Canadian regions. Overnight, employment opportunities in the public sector became available to Francophones outside Quebec, as did investments in our public institutions. Being an Acadian suddenly held important advantages. We were no longer the discarded people and governments were no longer just for the English. A French-language high school was built in Moncton, where there are now two. My university was established in 1963, three years after Robichaud came to power. The Robichaud government passed the Official Languages Act in 1969 and its impact is still being felt to this day. At least as we saw things, it was finally our turn under the sun and we were ready to take full advantage of the opportunities. Our rationale was simple – all or nearly all opportunities to serve in government until the 1960s were reserved for Anglophones, and so, we had a great deal of catching up to do. There was a reaction from the English-speaking majority in New Brunswick. Many Anglophones saw our gains as their loss. The status quo had served them well, over the years, and they saw no reason for change. They now had to adjust. As we saw things, the onus to change was now on them, not on us. The status quo, as it is in all things when it comes to government and public policy, is a powerful force. Those who hold the upper hand rarely see the need to change things that in the end would, at least from the

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way they see things, weaken their position. Why would they? I detected a sense of resentment on the part of some Anglais by the early 1970s. I recall an English-speaking Monctonian studying at the University of New Brunswick telling me that, unlike him who was an Anglophone, I would not have a problem “finding a job” because I was “French.” His reaction was mild when compared to others. Now, the shoe was on the other foot. Suddenly, and somehow, les Anglais in New Brunswick would see themselves as victims. My family moved to Moncton in 1959 to enable my father to grow his business. The city, around that time, became a hotbed of English-French tensions. The Université de Moncton attracted students from northern New Brunswick and Quebec. Northern New Brunswick is very different from Moncton in that it is rural and largely French-speaking with some communities hearing little to no English. A majority of Monctonians, then and now, are English-speaking. The city only became officially bilingual in 2002. I note that Ottawa, Canada’s national capital city, became officially bilingual even later, in 2018. Shortly after the university was established, tensions surfaced between the two language groups, with university students leading the charge and calling for better Frenchlanguage services in the municipality. A group of university students in Moncton met to discuss the report of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism (the Laurendeau-Dunton report) published in five parts between 1967 and 1970. The focus of the discussion was on bilingual services provided by municipal governments, notably by the City of Moncton.21 Students became highly critical of the slow progress, if any, the City of Moncton was making in providing services in both English and French. A number of them, mostly from out of town, decided to organize a march on City Hall. Some students and, in particular, the university administrators, saw that they needed a spokesperson from Moncton to lead the march, knowing that the mayor would ask if the students or their parents were from the community and paying taxes in Moncton. The university president intervened and he and the students agreed to ask my brother Claude Savoie to lead the delegation. Some 1,000 to 1,500 students took part in the march. Inside City Hall, the students met a cold and aggressive city council. One city councillor immediately called for the city council to reaffirm its oath of allegiance to the monarchy, thinking somehow that it had something to do with the government’s ability or willingness to provide services in both English and French. Mayor Leonard Jones refused to hear the delegation in French because he and council members all understood English.

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Claude quickly switched to English in making his presentation. He took catcalls from those inside the council chamber – “Speak White” and “Go Home Frogs.” Claude remained calm, respectful, completed his presentation in English and thanked the mayor and council for their time. To this day, I hold that my brother won the day. It was a highly explosive situation and one false move could have led to violence. He was able to walk out of City Hall without inciting a riot. I asked Claude if he had ever seen Mayor Jones after the encounter. “Once, only once – the next day. I told him that he was not nice during the session. Jones simply shrugged and we both walked away and I never saw him again.” Moncton area students understood the dynamics inside City Hall because we were used to the attitude. However, those from northern New Brunswick and Quebec did not. They had seen enough. The day after the delegation went to City Hall, mayor Jones was scheduled to drop the puck, opening a hockey series that evening between two local hockey clubs at the Jean-Louis Lévesque Arena on the university campus. A few minutes before game time, some 150 students marched into the arena without paying while about twelve policemen stood by without intervening. The students marched in file around the arena singing “O Canada,” in French. Concerned about his safety, the mayor was apparently rushed into a waiting police cruiser and escorted off campus. After learning that the mayor would not be present at the arena, two students from Quebec went to the mayor’s house and placed a pig’s head on the doorsteps in a large cardboard box with a card that read: “This is a gift from us to you,” and signed it: “Jacques Belisle and Jacques Moreaux.” The two were backed by about fifty to seventy students in their march to the mayor’s house. Belisle and Moreaux were immediately arrested and charged. I note that the events at City Hall were captured in a National Film Board of Canada (nFB ) documentary, L’Acadie, l’Acadie. The next day the university was expecting the worst. The administration decided to have a few students standing by to answer telephone calls from the local English-speaking community. Again, they were to be students from the Moncton area. I was one of them. I have never before, or since, been subjected to such venom. I heard most of the swear words ever invented in the English language, and I was told in no uncertain terms to go back to France. One irritated caller said, “Go back home, you goddam frog.” “Where is home?” I asked the caller. “France, you stupid frog,” was the answer as he hung up. It had been a long, long time since my ancestors left France for l’Acadie and I couldn’t begin to imagine France as home. I bit my tongue more

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than once, knowing that provoking a debate with the callers would only make matters worse. Tensions between university students and English Monctonians ran very high, and any provocation could have tipped the balance towards violence.22 Leonard Jones had first been elected in 1963 and continued as mayor of Moncton for another eleven years. He won the Progressive Conservative (Pc ) nomination for the 1974 federal election, but it will be recalled that party leader Robert Stanfield refused to sign his nomination papers because of Jones’s opposition to the party’s policy on bilingualism. Jones decided to run as an independent and won the constituency against the Liberals, the ndP , and the incumbent mP , who was the Progressive Conservative candidate. Jones was able to secure 46 per cent of the popular vote. The message was not lost on Acadians – their presence and their fight for language rights were pressing against the wishes of the majority. For the majority of English Monctonians at the time, if Acadians were victims, it was fine with them. Jones decided not to run in the 1979 general election. He was later convicted of tax evasion for making false and deceptive tax statements on earnings between 1974–77. He also resigned from the Moncton Rotary Club in protest to the club deciding to accept women as members.23 Ironically, Leonard Jones ended up as one of the most powerful forces pushing Acadians to pursue language rights. His belligerent attitude towards the Université de Moncton students and his unwillingness to accommodate anything that resembled giving in to bilingualism (even erecting a bilingual plaque on City Hall) led many Acadians, who in the past had been reluctant to rock the boat and ask for language equality, at least in Moncton, to conclude that the time had come. They had had enough. There were not many Acadians from Moncton directly involved in the student demonstrations, but as we stood by watching events unfold, we understood what the students from away were trying to accomplish, though we may not always have agreed with the means. But things started to change. By the late 1960s, a few businesses in Moncton began to advertise in both English and French. Moncton is today vastly different than it was in the 1960s. A number of students from away who had come to study at the university decided to stay and launch businesses. They have become some of the leading members of their community. Leonard Jones, reflecting on his years in politics, had no doubt who was responsible for the rise of English-French tensions in Moncton – the Université de Moncton. It is worth quoting at length from a speech

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he gave to the Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada on 20 November 1978: “Back in the early sixties, peace, harmony and good will existed among the English and French persons in the City of Moncton of which I was then Mayor. We had all grown up together, gone to the same schools, the same boy scouts, or whatever the case may be. And this is not political jargon. But things changed in the City of Moncton with the setting up of a University there.” He argued that English Monctonians had contributed funds to the university but the university was not open for persons of English-speaking origin. This, of course, has never been true – there have been and continue to be many English-speaking Canadians who attend the university. The language of instruction, however, is French, much as the language of instruction at the University of New Brunswick, Mount Allison, and Saint Thomas universities is English. Jones also claimed that “persons from the Moncton area were being turned down over and above the Québécois.” This too is completely false; a Donald Trump-type lie. He never explained how he arrived at this conclusion. It may well be that he heard it on the streets of Moncton and decided that what he heard must be fact.24 Canada, in particular New Brunswick, has seen organizations like the Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada come and go. I have often asked – how can anyone possibly believe that measures are needed to preserve the English language anywhere in North America? The demographic reality of North America, the exchange of information through publications and scientific research, and now the internet, all turn to English as the language of choice. Conversely, the decrease in the demographic weight of Francophones in Canada and in the use of French, both at work and at home, is putting the French language on shaky ground.25 But things do change and organizations like the Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada are not taken seriously by the great majority of English-speaking Canadians, including Monctonians and New Brunswickers. As noted, Moncton became the first Canadian city to declare itself officially bilingual. It made clear that all municipal services and city documents would be available in both French and English.26 Most businesses in the city do not need to be told to hire bilingual personnel – many do because it makes business sense to do so. Thirty years ago, one of Moncton’s leading businessmen, an Anglophone, asked to see my brother. He told Claude that he had just seen L’Acadie, l’Acadie and he came to apologize. He explained that he did not fully understand Moncton politics during the Leonard Jones era.

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Looking back, he said that he was embarrassed for having stayed silent throughout the period. He told Claude that it would never happen again in Moncton because the city’s business community would not allow it.27 Things have also changed in the province. During the covId -19 pandemic, New Brunswick’s chief medical officer of Health, Jennifer Russell, held near daily televised briefings in both official languages. This would have been unthinkable sixty years ago, unless in the highly unlikely event that an Acadian would have been the province’s chief medical officer. The same can also be said for Heather Morrison, chief public health officer for Prince Edward Island, who also held her briefings in both official languages. The election of Louis J. Robichaud as premier of New Brunswick, the establishment of the Université de Moncton, the 1968 events at the Moncton City Hall, and the province’s Official Languages Act became seminal events of the Acadian renaissance. We had become full participants in the political and economic life of our region.

a c a dIa nS h a v e come o F age Acadians now strive in Moncton, in New Brunswick, and in Canada. All three jurisdictions are now officially bilingual, where English and French residents can communicate with their government in the language of their choice. Many Acadians are part of government at all three levels in both the political and civil service. This was rarely the case before the 1960s. From a dead stop sixty years ago, Acadians are also making a substantial contribution to the business community. They are now some of New Brunswick’s most dynamic entrepreneurs. Many have established highly successful businesses that have a global reach in several sectors from food production to manufacturing. More is said about this below. Faculty members at my university and at Nova Scotia’s Université Sainte-Anne are making contributions to the literature in their field. Our health-care and education facilities compare favourably with those in other regions. Moncton and New Brunswick’s linguistic divide have often been described as a microcosm of Canada. The Moncton experience shows that we can make Canada work. But there is also an important lesson learned – French Canada is now, much like Canada itself, a nation of regions. One could talk about a French Canada sixty years ago, but no more. Sixty years ago, French Canadians could look to a common interest. French Canadians from Cape St George, Newfoundland,

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Saint-Boniface, Manitoba, or Maillardville, British Columbia, could easily identify with the Montreal Canadians hockey sweater. Maurice “Rocket” Richard had fans in every French-speaking community in Canada, including in our house in Saint-Maurice. We had shared values, a common purpose and strong ties to the Roman Catholic Church. We also shared a common goal – la survivance. Today, there are many French Canadas. For example, the cleavage and the political tensions between Quebecois and Acadians today are nearly as pronounced as they may be between English Canada and Quebec. Indeed, there is a growing tension among French-speaking communities in Canada, and it is increasingly difficult to find a commonality of interests. When, for example, the New Brunswick Acadian community wanted to play host to the Sommet de la francophonie in 1999, it soon discovered that it could not count on support from their Quebec cousins. Those who would have been our most natural ally, say, sixty years ago, now wished to downplay the French-speaking presence outside Quebec in order to further their own objectives. Thus, French Canada no longer speaks with one voice, even on the language issue, and it is in this sense that there are now several regional French Canadas pursuing different objectives.28 I am happy to report that Acadians have been able to prosper in this new environment. They played host to the eighth Sommet de la Francophonie and, by all accounts, it was a success.29 They continue to win awards in all sectors from business, to the arts and literature, to sports, and more is also said about this later.

S t Il l v Ic tI mS? A former federal deputy minister and an Acadian told me a few years ago – “you know we are no longer in vogue when it comes to federal government spending. Indigenous peoples are now in vogue. They have taken our place.” Put differently, the former deputy minister was saying that in the eyes of the federal government, Acadians are no longer seen as victims, they have been replaced by the Indigenous peoples. He has a point. Louis J. Robichaud, over fifty years ago, gave Acadians all the tools they needed to prosper – the Premier’s Office, the Official Languages Act, a strong education system, a university, an opening to participate in the government decision-making process, and the confidence to go out and make a contribution in all sectors. In short, Acadians needed Louis J. Robichaud in 1960 to come out of their shell – it was a case of come the moment, come the man.

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But once a victim, it is difficult to break away from the mould. To be sure, being a victim holds many advantages. It gives rise to generous government programs and transfer payments in one form or another. It also provides a ready-made excuse if things do not work out. More to the point, being a victim allows people to shirk responsibility. I have seen that, all too often, government intervention leads to dependence, so that, individuals and even communities become dependent on continued government spending and lose their ability to become self-reliant. I have seen it at my own university. Faculty colleagues consistently call for more government spending and wage parity with faculty in the region’s English-language universities. I always make the case – fine, but let’s also compare performance, let’s see how we compare in securing research funding and peer-reviewed publications on a per capita basis. They have, for the most part, little interest in doing so – many of my colleagues prefer to make the case that history and the English-speaking majority have held us back, and so, we need special government assistance. In my earlier publications, I borrowed a page from one of my colleagues at my university and argued that we now have state-sponsored Acadians.30 I recall my mother asking Saint-Maurice residents to make contributions, however small, and in some cases only twenty-five cents, to support la Société Nationale des Acadiens. Government programs have since replaced volunteerism and have taken over the financing of Acadian groups. Acadians wanting to promote Acadian interests are now put on the public payroll. In short, Ottawa has institutionalized Acadian lobby groups and some Acadians, as my colleague at the Université de Moncton Maurice Basque puts it, are paid to be Acadians. In the process, governments have created parallel bureaucracies that exhibit the same behaviour as government bureaucracies. I was very quickly taken to task for my views in restaurants, in meetings, in telephone calls, and I suspect on social media. I was told in no uncertain terms that, as an Acadian, I should never have made this observation in print.31 Claude Bourque, the former head of the local Radio-Canada television and radio stations, wrote to me and to the president of my university to say that my views were counter to the interests of Acadian communities and that, henceforth, I should only write about national and international issues.32 The argument from Claude Bourque and others was that, somehow, I was not being loyal to the Acadian cause. This raises the question – should Acadians still view themselves as victims? In my opinion, the

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answer is no, at least when compared to many other minority groups at home or abroad, as we will see later. But there is profit or, at least, government revenues in victimhood. Acadians and Acadian groups with access to government funds, are always on the lookout to see if they are getting their share of government funding and, if not, why not? The view is that, in government spending, fairness rather than performance or merit, should guide who gets what from government. I hasten to add, as the following chapters make clear, that this view is hardly limited to Acadians. It is apparent at all levels – individuals, groups, communities, and regions. In brief, why let go of victimhood if it means less government money? Governments have done their part over the past fifty years or so to help Acadians make the transition away from victimhood. They have given us the tools to become full participants in Canada’s political and economic life. We now have what it takes to participate fully in any sector, be it in business, politics, public service, academe, sports, and in the arts and culture. It is now up to us as individuals and as a community to take advantage of opportunities. The Acadian experience speaks to Canada’s strengths. Acadian history has been painful. We refused to take sides in a war that we did not want and that had nothing to do with us. Our ancestors paid a very heavy price and, for over two hundred years, they were frozen out of government and hardly visible in the economic life of their communities. Over a short sixty-year period, they have been able to carve out a strong presence in all aspects of our community’s political and economic life and were able to do it because governments cleared the way. I am on solid ground in arguing that the future of my Acadian community is tied to the ability of Acadians to launch new businesses, to compete in the marketplace, and to perform in all sectors. Making the case before government that special support was appropriate sixty years ago when we started to make the transition away from victimhood, but it no longer is. If we cannot take our proper place in our communities, given all the tools that were provided to us combined with the progress that we have made in recent years, then more government funding and special programs will not help. It can only make us more dependant on government. I am again on solid ground in arguing that Acadians are well on their way in shedding the victimhood label. Looking back, there were two ways for Acadians to break free from victimhood. To be sure, the Robichaud years paved the way for New Brunswick Acadians. There was, however,

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another way. I recall that a number of my aunts, uncles, cousins, two sisters, an older brother, and friends did what many Maritimers did in the 1950s and 1960s and moved to the Boston area in search of employment. Some did return but many did not. Acadians that moved to New England, never to return, quickly left their victim mentality behind. They became proud, fully assimilated Americans. I see my relatives and friends, from time to time, and I cannot easily tell the difference between them and other Americans. They are Americans, not Acadian-Americans. A surprisingly large number of them have also bought into Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign. Some see no need to welcome Mexican immigrants to the US and applaud the idea of building a wall dividing the two countries. They forget that not too long ago, they too were immigrants, albeit from a different county. It is easier for a white Acadian to blend into the American mainstream than it is for non-whites. Acadians that moved to the Boston area fifty years or so ago are members of a majority in the US, at least for now. The question – who is better off, the Acadian who moved to New England and stayed or the Acadian Canadian? There is no definite answer to this question. Most Acadians that stayed in New England have performed well in business and other sectors.33 They either easily adjusted to the American way or returned home to the Maritimes. Those that remained in the US have little interest in the 1755 expulsion and what it now means for them. They have also proven that Lord Durham and Goldwin Smith were right when they observed in the nineteenth century that, if Quebec joined the United States, it would quickly become a completely American nationality like Louisiana became.34 Acadians who remained in the Boston area have been able to blend into the individualistic ethos of the Americans. Some have established a very strong and visible presence in the Massachusetts business world. Yvon Cormier, for example is now one of the state’s most successful real estate developer and businessman. He is also the owner of the prestigious Donald Ross designed Andover Country Club Golf Course, one of the top, if not the top, golf course in New England. He would likely have a quick answer if asked – who is better off, the Acadian who moved and stayed in New England or the Acadian who has remained in the Maritime provinces?35 He, like other Acadians who have stayed the course in New England, have become part of “E Pluribus Unum” – “From the many, one,” the motto that the United States embraced in 1776. Seymour Martin Lipsett

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summed things up nicely when he wrote about American individualism and private endeavours as the “unseen hand” that benefits all Americans. Lipsett contrasts this with the Canadian way, where governments see merit in mobilizing resources to pursue community objectives.36 The contrast between the US and Canada could not be sharper, at least from my perspective. I maintain that the contrast between the two countries has everything to do with our political institutions. The US institutions are built around the idea that political power can never be trusted. A series of checks and balances permeates all of its political, administrative, and judicial institutions. Canada is different because its institutions are different. We trust political power because our British-inspired institutions are designed to give political leaders a strong hand in all things. It also explains why Canada has thrived over the past 155 years. Those wielding political power have been able to adjust, to compromise and to strike deals to accommodate different perspectives. They have been able to focus on groups or regions to help them meet their challenges. Canada’s checks and balances to oversee political power are not built into the country’s institutions. They are produced by the continuing need for the necessary compromises to make Canada work. Canada, unlike the United States, Australia, or New Zealand, was colonized by two European powers, not one, and combined with the Indigenous peoples, it constitutes a “multination state within a state.”37 If one is looking for the Canadian identity, one needs not look further – Quebec is not Louisiana and Acadians are now making a substantial contribution to Canadian society with their own institutions and doing it all while retaining their language and culture. Because Canada is home to several nations, it demands little in the way of conformity. This, in turn, explains why we live in a much more tolerant society than the United States. Our political institutions are not about producing conformity – they are designed to be pragmatic, to generate compromises, and to make Canada work. I once asked Acadian author Antonine Maillet: “Do you think that Acadian society will exist in one hundred hundred years?” With no hesitation, she responded: “I do not know but I do know that we will fight to be here in one hundred years.” Canada, unlike the US, gives Acadians the tools to fight, as it has for other groups or regions. For me, this alone answers the question – we are better off being Acadians in Canada. Some Canadians may struggle to put their finger on Canada’s identity. I have no such difficulty. As subsequent chapters make clear, my Canadian identity is not limited to contrasting us to the Americans.

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The Canadian identity works in whatever circumstances one wishes to apply it to because Canada, through its institutions, has learned to make it work. The following chapters explain why and how. I hasten to add, however, that Canada remains a work in progress for reasons that will be made clear in the concluding chapter.

2

Quebecers: Victims of History

General James Wolfe scored a decisive victory against Louis-Joseph de Montcalm on 13 September 1759 in a battle that lasted about half an hour. Wolfe led his troops up a cliff in the City of Quebec and surprised the Montcalm forces on the Plains of Abraham. A few more skirmishes followed but British troops soon brought them to a close. Montreal fell to British forces in 1760. The Treaty of Paris put an end to the Seven Years’ War and formally turned New France over to Great Britain in 1763.1 France would abandon its colony forever. Not only had France lost the Seven Years’ War, but New France had also proven very costly. France saw no reason, even through diplomatic means, to secure a presence in North America aside from Saint-Pierre et Miquelon, a small archipelago situated off Newfoundland.

t h e c o n qU e St – la conq U ête The Seven Years’ War was a global conflict fought over five continents involving all of the great powers of Europe. Winston Churchill called it the First World War.2 Great Britain and France were the two main protagonists and the prize was control of North America. In wars, there are winners and losers. Britain won, France lost and to the winner goes the spoils of war. Francophone Quebec looks to La Conquête as a defining moment of its past.3 The British-appointed governor became the political authority in the new Province of Quebec in the aftermath of the Seven Years’ War or after the conquest. London appointed James Murray as the military governor of the District of Quebec in 1760 and civil governor in 1763, or after Quebec’s formal cession to Great Britain. Murray decided against

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establishing an elective assembly, anxious to have the upper hand in his dealings with the French. He decided initially to impose strict conditions on Quebec including an oath of allegiance to the British Crown for public employees and excluding Roman Catholics from holding public office. English criminal and civil law also replaced French law. This, however, proved short-lived since there were only two hundred Protestant families in Quebec compared to some nearly seventy thousand French-speaking Roman Catholics. It explains why Murray decided against creating an elective assembly. It did not take long, however, for British authorities, including Governor Murray and his successor, Guy Carleton, to loosen conditions. The British Parliament passed the Quebec Act in 1774 and it proved to be generous to Britain’s French-speaking colony. The act promised religious tolerance, permitted Quebec to retain French civil law and did not interfere with the use of French in public institutions. It gave Roman Catholics in Quebec a freedom that British Catholics only obtained in 1829. Ever since the capitulation of Montreal, French-speaking inhabitants were free to immigrate to France with their possessions if they so decided. Some did, notably the economically better off, but the great majority did not, including the Roman Catholic clergy. The clergy actually gained considerable influence following the conquest. The 1774 act also rejected assimilation as a policy, a decision that would have long-term implications.4 British authorities decided not to expel the French-speaking population, as they did in 1755 in Acadia. The terms of the 1760 understanding gave the people of New France immunity from deportation or physical maltreatment. For one thing, Quebec’s French-speaking population was much greater than Acadia’s population, so that, organizing an expulsion would have been extremely difficult and expensive, if at all possible. For another, it also became clear after only a few years that the Expulsion of the Acadians was not a success. Acadians kept trying to return to Acadia. In addition, other British colonies, notably South Carolina, were increasingly reluctant to receive Acadian refugees because they “could not force them to become indentured servants.”5 Some of the officers who participated in the Expulsion of the Acadians had second thoughts. John Winslow wrote in his diary: “I believe that they did not then, nor to this day, imagine that they are actually to be removed. Things are now very heavy on my heart and mind. Met by the women and children, great lamentation. It hurts me to hear their weeping. The worst piece of service yet ever I was in.”6 Governors Murray and Carleton also saw that a policy of assimilation was not practical, in part, because the French-speaking population

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was so numerous but also because it proved difficult to attract Englishspeaking immigrants to Quebec. In addition, given the growing tensions between Great Britain and the thirteen American colonies, there was concern that French Canadians might join an American revolt against British forces. The fear was that it would tip the balance and allow the Americans to take the British North American colonies. In brief, it became important to Great Britain for political, military, and economic reasons to gain the loyalty of the French-speaking population. It would do so by dropping its policy of assimilation, so that, Quebec would remain Quebec, largely under its own terms, with the means to protect its language and culture. Sir Guy Carleton, explained that Quebec was “a province unlike any other, and its distinctive circumstances needed to be acknowledged.”7 The Quebec Act, 1774 also considerably enlarged the Quebec territory to the annoyance of British colonies to the south. The act allowed the Roman Catholic Church to collect tithes to support itself and the clergy and permitted the restoration of the seigneurial system.8 The Quebec Act served an important purpose in the eyes of French-speaking Quebecers – it signalled that there were two nations in the British North American colonies, one English speaking and another French speaking. There was, however, only to be one centre of political authority and that was the British Crown in Parliament in London. The act conveniently overlooked another nation – the Indigenous peoples.

l o r d dU r h a m tU r n ed qU eB ecerS I n t o vIc t Im S o nce aga In Historians have given proper attention to the Durham Report (1839) and its impact on the development of Canada and its political institutions. Political scientists, much less so. Though Durham’s stay in Upper and Lower Canada was brief, his work helped pave the way to responsible government in addition to uniting the two Canadas. Lord Durham arrived at Quebec in May 1838 in the immediate aftermath of the 1837–38 political rebellions in Upper and Lower Canada. Louis-Joseph Papineau and his Patriots led the charge in Lower Canada while William Lyon Mackenzie led the charge in Upper Canada against the status quo. Papineau challenged the power of the British governor and his unelected advisers and sought to secure control of government spending. Mackenzie also sought to wrestle power away from the Family Compact, a small group of government officials and leading businessmen who ran things in the political, economic, and judicial spheres.9

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The British military easily crushed the rebellions. This led British authorities to take stock of political developments in Upper and Lower Canada. The War of 1812 was only a generation away and the United States reminded Canadians that self-government was possible. The objective was to see the British North American colonies remain loyal to the British Crown and “forestall” the annexation of Canada to the United States.10 The objective was also to bring responsible government to the British North American colonies. Durham was well connected at home. Son-in-law to the second Earl Grey, British prime minister from 1830 to 1834, he was also a high-profile Whig politician and sat in the House of Commons from 1813 to 1828. He was an overt radical Liberal and his views were wellknown but not widely shared in London. He helped draft Britain’s first parliamentary Reform Bill which was never enacted. His proposal to extend the franchise was viewed as much too generous and unworkable. Durham also favoured the emancipation of Roman Catholics and generalized education. He was a strong advocate of responsible government at home and saw its potential in the colonies, albeit with reservations when it came to Lower Canada because of its French-speaking majority. Durham came to Canada full of ambition. He wanted to unite the British North American colonies but both Nova Scotia and New Brunswick refused. He wanted to establish municipal governments and also a Supreme Court for the colonies. However, his recommendations were quickly rejected in London. He had more success with two recommendations at the centre of his Report on the Affairs of British North America: responsible government and uniting Upper and Lower Canada. On responsible government, he saw a problem when it came to Lower Canada, given its large Francophone population. He wrote that the English population in Lower Canada has “begun … to calculate the probable consequences of a separation … followed by an incorporation with the United States … They assert very confidently that the Americans would make a very speedy and decisive settlement of the pretensions of the French; and they believe that after the first shock of an entirely new political state had been got over, they and their posterity would share in that amazing progress, and that great material prosperity which every day’s experience shows them is the lot of the people of the United Sates.”11 His point on this and other issues – the status quo was not sustainable. Durham saw little prospects for Quebec Francophones to retain their language. They would be easily assimilated in the United States if they decided to join forces with the Americans, or they could be

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assimilated in the British North American colonies – either way, they would be assimilated, but best that they be assimilated in the British colonies. He also concluded that, unless the British North American colonies took a firm step towards responsible government, the English population in Lower Canada would soon look to joining the United States as the answer. However, Durham had to square the requirements of responsible government with the reality that the French in Lower Canada constituted a substantial majority and would continue to control the Legislature. Embracing responsible government had wide implications for the English population in Lower Canada which had a much larger population (670,000) than Upper Canada (480,000) in 1841, and Francophones held a clear majority (510,000). Durham explained what responsible government would entail: “The Governor, as the representative of the Crown, should be instructed that he must carry on his government by heads of departments, in whom the United Legislature shall repose confidence; and that he must look for no support from home in any contest with the legislature, except on points involving strictly Imperial interests.”12 Giving responsible government to Lower Canada meant that the French would be running government, something that the minority English population would not allow and something that Durham himself could not support. Durham described Lower Canada as an “unhappy province” with “many evils.” He then went on to produce one of the most often quoted sentences in Canadian history: “I expected to find a contest between a government and a people: I found two nations warring in the bosom of a single state: I found a struggle, not of principles, but of races; and I perceived that it would be idle to attempt any amelioration of laws or institutions until we could first succeed in terminating the deadly animosity that now separates the inhabitants of Lower Canada into the hostile divisions of French and English.”13 It only takes a moment’s reflection to appreciate that a struggle between races has a much greater propensity to create victims than a conflict over principles, political ideology, or partisanship. Durham painted a highly negative picture of the relations between the English- and French-speaking communities, and, when it came to blame, he did not hesitate to point his finger at the Francophone community. He also did not hesitate to undo the Quebec Act of 1774 and the Constitutional Act of 1791. As we saw, the Quebec Act gave Quebec Francophones religious freedom and retained the French form of civil

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law. The Constitutional Act, meanwhile, divided the Quebec province into two – Upper Canada, to accommodate an influx of United Empire Loyalists, and Lower Canada and its large Francophone population. The act also gave Francophones a national homeland, religious freedom, civil law, and their own institutions. Durham believed that the status quo did not work in the past and he was certain that it could never work in future. The problem in a word – race. He had this to say about French Canadians: “The French could not but feel the superiority of English enterprise … They looked upon their rivals with alarm, with jealousy, and finally with hatred. The English repaid them with a scorn, which soon also assumed the same form of hatred.”14 Durham insisted that the French lacked education, enterprise, and were full of narrow prejudices. He argued: “The superior political and practical intelligence of the English, cannot be for a moment disputed.”15 He reported that the tensions between the two races had recently reached a high point and he concluded that it did not appear “to be the slightest chance of putting an end to this animosity during the present generation.”16 Under no circumstances, he argued, would the English be “peaceably” submitted to a French majority in a constitutional government.17 The Durham Report made clear, time and again, that the political institutions in Lower Canada were not and could not be effective in dealing with the problem. The political institutions were also at fault in perpetuating social animosity. Durham explained: “the system of government pursued in Lower Canada has been based on the policy of perpetuating that very separation of the races and encouraging these very notions of conflicting nationalities which it ought to have been the first and chief care of government to check and extinguish. From the period of the conquest to the present time, the conduct of the government has aggravated the evil, and the origin of the present extreme disorder may be found in the institutions by which the character of the colony was determined.”18 Durham had a clear solution – assimilate as quickly as possible Francophone Quebec. Goldwin Smith, an Oxford Regius Professor of History between 1858 and 1866, who later immigrated to the United States and Canada, wrote in his Canada and the Canadian Question that: “Lord Durham, coming immediately after what was called a rebellion, but was really rather a war between the two races in Lower Canada, describes not only the estrangement of the races but their mutual bitterness as extreme.” He added: “It is the height either of generosity or of folly when you have beaten people with arms to bestow on them the

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means of beating you with votes.”19 The point – Durham was hardly the only one who saw the problem as a conflict between two races and the urgent need to assimilate Francophone Quebec. The British government accepted Durham’s recommendations to unite Upper and Lower Canada under a single legislature. However, in embracing the Durham Report, it did an about-face on the concessions it had given in both the Quebec and the Constitution Acts of 1791. The two Canadas would be represented by forty-two seats each, in order to protect the interests of the English population. As noted earlier, Canada East had a much larger population than Canada West. English was also designated as the only language for both the legislature and government. The public debt of both Canadas were combined, which clearly favoured Upper Canada because it had a much greater debt and a smaller population base to service it. Durham also favoured introducing responsible government in the colonies. He believed, however, that representative and responsible government could only be achieved if a harmony of interests existed.20 Without harmony, one of the two races would come to dominate the other, given the deep hostilities that existed between the French and the English – for Durham, best that it be the English. It will be recalled that responsible government was first achieved in Nova Scotia in 1848 and later that year in Canada. Durham believed that assimilation would eventually lead to harmony, which, in turn, would make responsible government work. He was convinced that the French could not define political institutions that would promote harmony on their own. The French population had been cut off from France and was left with no historical heritage, low literacy levels, and no institutions other than British ones and the Roman Catholic Church. If the French population looked to France, it would look at the French Revolution and the horrors of Robespierre and the Napoleonic Wars that were only twenty-five years away. He believed that French institutions had been shaped by a clear authoritarian bias and a dominant Roman Catholic Church that had left the French in Canada both unimaginative and politically uneducated when it came to representative democracy. Assimilation worked in Louisiana and Durham was convinced that it would also work in Canada. He believed that the United States government had shown how to handle a French presence in its dealings with Louisiana. The French in Louisiana at one time constituted the majority but had quickly become “completely an American nationality.” Durham also saw that Louisiana’s representatives went to Congress in the same

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manner Dutch-Americans from New York did.21 If Quebec was to join forces with the United States, it could soon suffer the same fate and assimilation could quickly follow. In brief, the Act of Union of 1841 established one Parliament with an equal number of seats for Upper and Lower Canada. The French language was dropped in both the Legislative Assembly and government as well as in institutions of education and law. Kingston, Ontario, was designated as the capital. As Durham had recommended, the act also paved the way for responsible government. The union proved to be unstable from day one. French Canadians saw the union as a bigoted-inspired and unfair arrangement. Bigoted because the act’s main objective was to see the French language and culture disappear. Unfair because Lower Canada, with a larger population, was allocated the same number of seats as Upper Canada. Louis-Joseph Papineau demanded representation by population on the very first day he sat in the new Parliament. However, his proposal was rejected out of hand. Durham sowed the seeds of victimhood in Quebec. Durham saw many of his recommendation implemented but not all. He urged a union of all the British North American colonies, envisioning a united British North American nation acting as a buffer or counterweight to the United States. However, both New Brunswick and Nova Scotia wanted no part of the plan, fearing that the larger colonies of Upper and Lower Canada would come to dominate at their expense. Durham borrowed a page from the United States, however, and looked to a federal system as the way forward for the British colonies. He would give the federal government control of all important jurisdictions while leaving some minor fields of responsibility to the provinces. This, he thought, would appeal to the French in Lower Canada because it would give them their own legislative assembly, albeit over matters of little importance. Durham also believed that, as the French population became assimilated, the federal system would disappear and a strong legislative union “would emerge.”22 Sir John A. Macdonald would turn to Durham’s blueprint twenty-four years later as he sought to define the terms of Confederation. Not only would there be no union of the British North American colonies, the union of the two Canadas was a complete failure. The capital’s location changed six times – it started off in Kingston, then Montreal (1844–49), then Toronto (1849–51), then Quebec City (1851–55), then Toronto (1855–59), only to return to Quebec (1859–65). The Parliament buildings in Montreal were burned to the ground in 1849, after the Lafontaine-Baldwin government passed the Rebellion Losses Bill. Queen

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Victoria finally decided in 1857 to select Ottawa as the final location and the construction of the Parliament buildings was completed in 1865. There was one item of positive news: the governor general endorsed legislation in 1849, making it clear that responsible government had arrived to stay.23 The government had two leaders – one from Canada West and one from Canada East. The Legislative Assembly had to produce a double majority on proposed legislation. By the 1850s, the population of Upper Canada had overtaken that of Lower Canada, and now it was Upper Canada that no longer saw any merit in equal representation. George Brown, editor of the Toronto Globe, for one, began his long campaign for Canada to embrace representation by population to ensure fair, or better, representation for Upper Canada, or Canada West. Francophones in Canada East saw the development for what it was – changing the rules to square with Canada West’s interest – and therefore Canada East consistently opposed the change. The union was also marred by political instability due, at least in part, to the inability of one political party to achieve a dominant position.24 The colony saw four governments over a three-year period and two inconclusive elections in the early 1860s. As Richard Gwyn writes, “Canada’s political system had degenerated into paralytic deadlock.”25 Goldwin Smith summed it up best when he wrote in 1891 that governments between 1840 and 1867 “followed each other like the shifting scenes of a farce.”26 The union of the Canadas also failed at its most important goal – the assimilation of the French-speaking population. Smith explains why: “The digestive forces of Canada have been too weak to assimilate the French element even politically. Instead of being assimilated, the French Canadians assimilate, and the Scotch regiments disbanded among the French population and became French in language, in religion and in everything but name and face.”27 It will be recalled that the Quebec and Constitutional Acts gave the province’s French-speaking population language rights. It made sense at the time for British authorities to provide these rights, given the fear that the French in Canada would join forces with the Americans. By 1839, however, the threat was more internal with les Patriotes agitating for responsible government than it was with the Americans. The problem as seen by Durham and others now was – the French wanted to expand their influence and their defiance of British institutions and rules became more and more evident. Giving linguistic rights in 1774 and again in 1791 but taking them away in 1841 created victims. The French in Canada saw a double standard. They saw that whenever British authorities changed the rules after 1791, it was never to their advantage and they had a point. By the

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1850s, the population of Upper Canada had overtaken that of Lower Canada and suddenly, representation by population became the answer. The British gave Francophones linguistic rights because it was to their advantage to do so, again, fearing the French would join the Americans in a conflict. However, when the threat receded, the British did away with language rights for Francophones. The Quebec Act established a pattern of linguistic accommodation that, at least in the eyes of Francophone Quebecers, would come to underpin Canada’s political culture. Even Durham could not undo the pervasive influence the Quebec Act had and would continue to have on Quebec and Canadian politics. It is worth quoting David Cameron at length on this point: “Lord Durham recommended the assimilation of French Canadians in his famous 1840 report, but by then the opposite approach of toleration and accommodation had established itself, and his ideas fell on deaf ears. The realization of Durham’s proposal to create a United Province of Canada bringing together the French and English communities within one political structure did not lead to the assimilation of the former, as he had hoped, but instead brought about the reverse – namely, an informal, binational political system in which policies clearly unacceptable to one of the two communities were not acted upon.”28

d e a lIn g w It h t he de F eat A generous act was one thing but accepting defeat and learning to live with the victors after La Conquête, was quite another. The impact of the defeat was profound and continues to be felt to this day. We know that in French Canada, some of the richer and better-educated settlers retreated back to France after the conquest, depriving it of much of its economic and political elites and its innovative capacity. France itself showed little concern for the fate of its former colonists once the colony itself was lost. Far from helping to rebuild its economy after a damaging and costly war, France even renounced its debts to the colony. Francophones in Quebec and in the other British North American colonies were left to fend for themselves. The mother country had other more important things to attend to. No longer in control of their own land and finding themselves, for one reason or another, at a disadvantage in comparison with the British conquerors, the French withdrew to a large extent from economic competition. They looked to their traditions and cultivated a local nationalism, consoling themselves for their failure to participate fully in the economic life of their province with assurances that they did not

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wish to do so anyway. They preferred the gentility and humanity of their own life, their own Roman Catholic faith, values, and culture to the vulgar materialism of the victors. As time went by, these attitudes became formalized and ritualized. The hugely popular Radio-Canada radio and television series Les belles histoires des pays d’en haut, which ran between 1956 and 1970 throughout French Canada, spoke to the moral values of the time. The interactions of the French Canadian community in the Laurentides depicted a miser and evil man that dominated the economic life of the village. He was pitted against the parish priest and the good people, the habitants happily eking out a living on the farm or in the woods. There were no entrepreneurs or business leaders in the series, only the good people, the priest (also portrayed as good), and the villain and economically-well-to-do Séraphin Poudrier. The series was an adaptation of Claude-Henri Grignon’s 1933 novel, Un homme et son péché, set in the 1880s. I recall well listening to Séraphin on the family radio, which was by far the most popular radio and television series in my village. The important lesson to be drawn from the series – no one in French Canada should ever want to be or become a Séraphin. Priests often reminded parishioners that it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to go to heaven. I recall, as a young boy, hearing our parish priest making this very point in his Sunday morning sermons. Businesses belonged to the English Protestants, and Francophones somehow convinced themselves that they would eventually pay a heavy price for this. Growing up, I often tried to imagine how English Protestants could possibly squeeze through the eye of a needle to get to where we, on the other hand, were sure to go. So persuasive was this ideal of a serene, agrarian society and romanticized rural lifestyle led by the Roman Catholic Church and a cultivated elite indifferent to wealth, that many French Canadians began to think French Canada really was like that. Thus, in 1898 Sir John Bourinot, Clerk of the House of Commons in Ottawa and secretary of the Royal Society of Canada, wrote: “As a rule, the habitant lives contentedly on very little. Give him a pipe of native tobacco, a chance of discussing politics, a gossip with his fellows at the church door after service, a visit now and them to the county town, and he will be happy. It does not take much to amuse him, while he is quite satisfied that his spiritual safety is secured as long as he is within sound of the church bells, goes regularly to confession, and observes all the fêtes d’obligation. If he or one of his family can only get a little office in the municipality, or in the ‘government,’ then his happiness is nearly perfect.”29

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J.P. Beaulieu of Quebec’s Department of Industry wrote in a similar vein as recently as 1952, although he showed more appreciation for industrialization, which was then slowly taking place in the province. He argued: “Quebec, barely half a century ago, a picturesque region in a vast country, over most of its extent farm lands alternated with forest, rivers, villages, and freshly created colonization centres. This was Quebec little changed from pioneer days with the old ways kept alive from one generation to the other by the rural population.”30 I stress that both Bourinot and Beaulieu were French Canadians writing about their own community. The conclusion seems to be that until the 1960s, French Canadians lagged behind the rest of the country because they preferred it that way, in order to preserve their religious and cultural traditions. French Canada did not provide proper support to its own entrepreneurs; entrepreneurship – and to a considerable degree, capital as well – came from outside. In short, for a long time Quebecers did not value business activities or entrepreneurship. They embraced a romanticized rural lifestyle and looked to the Church for guidance in all things and later to the government to grow the economy.

c o nFe d e r a t Io n : c r e a tI ng new v Ict Im S The union of the two Canadas was badly broken and it became obvious by the 1850s that the arrangement was no longer sustainable. Francophones were open to a new deal but had strong reservations. They looked to some of the leaders from Upper Canada and they were not reassured. George Brown, the journalist-politician, held strong views, arguing at one point that French Canadians were imposing their will on the rest of Canada, adding “What has French Canadianism been denied? Nothing. It bars all it dislikes. It extorts all it demands and grows insolent over its victories.”31 He wrote these observations, after the terms of the 1841 arrangement designed to assimilate Francophones, were struck. For Brown, the English were the victims, not the French. When he came calling to sell a new deal, Quebec Francophones were understandably cautious. Brown would not bend on one issue – representation by population – and he won the day on this point. George-Étienne Cartier also came to the negotiating table with a firm requirement – a federal system which would provide Quebec with a degree of autonomy. He set out to protect the interest of Quebec Francophones by securing provincial jurisdiction in the areas of education and local government.

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The lead architect of Confederation and the maestro in shaping the negotiations, Sir John A. Macdonald, also had a firm position – import British political institutions and apply them to Canada. He always remained steadfast loyal to the British Empire and, like all politicians, loyal to the region he represented, Ontario, throughout his political life. Macdonald never saw the need to adjust British-inspired political institutions to the requirements of federalism or the Canadian setting. In fact, he did not see much merit in federalism itself and believed that eventually Canada would come to its senses and embrace a unitary form of government, as was the case in Great Britain. Macdonald only had to borrow a page from Lord Durham on how best to shape new institutions for a renewed Canada. Durham, it will be recalled, favoured uniting the British North American colonies in a federation, granting all important jurisdictions to the national government and hoped that one day the provinces would walk away from the federal system and turn Canada into a unitary state like the mother country – Great Britain. This was precisely Macdonald’s playbook. This is unlikely to have reassured Francophone leaders from Quebec, given that they well knew that Durham’s objective was to assimilate Francophones. Macdonald was able to secure the support of his longtime friend and ally, George-Étienne Cartier, for several reasons. Cartier saw Confederation as an opportunity to bring civil law back to Quebec, to promote the French language in public institutions in Quebec and provide a degree of political autonomy for the new province. Confederation had four key architects: Macdonald, the lead architect, George-Étienne Cartier, George Brown, and Alexander Galt. All four got what they wanted out of the Confederation deal. Macdonald got a strong federal government verging on a unitary state. He saw little merit in federalism, convinced that it did not square with a Westminster-inspired parliamentary government. Macdonald also claimed that the Americans had clearly shown that federalism could not work and pointed to the US civil war to make the case.32 He saw provincial governments as subordinate governments, concerned only with local matters. The British North America Act even contained a provision that does not square with the spirit of federalism. The act gave the Ottawa appointed provincial lieutenant-governors the power to stop provincial legislations from coming into force, until the central government had approved it.33 Macdonald tried at the very last minute, albeit without success, to push for giving still more power to the central government. Cartier stood firm and threatened to withdraw his support for Confederation if Ottawa was given more power than was agreed to at the Quebec Conference.

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Macdonald backed down, convinced that in time Canada would evolve into a unitary state.34 Cartier also got what he wanted. He set out to protect the interests of Quebec and to recapture provisions made under the Quebec and Constitutional Acts. He was successful. He ensured that Quebec would have authority over education, civil law, local institutions, and the use of French in public institutions. Discussions about minority language rights only dealt with Francophones and Anglophones in Quebec. Cartier and his colleague Hector Langevin rejected a proposal to turn control over education to the federal government. This would have benefitted Francophones outside Quebec but Cartier and Langevin were concerned about ensuring French language and religious rights in Quebec. Francophones outside Quebec soon discovered after Confederation that language rights did not extend beyond Quebec boundaries, at least when it came to education.35 George Brown also got what he wanted. He had long insisted on representation by population to establish political power in Canada and making it a “fundamental part of Confederation.”36 Quebec had reservations but Cartier saw that, since the province would gain jurisdiction over education, language, and religious rights, these rights would be beyond the reach of the Orangemen from Ontario. However, Prince Edward Island said no to Brown and his representation by population while New Brunswick and Nova Scotia both expressed strong reservations. Still, in the end, Brown got what he wanted, albeit with some modifications. Representation by population would still decide who would hold political power in Canada. There would be a Senate, but its representation would be appointed based on regional, not provincial representation. The scene was set to have a weak Senate. However, it was later decided that no province would have less members in the House of Commons than it has in the Senate. This favours the smaller provinces. Alexander Galt got what he wanted. He succeeded in designing the new country’s financial arrangements which favoured Canada West and East at the expense of the two Maritime provinces – New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.37 He also succeeded in securing some constitutional rights for Quebec’s English-speaking minority by altering Senate composition for his province. The same provisions were not made for the Francophone minorities in provinces outside Quebec.38 The Colonial Office in London also got what it wanted. London was sending out clear signals to its British North American colonies that they should unite in order to lessen their dependence on the British treasury

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and strengthen their capacity to finance their own defence requirements. By the 1860s, Great Britain considered that the costs of defending the British North American colonies were too high for the benefits. One member of Parliament spoke on behalf of many in Britain: “I want the Canadians clearly to understand that England would not be sorry to see them depart from her tomorrow.”39 The Colonial Office applied strong pressure on the Maritime colonies hesitant about signing on to Confederation. As noted earlier, “The Maritimers were smacked into line by the British acting on appeal from the Canadians.”40

con F e d e r a tI o n : a F o o t I n and a Foot o U t Quebec leaders understood in 1864, as well as anyone, that the political deadlock was hurting both Canada West and East. They also knew that they were clearly outnumbered at the Charlottetown Conference that same year – four out of twenty-three, George-Étienne Cartier and Hector Langevin were the only two francophones present. In contrast, there were eleven Freemasons, perceived as anti-Roman Catholic and anti-French. Still, both Macdonald and Cartier knew full well that Confederation was simply not possible without Quebec. Both also understood that the Act of Union was a failure and that the status quo was not sustainable. Cartier, for one, saw advantages in Confederation. He perceived the future in stark terms – either a union of the British North American colonies or Quebec, in time, would be absorbed by the United States. He rejected George Washington’s call to French Canadians to abandon the flag of their new masters who, he argued, differed in language, race, religion, and sympathies and to join American forces in creating new, more democratic institutions. Cartier also saw a great deal of merit in British political institutions, notably responsible government.41 He understood how the Americans had dealt with the French in Louisiana and wanted no part of that solution for Quebec. There was, however, resistance to Confederation in Quebec. The Durham Report and the 1841 Act of Union left deep wounds. Francophones saw the two for what they were – a policy to assimilate them and a British parliamentary system designed to give the English an artificial majority. Put differently, the French had a majority of voters but the Act of Union was able to turn them into a minority.42 A good number of political leaders in Quebec made the case that the British and French Canada had nothing in common and that when one community differs in race and language, it should be a separate nation.43

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Politicians who supported Confederation made the case that they understood the ways of British political institutions and they had been able to make responsible government work in their favour since 1848. They also saw strong economic advantages with the St Lawrence becoming the centre of economic activity given the two Maritime provinces to the east and Ontario to the west. They saw Confederation quadrupling Montreal’s economic activities. Confederation would not only bring the 1841 Act of Union to an end, it would also re-establish a separate government for Quebec to be controlled by Francophones. Put differently, Confederation would establish a new state within a “state.” La Minerve saw it as “la reconnaissance formelle de notre indépendance nationale.”44 Ralph Heintzman sums things well: “There were few genuine federalists or ‘independentists’ in 1867. To apply such categories to the immediate post-Confederation period is an anachronism. No one thought the new union could be quickly dissolved. But few yet thought it necessarily eternal either. After all, the previous constitution had only lasted 26 years and the one before that less than fifty.”45 As Heintzman argues, for some Quebecers then and now “independence was just une question de temps.”46 Generations of Francophone Quebecers from 1867 to this day have continued to see sovereignty or une nation autonome as the ultimate goal. The goal has taken different forms – some have called for outright independence, others have pushed for a gradual strengthening of Quebec autonomy until the federation is reduced to a simple postal and customs “union” and still others see merit in some form of a “sovereignty-association” arrangement.47 For many, the dream of an independent Quebec never dies. Confederation served the purpose, at least for the time being – it dissolved the Union of 1841 and Lord Durham’s legacy and created a Quebec state within a state. Quebec has had a constant stream of political leaders calling for independence or, failing that, greater autonomy. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Canada’s seventh prime minister, was, at one time, opposed to Confederation. Lionel Groulx, an historian-activist, argued that Quebec, degraded by the British Conquest and Confederation, is a failure. He inspired generations of Quebec nationalists with his “Maîtres chez nous,” a call that resonates to this day in Quebec.48 Maurice Duplessis, Quebec’s premier from 1936 to 1939, and again from 1944 to 1959, constantly fought what he called Ottawa’s excessive centralization. Until 1977, Quebec’s licence plate bore the motto La belle province. It now reads Je me souviens, making the point that Quebec no longer considers itself a province.49 Robert Bourassa, premier

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of Quebec from 1970 to 1976 and again from 1985 to 1994, constantly underlined the need for Quebec’s cultural sovereignty and later called on Canada to recognize Quebec as a distinct society. René Lévesque’s call for sovereignty-association with Canada gained widespread support in Quebec. Jacques Parizeau said that he went into politics to secure independence for Quebec and he came very close in the 1995 referendum. Premier Legault introduced legislation in May 2021 to amend Canada’s Constitution to affirm that “Quebecers form a nation” and that “French shall be the only official language of Quebec.” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quickly declared that his government would not challenge Quebec’s decision in court.50

l o o kIn g B ack Quebec has always had uncertain ties to Canada. Groulx is hardly the only Quebecer who believed or believes that the Conquest degraded Quebec, that the Durham Report constituted nothing short of an insult to Quebec Francophones and that Canada does not work for Quebec. Quebec leaders signed onto Confederation because the status quo no longer held, because going alone was not an option at the time, because joining the United States meant assimilation in short order, because it was widely believed that Confederation would bring important new economic benefits to the province and, for some, it constituted the first step towards an independent Quebec by creating a state within a state. Not much has changed since 1867. Those in Quebec selling Confederation still do so by focusing on the economic benefits that flow from it. Many federalists in Quebec have been selling Confederation as un fédéralisme rentable. Former Quebec Premier Robert Bourassa made the case for it or making Canada profitable for Quebec, hardly an enthusiastic call to be part of the Canadian family. Those who favour independence or much greater autonomy for Quebec in loosely defined arrangements with the rest of Canada still do so in the name of “maîtres chez nous.” Quebec continues to view itself as a victim, but victimhood has taken on different forms. To be sure, La Conquête and the Durham Report made them victims of war and political decisions. By the 1960s, with the Roman Catholic Church losing its grip on Quebec society, Quebecers focused more and more on economic development and saw that their province was trailing other provinces, notably Ontario. Many looked to Ottawa both as the problem and the solution. This was a great deal easier than looking in the mirror, to history or even to their recent past. We saw earlier that Quebec authors themselves argued that little in the

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province had changed from the pioneer days until the 1960s, that Quebec did not provide proper support to its own entrepreneurs and that the bulk of business investments came from outside the province. Quebec, at least until the twentieth century, happily looked to the Church for leadership and embraced a romanticized rural lifestyle. Ottawa became a key player in promoting economic development in Quebec by the 1960s. It threw its regional economic development policy to the wind, rendering it rudderless in the name of national unity. That was not the end of it. Ottawa has also located a number of agencies in Quebec, from the Canadian Space Agency to the head office of several federal government departments and Crown corporations. In addition, Ottawa has intervened to direct economic activities to Quebec that would have otherwise gone to other regions. It will be recalled that Ottawa approved plans to build six Halifax-class frigates in 1983, and another six in 1988. The Saint John shipyard was awarded the contract through a competitive bidding process with some restrictions tied to Canadian content. Shortly after the contract was awarded, Ottawa forced Saint John Shipbuilding to subcontract three vessels to mIl-Davie Shipbuilding located in Sorel, Quebec. The federal government decided to sidestep the competitive bidding process to ensure that Quebec received its share of the procurement contract. The Quebec facility could not compete in the open bidding process and was only awarded the work through political intervention. The Quebec shipyard had difficulties meeting production targets and ran into delays. Saint John Shipbuilding sued mIl -Davie Shipbuilding for nonperfomance. The suit was dropped only after Ottawa compensated Saint John Shipbuilding for $323 million for problems at mIl -Davie. For its part, Saint John Shipbuilding delivered the frigate program “on time and under budget.”51 Again, this was not the end of it. Quebec minister for the Economy, Jacques Daoust, told the media in May 2015 that he was “begging” Ottawa to give a shipbuilding contract to the Davie Shipyard now that “British Columbia and the Maritimes have well-filled order books.” He neglected to add that the Maritimes won the competition in a transparent arm’s-length tender process.52 In June 2015 the minister of Defence announced the government was initiating “exclusive negotiations” with Davie Shipbuilding to provide a supply ship for the Canadian navy.53 We return to this point in the next chapter. It will also be recalled that the federal government awarded the cF-18 maintenance contract to Montreal-based Canadair, after Bristol Aerospace from Winnipeg won the contract in a competitive bid. The

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political fallout in Western Canada still reverberates to this day. It “spawned the Reform Party” and gave fuel to the call “the West wants in.”54 More is also said about this later. In the early 1980s, when the federal government and nine provincial governments decided to patriate the Constitution, the Quebec government of the day insisted that the province had been “stabbed in the back during the night by a bunch of carpetbaggers.” Quebec Premier René Lévesque declared that Quebec had “been betrayed in secret” by the other nine premiers and the federal government. He labelled the betrayal as “the night of long knives.”55 In more recent years, Quebec argues that it has become a “victim of indifference” from the rest of Canada. Premier Philippe Couillard sought in 2017 to relaunch Canada’s constitutional debate and bring Quebec into the constitutional fold.56 The rest of Canada showed little interest and Couillard’s efforts died. Many in Quebec expressed their disappointment that the other nine provinces or Ottawa showed no interest in meeting Quebec at the negotiating table. Le Devoir saw Quebec as a victim of indifference or what it labelled “la quasi-indifférence” from the rest of Canada.57 Premier Legault’s decision to declare Quebec a “nation” in the Constitution and French as the province’s official language was also met with a level of indifference both from the rest of Canada and the media. Many Canadians simply shrugged, thinking that Quebec was once again just being Quebec. This would not have been the case thirty years ago.58 The above are hardly isolated instances of Ottawa intervening to show that the federal government can work for Quebec. It does not say much, however, for some Quebec-based firms having to turn to Ottawa to intervene because they cannot compete to secure a contract in a competitive bidding process. Even when they lose, they are still able to secure a contract because they are located in Quebec. The competitive bidding process takes a back seat to national unity concerns and any benefits that Quebec may be able to secure from the federation. In Canada, it pays to label oneself a victim. However, when Ottawa intervenes to show that Canadian federalism works for Quebec, it creates new victims. The Western and Maritime provinces, as we will see in the following chapters, have reasons to regard themselves as “victims” of Canadian federalism. Given its seventy-eight seats in the House of Commons and its never-ending threat to national unity, Quebec has been successful in influencing decision makers in Ottawa. Quebec’s economic challenges have had little to do with the terms of Confederation. As we saw, after

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the conquest, many Quebec economic elites left the colony for France. In addition, for a long time, Quebec valued a serene, agrarian society led by the Roman Catholic Church while cultivating an indifference to wealth. It is difficult to see how Quebec can still see itself as a victim of Confederation. In the era of governing from the centre, prime ministers from Quebec have held power forty-two of the past fifty-three years. Quebec was able to rewrite a section of Canada’s constitution stating that “Quebecers form a nation,” and that “French shall be the only official language of Quebec.”59 Ottawa and the rest of Canada essentially said nothing. It is not clear whether Quebec sees the challenge to the French language coming from within Canada or the United States, the workings of the global economy, or the internet. Quebec has recently added a new twist in playing the victim card – “indifference.” As we saw above, former Quebec premier, Philippe Couillard, and leading journalists now talk of Quebec becoming a “victim of indifference.” It seems Quebec views itself as a victim both when history and the rest of Canada pay attention to it and when they do not. Quebec, and more generally Francophones in Canada, may have challenges ahead, but Canada and Canadian federalism are not the problem – they have been the solution since the 1960s. Canada has played a critical role in transforming the Quebec economy from an agrarian and church dominated society into a thriving modern economy. Ottawa has had and continues to have a strong presence in Quebec’s aerospace industry (see investments in Bombardier and the Canada Space Agency with its $500 million annual budget), the pharmaceutical sector and the public sector (the head offices of several federal government departments are located in Gatineau). Quebec also benefitted from federal transfer payments including equalization (over $30 billion in 2021–22 in total federal transfers out of $120 billion in revenues).60 The Conquest and the Act of Union may well have made Quebec a victim. However, since the 1960s, Ottawa has been a pivotal partner in moving Quebec away from wearing the victim label. Canadians outside Quebec are likely at a loss in seeing how they could do more. Western and Atlantic Canadians, in particular, given that the National Policy and national political institutions have both favoured Central Canada, are not likely to accept that Canadian federalism is to blame for Quebec’s economic woes and challenges. The one million strong Francophones outside Quebec are unlikely to see the logic that the French language would be better protected if Quebec left Canada.

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Maritimers: Victims of Confederation

It will be recalled that the leaders of Upper and Lower Canada had a problem that they could not solve on their own or by looking to their political institutions. They looked to the only place they could to break their political impasse – the three Maritime provinces and Newfoundland. Two Maritime colonies (New Brunswick and Nova Scotia) helped break the impasse, but it came at a cost to them. Historians have documented how Confederation and the National Policy have played havoc with the Maritime economy.1 Both have turned the Maritime region into a region of victims, at least, that is how many Maritimers view their place in Confederation. The reader may well ask why I am writing about the Maritimes and not Atlantic Canada. People from outside Atlantic Canada are much more comfortable with the term Atlantic Canada than are people from my region. The political, economic, and cultural ties between the four Atlantic provinces are weak. Attempts at promoting economic cooperation between the four provinces have always missed the mark, by a wide margin. As Jim Bickerton argues, “Atlantic Canada” is more of a convenient construct for Ottawa-based officials than it is a region.2 I consider myself a Maritimer, not an Atlantic Canadian. Former Newfoundland premier, Joey Smallwood, summed up things well when he pointed out that his province had no interest in joining the three Maritime provinces to study either political or economic union.3 He said that Newfoundland would be more open to joining Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island than the three Maritime provinces, because the three islands have something in common. Alex Campbell, former premier of Prince Edward Island, was even more to the point: “We sit here under the banner of an Atlantic regional caucus when in fact there is no such thing. The only people who consider

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Atlantic Canada as a region are those who live outside of Atlantic Canada, the planners and the bureaucrats in Ottawa, the newscasters in Toronto, and the airline executives in Montreal.”4 Former New Brunswick premier, Louis J. Robichaud, who launched an initiative to unite the three Maritime provinces, went to the heart of the issue when he said, “Newfoundland is quite a distance from the rest of the country, and they have their own ways of life that are completely different from those of people from Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick.”5 I leave the last word to historian James Hiller: “There is a strong sense that while the Maritimes may indeed constitute an historical region, Newfoundland does not fit.”6 Though Newfoundland and Labrador is the late arrival to Confederation (1949), the province is no less convinced that misguided Ottawa policies explain, at least in part, its economic difficulties. Many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians blame the federal government for nearly wiping out major fish stocks. The province’s premiers have long argued, for example, that the province should be allowed to participate in decision-making about the fishery.7 Provincial government officials and local fishers insist that Ottawa erred in many ways in managing the fishery – that it gave too many “large quotas” to foreign fleets and never fully appreciated the sector’s requirements. They point out that all senior policy and decision makers in the fishery, are located in an office tower in downtown Ottawa, thousands of kilometers away from the fishing grounds in the four Atlantic provinces and in British Columbia, too far removed from the industry to appreciate its challenges and opportunities.8

t h e l e gacy Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland said no to what the Canadians had to offer. Leaders from the two colonies quickly rejected the terms of Confederation, convinced that it would leave the smaller colonies without much of a voice in the united Parliament and always at the mercy of Ontario and Quebec, for all things political. As noted previously, when given a chance to voice their view, Nova Scotians gave a resounding no to Confederation on two occasions. New Brunswickers, initially at least, strongly opposed it in the 1865 election, but subsequently said yes in another election, the following year. The pro-Confederation forces in New Brunswick, led by Sir Leonard Tilley, had the strong backing of the Colonial Office – no small advantage in 1866. Tilley also received from Sir John A. Macdonald $5,000

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to “bribe voters” and help persuade the undecided. Luck also intervened on Tilley’s side. The Fenians launched raids along the Maine-New Brunswick border precisely at the time when pro- and anti-Confederation forces were crossing swords over the merit of Confederation. The raids considerably weakened anti-Confederation forces in the region, making the case that New Brunswick needed outside help to protect its border against the Fenians through a strong central government.9 The Fenians, a group of Irish patriots who had immigrated to the United States, wanted to put pressure on Great Britain to withdraw from Ireland. The pro-Confederation forces in New Brunswick and in the Colonial Office exaggerated the menace of the Fenian threat, convinced that it would strengthen their hand.10 High-profile political leaders from the three Maritime colonies, notably Joseph Howe, Albert Smith, and William Annand, saw problems on all fronts with the Confederation deal. They argued that their provinces would lose financially in exchanging customs and excise to Ottawa for an eighty-cent per capita subsidy. Annand, for example, insisted that Ottawa would use Nova Scotia resources to build canals in Central Canada and to open-up the West. Furthermore, he could not understand why Nova Scotia Premier Charles Tupper would accept representation by population, which would leave the province with only nineteen mP s out of 181, with the proportion declining as Canada expanded to the west and north (today Nova Scotia has eleven mP s out of 338). With no effective ability to counterbalance “rep by pop,” he saw that Central Canada would come to dominate the Maritime provinces at will. Annand went to London to plead his anti-Confederation case. However, after a meeting with the colonial secretary, he concluded that the “imperial authorities would use every means in their power, short of physical coercion to implement confederation.”11 They did. The Nova Scotia business community also saw little advantage in the new arrangement. Merchants opposed the deal, insisting that their markets were across the seas, east and south, and not inland in Canada. Joseph Howe, a powerful orator and editorialist, decided to jump in the debate to oppose the Quebec Resolutions shortly after their content became known, convinced that Confederation, as defined by politicians from the two Canadas, would seriously inhibit Nova Scotia’s development.12 Ralph Heintzman, a noted historian of the Confederation period and a keen observer of public policy, who also served in a senior position in the federal government, has this to say: “Of course Confederation was

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designed to solve the problem of Ontario and Quebec and the Maritime colonies came in handy.”13 To be sure, the political and economic interests of the Maritime colonies were not top of mind among the four architects of Confederation or the Colonial Office. They had far more pressing issues to attend to, at least from where they sat. The Fathers of Confederation had a challenge – how to develop a political structure that runs contrary to the country’s geographical landscape, given its natural north-south pull. The political, linguistic, and sharp regional divisions cried out for the establishment of a genuine federal system with a built-in capacity in its national government to address regional circumstances. However, the Colonial Office had no interest in federalism and had, even by the mid-1860s, little knowledge in how to make federalism work. The four key architects of Canadian Confederation also had little knowledge about the workings of federalism. As we saw, Macdonald, for one, wanted a unitary state and he was convinced that, in time, Canada would evolve into one. Albert Smith, the New Brunswick premier in 1865–66, not only had an understanding of federalism, he also showed a great deal of foresight. He argued that the terms of Confederation would render his province “utterly powerless.” He explained that New Brunswick would be “under the controlling power of Messrs. Macdonald and George-Étienne Cartier.” And, though in time there would be “a change of Government, it would be no better for the people of the Maritime provinces. The interests of Ontario were entirely distinct and at variance with all the other provinces.”14 Smith called for a referendum on any act of confederation. Macdonald, Cartier and the Colonial Office saw no need for a referendum, and nothing came of Smith’s recommendation. Smith also made the case that smaller provinces be given “at least the guard which they have in the United States (i.e., an equal and effective Senate), although we ought to have more, because here, the popular branch (i.e., the executive branch) is all-powerful.”15 Macdonald, however, saw a different role for the Senate – a House of “sober second thought” to act as a check on full-blown democracy. Nothing came of Smith’s recommendation for a US-styled Senate either.16 Rather than embrace an effective Upper House to deal with the demands of the Maritime delegates, the Ontario representatives argued that the Maritime provinces could always count on Quebec if their province ever attempted to dominate Confederation. It would have been very difficult to predict in 1867 that Quebec would ever agree to support

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Ontario’s economic interests, and vice versa, given the tension between the two at the time. As far as Canada West was concerned, that should have constituted enough assurance to the Maritime colonies that Ontario could never dominate the national political agenda. It was a case of political spin circa 1860s. Time would show that it hardly constituted a lasting or even a short-term arrangement. Former Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard made this clear when he addressed the Ontario legislature in 2015 and said that Ontario and Quebec are “natural allies,” and added: “Central Canada is an economic force. It is a political force.”17 His comments led the National Post to argue in an editorial that “the message here is not Canada First. It’s Central Canada First.”18 It has always been thus. In 2014, for example, Ontario and Quebec allied themselves once again to develop a list of “local” demands on the Energy East pipeline project. The Energy East project died before it even got off the ground and many have pointed the finger at Quebec for its demise. The two central provinces have also agreed to open up their procurement to each other’s companies, but not to any other province.19

t h e m a rIt I m eS : w h ere I t never r a In S a n d It IS o t t awa’ S F aUlt It soon became clear to the two Maritime colonies that Confederation was about Ontario and Quebec. Maritimers saw very early on that they would lose out on key issues. The Quebec Resolutions gave all the power of both indirect and direct taxation to the federal government, leaving the provinces with access only to direct taxation, which held very limited possibilities in 1867, at least for the Maritime provinces. The region’s main source of revenue at the time of Confederation was indirect taxes (notably customs), given that it was a strong trading region. Indirect taxation was not as important for Ontario and Quebec. In contrast to Ontario and Quebec, the Maritimes also had an extremely weak municipal structure, essentially limited to Halifax and Saint John. Municipal governments, as creatures of the provinces, were able to impose direct taxation in the form of property taxes – the only direct taxation widely acceptable to citizens in 1867. It soon became clear that New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, with a weak municipal structure and the loss of their main revenue source, would not be able to cope under the new arrangement. Thus began federal transfers to the provinces on a per capita basis, with a slight modification to accommodate Nova Scotia

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and New Brunswick circumstances. The modifications had a modest impact and, as a result, Ontario and Quebec got subsidies that were greater than their needs at the time while the fiscal position of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia would soon become intolerable.20 In 1866, customs and excise represented 75 per cent and 72 per cent of revenues for the colonies of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick respectively, but only 56 per cent for Canada. Revenue from “realty,” meanwhile, represented 23 per cent of revenue for Canada but only 7 per cent for Nova Scotia and 9 per cent for New Brunswick. In relinquishing the right to levy customs and excise taxes and transferring it to the federal government, the two Maritime colonies lost a great deal more than did Ontario and Quebec.21 At the political level, Tilley, who had championed Confederation in New Brunswick, envisioned himself as the minister of Finance in the new Canada, given his background as a businessman and his experience in government in New Brunswick. However, the Finance portfolio went to a Quebec politician, Alexander Galt. Macdonald never considered a non-Canadian, or an mP not from Ontario or Quebec, for the powerful Finance portfolio because “he was having trouble enough satisfying Canadians as it was.”22 The other senior portfolios, at the time Militia and Defence, Inland Revenue, Public Works, and Agriculture, all went to Ontario and Quebec politicians. Tilley wrote to Macdonald as his minister of Customs, pleading with him: “Do strengthen my hands … I want all the assistance I can get, to allay dissatisfaction that exists … that I have no influence with the government.”23 The Maritime colonies also quickly discovered that they would be greatly underrepresented in the federal public service. The new civil service consisted of “little more than” the old bureaucracy of the former United Province of Canada.24 Officials from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia were, for the most part, frozen out of government appointments in Ottawa. Shortly after Confederation, the civil service numbered five hundred and only two came from the Maritimes. Public servants who retired from the old Canadian bureaucracy were given a pension financed by the federal government, while those from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were not.25 The message was not lost on Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and public servants – their region was little more than an appendage to Upper and Lower Canada, as Albert Smith and Joseph Howe had predicted. It had all the makings of victimhood or the basis for the two provinces to see themselves as victims of Confederation.

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It w aS a l l aB oU t canal S Canals mattered a great deal in the 1860s. They held strategic military importance. But they also held important economic development considerations, given that they constituted a crucial infrastructure to grow the economy. They connected communities, bypassed falls, and transported goods. There was no shortage of possibilities in the negotiations for the construction of canals at the Quebec and London conferences. Delegates had their favourite projects. Maritime delegates had the construction of the Chignecto Canal at the top of their list. It presented enormous potential for the region. Jacques de Meulles first suggested building a canal through the Chignecto Isthmus in 1686. Over the years, twelve major engineering reports and three Royal Commissions were produced, and none disputed the engineering feasibility of building the canal.26 There was an understanding between Canada and Maritime representatives that the construction of the Chignecto Canal was part of the Confederation deal. There was a consensus then, and for one hundred years later, that the “Isthmus of Chignecto” was a “barrier which has obstructed the full economic development of Canada, particularly that of the Atlantic region.”27 After Confederation, the building and rebuilding of canals in Ontario and Quebec remained a priority of the new federal government. The Canadian Encyclopedia explained it this way: “Following Confederation in 1867, inland transportation in Canada was given high priority by the new government. The 1870s and 1880s were years of active canal rebuilding and improvements. The bottleneck locks on the Grenville, the third of the Ottawa River canals, were finally rebuilt; a new Carillon Canal replaced the original canal and the Chute à Blondeau single-lock canal. All the locks on the Lachine and St Lawrence River canals were rebuilt in this period to standard dimensions … The third Welland Canal, a major rebuilding of the second, was finished by 1887.”28 Nothing is said about the Chignecto Canal in the encyclopedia. Though Ottawa committed important resources to the building and rebuilding of canals soon after the country was born in 1867, and though the proposed Chignecto Canal figured in the discussions leading to Confederation, the canal never made it on the government’s to-do list. All the major canals in Central Canada did. To deal with the various demands, the Macdonald government established a royal commission in 1870, chaired by Sir Hugh Allan, to look into canal building and establish priorities.

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The Allan Commission divided its recommendations into works of first, second, third, and fourth classes. The first class embraced projects where “the general interest of the Dominion” was evident and had to “be undertaken and proceeded with as fast as the means at the disposal of the government will warrant.”29 All canals, except one, that made it to the first class list were quickly built. The Chignecto Canal, which was strongly endorsed by the Allan Commission, is the one that was never built. Maritime mP s kept pushing for the construction of the Chignecto Canal and the federal government kept coming up with reasons to postpone its construction. The Alexander Mackenzie government, elected in 1873, allocated funds for the canal, but then had a change of mind when the economic difficulties of the 1870s hit. The Chignecto Canal became a casualty.30 Commissions and studies once again followed, making the case that the Chignecto Canal was possible on “climatic and engineering grounds.”31 But there was always something that stopped the project. There is evidence to suggest, for example, that the Chignecto Canal got caught up in “conflicts and jealousies” inside the Ottawa bureaucracy, and though tenders were called for its construction, it stalled in the Ottawa system.32 The Maritime provinces decided they could no longer wait for the federal government to make good on its commitment to build the canal. They asked leading engineer H.G.C. Ketchum to come up with a new proposal and to shop around for additional support. Ketchum raised funds from private sources and obtained a charter in 1882 to establish the Chignecto Marine Transport Railway Company. The federal government agreed to pay an annual subsidy of $200,000 for twenty years on the condition that the project would be in operation within several years. This would enable Ottawa to turn over responsibility for the construction of the Chignecto Canal to the private sector – something it did not do for the other canals on Allan’s A-list.33 Ketchum successfully raised funds in Great Britain and was able to commit $4 million to the construction of the Chignecto Canal. However, he did not have enough funds to complete the project on time. One of his British investors had to back out of the deal after the crash of the money market in England in 1890, and because some of the firm’s investments had gone bad in Uruguay and Argentina. Ketchum asked for more time, but the House of Commons refused to extend the deadline for the subsidy; the project collapsed.34 By 1896 Ketchum had raised and spent $3.5 million on the project and had something like 80 per cent of the work completed. He required another $1.5 million

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and about two more months of work to finish the project. The bill to extend the period for Ketchum to secure new funds was defeated in the Commons by a single vote – fifty-five to fifty-four. The Senate played no role in the decision.35 Maritime mP s and Maritime provincial governments never gave up on the Chignecto Canal. They kept at it and more studies were produced – Ottawa kept saying no. When the federal government looked at building the St Lawrence-Great Lakes canals, at a cost substantially greater than the Chignecto canal, it explained that “in the case of the Great Lakes, the canals are a national necessity; in the case of Chignecto, a canal would simply be a refinement of present facilities and largely of local significance.”36 Ottawa never explained what it meant by “refinement of present facilities” to Maritimers, who were perplexed, since there were no present facilities to be refined. It was never explained either why the St Lawrence-Great Lakes canals were a national necessity, while the Chignecto Canal was only of local significance. Maritime political and economic leaders were still not prepared to throw in the towel on the Chignecto Canal, even as late as the 1950s. Infrastructure spending was in vogue in the post-Second World War period. Construction began on the Trans-Canada Highway in 1950. In 1951, Parliament passed the International Rapids Power Development Act to enable Canada to start navigation works on the St Lawrence River from Montreal to Lake Ontario. In 1954 the St Lawrence Seaway Authority, a Crown corporation, was established by an act of Parliament to acquire lands and construct and operate a waterway between Montreal and Lake Erie. In the end, the cost was $470 million, with Canada assuming $336.5 million of the cost and the United States $133.5 million. In 1959, the St Lawrence Seaway was completed, establishing a link between the Great Lakes and global markets. Other initiatives were later launched, including a realignment of the Welland Canal to bypass the city of Welland, at a cost of another $300 million to Canada. Canada and the United States spent an additional $600 million on hydroelectric development.37 These federal government activities all had a negative impact on Maritime ports, notably those of Halifax and Saint John. Corey Slumkoski wrote that the proposed St Lawrence Seaway once again sparked interest in the construction of the Chignecto Canal in the Maritimes. Like the St Lawrence Seaway, the canal could provide a new source of hydroelectric power for the region by harnessing the tides. It would also shorten the distance between the eastern seaboard and the continental interior. Maritimers looked at past “massive” government

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investments in canals in Ontario and in the St Lawrence – all funded by “federal coffers” – and asked why government investments could not be committed to the Chignecto Canal? The view from the Maritimes was that federal government spending continued to be earmarked for projects of “national importance” as defined by Ottawa.38 The difference, of course, is that one region – Ontario-Quebec – had the political clout and the bureaucratic influence to decide what was of national importance and what was not. As in the past on other issues with a strong regional component, the Senate had little to offer on the Chignecto Canal. Local business and community leaders decided to get involved and they established a Chignecto Canal Committee to promote the project.39 They sponsored studies to make the case for the canal before the federal government. The committee proposed to build the 30.5-kilometre canal on a narrow strip of land that separates Nova Scotia from New Brunswick. Studies showed that the canal would shorten shipping routes between the continental interior and the eastern seaboard of the United States by some 650 kilometres. Support for the committee’s work came from many quarters in the four Atlantic provinces, starting with the two adjoining communities – Sackville, New Brunswick, and Amherst, Nova Scotia, – local boards of trade, and leading businessmen from the region, notably K.C. Irving. Local business leaders argued that national tariffs and trade barriers made it difficult for them to sell their products on international markets. They explained that they had to push their products “uphill” to markets in Central Canada while businesses in Central Canada only had to nudge their goods “downhill” to the Maritime provinces.40 The Chignecto Canal Committee made the case that all sectors of the Atlantic economy would benefit from the canal: essentially, the canal would establish the required circumstances for economic success in the region, much like the St Lawrence Seaway was doing in Central Canada. The committee also noted the canal would generate new activities around large zinc and copper deposits in northern New Brunswick, in the forestry, fishery, coal, and manufacturing sectors. Since transportation disadvantages to the eastern seaboard of the United States and to markets in Central Canada would be considerably attenuated, the region’s economic performance would improve. This, combined with new sources of energy, would provide important economic benefits not only to the three Maritime provinces but also to Newfoundland and Labrador. K.C. Irving and other business leaders pledged to invest $105 million in new economic activities in the Bay of Fundy area if the canal was built.41

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The estimated cost of building the canal in 1957 stood at $90 million, a figure substantially lower than the construction of the St Lawrence Seaway. Ottawa, however, did not buy the committee’s arguments. Lionel Chevrier, the powerful Transport minister from Quebec, made clear his opposition to Chignecto at every opportunity. If the responsible minister – particularly one with Chevrier’s influence – representing a province that was also home to the prime minister, did not support a project that came under his jurisdiction in the 1950s, the chances of the project seeing the light of day were slim. Chevrier was convinced that the Chignecto Canal would take away from his St Lawrence Seaway project, and thus he embraced all arguments against the Chignecto Canal, insisting the cost was too high. All that is left of the proposed Chignecto Canal are twelve engineering and feasibility reports and the remnants of the work carried out by Ketchum. The canal will never be built. K.C. Irving, arguably Canada’s leading entrepreneur of the last century and hardly one that saw himself as a victim, did not hesitate to point the finger at Ottawa for the canal always remaining on the drawing board. He said the construction of the Chignecto Canal was a project that decision makers in Ottawa “owe to this part of the country.”42 K.C. Irving also observed: “Let’s not forget that in some cases, Upper Canadians are the worst type of foreigners.”43 Key political figures in Ottawa never accepted the arguments in favour of the Chignecto Canal, convinced that the Chignecto Canal, which they deemed a regional project, could create problems for the St Lawrence Seaway, which they saw as a national project. Power established by national political institutions – notably the House of Commons operating on a rep by pop basis – was free (and remains free) to define what is national and what is regional. The Senate, as in so many other issues, simply stood on the sidelines as the executive decided that the Chignecto Canal would never be built. For Maritimers, Ottawa’s decisions on canals and its unwillingness to support the building of the Chignecto Canal became a symbol of the federal government’s indifference towards their region. The Maritimes held much greater appeal to Macdonald and Cartier before Confederation than after the deal was struck. How Ottawa dealt with canals, one of the most important economic development instruments in 1867, would set the stage for how the federal government would shape economic policies in future, or act as a precursor of Ottawa’s National Policy (circa 1878 until the Second World War). For the Maritime provinces, how Ottawa decided which canals would be built and which ones would not, was a harbinger of things to come.

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The region would have a readymade solution to explain its slow economic growth. The Maritimes could and have, on many occasions, made the case that Confederation and national policies have made them victims of Ottawa’s economic policies. I have also made this case on several occasions in the past, as I do once again in this chapter.44

n a tI o n a l Pol Icy Ottawa’s National Policy has a lot to answer for, at least, when it comes to the Maritime provinces and Western Canada. The National Policy emphasized an east-west continental economy, and by ricochet, it protected emerging central Canadian producers. It meant that Maritimers would have to import their manufactured goods from Montreal and Southern Ontario or pay duties of 50 per cent in some instances, to import goods from traditional sources such as Great Britain or the New England States. Maritimers saw that under the National Policy, they were compelled to buy what they consumed in a substantially protected home market but had to sell their products in a virtually unprotected one. Over time, economic protectionism and the National Policy forced producers in the Maritimes to ship their goods on expensive rail routes to Central Canada rather than on ships to their traditional export markets in the New England States, the Caribbean Islands, and elsewhere. Canada’s east-west trade patterns, which were artificially created through the National Policy, promoted a shift to overland trade (for which the three Maritime provinces were geographically ill-suited) and served to make the region essentially an “isolated extremity of Canada.”45 The emerging trade patterns were artificial in the sense that they were created, initially at least, by political decisions, not by market forces. Many observers have argued that the National Policy and protectionism have served to undercut the region’s trading advantage in waterborne shipping. David Alexander summed up the impact of the National Policy on the region in this way: “In the Maritimes, underdevelopment seems a sorry descent from those heady days when the region possessed one of the world’s foremost shipbuilding industries, the third or fourth largest merchant marine, financial institutions which were the core of many of the present Canadian giants (see, for examples, the Royal Bank of Canada and Scotiabank both first established in Halifax), and an industrial structure growing as fast as that of central Canada.”46 In short, the National Policy is at least partly responsible for the region’s economic decline. The policy also encouraged American firms to establish branch plants in Canada. Here, geography again clearly favoured Central Canada. It

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became the location of choice for foreign firms wishing to establish a presence in Canada. They too only had to nudge their products down to the Maritime provinces. Maritimers can legitimately claim there was no place for them in the National Policy. One keen observer of New Brunswick politics, for example, wrote in 1961 about the “enormous economic disabilities under which the region has been laboring since the inauguration of the National Policy,” with the result that New Brunswick and, more generally, Maritime politicians have been cast in the role of supplicants pressing on whatever pretext can be devised for better terms from Ottawa.47 National Policy took on a life of its own, and its impact has been long lasting. The answer to the question of the government’s role in influencing where industrial activities would be concentrated in the country was, until recently, straightforward. The Maritime business community had difficulty competing, given that the National Policy clearly favoured businesses in Central Canada. It also could not compete with business leaders from the vote-rich provinces of Ontario and Quebec in influencing national policies. Ernest Forbes explains that it soon became clear that whenever there was regional competition, Ottawa invariably opted for Ontario and perhaps also Quebec. He pointed out, for example, that Ottawa simply said, “‘We can’t have a tariff on coal because Ontario needs to import it from the United States.’ They took the tariff off and were able to create an iron and steel industry in Ontario.”48 That decision alone shifted important economic power to Central Canada and served to eliminate the advantages previously enjoyed by Cape Breton coal producers. This is far from an isolated development. Historians have produced a veritable catalogue of federal policies that had a negative impact on the Maritime provinces. Hugh Thorburn succinctly observed, “In the long run the federal government’s tariff, transportation, and monetary policies have worked to the general disadvantage of New Brunswick.”49 Policies were struck in Ottawa to meet national objectives, which to a Maritimer, became a code phrase for “the economic interests of Ontario and Quebec only.” What was good for Central Canada was invariably perceived in Ottawa to be good for Canada as a whole, but the same reasoning would never apply in the Maritimes. Ottawa’s monetary policy during the 1930s – and for that matter ever since – reflected economic circumstances in Ontario and Quebec and, only recently in Western Canada; often at the expense of the Maritimes. Canada refused to devalue its currency during the depression of the 1930s, while many other countries did. The Maritime region was “exposed to a two-way squeeze: from high and rigid prices for the manufactured

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goods she had to buy (from central Canada), and from difficult selling conditions in the export markets upon which she depended.”50 National Policy was followed by the war effort and here again Maritimers can legitimately claim that Ottawa seriously short-changed their region.

t h e w a r eFF ort The war effort (circa 1940–45) played a pivotal role in establishing Canada’s manufacturing sector. Ottawa established thirty-two Crown corporations during the war years, thinking that they were better suited to attract business leaders to manage war programs than a typical government department. All thirty-two were established in Ontario and Quebec, virtually all in the Montreal-Windsor corridor, not a single one was created in the Maritimes or Western Canada. Crown corporations represented a significant new source of investments with the potential to generate a great deal of new economic activity. Indeed, they would provide the basis for future development in the manufacturing sector in the postwar years. For example, wartime Crown corporations gave rise to aircraft manufacturers, synthetic rubber producers, and an advanced technology company called Research Enterprises Limited. Although many of the Crown corporations established during the war were later disbanded, some continued, including Polysar and Canadian Arsenals Limited. The important point is that Canada’s war effort and the measures to reconstruct the country’s economy in the immediate postwar period were a product of government initiatives, specifically the federal government’s initiatives. When the private sector could not deliver what the war effort required, Ottawa created Crown corporations. The capacity was created in Ontario and Quebec, while labour from the Maritimes was drawn to these two provinces. To be sure, the Crown corporations served the war effort well. They also served in the long run to considerably strengthen Central Canada’s manufacturing sector. And that was not all. The Department of Munitions and Supply made extensive new investments in Canadian industries, but by 1944, only about 3.7 per cent of these had been made in the Maritimes, mainly for aircraft and naval repair. In fact, even the bulk of the shipbuilding for the war was carried out elsewhere. Historians now recognize that “C.D. Howe and his bureaucrats favoured the concentration of manufacturing in central Canada,”51 even though locating certain activities in the Maritime provinces made more economic sense because of geography, the presence of entrepreneurial talent (e.g., K.C.

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Irving), and the industrial capacity in Saint John and Halifax.52 This is one time when geography should have favoured the Maritime provinces; it was Central Canada, not Halifax or Saint John, that was far from the war theatre. C.D. Howe was consistently focused on Central Canada in shaping the country’s manufacturing sector. The Dominion Steel and Coal Corporation (doSco ) was, at one time, one of Canada’s big three steel producers and one of the largest employers in the Maritime provinces. Howe and his department decided to help steel producers modernize their operations for the war effort. He offered subsidies to the Steel Company of Canada in Hamilton and to the Algoma Steel Company in Sault Ste Marie. He offered nothing to Cape Breton’s doSco , which prompted Arthur Cross, its president, to report that his firm was “the only primary steel producer in this country which is receiving no government assistance.”53 Howe’s decision made sense to then Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King (from Ontario), the larger Ontario caucus, and Ottawa-based senior public servants. Ottawa established much of the war effort in Central Canada, even when military considerations suggested otherwise. After a visit to Canada in 1940, the British Admiralty Technical Mission concluded, “Political issues weigh heavily” in military decisions. It underlined the problems with building ships in yards cut off from the Atlantic Ocean for five months of the year and questioned the need for vessels to make the long trip down the St Lawrence. American military advisors also made the same point.54 The first ten ships built for Great Britain barely escaped getting trapped in the St Lawrence in the winter freeze-up and “required substantial work in the Maritimes before they could risk an Atlantic crossing.”55 The British tried as best they could to convince Ottawa to make Halifax the logical naval headquarters for their Canadian convoys and as the repair centre for the larger vessels. They were not successful.56 In its first activities report tabled on 30 April 1941, the Department of Munitions and Supply made clear its bias for Central Canada. The Canadian and British governments had already committed $484 million to the war effort. Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick received nothing, while Nova Scotia received only $8.7 million, with $3 million of it allocated to a Montreal firm to build a floating dry dock for Halifax.57 Ottawa’s postwar reconstruction efforts continued in the same pattern. Some of the Crown corporations continued operating, while others were eventually privatized. Some 80 per cent of the funds earmarked for reconstruction were allocated to Ontario and Quebec contractors. Firms looking for assistance had to be “profitable,” and Ottawa often

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turned away from Maritime ones, arguing that the region lacked skilled workers, many of whom had moved to Central Canada to work for the war effort. Many other Ottawa decisions favoured Central Canada at the expense of the Maritime region’s industrial sector, including the decision of Canadian National Railway (cn ) to establish a repair shop in Montreal, which in time would undermine Moncton’s repair shop and eventually cause its demise.58 In our ahistorical world, it is all too often overlooked that the federal government played a major role in promoting the country’s manufacturing sector through tariffs and the establishment of Crown corporations. When decisions are made in Ottawa about where to locate a new research foundation, the Space Agency, or an R&D government unit, the debate nearly always turns on whether it should be located in Ottawa, other parts of Southern Ontario, or Montreal – rarely, if ever, in the Maritime provinces or Western Canada.59 Only on occasion will the Maritime provinces get, in the words of a former clerk and secretary to the Cabinet, a “breakaway” and draw the attention of Ottawa-based decision makers.60 Breakaways are increasingly rare, as both the region’s political clout and the role of Maritime ministers have become increasingly marginalized. It will be recalled that Justin Trudeau did away with “regional ministers” in 2015 only to re-introduce the concept four years later but for Quebec only.

B U Il d In g S hIP S : t h e Pattern I S S et Frank McKenna, former New Brunswick premier and hardly one to consider himself or even his province as victims, underlined the importance of shipbuilding to the Maritime provinces: “Shipbuilding belongs to us on the Atlantic Coast of Canada. But friends, this is not an artificial creation, we’ve been building ships for hundreds of years; before this country was ever created, we were building ships. This is the land of the Marco Polo and the Bluenose. This is the story of our civilization as we developed here. We build ships, and we build good ships. Unfortunately, we live in the only country in the industrialized world that does not have a shipbuilding policy to support those who build ships. And – this may sound a little bit cynical – but I think if you could get ships in Oshawa, Ontario, or Ottawa, they would have shipbuilding policy for this country.”61 We saw earlier that Ottawa intervened to direct some shipbuilding work to a Quebec firm even after Maritime shipyards had won the competitive bids. Quebec’s gain was the Maritime provinces’ loss.

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We also saw that the federal government approved plans to build six Halifax-class frigates in 1983, and another six in 1988. The Saint John shipyard was awarded the contract through a transparent bid process, albeit with some restrictions tied to Canadian content. Shortly after the contract was awarded, Ottawa forced Saint John Shipbuilding to subcontract three vessels to mIl-Davie Shipbuilding located in Sorel, Quebec. Quebec ministers led by Marc Lalonde intervened to ensure Quebec received its share of the procurement contract. The Quebec facility could not compete in the open bidding process and was only awarded the work through political intervention. New Brunswick’s Roméo LeBlanc, then senior Cabinet minister, told me that “Marc Lalonde and André Ouellet got to Trudeau and that was that. I had little say in that decision.”62 As mentioned, the Quebec shipyard had difficulties meeting production targets and ran into delays. Saint John Shipbuilding sued mIl -Davie Shipbuilding for nonperformance. Ottawa decided to intervene and compensated Saint John Shipbuilding with $323 million for problems at mIl -Davie.63 Jeffrey Simpson argued Stephen Harper learned a lesson from the first frigates purchase. Harper decided to put in place an arm’s-length bidding process when the decision was made in 2011 to build new navy ships. Simpson wrote that government “defined the ships it wanted, and the money it would pay. It asked a group of civil servants to assess the shipyards interested in bidding. It hired an international firm to crosscheck their work. It published the results, and lived by them, whatever the political consequences.”64 Politicians were only told of the choice minutes before the announcement was made public.65 The Halifax-based Irving Shipyard won the bulk of the contract. The point is, when Ottawa embraces an open, transparent, and fair bidding process free of political interference, the Maritime region is able to compete and win. It is interesting, if not revealing, to note that Harper is from Western Canada and Trudeau and Mulroney are from Central Canada. As noted, Quebec minister for the Economy, Jacques Daoust, told the media in May 2015 that: “while projects in British Columbia and the Maritimes have well-filled order books with military contracts, Quebec is forced to beg for a contract.”66 Begging works, particularly when it comes from a province with seventy-eight mP s in the House of Commons and when the province has a monopoly on national unity concerns. In June 2015, the minister of Defence announced the government was initiating “exclusive negotiations” with Davie Shipyard to provide a supply ship for the Canadian navy.67 The announcement came

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four months before the 2015 general election. Political intervention, it seems, is fine when it involves Ontario or Quebec with their large number of mP s, but less so when it comes to the Maritime provinces. The Senate, as always, played no part in speaking to the regional perspective on this or other major procurement decisions.

l o o kIn g F o r Balance By the late 1950s, Ottawa policy makers became concerned with the regional imbalance in the national economy. The legacy of National Policy, Ottawa’s decision to concentrate the country’s war effort in the vote-rich Windsor to Quebec City corridor and other measures, created a regional imbalance in the national economy and led policy makers to look at slow-growth regions. To be sure, politicians from the Maritime provinces pointed time and again to Ottawa’s policies which, they insisted, inhibited the development of their region. Their criticisms had an impact, notably when their numbers in the Commons mattered more than they do today. It will be recalled that protests from the region gave rise to the Maritime Rights Movement that had some, albeit brief, impact on Ottawa, at least, at the political level.68 It will also be recalled that the Rowell-Sirois Commission led to an elaborate system of federal-provincial agreements, a point that we explore in greater detail later. The commission, however, did not look at factors that would influence where economic development takes place. It did not address tariff issues or trade patterns and it saw no reason to change course. John Ibbitson went to the heart of the matter when he wrote: “After the Second World War, Queen’s Park and Ottawa collaborated to ensure that the rest of the federation served the interest of the economic heartland.”69 Sitting in Ottawa, this is how it should be. Sitting in the Maritime provinces or Western Canada, it is not. In its last budget, the Louis St-Laurent government announced plans to implement an annual equalization payment to the have-less provinces. The thinking was that the national economy, as defined by Ottawa, would continue to be promoted with its emphasis on the country’s economic heartland, while dividends flowing from it should be shared with all regions. Janine Brodie summed things up well when she wrote: “The grants would simply help to underwrite some of the social costs of uneven development within certain political jurisdictions (for example New Brunswick), while the economic relationship that promoted uneven development remained unchallenged.”70 Equalization was designed to share the wealth being created, not to try to influence where it is created.

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Things would change by the 1960s, however briefly, when Ottawa decided to address Canada’s uneven economic development. Pierre Trudeau boldly declared: “Economic equality is just as important as equality of language rights. If the underdevelopment of the Atlantic provinces is not corrected, not by charity or subsidy, but by helping them become areas of economic growth, then the unity of the country is almost as surely destroyed as it would be by the French-English confrontation.”71 Trudeau established the Department of Regional Economic Expansion (dree ) and instructed it to focus its efforts on Atlantic Canada and eastern Quebec.72 By the 1970s, however, Atlantic Canada had lost standing in Ottawa’s regional economic development efforts. The region once again took a back seat to national unity concerns, at least, as they were viewed from Quebec and Ottawa. The Trudeau government directed dree to designate Montreal for the purpose of Ottawa’s regional development efforts. The thinking was that the best way to nip the Quebec sovereignty movement in the bud and to show Quebec that federalism works for the province was by helping Montreal become the engine of the province’s economic growth.73 Ottawa’s regional development programs would assist businesses to locate or expand in Montreal, not just in Atlantic Canada and eastern Quebec.74 By the 1980s, it was Ontario’s turn. Ottawa tabled a document in 1981 which insisted that the country’s regional balance in economic development was changing as a result of buoyancy in the West, optimism in the East, and unprecedented softness in key economic sectors in Central Canada. The federal government was making the case that something had to be done to rescue the economy of Ontario and Quebec while energy megaprojects and agriculture would fuel growth in both Atlantic and Western Canada.75 In brief, Pierre E. Trudeau’s commitment to address Atlantic Canada’s underdevelopment was short-lived. Moreover, Atlantic Canada never witnessed the level of growth that Ottawa had projected and the economic downturn for Ontario and Quebec it had envisaged never materialized. Ottawa’s objective, as it has been since 1867, was to protect Canada’s industrial heartland and to cater to vote-rich Ontario and Quebec. Ottawa’s regional development policy is no more. Today, the policy means anything, everything and everywhere, or whatever anyone in the most senior political circles want it to be, it will be. Consider this: there are now seven federal regional development agencies, so that, every postal code in Canada has direct access to a federal regional development agency – Ontario has two, one for northern Ontario and another for southern Ontario. In the fall 2020, the federal minister for regional development policy announced an additional $508 million for the two

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federal agencies in Ontario, a new federal agency for British Columbia and $170 million for the four Atlantic provinces. She also directed the agencies to help “the downtown cores of Canada’s biggest cities” and announced new funding for Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa.76 If Ottawa’s regional development means all of the above, it means nothing. In any event, Ottawa has not only made sure that its regional development policy would leave intact the economic relationship that promoted uneven development, it has been turned into an instrument to promote national unity – here it means Quebec – and to generate votes in large urban centres – here it means Ontario.

tU r nIn g m a rI t I m e rS Into SUPP l Icant S There are numerous studies arguing that the three Maritime provinces and Newfoundland and Labrador have benefitted more from federal government transfers than other regions. One such study points out that between 2007 and 2019 the federal government spent $423.2 billion in Atlantic Canada and raised only $226.5 billion in revenues for a net transfer of $196.7 billion.77 Both provincial governments and individuals in the Maritimes have indeed benefitted greatly from federal government transfers over the past sixty years or so. In a sense, Ottawa’s strategy of underwriting some of the social costs of uneven economic development worked – it compensated slow-growth regions for economic policies that favoured Ontario and Quebec.78 Federal transfers also kept discontents with national economy policies in check.79 I am hardly the only one to make the case that federal transfers to the Maritimes have made the region dependent on continuing transfer payments thus inhibiting self-sustaining economic growth.80 They have also given the region bad press. One of many newspaper articles reports that the region has more seats than it deserves in the House of Commons and that the “region is awash in federal handouts.”81 This journalist based everything on a “representation by population” argument without addressing how smaller provinces should be heard in national political institutions in a federation or how national policies have, over the years, favoured Central Canada over other regions.

t h I n g S a r e c hangI ng It is simplistic to point the finger at Maritimers and tell them that they are responsible for their economic challenges. Confederation and the workings of national political institutions have a lot to answer for. Maritimers

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can make a legitimate claim that decisions that have flown and continue to flow from national institutions have contributed to strong economic growth in Ontario and Quebec, while turning them into victims. It is worth repeating the point that Confederation was designed by the political leadership of Ontario and Quebec for the political and economic interests of Ontario and Quebec with the help of the Colonial Office. They set the pattern in 1867 and policy makers that followed have stayed the course. Federal politicians have always known, better than anyone, where the votes are to win elections – Ontario and Quebec. Senior federal public servants, meanwhile, are all located in the national capital and, for the most part, they are from Ontario and Quebec. They read the Globe and Mail, the National Post, the Ottawa Citizen, and Le Devoir. Few of them read the Regina Leader Post or the Chronicle Herald. They are concerned with the national economy and the integrity of national economic policies. But for Maritimers and Western Canadians, “national policy” are code words for the economic interest of Ontario and Quebec and the integrity of national economic policies always seem to work in the interest of Central Canada. When discussing these points with senior federal government officials at both the political and bureaucratic levels, my sense is that they understand them but that they have long concluded: it is what it is and there is not much that can be done about it. They know that the Fathers of Confederation decided where political power should be located, and their responsibility is to make government work. Their message to Maritimers – get over it, because national unity and promoting Canada’s manufacturing heartland from Windsor, Ontario, and Quebec City is what truly matters. One can appreciate why Maritimers view themselves as victims of Confederation and lament the inability of Canadian federalism to accommodate regional circumstances when shaping national policies, except those in Ontario and Quebec. But things are changing and there are signs that the region is making the transition away from victimhood. I am not alone in seeing the region shedding its victim label. Former New Brunswick Premier Frank McKenna says that he is “unequivocally more optimistic about the future of Atlantic Canada now than when he was premier.”82 We will explore later, more fully, the region’s progress in making the transition away from victimhood. Suffice to note here that, when I wrote my report for Prime Minister Mulroney on establishing the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, the main challenge was to create jobs in the region. I also recall well when Ottawa tried, for a brief period in the

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late 1960s and early 1970s, to move jobs from the industrial heartland to Atlantic Canada. Today, the region has many unfilled jobs and is looking for people to fill them. In brief, the challenge now is more about finding people to fill jobs, and less about creating jobs. We will also explore later how Ottawa has been able to lend a helping hand in promoting the transition over the past thirty-five years or so by embracing free trade agreements and by adjusting its immigration policy to accommodate better the requirements and economic circumstances of Atlantic Canada. I note, however, that it took over one hundred years to bring the Maritime economy low and it will take years to see the region grow to its full potential.

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Western Canadians: Victims Searching for a Voice

Western Canadian provinces were late to the Confederation party. Manitoba joined in 1870, British Columbia in 1871, Alberta and Saskatchewan in 1905. They had no voice at the Charlottetown, Quebec, and London conferences and by the time they joined, the die was cast. The division of power was already established, and national political and administrative institutions had become set in their ways. Western Canada has consistently looked for a stronger voice in Ottawa since it became part of Canada, meeting with only modest and periodic success. Populism and economic grievances go hand-in-hand. In Canada, this is the case for both individuals and regions.1 Populism has manifested itself in Western Canada on several occasions through the Social Credit movement between the 1930s and early 1960s, and the Reform Party of Canada in the late 1980s. Populism can force elites to deal with issues that they prefer to view as settled questions.2 This is what populism can be good at. It is not too much of an exaggeration to write that Ontario and Quebec political elites in Ottawa and senior federal government career officials regard the preponderance of Ontario and Quebec in the federation as an issue long settled by the Fathers of Confederation. They see no need to revisit the matter in any fundamental way. It is also in their political, economic, and bureaucratic interest to hold this belief. Western Canadians came face to face with this settled question in the early 1900s, when Frederick Haultain proposed that Alberta and Saskatchewan, up to the 57th parallel, join Canada as a province to be named Buffalo. Buffalo would have been larger than Ontario and only slightly smaller than Quebec. It would also have become, in time, a political and economic powerhouse – therein laid the problem from a

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Central Canada perspective. Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier rejected the proposal, fearing that Buffalo would, at some point, be able to compete with Ontario and Quebec and thus give “too much power to Western Canada.”3 Giving too much power to either Ontario or Quebec, however, was never an issue for Laurier. Well-known historian Bill Waiser explains the reasoning behind Laurier’s refusal: “because of the fear that one large western province might upset the balance of Confederation.”4 For Laurier, the Fathers of Confederation decided in 1867 that Ontario and Quebec would be the top dogs in the federation and he saw no need to revisit the question. Haultain, for his part, envisioned dividing the region into three provinces and two territories and Ottawa retaining control of the region’s natural resources, as a sure way to “render the great northwest as an ‘unwilling, inferior and imperfect’ member of confederation.”5

n a tI o n a l Pol Icy The Maritime provinces were not alone in strongly objecting to Ottawa’s National Policy. They and Western Canadians saw that it was not a “national policy” but rather a regional policy geared to the economic interest of the Windsor to Quebec City corridor. One observer of Canadian politics explains: “The Montreal-Windsor axis was to be the heart of the country … to benefit its population. The Maritimes … would not benefit greatly from the policy. Their contribution (to the national policy) would be largely to export men and resources to the center of Canada while importing its expensive industrial products … For a long time, in fact until the development of the oil and gas industry, the West was condemned to virtual economic stagnation and its farmers were forced to buy expensive eastern products, thus lowering their standard of living (the tariff subsidized each person in Ontario by $15.15 a year and in Quebec by $11.03 but cost each person $11.67 in Nova Scotia and $28.16 in Saskatchewan).”6 The Canadian Encyclopedia reports that “the National Policy was a political success in Central Canada, it was extremely unpopular in the West and was at the core of lingering resentment toward the eastern manufacturing base.”7 The view is widely shared in Ontario that Sir John A. Macdonald had several major accomplishments including Confederation, the National Policy, and the 1871 Bank Act.8 In Western Canada, the National Policy was broadly condemned and was seen as one of the most important roadblocks to its economic growth.

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Western Canada saw Ottawa embracing a deux poids, deux mesures strategy when establishing the policy. Ottawa did not hesitate to protect Central Canada’s manufacturing sector by compelling Western Canadians to buy goods at above international market prices but refusing to provide similar protection for the West’s resource-based economy, therefore coal, potash, and wheat were sold at international market prices. Western Canada tried as best it could to oppose and even derail Ottawa’s National Policy. The region, however, did not look to the Senate. It knew that the Senate would be of no help, with Senators doing what the government essentially told them to do, especially when they happen to be of the same political persuasion as the government. In addition, Ontario and Quebec had twice the number of senators Western Canada had and still has. The House of Commons was also of no help. Peter McCormick and David Elton explain why: “The key to forming the government in Canada is winning most of the seats in Central Canada, and this can often be done by ignoring … other parts of the country, such as the West … If government makes a decision that makes voters in Ontario unhappy, it is a major disaster; if it makes a decision that displeases the voters of Alberta, it is a minor misfortune.”9 Ottawa’s political and bureaucratic elites, the architects of the National Policy and those charged with implementing it, obviously saw no reason to help Western Canada challenge the policy. Prime ministers Macdonald, Laurier, King, and St-Laurent were from Ontario or Quebec, as were their more senior ministers and public servants, and they all saw merit in the National Policy. They viewed National Policy not only as the way to strengthen Canada’s economy but also to resist the strong economic presence of the United States. But Western Canadians saw things differently. They saw Central Canada imposing its political will, to the benefit of the economic and business interests of both Toronto and Montreal. T.W. Acheson put it succinctly: “In many respects the National Policy simply represented to the entrepreneur a transfer from a British to a Canadian commercial empire. Inherent in most of his activities was the colonial assumption that he could not really control his own destiny, that, of necessity, he would be manipulated by forces beyond his control.”10 The policy gave rise to a powerful new political voice in Western Canada in the 1920s – the Progressive Party. The party paved the way for other third parties to emerge later in Western Canada.11 Provincial governments from Western Canada continually sought to pass legislation to attenuate the impact of the National Policy. Between

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1867 and 1920, Ottawa disallowed ninety-six provincial laws, with the bulk from Western Canada, and most dealing with the National Policy.12 In sharp contrast, Ottawa only disallowed a handful of acts from Ontario and Quebec between 1867 and 1943.13 The Fathers of Confederation attached the power to disallow provincial legislation to the Constitution to enable Ottawa to discard projects deemed not to serve the national interest – a national interest defined by Parliament and by the government, with little in-house capacity to deal with regional issues. It is important to note that there is now a constitutional convention that the federal government will not use its power of disallowance and it has, in fact, not been used since 1943.14

w h y S h oUl d I S e l l yo Ur wheat? Former Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau put the question to Western farmers. Western Canadians knew full well that no Canadian prime minister would ever ask Ontarians why he or she should help them sell their automobiles or Quebecers why help Bombardier sell its airplanes. We note once again that the Mulroney government decided to award a cF-18 maintenance contract to Canadair, a Montreal-based firm, even if Winnipeg-based Bristol Aerospace won the bid. Western Canadians saw that the prime minister did not ask Quebecers: “why should I redirect the contract to Montreal?” He simply did it. Bristol had both a technologically superior and less expensive bid. We underline the point again because the decision speaks to the reason that gave rise to Western alienation: Western economic interests are all too often at the mercy of Central Canada’s economic interests. The head of Bristol told then Manitoba Premier Howard Pawley, “If this is the way Canada wishes to do business, we will avoid smaller provinces; they have too little political clout. It’s better for us to choose provinces like Quebec or Ontario, they can pull the political strings.”15 He understood Canadian politics and knew that he would not likely have encountered a similar problem in other countries, certainly not in other federations equipped with national institutions capable of representing regional interests. He may have been surprised, at first, at how Ottawa decides but Western Canadians were not. Ottawa has done many things over the years in the name of national unity, invariably to the economic benefit of Quebec and in promoting a healthy national economy, to the benefit of Ontario. It is hardly possible to overstate the point that Ontario and Quebec interests dominate the national government agenda and prime ministers,

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at times, brazenly favour these two provinces because our national political institutions do not only allow it, they encourage it. There is political capital to be gained by openly favouring the two vote-rich provinces. Prime ministers know better than anyone that you win a general election by winning Ontario and then you go on to win a majority government by winning Quebec. In short, Ontario and Quebec voices are always heard loud and clear in Ottawa, but not so much when it comes to the other regions. This has everything to do with how our national political institutions were structured in 1867. The voice from Western Canada has often taken the form of protest movements, if only because the country’s national institutions have not been able to accommodate it. The electoral success of the Progressive Party in 1921 and the rise of the Reform Party later are two examples. There have been others, including the United Farmers of Alberta and several separatist parties, notably the Western Canada Concept.16 These voices are loud and clear in Western Canada but not in Ottawa, where it needs to matter. At the risk of sounding repetitive, the Fathers of Confederation decided that effective political power of the federal government would reside in Ontario and Quebec. The deal they struck in 1867 has had remarkable staying power. Alan Cairns explains: “The institutional framework – federalism, responsible government, monarchial institutions, and bicameralism – has undergone little formal change since 1867. The functioning of Canada’s institutions, however, is significantly different from that originally intended. The interaction between an evolving society and a network of institutions established in simpler times has inevitably transformed their meaning and modified their working. Since 1867 the population has grown … and a predominantly rural nation has become predominantly urban, all within a formally unchanged constitutional order.”17 Canada and its politicians, meanwhile, have been unable or more likely unwilling to address “its deficiencies.”18 National institutions have, in turn, created victims and Western Canada is one of them. Western Canada has tried time and again to address these deficiencies, but with little success. For example, the region tried, in vain, to see the Senate play its proper role in a federal system – accommodating the regional interest in national institutions. It is worth reminding the reader that this is the case in other federations notably the United States, Germany, and Australia which, like Canada, also have a Westminsterinspired parliamentary system.19 Regional loyalties and cleavages, according to Alan Cairns, are the most important factors “in Canadian politics.”20 Donald V. Smiley

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correctly argued that: “The institutions of the central government have ceased to be an adequate outlet for interests that are territorially demarcated. This then confers upon the provinces the almost exclusive franchise to be vehicles for the representation of such interests.”21 The problem is that provincial premiers are nonplayers in Ottawa’s internal policy and decision-making processes. There have been numerous occasions when an effective Senate could have played an important role on behalf of the smaller regions. One only has to look at the construction of canals in the nineteenth century, the implementation of the National Policy, the war effort in the 1940s, the National Energy Program of the early 1980s, various procurement contracts, and the list goes on. Former Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre, perhaps inadvertently, explained why Canada needs an effective Senate capable of articulating the interests of the smaller provinces in shaping national policies. It will be recalled that the Trudeau government had political problems with the Energy East pipeline project because Quebec had problems with it. Energy East did not square with the province’s economic interest. The main beneficiaries would have been Alberta and New Brunswick. Former Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall urged Coderre to support the Energy East project, making the case that it was in the interest of the national economy. Coderre dismissed Wall’s position out of hand when he tweeted that “the respective populations of metropolitan Montreal versus Saskatchewan: four million compared to 1.13 million.”22 For Coderre, nothing more needed to be said or done. He was making the case that the smaller provinces and their premiers have little standing in Ottawa. No mayor or elected politician from a large city or state in a federation having an effective Upper House would make this argument in hopes of making it stick. As expected, Alberta and New Brunswick politicians reacted strongly to the decision not to pursue the Energy East pipeline. Prime Minister Trudeau was quick to evoke national unity concerns and accused proponents of Energy East of “stoking national divisions.”23 Trudeau said nothing to Denis Coderre, at least publicly, about his response to Premier Brad Wall’s plea to support the pipeline. As was the case for past prime ministers, Justin Trudeau was making the point, once more, that national unity concerns are always about Quebec – other regions need not apply. Trudeau and his close political advisers also understood the political implications. Three leading Quebec pollsters warned the Trudeau government that a yes to the Energy East project could create a perfect

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storm in the province, arguing that it would not only make winning the 2018 provincial election difficult for the provincial Liberal Party, but also “lead to a resurgence of support for sovereignty in Quebec.”24 Many in Western Canada insist that the Justin Trudeau government does not give pipeline issues the attention they warrant because the region lacks the political clout in national political institutions. According to Gary Mason, “in the West, the pipeline is the biggest issue, one now enveloped in generations-old complaints. If the aggrieved party was Quebec, instead of Alberta, this matter likely would have been solved by now. (Mostly by ensuring Quebec got whatever it wanted.) At least, that is the sentiment this clash has sown west of Ontario.”25 Quebec has seventy-eight seats in the House of Commons, compared to forty-four for Alberta and New Brunswick combined. Alberta and Saskatchewan are landlocked and look to pipelines to move their oil products. They are well aware that environmentalists are continually making the case against pipelines. They argue that Canadians will continue to consume oil products and that they have a choice – consume oil from Canadian sources or import them from abroad, notably Saudi Arabia and the United States. Canada imports half of the oil used in refineries in Quebec and Atlantic Canada from foreign sources.26 Viewed from Western Canada, this is yet another case of Ottawa having deux poids, deux mesures. The perception is that Quebec, in the name of national unity, has held the sword of Damocles over the rest of Canada. Mathieu Bouchard, former senior policy adviser to Justin Trudeau, explains: “If Quebeckers don’t feel represented by the government for a period of time, unlike in other provinces, it becomes a question of national unity. We always have to be conscious of the fact.”27 According to Bouchard, that logic only applies to Quebec, never to Western Canada. The logic is straightforward – it is fine for other provinces and regions not to feel represented in Ottawa for a period of time but somehow things are different for Quebec. Bouchard and others of like mind simply state the case, never explaining why their logic can only apply to Quebec.

n a tI o n a l e n e r g y P rogram The word “national” in Canada always works best for Central Canada, rarely, if ever, for the outer Canadians or Western and Atlantic Canada. The National Policy and the national war effort brought great dividends to Central Canada but hardly any to the Western provinces, and in the case of National Policy, it actually held the region back.

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When Ottawa unveiled a National Energy Program (neP ) in the early 1980s, Western Canada quickly took note, convinced that most of the benefits would flow to Central Canada. They were right. There is now a whole body of literature on the neP and there is no need to go over the program in any detail here. Suffice to note that the neP had three goals: promote Canadian ownership in the oil industry, make the country a self-sufficient oil producer, and increase Ottawa’s share of oil revenues. neP was a complex program that drew a difference between “old” and “new” oil, established a blended price for oil and called for a new federal oil revenue tax.28 As is well known, the reaction in Alberta was swift and damming. The Calgary Herald ran this editorial on the front page: “Alberta must fight this flawed policy,” making the case that the program will change “the very character of the oil industry and the country itself.” Marc Lalonde, one of the architects of neP, observed on the 40th anniversary of the program that: “a lot of people in Alberta like to entertain a kind of sense of persecution up to this day.”29 To an Albertan, a federal Cabinet minister from Quebec telling Alberta that it has “a kind of persecution” complex is like the pot calling the kettle black. Blaming the victim may make sense from an Ottawa or Central Canada perspective, but not in Alberta. Albertans saw neP for what it was – Ottawa moving in the oil and gas sector to establish a made-in-Canada price which would never be more than 85 per cent of the price of imported oil as well as the introduction of a series of new taxes on the industry. The beneficiaries: federal government coffers and consumers in the rest of Canada notably those in Canada’s two most populous provinces. The economic impact on the oil and gas sector was immediate. Drilling rigs left Alberta for the United States and businesses in the sector quickly began to lay off employees. Allan Gotlieb, Canada’s Ambassador to the United States at the time, reported that he heard criticism of neP everywhere he went – in Alberta, where he was told that, “Ottawa is sacrificing the West for the East” and in Washington, where the “Americans have created a climate of near crisis over the neP .”30 Writing in the Toronto Star, David Olive wrote, some forty years after its introduction, that neP was “one of the most arrogant and misguided acts by a Canadian federal government.”31 As it has been on some major issues that have had a negative impact at the regional level, the Senate had nothing to offer on neP . Marc Lalonde offered a solution to Albertans: “The better choice for Albertans and the Alberta government is to be a full participant rather than sitting on the sidelines and bitching all the time.” He has little to contribute on how Alberta can become a “full participant.” When

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Western Canada sought to sell a Triple-E Senate to give it a stronger voice in Ottawa, Lalonde said nothing. Sitting either in Ontario or Quebec, it is quite conceivable to say: “become ‘a full participant’ in the federal government policy process” because you have the number of mP s in the House of Commons and many senior public servants are at the ready to make it possible to become a full participant. As we have seen, national political institutions from Parliament, the Prime Minister’s Office, Cabinet, and the public service have a built-in bias that favours the interest of Central Canada. Ontario Member of Parliament David McGuinty spoke both to the challenge for Western Canada to be heard in Ottawa and the Central Canada bias in national political institutions. He argued that Alberta federal politicians who come to Ottawa are too “provincial” when they focus on the energy sector. He said, “They are national legislators with a national responsibility, but they come across as very, very small-p provincial individuals who are jealously guarding one industrial sector, picking the fossil-fuel business and the oil-sands business specifically, as one that they’re going to fight to the death for.”32 The “one industrial sector,” fossil fuel, matters greatly to British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland and Labrador (six out of ten provinces). No matter, in the eyes of McGuinty, it is a regional sector and politicians who focus on it are parochial, unable to pursue a national perspective. McGuinty, other mP s from Ontario, and the national media, however, view the automobile sector as a “national sector.” Yet, for nine of Canada’s ten provinces, the automobile industry is a regional sector – far more than fossil fuel – and, for over half of the Canadian provinces the fossil-fuel sector and its by-products are a critical element to their economy. The Automotive Products Trade Agreement (also known as the Auto Pact) is not a product of the markets or Adam Smith’s hidden hand. It is a result of politics and government decisions. More to the point, the health of Ontario’s automobile sector is tied to several historical events initiated by the Canadian government. The Auto Pact allowed firms to bring parts and automobiles into Canada without any tariff, provided that these firms created jobs and generated investments in Canada. The agreement benefitted large American automakers and Southern Ontario. In exchange for tariff-free access to the Canadian market, the Big Three US automakers agreed that automobile production in Canada would not fall below 1964 levels and that for every five new cars sold in Canada, three new ones would be built there. The Auto Pact had an immediate effect. In 1964, only 7 per cent of the automobiles built in

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Canada were sold in the United States; the proportion jumped to 60 per cent by 1968.33 By 1999, Canada had become the fourth most important automaker in the world. This sector was also the largest component of Canada-US trade: it went from just $715 million in 1964 to about $92.7 billion in 2000, but dropped to $65.3 billion in 2012.34 There were 146,495 Canadians working in the auto, vehicle, and auto parts industry in 2001 and Ontario was home to 130,000 of these jobs – that is, about 90 per cent of all jobs in the industry in Canada.35 The industry has also been able to secure federal funding in recent years to modernize its operations.36 When the auto sector confronted serious financial difficulties in 2008–09, the federal government rushed in to save GM and Chrysler from bankruptcy with financial support amounting to $9.1 billion. The minister of Industry claimed that the move “saved more than 50,000 jobs.” However, the auditor general would later report that the government came to the rescue with “limited analysis showing how the restructuring actions would improve the financial situations of GM and Chrysler’s Canadian subsidiaries, what concessions had been made by stakeholders and how the companies would repay their loans.”37 Ottawa sold all its GM shares in April 2015 at a loss of $3.5 billion to Canadian taxpayers.38 The federal government does not hesitate to rush in to save ailing sectors in Ontario and Quebec with “limited analysis,” but less so when it comes to Western Canada.

t h e S e n a t e F r ozen In t I me Western Canada led the charge for Senate reform until the Supreme Court effectively put an end to its efforts (circa 1980 to 2014), in its decision on the Senate Reform Reference. The court ruled that the Canadian Parliament could not legislate nonbinding consultative elections without the consent of seven of the ten provinces and that it could not abolish the Senate without the consent of all ten provinces.39 Western Canadians saw the Senate for what it was and still is – “a much-maligned institution,” a “tarnished appointed body,” an institution continually confronting a “crisis of legitimacy” and “unable to look after the country’s regional interests.”40 Robert MacGregor Dawson, the dean of Canadian political scientists, reminds us that the hopes of the Fathers of Confederation “were not excessively high” when it came to the Senate.41 The goal of Ontario and Quebec was straightforward: downplay its importance because it was in their interest to do so. Janet Ajzenstat makes the point that: “The founders could not have believed representation of regions in the Upper

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Chamber would be enough to satisfy local feeling.”42 But the Fathers of Confederation from Ontario and Quebec who drove the negotiations, did. They insisted that the Senate and Cabinet alone could be the institutions that would look after regional interests, at least other than their own. The Senate never performed to expectations while Cabinet did, but only up to a point and not in recent years. I can produce a catalogue of criticisms directed at the Senate, going back 155 years. The New Democratic Party has repeatedly called for its abolition. A Royal Commission on Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, better known as the Macdonald Commission, labelled the Senate an “institutional failure.”43 Maclean’s magazine has also called for its abolition, arguing that “from a practical perspective, Canada already has a unicameral legislature. Why not make it official? … The Senate’s lack of democratic legitimacy prevents it from pushing back against government initiatives in the name of regional fairness.”44 Political scientists have also been, for the most part, highly critical. David Docherty remarks that “the Canadian Senate ranks as one of the last unreformed chambers in Westminster-based parliamentary democracies … It represents and embodies some of the most anti-democratic features of representative assemblies.” That the Senate “looks remarkably similar to the 1867 Senate in terms of its democratic qualities is worth discussion,”45 he adds. We have had many discussions about the Senate and Senate reform but not much has resulted from them. Some regions have paid a higher price than others for the Senate’s institutional failure notably the Western and Atlantic provinces. The Senate, David E. Smith points out, “was designed to secure the voice of Maritime interests … in a Parliament whose lower house, based on repby-pop overwhelmingly advanced the concerns of central Canada.”46 The Senate has failed the Maritimes time and again and it has continued to fail Western Canada at every turn. Western Canada decided some forty years ago that it would focus on reforming the Senate to advance its interests. It launched a campaign to promote a Triple-E (equal, elected, and effective) Senate which became the rallying cry for the “West Wants In.” It will be recalled that Alberta held a province-wide election in 1989 to elect senators, and former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney responded by appointing Stan Waters on this basis. There was some resistance to the move in Ottawa, both in political and bureaucratic circles. The national media, or the Ontario and Quebec-based media, have not been supportive of the Senate or Senate reform either. The Globe and Mail, the National Post, La Presse, and Maclean’s magazine have

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either called for its abolition or for the status quo. The Quebec-based media have largely favoured the status quo, while the Ontario-based media, notably the Globe and Mail, continue to underline the Senate’s “sober second thought” role, more often than not ignoring its responsibility to speak on behalf of the smaller regions.47 The Ontario and Quebec media have not, however, answered the question: who should speak for the interest of the outer Canadas in national institutions if the Senate cannot do so or if it were abolished? One can only assume that they believe that all is well and all would still be well without the Senate. It will be recalled that David Peterson was punished at the polls after he offered six Ontario Senate seats to the other provinces during the Meech Lake constitutional negotiations.48 Peterson understood that Ontario losing Senate seats would have little impact on his province’s ability to shape policies in Ottawa. In brief, Ontario, the national media and Quebec have joined forces to generate a powerful voice favouring the status quo. Western Canada’s campaign for a Triple-E Senate (again equal, elected, and effective) met stiff resistance from the very beginning. Arguments by the Conservative Party, by the Reform Party, and by many other Western organizations always fell on deaf ears, particularly in Central Canada, before the Supreme Court was asked to rule on Senate reform. Roger Gibbins argued that in the case of the United States: “effective territorial representation within national political institutions has promoted national integration, strengthened the national government, broadened its reach and reduced the power of state governments to a degree unimagined in the founding years of the American republic.” He added, “Strengthening regional representation at the centre would provide a mechanism for the further nationalization of Canadian policies.”49 One could also add that, coincidentally or not, American regional economic development policy has been quite different from the Canadian experience; in the United States, different regions have taken turns at high growth, which has not been the case in Canada.50 There are powerful forces resisting Senate reform in Canada. Otherwise, it would have occurred a long time ago. While the Ontario government wanted to abolish the Senate, Quebec threatened to take the federal government to court, should it proceed with Senate reform without its consent. They argue that a Triple-E Senate does not square with a Westminster-style parliamentary system (while saying nothing about Australia, where its Westminster-style system has been able to make a reformed Upper House work); that it would only lead to deadlock in policy and decision making; or that under no circumstances could

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Ontario and Prince Edward Island have the same number of senators in an effective Senate, conveniently leaving aside the example of California (population nearly 40 million) and Wyoming (population 590,013) in the United States Senate, or Australia New South Wales (population 8.2 million) and Tasmania (less than 550,000). Matthew Mendelsohn, the former head of Ontario’s Mowat Centre and former deputy secretary to the Cabinet in the Privy Council Office (Pco ) in Justin Trudeau’s government, dismissed out of hand the prospect of a democratically elected Senate because, he insisted, the required provincial government consent is simply not in the cards. He made a revealing observation: “Today, the Senate does not really matter for decision-making. … So the fact that New Brunswick has ten seats in the Senate and British Columbia has only six is an oddity but not a big concern. It doesn’t really matter because the Senate doesn’t really matter.”51 That the Senate does not matter serves the interest of the two most populous provinces: Ontario and Quebec. Although perhaps unwittingly, Mendelsohn makes the case for Senate reform in a well functioning federation. An Upper House in a federation needs to “matter” to give voice to the smaller provinces. Stéphane Dion argued, “So why not simply elect the future senators instead of letting the prime minister appoint them? There is a basic problem in that logic, one that derives from the unequal distribution of senators per province. To elect senators with the current distribution of seats would be unfair for the underrepresented provinces, Alberta and British Columbia, who have only six senators each, whereas New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, with about one quarter of their population have ten.”52 Dion also ignored how Australia has been able to make its elected Upper House operate effectively, even though it has a Westminster-style parliamentary system. He also offers nothing to Western Canada on how to see its voice gain more influence in Ottawa. One can only assume that Dion believes that the status quo is fine for Canada, knowing full well that it does not square with an effective federal system. It must have come as a surprise to many in Western Canada that a Quebec minister would want to protect its interests against New Brunswick or Nova Scotia. The whole point of having an effective Senate in a federation is to bring regional balance to national policy-making or, as Gibbins argued, to bring “effective territorial representation within national political institutions.” And the whole point of having a federal system rather than a unitary one is that political structures have to be established to better accommodate regional interests. To ensure this, there is a need

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for less populous provinces or states to be overrepresented in the Upper House. Dion basically said the United States, Australia, and Russia have it all wrong with an equal number of senators for every state, no matter their population. I hear very few Americans and Australians making the same point. Dion and others of like mind also offer no solution to counter representation by population in a federation as large and as diverse as Canada, suggesting they may not see the problem. One can only conclude that they believe that smaller provinces and regions in a federation such as Canada should simply rely on representation by population if they want to be heard and have influence in a national setting. As Canadian history has so clearly demonstrated, this does not work for Western Canada, the Maritime provinces, or Newfoundland and Labrador.

t h e S U P r e m e coU rt The Canadian Supreme Court, unlike its US counterpart, is based on regional representation with Ontario and Quebec having six seats on the court, Western Canada two, and Atlantic Canada one on a court of nine judges. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was, at one point, willing to break from the practice of ensuring regional representation from Atlantic Canada. His minister of Justice explained: “the next appointment will not necessarily be a person from Atlantic Canada,” after the Supreme Court Justice from Atlantic Canada decided to step down. I cannot imagine any prime minister suggesting that he or she is willing to break from regional representation when it comes to either Ontario or Quebec. I note that Quebec representation on the Supreme Court enjoys constitutional status. Faced with criticisms from various quarters, Trudeau backed down and appointed Malcolm Rowe from Newfoundland and Labrador.53 I note that the US Supreme Court divides on ideological grounds while the Canadian Supreme Court divides along regional lines. Some Western Canadians have taken direct aim at the Supreme Court and its decisions. Ted Morton challenged the Court’s reliance on the “framers’ intent” regarding the Senate. He writes: “Anyone familiar with the Court’s Charter of Rights jurisprudence knows that the justices have routinely ignored “framers’ intent.” He adds: “The court can and should also be faulted for failing to live up to its own precedents of ‘bold statecraft, questionable jurisprudence’ to break constitutional gridlock, as it had done in the earlier Patriation Reference and Quebec Secession Reference.” He maintains that: “The parallels between the

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Senate Reform Reference and these earlier landmark rulings are striking: high political stakes, high policy stakes, and high levels of partisan and regional conflict.”54 Western Canadians, however, took some comfort in the fact that a Westerner, Stephen Harper, was elected prime minister in 2006. The call for Senate reform in the form of the “West Wants In” was answered at least, but the answer only proved to be a temporary one. During his tenure in office, Harper was able to introduce measures favorable to the interest of Western Canada.55 With Harper no longer sitting in the prime minister’s chair, old patterns quickly re-emerged and the failed Energy East project is just one example. Jason Kenney, the former premier of Alberta, announced that Alberta would once again hold a provincial election to decide who to recommend for a Senate appointment. Time will tell how Ottawa will react to a Senate election. Emmett Macfarlane, a constitutional law expert, points out that the 2014 Supreme Court ruling is not clear on appointing candidates elected in provincially run votes.56 Pierre E. Trudeau went into politics to secure Quebec’s place in the federation, while Stephen Harper went into politics to secure Western Canada’s place in the federation. Trudeau got what he wanted – he was able to patriate the Constitution, attach to it a Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and see to it that French Canadians would feel at home from coast to coast to coast. He was also able to overhaul the Canadian public service to ensure that French Canadians would feel welcomed working in its ranks. It will be recalled that the premier of Ontario was one of the first of the premiers to support Trudeau’s patriation effort – a significant development, given Ontario’s presence in the federation and the fact that Canada’s English media is located in Toronto and Ottawa. The Supreme Court also provided a degree of support to Trudeau at a critical moment in the patriation process. Harper tried to reform the Senate to give Western Canada a greater voice in Ottawa. Ontario showed no interest in supporting his effort and the Supreme Court essentially put an end to the Senate reform movement. The court ruled that Ottawa could not establish a consultation process to appoint senators or impose term limits without a constitutional amendment.57 The public service looks much like it did before he came to power, although it is bigger today. I note, however, that Harper was able to shift a number of federal transfer payments to a per capita basis, something that both Western Canada and Ontario had been calling for, for some time. In brief, the Fathers of Confederation set Canada on a path and it has stayed the course since 1867. The result is that Western Canada is too

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often left on the outside looking in when so-called national policies take shape. This in large part because, as we already noted on several occasions, representation by population decides who holds political power in Ottawa, something that clearly favours Ontario and Quebec.

t h e c a n a dI a n P U BlI c Serv Ice: a n o t t a w a - c e n t rIc Per S Pect I ve The Canadian civil service is highly centralized in Ottawa, a city that geographically links Ontario and Quebec. Canada stands out among Anglo-American countries in locating a large share of its public servants in the National Capital Region (ncr ). The Government of Australia publishes annually a State of the Service Report, which provides a breakdown of where public servants work. A recent report reveals that 38 per cent work in the “Australian Capital Territory.”58 Great Britain also publishes an annual report, which contains data on civil service employment by region. The latest report reveals that 18.6 per cent work in London.59 In the United States, about 16 per cent of federal government employees worked out of the Washington, dc area in September 2015.60 France, a unitary state like Great Britain, has about 22 per cent of its public servants located in the Île-de-France region of Paris.61 In Canada forty-five years ago, about one in four federal public servants worked in the ncr .62 However, since the early 1990s, we have seen a substantial shift away from the regions. As recently as 2000, 35.5 per cent of federal public servants worked in the ncr . Today, 41.1 per cent of federal public servants work out of the ncr , a figure much higher than in other Anglo-American countries.63 Ontario and Quebec are home to over 66 per cent of federal public servants, though they represent 61.5 per cent of the Canadian population. As in all things, the Senate has had little to say about the centralization of the public service in the National Capital Region. The permanent public service, as it should, plays a pivotal role in shaping both policies and programs. It is difficult to overstate the influence of central agencies – the Privy Council Office and the Department of Finance – in deciding what is important and what is not.64 There are some two thousand public servants in these two agencies, they are the elites, the highfliers, and the future permanent heads of government departments and agencies. They all work in the National Capital Region and the great majority of them come from and are educated in Ontario and Quebec. They also view problems and solutions from a Central Canada perspective.65

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I t IS aB oU t InS tI tU t Ion S There is a serious long-standing malaise in Western Canada and it cannot be easily dismissed by Central Canada. A recent public opinion survey is very revealing: 33 per cent of Albertans believe that the province would be better off if it separated, which compares to 26 per cent of Quebecers; 42 per cent of Saskatchewanians feel less committed to Canada than they did a few years ago, which compares to 29 per cent for Quebecers; 15 per cent of Manitobans think that their views are adequately represented in Ottawa, which compares to 44 per cent for Ontarians and 36 per cent for Quebecers.66 Another survey reveals that 72 per cent of Canadians believe that smaller provinces are often ignored by the federal government in the interest of the larger provinces and this view is even more strongly held in Manitoba (90 per cent), Nova Scotia (86 per cent), Saskatchewan (84 per cent) and New Brunswick (84 per cent).67 The problem lies in that our national political and administrative institutions are not suited to work in a federal system, particularly in Canada, with a vast geography and different regional economies. The situation cries out for attention. Alberta is asking fundamental questions about its participation in the Canadian federation. The Alberta government called for a referendum on Ottawa’s equalization program. The referendum asked Albertans whether they believe the equalization principle should be removed from the Canadian Constitution – 61.7 per cent voted in favour of removing it from the Constitution. The voter turnout was low, at 39 per cent, and the verdict is unlikely to carry much weight in Ottawa.68 That said, it does not take away from the need to find ways to give proper weight to Western views. Western Canada does not jump to mind when one thinks about victims. It is rich in natural resources and has a strong history of self-reliance, particularly in rural areas. When Western Canada turns to Ottawa, it is not to ask for a handout but rather to clear the way to further its self-reliance agenda. The region, for example, had to struggle until 1930 to secure jurisdiction over natural resources, something that the four founding provinces have enjoyed since 1867. There was a time when Western Canada was able to send some powerful voices to Ottawa.69 I am thinking of course of John Diefenbaker and Stephen Harper. The region has also had powerful ministers in Ottawa, notably Clifford Sifton and Don Mazankowski, but they were no match for the likes of C.D. Howe, Ernest Lapointe, Jim Flaherty, and Michael Wilson.

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Some ministers were powerful ministers from Western Canada, in part, because they held the post of regional ministers. Ottawa, at both the political and bureaucratic levels, understood that Alberta or the other three Western provinces had a voice in Cabinet, a voice that mattered more than ministers that did not wear the “regional minister” label. However, as noted earlier, Justin Trudeau did away with regional ministers in 2015. For some unexplained reason, he decided to re-introduce the position in 2019 but only for Quebec, when Pablo Rodriguez was made “Quebec lieutenant.”70 It is difficult to understand why Trudeau saw the need for a regional minister for Quebec and not for any other province, given that he is from Quebec. Western Canadians know that Canada’s national political institutions are ill-suited to speak to their interests in shaping national policies. To be sure, the institutions would be ill-suited for any federation, but all the more for Canada, given its size and the reality that it is home to six time zones and several economies. They see signs everywhere that Canada’s body politics and national political and administrative institutions can never accommodate Western Canada’s interest on substantial issues (Senate reform) or even on other issues (they know that on procurement, the bidding process was changed to direct contracts to Ontario and Quebec but cannot come up with examples of when the bidding process was ignored to direct contracts to firms in Western Canada). In this sense, Confederation and the workings of national political institutions have turned Western Canadians into victims and Western Canada’s voice in Ottawa does not match the contributions the region has made and continues to make to Canada. The rest of Canada may not like to be reminded of this, but Alberta has made a staggering contribution to federal coffers since 1961 – Albertans have paid $622 billion more in taxes than they have received from Ottawa. Between 2007 and 2018 alone, the amount totalled $240 billion.71 Western Canadians know full well that Quebec has been a major beneficiary of federal transfer payments. The province has, over the years, received $230 billion under Ottawa’s equalization program, more than half of the $450 billion distributed. The reader will remember that the Quebec premier blocked the Energy East pipeline project because there was no “social acceptability” in Quebec. This, notwithstanding the fact that Western Canada supplies over 50 per cent of the oil in Quebec and the province buys foreign crude oil that is shipped in boats up the St Lawrence River.72 The reader will also recall that Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau chastised those who were critical of the Quebec premier’s position on the

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pipeline in the name of national unity. For Western Canadians, national unity, when viewed from Ottawa, is a one-way street – always about Quebec. The Quebec premier also killed a project that would have carried natural gas from Western Canada to the Port of Saguenay, through Quebec, to export it to overseas markets.73 The Canadian prime minister meanwhile stayed silent. Several scholars came together in 2020 to ask fundamental questions about the place of Western Canada, notably Alberta, in Confederation. Ted Morton wrote: “If Quebec was treated as Alberta has been treated, it would have separated long ago. And if Albertans had the opportunity to re-negotiate the terms of our relationship with Canada, we would never consent to the status quo.”74 Morton’s position resonates with many Western Canadians and they feel powerless to do something about it. The scholars explored several issues and asked fundamental questions about Alberta’s place in Canadian federalism. They assessed Alberta’s contributions to the Canadian economy, the future of the resource sector, prospects for Western independence, and the list goes on.75 They saw a number of possibilities for the region, but the status quo was not one of them. There is a risk for Canada and Ottawa to ignore the work of these scholars and many other voices from Western Canada. I remind the reader that Northrop Frye, arguably Canada’s most accomplished literary critic, sought to draw a distinction between national unity and strong regional identities. Frye identified a series of Canadian identities including the Prairie, Maritime, and Quebec identities that are distinct from the Laurentian identity.76 Canada’s national institutions were never designed for and have remained unable to accommodate the country’s regional identities and, in the process, laid the groundwork for creating regional victims. Victimhood takes various forms in Canada because of its Constitution and how its national political and administrative institutions decide. Western Canada has a legitimate claim that its voice and its political and economic interests are not given proper attention in Ottawa, as they should be able to in a federal system. Canada has thus far failed to introduce intrastate mechanisms – a glaring failure has been the Senate’s inability to promote regional interests.77 As noted, this has suited both Ontario and Quebec but has left, all too often, Western Canada on the outside looking in as national policies were and are being developed. Western Canadians have learned to deal with national institutions that are only occasionally able to accommodate their interests: Stephen

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Harper, for example, was able to bring Western interests to light in Ottawa. But the efforts only lasted as long as Harper sat in the prime minister’s chair.78 When Western Canadians feel abandoned by Ottawa, they turn to a third party or their own regionally-based party. This has happened on several occasions but this is as far as the region has gone. A colleague, a Maritimer, asked me: “Do you really believe that Western Canada is a victim? Just look at its wealth and resources. Vancouver as a victim. I don’t think so.” Western Canada has indeed created a lot of wealth and it continues to do so. All of Canada has benefitted greatly from it. I understand why it is difficult to imagine a resident of West Vancouver as a victim. However, sitting in West Vancouver or in Upper Mount Royal, Calgary, it is clear that your voice in Ottawa does not carry the weight that it should or even compares to someone sitting in Toronto, Ottawa, or Montreal, essentially because of the distribution of seats in the House of Commons, an ineffective Senate, and a federal public service concentrated in the National Capital Region. Many Western Canadians see themselves as victims of Canada’s national political and administrative institutions. When it comes to national institutions, at least, Canada does not stand on guard for all victims, notably Western Canada. Viewed from the West, Ottawa is too quick to apply the national moniker when the policies or decisions are in the interest of Central Canada. I am thinking of the National Policy, the National Energy Program, and the auto sector, among others, in contrast to “selling your wheat,” or promoting the oil and gas sector. The Ottawa argument is that “national” policies are required to promote the economy so that it can continue to lay “golden eggs.”79 Western Canada is asking for its turn to keep laying golden eggs, nothing more. There are solutions at hand. Some, like Senate reform, require a constitutional amendment (unlikely), while others do not, including making Cabinet government work, appointing regional ministers, decentralizing the federal public service, and producing an annual report card on Western issues and progress made in addressing them. More is said about this later.

5

Ontario: Victimhood Is in Its DNA

As already noted, I consulted colleagues and friends from all walks of life at several stages while working on this book. In virtually all cases, they said that they were looking forward to reading what I had to say about Ontario. One bluntly told me: “Good luck with that. Ontario, a victim, really? Seriously?” A colleague at my university said: “I can’t wait to see how you will turn Ontario into a victim.” One Ontario friend had this to say: “Oh sure, we are victims. All other Canadian regions do not like us.” To be sure, Western and Atlantic Canadians and Quebecers do not look to Ontario when they think of victims of Confederation. They see Ontario as the big dog of Confederation and big dogs always eat first. From day one, Ontario has benefitted from Confederation on big issues (for example, a dysfunctional Senate and National Policy) and also on regional issues (for example, a border dispute with Manitoba). How then can one possibly include Ontario among the victims of Confederation?

l o o k t o t h e BegI nn Ing The motto on the Ontario coat of arms reads: “Ut Incepit Fidelis Sic Permanet” (Loyal she began, loyal she remains). Loyalists shaped Ontario’s political culture in its early years and their influence is still evident to this day. Peter Russell writes that the American Revolution made English Canada – here read, in particular, Ontario, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. The arrival of the Loyalists, in the immediate aftermath of the American Revolution, created two new colonies, Ontario and New Brunswick, and in time they would exert a profound influence on the history of Canada and its national political and administrative institutions.

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The Canadian Encyclopedia reports that: “Modern Canada inherited much from the Loyalists, including a certain conservatism, a preference for ‘evolution’ rather than ‘revolution’ in matters of government, and tendencies towards a pluralistic and multicultural society.”1 They also instilled in the Ontario psyche an anti-American bias. In the early years, leaving aside the Indigenous peoples, the population of Upper Canada was largely American born but loyal to the British Crown. Alan Taylor writes: “The political institutions and economic policies of Upper Canada were designed by Britons and Loyalists who had fought against the Revolution and who meant to prevent its recurrence within their province.”2 John Graves Simcoe, Upper Canada’s first lieutenant governor, made the case that: “The establishment of the British Constitution in this Province offers the best method gradually to counteract, and ultimately to destroy or to disarm the spirit of democratic subversion.”3 Simcoe sought to attract Americans to take refuge in Upper Canada, convinced that the American states were filled with closeted Loyalists. He believed that not only would the Loyalists quickly become self-sufficient frontier farmers but that they would also shore up the colony’s defence while at the same time weakening the republic’s economic and military strength. Simcoe decreed that Loyalists moving to Upper Canada would receive at least two hundred acres per family, paying only a very modest administrative fee. In return, all that Loyalists were required to do was to take an oath of allegiance to “the King in Parliament.”4 The great majority of Loyalists who came to Canada stood out for their poverty and many had “modest economic aspirations” and little education. Alan Taylor reports: “Of the 719 names on the register, 171 (24 percent) made a mark instead of signing, an illiteracy rate about three times higher than usually prevailed in the northern American states during the 1790s.”5 Loyalists arrived in Canada as victims. Frederick Haldimand, who served as governor of Quebec between 1778 and 1786, described its new settlers as “Loyalists in great distress.”6 Historian Desmond Morton writes that the Loyalists were “a flood of bitter, defeated exiles who had suffered much and lost everything for the Crown.”7 The Loyalists fought and supported the British Crown against the American patriots. They lost. They also lost their livelihood, their homes and some, their lives. In the colonies under patriot control, those loyal to the British soldiers could not vote, sell land or work as doctors, schoolteachers or lawyers. Some were stripped naked, tarred and rolled in feathers that would very quickly adhere to the tar. They were then paraded around town in a cart before being released – their humiliation

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was complete. Others were banished from their communities and told that they would be put to death if they ever returned. They were declared traitors and enemies of the American Republic and they would not be tolerated, if they ever went back to their homes. W.S. MacNutt writes: “Bullying and dragooning became normal features of life” and an “unspeakable indignity was inflicted upon them (the Loyalists) by the triumphant republicans.”8 Their properties throughout the American colonies were either confiscated or vandalized. Many fled their homes and, if caught, they were imprisoned for treason. Some eight thousand of the United Empire Loyalists who fled the United States migrated to southern Ontario. They arrived in the British North American colonies as a defeated people and they became “anti-American by conviction and experience.”9 Many Loyalists fled the American colonies in a panic and arrived with little in way of their possessions, to a sparsely populated land with a harsher climate than was the case in the American colonies. One Loyalist, the grandmother of Leonard Tilley, a Father of Confederation, wrote shortly after arriving in New Brunswick: “I climbed to the top of Chipman’s Hill and watched the sails in the distance, and such a feeling of loneliness came over me that though I had not shed a tear through all the war, I sat down on the damp moss with my baby on my lap and cried bitterly.”10 Leading Canadian historians have made the case that Canada is a “by-product” of the American Revolution.11 W.G. Shelton is more blunt: “the Loyalists were on the losing side” so that “Canada was the offshoot of the losing and conservative side of a great radical upheaval – a struggle between classes and masses in a ‘frankly anti-democratic’ society, with the classes retreating to Canada after their defeat.” He also noted, however, that “others who joined the trek north had merely put their money on the wrong horse and were repudiated by the victors.”12 Many of the Loyalists were so poor that they were not able to make a claim for compensation from Great Britain because they had nothing that could be confiscated by Americans. In addition, for the most part, they were minorities in the communities of the American colonies – Anglicans or Episcopalians in the north, Presbyterians in the south, Quakers in Pennsylvania, and Black Loyalists.13 Maya Jasanoff writes that the: “Loyalists have long been relegated to the margins of mainstream history; they are often seen as losers, backward, and wrong.”14 They may have arrived in Upper Canada as victims but they set out to change their status and the British Colonial Office was there to offer them a helping hand.

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n o t a l l vIc tI mS a r e created eq Ual Loyalists instilled conservatism and class consciousness in their political institutions and they dominated the political, bureaucratic, and business sectors until the mid-1850s. John Simcoe felt that the best way forward for the colony was to establish a hierarchical class structure and limit appointments to positions of authority to people with connections, much like was the case in Great Britain. William Lyon Mackenzie coined the term “Family Compact” to describe Upper Canada society. It is estimated that half of the members of the Family Compact were second-generation United Empire Loyalists.15 The pejorative term was employed to describe the close relations, through marriage or business, between members of the ruling class. They may have arrived in Upper Canada as victims, but they were determined to be victims no more. British Loyalists, with the support of the Colonial Office, would soon dominate Ontario politics and, in time, they would extend their influence to other colonies in British North America.

S t a y In g o n to P When it comes to the economy, Ontario has always been on the lookout to protect its big-dog status in the Confederation. As noted earlier, the built-in bias in our national political institutions favours Ontario and dates back to 1867. It has remained intact ever since. Ontario representatives in both national and provincial institutions continue to stand on guard against becoming victims to the United States and to the outer Canadas. They look to their strong presence in national institutions to protect Ontario’s economic status in the country’s leading economic sectors, notably manufacturing. Ontario, going back to the United Empire Loyalists’ era, has had an uncomfortable relation with the United States. The province has always believed that it stands at the forefront of Canada’s nation building by resisting American economic and cultural dominance. Ontario has led the charge in building the nation by promoting a transcontinental economy “largely independent of its neighbour.”16 Ontario politicians have consistently pushed Ottawa to enact policies to stop hemorrhaging people and business opportunities to the United States. Goldwin Smith wrote, over 125 years ago, that: “The Americans may say with truth that if they do not annex Canada, they are annexing the Canadians.”17 It will be recalled, for example, that Ontario turned to its political might in Ottawa to promote its manufacturing sector for the war

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effort in the 1940s, when both geography and military considerations suggested that it would have been best to locate at least some of these activities along the East Coast. And this is hardly the only case. In the 1980s, Germany’s Thyssen Industries called on the federal government, wishing to establish a manufacturing facility in Bear Head, Cape Breton. Thyssen wanted to build a heavy industrial manufacturing plant in eastern Nova Scotia to produce military vehicles and a range of environmental protection products. What Thyssen asked of the government was a sole-sourced start-up order from the Department of National Defence to design and build 250 Light-Armoured Vehicle (lav ) units of the department’s 1,600 lav required.18 With the help of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (acoa ), Thyssen was able to secure an “understanding in principle” with the federal government in 1988. The project, however, did not go beyond that. The proposal ran into stiff opposition as soon as it surfaced in Ottawa, from Ontario ministers in the federal Cabinet, senior public servants in the National Capital Region, and the Ontario-based defence industries. The Toronto Star reported that the proposal “sparked a split within Mulroney’s Cabinet, between ministers from Atlantic Canada – the proposed site of the Bear Head plant – and the manufacturing heartland of Ontario.”19 Whenever such opposition arises, the Atlantic region is no match against Ontario’s political weight in the House of Commons, in Cabinet and, more importantly, in the Prime Minister’s Office. And, as always, the Senate was relegated to the sidelines. Senior public servants in the Privy Council Office (Pco ), the Department of Industry, and Foreign Affairs teamed up to oppose the project. Industry officials feared that it would “undermine existing domestic manufacturer General Motors.” Pco and Foreign Affairs officials argued the proposal “could jeopardize Canadian foreign policy by selling military vehicles to volatile areas such as the Middle East.” Robert Fowler, who was then a senior Pco official, explained, “At bottom this is a moral choice, a point of principle, a decision not to build a stall in the Middle East arms bazaar.”20 The project never advanced beyond the discussion stage in Ottawa. Now, fast forward to 2015. Somehow, moral choices, points of principle, and the fear of building a stall in the Middle East arms bazaar were thrown out the window. The government of Canada agreed to a multi-billion-dollar deal to sell “made-in-Canada light armoured vehicles” to Saudi Arabia. The deal was approved by the federal government’s

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Canadian Commercial Corporation in support of General Dynamics Land Systems Canada, based in London, Ontario. The government has refused to make public the requirements of the deal, insisting it needs to protect the “commercial confidentiality” of General Dynamics Land Systems Canada.21 Departmental emails revealed that the Department of Foreign Affairs issued no red flags over the proposed deal and that “General Dynamics has little to fear concerning official approval of its export permits.” The Globe and Mail observed, “Selling General Dynamics light-armoured vehicles to the Saudi government will help sustain more than 3,000 jobs in Canada, including many in London, Ont., where the factory is located. There are 10 federal ridings in the London region, many of them held by Conservatives, and the Tories are eager to retain this foothold in the October election.”22 The federal government refused “to divulge how it was justifying this massive sale to Saudi Arabia under Ottawa’s strict export control regime” given that “rules oblige Ottawa to examine whether arms shipments would further endanger the civilian population in countries with poor human-rights records.”23 The newly elected Justin Trudeau government had an opportunity, shortly after it came to power, to cancel the contract. The renamed Department of Global Affairs has a responsibility to audit requests to export military goods to countries “whose governments have a persistent record of serious violations of the human rights of their citizens.”24 Stéphane Dion, the minister responsible, declared, “The contract is not something that we will revisit.”25 Political and business leaders in London jumped to the defence of the contract to Saudi Arabia, insisting it was “a pivotal component of the region’s effort to become a major hub for defence-industry manufacturing.”26 Again, no federal minister and no senior federal public servant spoke about “a moral choice” or building a “stall in the Middle East arms bazaar.” The Senate never once asked the government:“why the double standard?” Controversy over the Saudi arms deal negotiated by the previous Harper government dogged the Justin Trudeau government for months. The United Nations released a report documenting human rights violations by Saudi Arabia.27 The Foreign Affairs minister, Stéphane Dion, described Saudi Arabia’s human rights record as “terrible.”28 No matter, the government announced that the contract “will be exempt from a global arms trade treaty” – a standard practice for countries that sign the treaty – and stood firm in its decision.29 The Globe and Mail explained why: “The $15 billion deal will keep 3,000 Canadians employed for 14

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years – many of them in Southwestern Ontario.”30 It later added in an editorial that cancelling the contract “would be a futile gesture because another country would simply supply the combat vehicles.”31 That logic, it seems, applies only to Ontario, not to other regions. It was revealed in early 2020 that Canada had sold “a record amount of military hardware to Saudi Arabia in 2019,” worth $2.2 billion (US dollars). The bulk of the exports were part of a $14.8 billion (Canadian dollars) deal for light armoured vehicles. A number of rights groups, academics, and policy advisors have called on the Trudeau government to cancel the military deal with Saudi Arabia, like Germany and Sweden have. The calls have fallen on deaf ears.32 In September 2021, a United Nations panel included Canada to a list of five countries helping to fuel the war in Yemen. Canada sold more than $1.3 billion worth of Canadian defence equipment to Saudi Arabia – “chiefly armoured vehicles equipped with machine guns or cannons.” This was part of a $15 billion deal to sell combat vehicles to Saudi Arabia, which has been directly involved in the war in Yemen since 2015, leading the charge against Houthi rebels backed by Iran.33 National policies and Canada’s national political and administrative institutions have played a pivotal role in Ontario’s economic growth. The word “national” when attached to policies and programs, invariably speaks to Ontario’s economic interest, just as “national unity” speaks to Quebec’s interest. Senior policy makers in Ottawa, whether at the political or bureaucratic level, do not see this in a negative light. They see it as necessary to nation building and resisting the economic pull of the United States. They see Ontario as having a comparative advantage over the other regions in building a competitive manufacturing sector. They believe that failing to see this runs the risk of turning all Canadian regions, Ontario included, into branch plants of the US economy. This explains why Ottawa has made it a point to protect Ontario’s preeminent economic position in the manufacturing and the research-development sectors by discouraging and, in some cases, blocking projects in other regions. The challenge for the province is to protect its economic position in Confederation and, in that sense, Ontario has become both a victim of and a beneficiary of national policies that have long favoured its growth. A case can be made that the Ontario economy has been as dependent on national public policies and the political clout it holds in Ottawa to promote its economic position in Canada, as the three Maritime provinces have been dependent on federal transfer payments. The latter generates more media interest and it also makes one victim more visible.

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Ontario has a rationale for seeing itself as a victim and for wanting to protect itself as top dog in the Canadian federation. It argues that its economy plays a pivotal role in the national economy and that it needs to be protected from an overly generous federal government with its wide menu of transfer payments to provinces and individuals. Ontario also argues that it plays an important role in articulating a Canadian identity and that, to do so, it needs a strong economy. Quebec argued that Ottawa needed to allocate ships to the province from its naval shipbuilding program in the interest of fairness and national unity, even though it lost the contract in a competitive bidding process. Quebec had the number of members of Parliament to make the request stick. Ontario made a similar case in opposing the construction of military hardware in Nova Scotia. The reasons that Ottawa put forward when it said no to Nova Scotia do not apply when it comes to Ontario. Like Quebec, Ontario had the number of mP s in Ottawa and a presence in the senior echelons of the public service to make the request stick.

P r o t e c tI n g t h e golden goo S e F r o m F a l l I n g In t o v I ctI mhood Ontario’s thinking is that the province is Canada’s golden goose and that its economic position needs to be protected from that of other regions. Put differently, it fears becoming a victim to the demands of other regions. Former Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty repeatedly warned Ottawa and other provincial governments against adding new funding for have-less provinces: “My concern is that it’s very important that the provinces understand that they have to protect the golden goose here. If there is more money available from the federal government, we’d rather that it be distributed in such a way that it benefits all of us, including supporting, for example, post-secondary education in the province of Ontario, which contributes to the strength of our economy and increases our capacity to make contributions to the federal government.”34 McGuinty never asked how Ontario became Canada’s golden goose or what impact Ottawa’s policies had on economic development in his province when compared with the Atlantic and Western provinces. Ontario’s call for “A Fair Fiscal Deal” ignores history to focus exclusively on Ottawa’s current allocation of federal payment transfers.35 The province calls for transfers to be calculated on a per capita basis in the name of fairness. The call ends with transfer payments – it does not go on to review Ottawa’s R&D spending and the positive impact Ottawa’s

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National Policy had in Ontario on investments in support of the war effort and historical investments in Ontario’s canals, the auto sector, and high-tech sectors. We saw earlier that tariffs imposed to implement Canada’s National Policy subsidized each person in Ontario by $15.15 a year but cost each person in Nova Scotia $11.67 and $28.16 in Saskatchewan. Ontario never mentions this in its argument for “A Fair Fiscal Deal.”36 McGuinty also never made reference to the fact that the Maritime provinces have invested a great deal in postsecondary education, only to see a high number of their graduates move to Ontario for work. This too contributes to the strength of the Ontario economy. When the time came, however, McGuinty did not hesitate to launch a high-profile campaign to secure a greater share of federal transfers for Ontario, notably under federal shared-cost programs. He and the then Ottawa’s Finance minister, Jim Flaherty, won the day on health-care transfers in 2012.37 Given how Canada’s political institutions operate, it has always been easy for Ontario to get its way whenever Ottawa strikes decisions in “the national interest.” It remains the case today. When covId -19 hit Canada, a decision had to be struck on how best to distribute the vaccines. It was clear, even in the early days, that covId -19 was much harder on seniors. The Maritime provinces suggested that the vaccines be distributed taking into account the region’s demographics, given its faster aging population. As already noted, this was rejected by Ottawa in favour of the “per capita” criteria which clearly favoured the more populous provinces, starting with Ontario. The Maritime provinces and Newfoundland and Labrador were quick to impose strict lockdown rules and keep them in place over extended periods. The lockdown was demanding. We were not, for example, able to see our son who lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, only two hundred kilometres away, for eight months. However, the strategy worked. The Atlantic provinces had fewer cases than other regions, even on a per capita basis. Allison McGeer, an infectious disease physician at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, explains: “The Atlantic provinces had few enough cases when they went into lockdown last year that they were able to keep close to zero transmission, like Australia, Taiwan and Singapore.”38 By contrast, the Ontario government did not manage the covId 19 pandemic nearly as well, in the early months of the pandemic. The Toronto Star reported that the premier’s “response to the pandemic has been a comedy of errors” and that he opened up the economy “when both science and common sense say it should be shut down.”39 A majority of Ontarians or 65 per cent concluded that the provincial government

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mismanaged the response to the pandemic.40 The problem was, at least in part, self-inflicted and the per capita distribution of vaccines was not enough to manage the pandemic. Ontario soon asked if Ottawa could redirect vaccines destined to the Atlantic provinces. One Ontario physician argued: “I know cities in Canada that have more patients hospitalized than there are patients in the Atlantic with covId -19 total. They have functional healthcare, they’re separate from the rest of Canada. That’s fine, it’s working for you, but let us take the doses – give it to the rest of Canada that’s suffering.”41 Former senior federal Cabinet Minister Sheila Copps called for a “national” vaccine rollout, asking “why is that per capita system inviolate,”42 Ontario needed special help that went beyond what the province has always favoured in all things – allocation on a per capita basis. Ontario thus became a victim, even to its long standing position that Ottawa should embrace the per capita when striking policy. Ontario Premier Doug Ford asked to reroute vaccines to Ontario from Atlantic Canada and turned to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for a helping hand. Trudeau reported, in a tweet, that he had reached out to the Atlantic provinces to ask how they could help Ontario. He raised the idea of redirecting vaccines from the Atlantic provinces to Ontario but met stiff resistance. Nova Scotia then Premier Iain Rankin said that: Nova Scotia “likely wouldn’t consider sending along vaccine supply until the province of Ontario implements stricter public health measures.”43 Ottawa did deploy military help to Ontario to help the province deal with the pandemic.44

o n t a rIo : vIc tI m t o US dom I nance I recall participating in a roundtable discussion in Ottawa in 1986 to discuss the proposed Canada-US Free Trade Agreement (Fta ). Tom Courchene, a widely respected economist from Queen’s University, also participated. He is a good friend with whom I have worked on several research projects in the past. He is well-known for his views on challenging government programs designed to promote regional economic development. Not only has his work been widely quoted, it also continues to have a strong influence among Ottawa policy makers. Courchene expressed concerns at the roundtable over the proposed Free Trade Agreement designed to open up the US and Canada economy and to impose some limits on the ability of government to intervene in the economy. Courchene argued that the move could lead to the “maritimization of the Ontario economy.” He made the point that if you remove requirements

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on where to locate economic activities, then American firms will have no reason to place branch plants or other activities, other than a sales force, in Ontario, to serve the Canadian market. It struck me that it was somehow acceptable from a public policy perspective to have a maritimization of the economy in the Maritime provinces, but not in Ontario. Put differently, it was not okay for the government to intervene to promote economic development in one region, but it was fine when it came to promoting Ontario’s economic interests. Why deux poids, deux mesures? It will be recalled that the Ontario government opposed the Canada-US Fta. At one point, it even threatened to take the issue before the courts.45 This despite Ontario’s strong support for the 1968 US-Canada Auto Pact. As the Globe and Mail explains: “the auto pact forced them (i.e. auto manufacturers) to set up in Canada … The competitive advantage of Canada’s auto industry is now well known but that advantage never would have existed without the auto pact.”46 The Auto Pact was to be of benefit to Ontario, while the Free Trade Agreement would open the North American economy to all Canadian regions. But what was good for the goose would not be good for the gander. John Turner, former prime minister and Liberal Party leader, summed things up in this fashion: “Canada,” he argued, “was built on an infrastructure that deliberately resisted the continental pressure of the United States.” He added that a Free Trade Agreement with the Americans “will reduce us to a colony of the United States.”47 Former Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau also opposed the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement. By contrast, Maritime premiers, notably the New Brunswick Liberal premier, Frank McKenna, and Western premiers, including Alberta Premier Don Getty, voiced strong support for the proposed Canada-US Free Trade Agreement. The above to highlight the fact that Ontario never hesitates to turn to its enormous political clout in Ottawa to promote its economic interest. It has an easy go at it, given that it is home to 121 seats in the 338seat House of Commons. Ontario continues to make the case that strong national policies, which invariably favour the two central provinces, are required to guard against Canada becoming a victim to the United States.

t h e U S IS t o o n t arIo what o n t a rIo IS t o t h e oU ter canada S Ontario has sought to define its identity by avoiding being a victim to the United States and by its struggles to shape an identity different from the Americans. This began when the Loyalists first arrived in Upper

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Canada and continues to this day. La Conquête has had a lasting impact on Francophone Quebec and so has the US Revolution on Ontario. Ontario’s political and intellectual elites have led the charge in trying to define a Canadian identity by contrasting it to the US identity. Their message has been consistent down through the ages – Canadian identity centres around resisting the American pull to the south, building an eastwest economy, bringing together an English and French population by including other British territories and by somehow forging a different cultural setting in English Canada to that found in the United States. This is what Sir John A. Macdonald and George-Étienne Cartier sought to accomplish in 1867. This is also what Alexander Brady, past president of the Canadian Political Science Association and a highly regarded political scientist at the University of Toronto, argued in 1964. He wrote: “Canada implied the building of a continental nation, capable of surviving alongside the United States. Confederation, which brought it into being, rested on two facts: first, the agreement of the French and English to replace the union of 1840 with a system that would give greater political satisfaction to each and also improve their common economic prospects; secondly, the inclusion of other British territories in North America.”48 However, four years later, Brady wrote that “nationalism is an elusive concept and Canadian nationalism more elusive than that of most countries.”49 The struggle to identify a Canadian identity continues, at least in part, because the identity that resonates in Ontario does not in other regions. I can think of no other country that has had as much difficulty as Canada in building its national brand or identity. I am hardly alone. Ontario-based historians, political scientists, and the head offices of the English-language national media have led the charge in defining a Canadian identity, again by contrasting it to the American identity. More to the point, they seek to define Canada’s identity by contrasting it with American flaws. Public opinion surveys reveal that many Canadians view Americans as violent, greedy, and rude.50 To be sure, Donald Trump’s winning the presidency election in 2016 did not help matters. J.L. Granatstein, the York University historian, traced the evolution of anti-American sentiment in Canada to the arrival of the United Empire Loyalists, followed by efforts from the captains of industry located in Ontario to keep competitors from the United States out of Canada, and then, to the growth of postwar Canadian nationalism led by Ontario’s intelligentsia.51 Other leading Canadian historians from Ontario, notably Donald Creighton and W.L. Morton, viewed the United States as an aggressive imperial power “determined to impose its cultural values

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upon Canada.”52 They argued that Canada required the economic and cultural tools to resist it. George Grant’s Lament For A Nation, which has been defined as one of Canada’s seminal books in Canadian politics, claims that Canada has gone from being a colony to Great Britain, to being a cultural colony of the United States.53 Grant’s book won high praise. It had, however, far more traction in Ontario than anywhere else in Canada. With Quebec nationalism on the rise in the 1960s and 1970s, Ontario historians urged their peers from other regions to “close ranks and re-emphasize their commitment to the search for a ‘national identity.’” Ramsay Cook told historians that “as a tool of analysis, ‘regionalism’ is a concept whose time is gone.” Toronto-based historians, J.M.S. Careless, Ramsay Cook, Michael Bliss, and J.L. Granatstein, joined forces to warn other Canadian historians of the danger of “ignoring the ‘national experience.’”54 They, like many policy makers in Ottawa, equated Ontario’s interest and Ontario’s identity with Canada’s interest and Canada’s identity. Doug Owram explains why: “It is worth emphasizing that this (the centrality of the intellectual history of Ontario) is not just a matter of Central Canadian conceit on the part of Ontario scholars. In many instances ideas emerging from Ontario have defined the national character, at least in their ability to be heard in Ottawa. Regional writers may dislike it but the Ontario identity has for a very long time been taken by many as the Canadian identity. Intellectual historians have a duty therefore to recognize the extent to which Ontario themes have been translated into national ones.”55 If the ability to be heard in Ottawa is what matters in defining a Canadian identity, then, to be sure, Ontario is in the driver’s seat. The message to other regions – embrace Ontario’s identity if you want to build a Canadian identity, and your regional identities do not count for much. P.A. Buckner went to the heart of the matter when arguing that those who take the Ontario identity as the Canadian identity are from Ontario and “what they seem unwilling to accept is that they are just as much regionalists” as non-Ontario historians.56 Put differently, other Canadian regions see themselves as victims to big-dog Ontario, much like Ontario sees itself as a victim to big-dog United States. That Ontario sees itself requiring protection from the United States is made evident time and again in the work of Ontario’s intelligentsia, in the work of Ottawa policy makers, by listening to the Ontario-based captains of industry over the years, and by looking to what Ontario political leaders had to say during the free trade negotiations with the United States.

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Ontario’s intelligentsia and its political and economic elites are fine promoting their province’s interest but dislike when other regions do the same. In turn, they define the national interest essentially as a guard against becoming victim to the powerful political, economic, and cultural force to the south. They sought to guard against becoming replicas, or worse, junior partners in all things to the Americans. This goal was and is to strengthen Canada’s brand by showing that we are not Americans, that we are different from them in both important and unimportant ways. The opinion Canadians have of the United States varies by region. Atlantic Canada is much more open to US investments than Ontario and Quebec.57 It will be recalled that Ottawa established a Foreign Investment Review Agency to screen incoming foreign investments, with a focus on US investments. But the agency met resistance on the part of the business community and from provinces in Western and Atlantic Canada. If Ontario felt that it had too much US investments, the three Maritime provinces insisted that they did not have enough.58 In their review of Canada-US relations, Lydia Miljan and Barry Cooper point to regional differences in how Canadians look at their southern neighbour. They write: “At the centre of a mythical and symbolic anti-Americanism is what Northrop Frye called the ‘garrison mentality,’ a broad view of the world disproportionately maintained and believed in by Canadians living in the Loyalist heartland of southern Ontario. Other parts of the country – Newfoundland and Alberta, for example – have contrasting forms of consciousness and contrasting myths that accord little or no significance to emotional anti-Americanism.”59 Maritimers have maintained strong ties to the “Boston States” or New England for 150 years. A number of economic forces pushed Maritimers to leave their region in search of economic opportunities. Albert J. Kennedy identified one such powerful force: “In 1867 Confederation forced the region to look for leadership to the land and central Canada rather than to Britain and the sea.”60 Some 330,000 Maritimers left the region between 1860 and 1910, many of them looking to Boston, not Ontario.61 Kennedy writes that, as early as the 1880s, Boston had more New Brunswickers than Moncton did and more Nova Scotians than Yarmouth, Pictou, and Sydney combined.62 The outmigration of Maritimers to New England continued until recently. The region’s academic community has not joined forces with its Ontario counterparts to define a Canadian identity by contrasting it with a US identity. Maritime-based scholars have produced a number of studies designed to assess how ties between the Maritime provinces

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and New England have grown stronger through expanding trade, smuggling in the Bay of Fundy, and outmigration.63 I have never detected in the literature or anywhere else much of an anti-American view in the Maritime provinces. The same can be said about how Western Canada sees its relations with the US. The Alberta government explains that: “The United States has long been Alberta’s most important bilateral trade partner. The US is by far the largest customer for Alberta’s exports and the source of two thirds of all foreign investment in the province.”64 Saskatchewan also looks to the US to grow its economy tied to trade, and some 60 per cent of its exports goes to the US, by far Saskatchewan’s biggest trade partner. Though not limited to Ontario, anti-Americanism is more prevalent in that province than in other regions. Charles F. Doran and James Patrick Sewell outlined an important reason for Canada’s anti-American perspective: “In one fundamental sense, Canada’s very essence is anti-American. Soon after what some Canadians think of as the second North American civil war – the first being the Revolutionary War, which founded the United States – the Canadian federation was launched. It was a deliberate effort to create a political society distinct from the United States while accommodating both European founding nations. The saga of extending the Dominion from sea to sea similarly bespoke an aim of protecting the Canadian project from its neighbor and its neighbor’s way of life.”65 In brief, it has fallen on Ontario, or Ontario has taken it upon itself, to define a Canadian identity – Quebec looks to its own history, culture, circumstances and challenges to define its identity, the Maritime provinces are preoccupied with identifying the cause of their underdevelopment and how they fit in the Canadian family, and this includes both the business community and the literature, while Western Canada looks to how its political and economic interests can be better accommodated in the Canadian setting. As noted, Ontario has sought to promote a Canadian identity by contrasting its own with the United States identity and resisting its influence. I can do no better than quote J.J. McCullough: “Canadians have little identity beyond what can be defined through contrast with American flaws.”66 Richard Gwyn, a Toronto-based author, explained in his Munk School lecture that Canadians are pushing back against Americans because they are “Not-Americans.” He adds: “The awkward truth is that just about any description of Canadian identity has as its first line: ‘Canadians are Not-Americans.’” He goes on: “It is exasperating and depressing and infuriating to have to start off your identity with

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a negative. One of our responses to this circumstance has been the endless search for differences between us and Americans.”67 Gwyn maintains that the struggle for a Canadian identity dates back to pre-Confederation with the arrival of the British Loyalists and continues to this day and concludes that: “The truth is that anti-Americanism has always been part of Canadian dna .”68 The truth is that anti-Americanism is much more a part of Ontario’s dna than it is in all the other Canadian regions. The objective has been to fight US dominance both culturally and economically. The United States holds not only powerful military hardware, it also holds powerful soft power through music, the film industry, the internet, social media, cable news and the likes, that influence both ways of thinking and ways of doing things. A decision was made at Confederation and when Ottawa introduced its National Policy in the late 1870s that fighting US economic dominance required a “national effort.” The decision continues to apply to this day, though it has taken on different forms. Ontario and Ottawa policy makers portray their policies as necessary to create a distinct, competitive economic space. In short, the best way to guard against turning Canada into a victim of US economic dominance is to embrace national policies. The argument is that the policies are needed, even though they may well be Ontario-centric. Policies need to be Ontario-centric, because without a strong national economy, Canada would become even more dominated by the United States than it is at the moment. Canada would then become an extension of the US. If this were to happen, Toronto “would be like Rochester, Buffalo, Cleveland. There is absolutely no way, in a single-country continent that a city like Toronto would exist on the north shore of Lake Ontario: there would be no economic or any other reason for it.”69 From a Maritimer’s perspective, if there were no Canada, Halifax would still be Halifax, albeit probably bigger. One can easily speculate that the United States would have built up the city as a major military base far more than it is today. It will be recalled that the American military made this very suggestion to Canadian policy makers during the Second World War. I hasten to add, however, that for the great majority of Maritimers, there is more to Canada than economic winners and losers. The fear, notably in Ontario, is that Canadians may become Americans without knowing it.70 Magazines, periodicals, and journals, for the most part from Toronto, are “crammed with articles pointing out the variety of ways in which the United States threatens Canada.”71 William M. Baker goes further, pointing out that noted University of Toronto

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historian Donald Creighton “swelled the anti-American chorus with his writings, culminating with Canada’s First Century.”72 Some argue that the desire to be non-American continues to fuel Canada’s identity and that this is fine – for example, Pakistan is Pakistan because it does not want to be India. Others, however, think that Canada pushes anti-Americanism too far. J.L. Granatstein maintains that the anti-American perspective is overdone. In his Yankee, Go Home? he traces the evolution of anti-American feelings over two centuries, starting when the United Empire Loyalists fled the United States. He argues that Canada’s “insecurities” have and continue to fuel anti-Americanism and that anti-Americanism is of little value to Canadian interest.73 These insecurities and the fear of becoming a victim of the economic juggernaut to the south, have enabled Ontario and Ottawa policy makers to focus their economic development efforts on Central Canada. They are Central Canada-centric, convinced that the best way to invest limited public funds earmarked for the manufacturing sector and for research and development efforts is in Ontario and Quebec in order to strengthen its competitive capacity with American firms. This explains why selling arms to Saudi Arabia from an Ontario manufacturer is acceptable in Ottawa, but it is not so if the manufacturer is located in Nova Scotia. This is but one of numerous such cases. From an Ottawa perspective, Western and Atlantic Canada should look to fishery, forestry, agriculture, the oil and gas sector, and tourism for economic opportunities, and leave much of the rest to Central Canada. It will be recalled that in the 1960s, the government of Canada decided to become a full participant in international development. Canada had to start from scratch, but the country had few firms in the international development sector. Ottawa decided to support startups in nearby Quebec and Ontario by awarding unsolicited contracts. Several years later, firms from Western Canada and Atlantic Canada knocked on doors in Ottawa to participate in the fast growing sector. They had limited success – Ottawa told them that they had no “track record” in the sector. Central Canadian businesses also had no track record in the sector before the 1960s. However, being closer to Ottawa and having an easier access to the political class, given the number of mP s and ministers as well as senior public servants from Ontario and Quebec, cleared the way for them to access new economic opportunities. For Western and Atlantic Canada firms, the process is little more than a cercle vicieux where history continues to repeat itself to this day.

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Ontario, wittingly or not, plays the victim card when it tells Ottawa that it plays the lead role in defining a Canadian identity and that, to do so, it requires national policies that square with its interest. The province also tells Ottawa to keep a close watch on federal transfer payments to other provincial governments and individuals for fear of killing the golden goose. Ontario continues to occupy a favoured position in Ottawa. Key decisions are made by the prime minister, key advisors, a handful of senior Cabinet ministers, and senior Ottawa-based public servants. They know that political power in Ottawa is determined by the number of seats Ontario and Quebec have in the House of Commons. Nothing else much matters when it comes to decide who can hold political power in Ottawa. The built-in bias favouring Ontario is evident for all to see. Quebec looks to its number of mP s to protect the Quebec identity and economic interest. Ontario looks to its number of mP s to promote and protect a Canadian identity against pervasive US influences. Both see themselves as victims – Quebec as a victim of Canada and its history, going back to the Conquest of New France and Ontario as a victim to US influence, going back to the American Revolutionary War and the United Empire Loyalists. The federal government has answered the call. Ottawa has intervened time and again to strengthen Ontario’s economy to act as a bulwark against American economic influences and to promote a “national” Canadian identity. The fear is that failing to do this, we would run the risk of seeing Ontario and, by extension, Canada become a victim to US dominance. The goal is not to become Americans and Ontario continues to lead the way.

6

Indigenous Peoples: Canada’s True Victims

I have spent most of my career in academe, only occasionally serving in government. I know my way around words. I tried to come up with a word to capture how non-Indigenous peoples have dealt with Canada’s Indigenous peoples over the years. I considered: “institutionalized racism, dehumanization, bigotry, genocide, injustice, intolerance, ignorance, ethnic cleansing, inhumane, race extermination.” I could not settle on just one. This chapter can hardly begin to document the difficult history of Indigenous peoples in Canada. Fortunately, we have a fast-growing and excellent literature on the topic. The five-volume Report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples provides a first-rate overview of this history. There are many more important contributions.1 I note that Aboriginal and Indigenous peoples are often used interchangeably. Section 35(2) of the Canada Constitution Act, 1982 defines Aboriginal peoples as: “the Indian, Inuit and Métis people.” Indigenous peoples is often used in an international context, in part, because of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples tabled by the United Nations General Assembly in 2007. I prefer the term Indigenous peoples and I employ it more often than Aboriginal peoples. First Nations, for the most part, are “Status or Treaty Indians registered with their home reserve, band or community.”2 I am well aware of Canada’s Métis and Inuit realities but my concern is with First Nations. I recall well as a young boy in Saint-Maurice, in the summer months, looking up the road to see two Mi’kmaq women coming to our village to sell hand-woven baskets. They came on foot from the Elsipogtog First Nation (formerly called the Big Cove Reserve) about thirty kilometers away. It was a long walk, particularly in the heat of the summer, to sell baskets.

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Many in Saint-Maurice bought the baskets. They were of fine quality, but I suspect that this was not the only reason they sold well. Word got around the village that, unless families bought baskets, the Indigenous peoples would use their special powers to curse our houses, family members, animals, or people in our community, causing them serious harm. I know that some individuals in Saint-Maurice actually believed this. I also know that contacts between Mi’kmaq and Saint-Maurice residents were rare, essentially limited to when they came to the community to sell baskets or ask for food. I also recall, around that time, going to watch hockey games between players from my parish and Mi’kmaq players from Elsipogtog. I know that our side was always told to prepare well because our players would be playing “les sauvages” who, we were told, invariably played dirty. Looking back, not only am I deeply embarrassed to report this, I also have come to terms with the fact that our side, if anything, probably played dirtier. In addition, if I were called a savage, I would be very tempted to play dirty. I suspect that this was not a Saint-Maurice-only event – it was likely repeated in many communities across Canada. I later learned that, because of our history and our common Roman Catholic religion, Acadians did not go as far “in their condemnation of Native witches as did anglophones.”3 I can not even begin to imagine how Indigenous peoples were treated by non-Acadians, given how my village dealt with them. Elsipogtog was declared off-limits to my generation. We were told that we should never set foot in that community because “les sauvages” drank, could not hold their liquor, could easily become violent, and could never be trusted. When we watched “Westerns” on television, the “Indians” were always the bad guys and they always lost. If anyone is looking for a definition of racism, one needs to look no further. I only visited Elsipogtog for the first time when I was in my early thirties. It was an eye opener. I saw poverty, unkept houses, abandoned vehicles, and uncut lawns. I recently visited the community and I am happy to report that it is a far cry from what it once was. There is now a sense of community pride. There are also clear signs that Elsipogtog is participating in the economy and making remarkable progress in community development. I am hardly the only Canadian who was or is hesitant about visiting a First Nations community. A recent national survey, which was deliberately oversampled in areas with a higher Indigenous population, reveals

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that 40 per cent of respondents said that they have never been to a First Nations community and another 32 per cent reported that they only drove through a First Nations community “without staying to visit.” Only four per cent of Canadians have spent “lots of time” on a First Nations land reserve and only eight per cent reported that they have “a good understanding of Indigenous issues.”4 If I were an Aboriginal, I would be very angry, resentful, and bitter. From day one, Canada could not have possibly mishandled its dealings with the Indigenous peoples more than it has. The Indigenous peoples, more than other communities, have been victims of misguided public policies. I understand that it is difficult to judge history through today’s lenses – however, no matter what lenses one looks through, Canada has engaged with the Indigenous peoples, all too often, in an inhumane manner. Those who believe that the wrongs belong to the history books and that the culprits should not be held responsible should look again and then ask if they are today standing up in support of Indigenous rights. What is all the more remarkable is that a number of First Nations, against all odds, have been able to make the transition away from victimhood, as we will see. Canada has been anything but helpful to the Indigenous peoples in developing their communities. All Canadians need to reflect on Richard Wagamese’s words in his Indian Horse and ponder how they can help: “When your innocence is stripped from you, when your people are denigrated, when the family you came from is denounced and your tribal ways and rituals are pronounced backward, primitive, savage, you come to see yourself as less than human. That is hell on earth, that sense of unworthiness. That’s what they inflicted on us.”5 The “they” includes Canadian history, our ancestors, and us.

l o o kIn g t o hI Story It is simply not possible to overstate the ignorance and prejudices the first Europeans had towards the Indigenous peoples, when they arrived in North America. They saw them as “savages,” “uncivilized” and “unproductive,” since they were perceived to have no institution of their own capable of leading their communities. The European settlers actually believed that they were seeing a land without people or terra nullius, providing them with a rationale to take over the land. They installed new governance structures on the basis that there was “nobody there other than the animals.”6 As is well known, Europeans also spread

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diseases to the Indigenous population which had no immunity to foreign pathogens, including smallpox, measles, and influenza. In far too many cases, communities were decimated.7 A key stumbling block to better relations between Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous peoples is the lack of historical awareness most Canadians have of our country’s First Nations and their difficult struggles, ever since Europeans first arrived in North America. Historians had little to say about Indigenous peoples until the 1980s, other than to report on how the colonial powers were able to exert control over the “Indians.”8 Many European settlers would not have survived, particularly in the early years, without the help of the Indigenous peoples. No matter, they were quick to assert political sovereignty over First Nations. The thinking was that First Nations simply roamed the territory and had no government rules or organizations capable of managing their land or communities, or holding anyone accountable. What European settlers failed to understand was that First Nations operated as independent nations and had their own institutions, laws, and distinct customs that suited their circumstances and environment but would not work in a European setting.9 Colonial powers decided to take control of Indigenous territory and apply their laws and their government structure to it. They established a “reserve” system to manage – or rather control – the Indigenous population. The system was a common strategy with colonial powers when they had to compose with displaced people who stood in the way of European settlers in Africa and North America. In the case of Canada, some Indigenous groups were compelled to give up their long-established migrating habits and to settle on reserves. Reserves also gave Europeans the opportunity to provide religious training to Indigenous peoples and assimilate them further into the European culture. British authorities sought to make the case that the reserves provided a safe environment for Indigenous peoples. It is not clear against whom Indigenous peoples had to be protected from, since they did not need reserves before the Europeans arrived. In brief, reserves held a far greater advantage for Europeans than the Indigenous peoples – for one thing, they made room for Europeans to establish farms and communities. Land was easy picking for European settlers. In many cases, they simply decided with little or no opposition to take over the land. In other cases, they wrote agreements or treaties to purchase the land in a language with which the Indigenous peoples were not familiar. As a result,

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the Indigenous peoples only received a very modest one-time payment or a small parcel of unwanted land in return.10 The Indigenous peoples were thus stripped of their land and pushed to the side to make way for European settlers and their political and economic plans. By all accounts, the Europeans were brutal to the Indigenous peoples, as they settled throughout North America. Political leaders who followed in both Canada and the United States were no less brutal when speaking about the Indigenous peoples. Teddy Roosevelt had this to say: “I don’t go so far as to say the only good Indian is the dead Indian. But I believe nine out of every ten are and I shouldn’t like to inquire too closely about the tenth.”11 As we will see, the views of Canadian political leaders of Roosevelt’s generation, with regards to Indigenous peoples, were no less offensive. I have often asked myself how I would have reacted to Indigenous peoples had I been a political or community leader in the nineteenth century. I can only hope that I would have been much more enlightened than politicians were when Confederation was being debated. I also continue to ask how I would have felt as an Indigenous person after the call by a Royal Commission for the Aboriginal people “to free themselves of the anger and fear that surges up in any human being or collective in response to insult and injury, and extend forgiveness to the representatives of the society that has wronged them.”12 I understand that this may well constitute the best way forward but it would be a very tall order to ask, at least for me. I know Acadian history and, without the assistance of the Mi’kmaq Nation, my ancestors would have found it far more difficult than they did, over four hundred years ago, to survive in an unfamiliar environment. I also know that the Mi’kmaq were close allies to the Acadians. There have been recorded marriages, particularly in the early years, between Acadians and Indigenous women. That was then. Today, things are different. We now see violent conflicts between Acadians and Mi’kmaq over the fishery. We saw that in the fall of 2020, for example, Indigenous lobster traps were cut, a boat was burned, vehicles were destroyed, and a lobster plant was burned to the ground.13 The above makes the point that history is never static. Relations between Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous Canadians continue to evolve. I am on safe ground in writing that non-Indigenous communities have put out a highly inconsistent and, all too often, negative message in their interactions with First Nations.

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a l o n g c a m e c o nFederat I on When the Fathers of Confederation set out in 1864 to create a new country, addressing the “Indian” problem was very low on their agenda. They felt that they had more pressing matters to which to attend. They simply added, without much debate at the Quebec Conference, the words “Indians and Lands reserved for the Indians” in a sub-clause to section 91 of the British North America Act and then assigned responsibility for both to Ottawa, making it clearly a so-called Ottawa problem in the eyes of provincial governments. No one in a position of influence had an interest in fixing the flaws in the relationship between Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous Canadians. For one thing, there were no representatives of the First Nations present in the negotiations. For another, there is no indication whatsoever that any of the Fathers of Confederation had any interest in exploring the role Indigenous Peoples could play in developing Canada or how best to encourage their participation in the country’s political institutions. Indigenous peoples were viewed as a stubborn problem that somehow had to be dealt with in order to let the Fathers of Confederation get on with building a country for White Europeans. The way to approach the problem was to let the status quo prevail. The basic outline of protection and assimilation established by pre-Confederation colonial policy would stay the course.14 However difficult it is to imagine today, it is important to underline the point that Indigenous peoples were completely excluded from the Charlottetown, Quebec, and London conferences. The Canadian Encyclopedia even goes further and points out that they “were excluded from public life.”15 George Brown, one of the four key architects of Confederation, tabled a document at the 1864 Charlottetown Conference that outlined the responsibilities that would be assigned to the federal and provincial governments. He made no reference to First Nations Peoples and things were no different for the other papers prepared by other Fathers of Confederation.16 The best that the country’s political leadership could come up with were paternalistic policies that, at times, even worked at cross-purposes. Don McCaskill explains: “Missionaries, educators, Indian agents, judges, and police were sent to the reserves to facilitate the transition from savagery to civilization. The Indians themselves had little to say about the process, because there was no political structure within which they could operate effectively.”17 The Fathers of Confederation either saw no reason to change the approach, could not come up with anything better, believed that the issue was not important, or, perhaps more

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importantly, they saw that Europeans settlers were benefitting from the status quo. It was also not in their dna to think that Indigenous Peoples could offer anything of value in shaping institutions or that they should be brought into the negotiations as equals. The federal government did handle the so-called problem by simply taking over the responsibility that previously belonged to the British Crown. Section 91(24) of the Constitution Act, 1867 gives the Parliament of Canada legislative authority to deal with the “Indians.” The provinces were frozen out of any responsibility and Indigenous peoples would, from 1867 to this day, look almost exclusively to Ottawa. In this sense, Macdonald got his unitary state, at least, when it came to the Indigenous peoples. The view widely held in Canada at the time of Confederation, was that Indigenous peoples were “uncivilized, economically backward and morally inferior to Europeans”18 and that their traditional forms of governance had nothing to offer to anyone, including Indigenous peoples themselves. Simply put, the goal was to “civilize” Indigenous peoples and have them embrace Christianity. If they were to die of starvation, somehow it would be their fault. Sir John A. Macdonald told the House of Commons: “I have reason to believe that the agents as a whole … are doing all they can, by refusing food until the Indians are on the verge of starvation, to reduce the expense.”19 Macdonald was not alone in thinking or wishing ill on Aboriginals. David Mills, a minister in the Liberal government of Alexander Mackenzie, said: “No doubt the Indians will bear a great degree of starvation before they will work, and so long as they are certain the Government will come to their aid, they will not do much for themselves.”20 The Indian Act was passed by the Alexander Mackenzie government. One can gain a better appreciation of the position of the Indigenous communities in Canadian society at the time of Confederation by reading the Indian Act. The act, passed in 1876, only nine years after Canada was born, is nothing short of a highly offensive, racist, and unacceptable document, particularly when viewed from today’s perspective. I invite readers to consult the Indian Act and some of the publications that it has generated. Readers should reflect on how they would react if the act were directed at them, their communities, or their ancestors.21 The purpose of the act was to strip the Indigenous peoples of their language and culture and assimilate them, as Sir John A. Macdonald put it, “with the other inhabitants of the Dominion as speedily as they are fit to change.” Little wonder that the Indian Act reflects a complete

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non-Indigenous perspective. Indian agents were told, for example, to employ whatever means necessary to discourage dancing at traditional ceremonies. An 1884 amendment to the Indian Act prohibited the “Tamanawas dance.” The amendment was designed to protect the “Indians” from their own culture and traditions because Ottawa decided that such traditions would inhibit any progress in civilizing them. The act built on the “reserve” system where land is held by the Crown for the “benefit” of bands. To be sure, the Indigenous peoples did not ask for this “benefit,” it was imposed by the government. Residents having a registered status may own land on a reserve but the ownership remains at the discretion of the federal government and, accordingly, it “does not entail full legal possession.”22 The reserve system holds many benefits but not for the Indigenous peoples. It enabled the government to stop the “wandering Indians,” to exert greater control on Indigenous peoples and to facilitate the task of missionaries educating them in the ways of the White Europeans. In the early years, the Indian agents held near dictatorial powers. They were even granted judicial authority in addition to their bureaucratic powers. In short, the Indian agents had the power to control all aspects of Indian life on reserves. The 1876 Annual Report of the Department of the Interior provides important insights on how the “Indian problem” was viewed. It reads: the “Indian legislation generally rests on the principle, that the aborigines are to be kept in a condition of tutelage and treated as wards or children of the State. I am firmly persuaded that the true interests of the aborigines and of the State alike require that every effort should be made to aid the Red man in lifting himself out of his condition of tutelage and dependence, and that it is clearly our wisdom and our duty, through education and other means, to prepare him for a higher civilization by encouraging him to assume the privileges and responsibilities of full citizenship.”23 The Indian Act has generated a number of legacies, precious few of them positive for the Indigenous peoples. The elective band council system is at the top of my list. The thinking was that, if Ottawa imposed non-Aboriginal political structures, Indigenous peoples would learn the merits of the ways of the broader Canadian society. The initiative failed miserably and is at the root cause of many problems First Nations are experiencing to this day. It undermined the authority of traditional leaders and their processes.24 It also created a governance structure in which, instead of building consensus, all too often First Nations are divided along family lines, driving a wedge between a community’s leading families, or the “greedy

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Chiefs,” and the others. To many Indigenous peoples, the democratic process in First Nations has far too frequently created artificial elites, who rule by favouring their families and close associates. They can, however, remind non-Indigenous peoples that the process was not of their own making – it was imposed by Ottawa and the federal government is now reaping what it sowed. Ottawa also had a double standard when it came to voting for members of Parliament, democratic principles, and the right to vote. Indigenous peoples did not have the right to vote from Confederation until 1920. The Indian Act did not permit “registered Indians” to vote, but if an Indigenous man surrendered his “Indian” status, he (not she) could vote. The belief was that Indigenous peoples in their natural state did not have the knowledge or skills required to vote. In short, an Indigenous man could be either an “Indian” or a voter, but not both. The Indian Act was amended in 1920 to make it easier for Indigenous peoples, notably males, to vote. In 1960, Parliament modified the Canada Elections Act, granting all Indigenous peoples the right to vote, from coast to coast to coast. The impact, however, has been modest. An Elections Canada study explains why: “Although all Indians gained the right to vote in 1960, the actual change in governance brought about by this development was minimal. In very few federal ridings are the number of registered Indian voters significant enough to affect who is ultimately elected. And in the past fifty years very few First Nations candidates have been successful. By the time the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples issued its final report in 1996, the whole issue of individuals from First Nations communities being included in the suffrage was a marginal concern in those communities. The right to vote was seen as neither a major achievement nor a vehicle for change.”25 The goal of policy makers at the time of Confederation was to carry on with the new constitutional arrangements, unite the British North American colonies and develop political institutions by turning to Great Britain for guidance and solutions. Indigenous peoples were seen, at best, as an inconvenient problem and the solution was to assimilate them as quickly as possible. They were given European names and every effort was made to have them embrace Christianity. Policy makers also sought to have them abandon hunting and fishing by encouraging them to turn to agriculture and adopt a more sedentary lifestyle. The way of life of the Indigenous peoples was foreign to them, but no matter, the European settlers always knew better. As noted, the federal government became the guardian of all Crown lands, including

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“Indian reserve land,” sending a clear signal that the Crown assumed responsibility “to care for and protect interests of First Nations people, as wards of the state.”26 In brief, the First Nations were stripped of political power or influence, divorced from the responsibilities of provincial and local governments, and relegated to live in communities “whose colonization was profound and immutable.”27 The federal government would keep full authority to manage the “Indian problem,” with band councils being delegated meagre authority. The government’s Indian agents held all the power to dictate the scope and pace of change in all key sectors.28 Wittingly or not, the Fathers of Confederation would lay the groundwork for Indigenous peoples to turn to the courts, rather than to political and bureaucratic institutions, to pursue their political agenda. The courts would in time listen to their grievances, something that the country’s political institutions could not or would not do. It is important to underline the point that the federal government has, over the years, made repeated attempts to reject the distinct forms of social and governance organizations in First Nations communities and to see the Indigenous peoples let go of their traditions and way of life. Duncan Campbell Scott, deputy superintendent of Indian Affairs, outlined the goal in a 1920 speech: “I want to get rid of the Indian problem … Our objective is to continue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian question, and no Indian Department.”29 The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples put it succinctly twenty-six years later: “interventions in Aboriginal societies reached their peak, taking the form of relocations, residential schools, the outlawing of Aboriginal cultural practices, and various other interventionist measures of the type found in the Indian Acts of the late 1800s and early 1900s.”30

ano t h e r F a I l e d a t t e mP t at a S SI m Ilat Ion The province of Canada, under the 1841 Act of Union, failed to assimilate French settlers. Canada, after Confederation, tried the same strategy with Indigenous peoples and here, it botched things up even worse. Don McCaskill explains that the reserve system actually accomplished the opposite of assimilation – it isolated Indigenous peoples.31 They were, in many cases, displaced physically to new locations labelled as reserves, selected on their behalf by colonial authorities. Indigenous peoples had no say – they were told what to do and they did what they were told.

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As noted, missionaries and Indian agents were sent to the reserves with two objectives – assimilate Indigenous peoples to the ways of Europe and convert them to Christianity. How to get it done was not the issue – the issue was simply getting it done. One need not look any further than residential schools for evidence. Between the 1870s and 1996, some 130 residential schools were established. More than 150,000 First Nations, Métis, and Inuit children attended these church-run government-funded schools. The tendency is to blame Sir John A. Macdonald for residential schools – and, to be sure, he deserves a good part of the blame. The reality, however, is that the schools continued to exist long after Macdonald left politics and nearly one hundred years after he had passed on. Because assimilation was the goal, the schools were established to eliminate parent involvement in the intellectual, cultural, and spiritual development of the children. Children were placed in residential schools against the wishes of their parents. Aboriginal languages and culture were deliberately suppressed in an effort to “civilize and Christianize” them. History reveals that discipline at these schools was harsh, “child neglect was institutionalized and the lack of supervision created situations where students were prey to sexual and physical abuses.”32 Former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, Beverley McLachlin, labelled the schools “a cultural genocide” against the Indigenous peoples.33 Irwin Cotler, Canada’s former justice minister, called the residential schools policy “the single most harmful, disgraceful and racist act in our history.”34 It is impossible to overstate the negative impact the residential schools had on generations of Indigenous peoples. I can do no better than quote the Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada: “For over a century, the central goals of Canada’s Aboriginal policy were to eliminate Aboriginal governments; ignore Aboriginal rights; terminate the treaties; and, through a process of assimilation, cause Aboriginal peoples to cease to exist as distinct, legal, social, cultural, religious, and racial entities in Canada. The establishment and operation of residential schools were a central element of this policy, which can be described as – cultural genocide. Canada denied the right to participate fully in Canadian political, economic and social life to those Aboriginal people who refused to abandon their Aboriginal identity … Canada did all those things.”35 Canada has not been able to turn the page on this sorry period of its history because of the horrific nature of the schools. Prime Minister Stephen Harper tried on 11 June 2008, when he issued a full apology for Canada’s role in residential schools and asked for the forgiveness of the

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Indigenous peoples.36 As recently as May 2021, news reports revealed that 215 children were found buried at a former residential school in British Columbia. Canadians were told that “some were as young as three years old” and that, as far as anyone knows, the “missing children are undocumented deaths.” By August 2021, more than 1,300 unmarked graves had been found across the sites of five former residential schools.37 British Columbia Premier John Horgan spoke to the schools’ lasting legacy: “The consequences of these atrocities continue to this day.”38 The residential school system is hardly the only example of racism towards Indigenous peoples. The work of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls was revealing on several fronts. The inquiry found that Indigenous women and girls are twelve times more likely to go missing or to be murdered than members of any other demographic group in Canada and sixteen times more likely to be slain or to disappear than White women. The inquiry made a number of recommendations to the federal government but they, at best, remain a work in progress. The report received some media attention, but nowhere near what it would have been, had the inquiry dealt with White murdered girls and women.39 This is just one more report in a plethora of reports on how Canada has badly mismanaged its relations with the Indigenous Peoples. When Indigenous peoples look at government reports, they rarely see success stories. Instead, they see report after report documenting atrocities committed against them and their communities, and solutions are rarely forthcoming.

t h e l e gacy Canadians should not view the residential school system as simply a sad, isolated, and unacceptable historical event. It is much more than that. The central message of residential schools was clear and devastating: Indigenous culture was of no value and it needed to be erased in Canada, from coast to coast to coast. The impact of the schools on the Indigenous peoples will continue to be felt for years in education, health care, justice, and individual and community development. But even the horrors of residential schools do not tell the whole story. I can think of numerous federal government policies that have seriously inhibited individual and community development but precious few that have helped the Indigenous peoples. The Indian Act can hardly be described as an instrument for economic development – it is anything but. The history of the “reserves,” and how they were established and

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managed in some ways parallel the residential school system. They were structured to denigrate Indigenous peoples and drain any self confidence they may have in themselves, in their communities, and in their culture. They were also structured to drain their land and their access to resources. This is clearly not the right road to economic or community development. While New France looked to reserves to put an end to nomadic practices and make it easier to convert Indigenous peoples to Roman Catholicism, the British implemented a reserve system to make way for the Loyalists moving north from the US and for many new arrivals from Europe, particularly from the Uk during the 1820s and 1830s. Europeans continued to arrive after Confederation – 1,140,000 Europeans came to Canada between 1867 and 1914.40 Pushing Indigenous peoples on small parcels of land became the answer to make room for Europeans. In brief, reserves became the solution because of the need for good agricultural land for European settlers, because of the widely held belief that Europeans were economically and culturally superior, because of the view that the Indigenous peoples stood in the way of progress, and to pursue the goal to civilize Indigenous peoples and convert them to Christianity.

F Ir St n a tIo n S c ommUn I tIe S The Indian Act reads: “Reserves are held by Her Majesty for the use and benefit of the respective bands for which they were set apart … No Indian is lawfully in possession of land in a reserve unless, with the approval of the Minister, possession of the land has been allocated to him by council of the band.”41 There are 634 First Nations communities in Canada where some 40 per cent of “Registered Indians” live on reserve, 14 per cent live off reserve in rural areas and 45 per cent live in urban areas. First Nations communities exist throughout Canada and 70 per cent of them have less than five hundred inhabitants. Only 4 per cent have more than two thousand.42 Canada’s reserve system has hardly been a model of transparency. There have been many instances when traditional lands were unfairly taken after being designated as reserves. This has led to numerous land claims. The reason for taking back land designated for Indigenous peoples was simple – whenever land was needed, the Indigenous peoples were simply pushed aside. To make matters worse, the government, much more often than not, established reserves on marginal land. History also reveals that land designated for reserves was drawn and redrawn to fit the requirements of the moment, never in the interest of Indigenous peoples. Pressure to

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redraw reserves became apparent following the end of the American Revolution, when many British Loyalists arrived in Canada looking for land. First Nations were not compensated when land was taken away from them. I note that the Parliament Buildings are located on traditional Algonquin territory.43 Fred Wien, at Dalhousie University, has made a substantial contribution to the literature on the state of First Nations and played a leadership role with the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. He has also generated a profile of the Membertou First Nation in Nova Scotia, a community that has produced a series of success stories in recent years in community economic development. Wien’s Membertou profile, which he recently updated, speaks to the community’s successes despite its difficult history with non-Indigenous peoples. Membertou is now a dynamic growth center in a regional economy that has been struggling for generations. It is today one of the three largest employers in the Cape Breton Municipality (cBm ). The transition to a high performing community is evident in all sectors. Mary Beth Doucette and Fred Wien write: “Membertou was once a place where no one visited, now … it is a place where everyone goes for social events and high-quality services.”44 The community has launched a number of projects including off-reserve projects, and some through partnerships with the private sector. Membertou teamed up, for example, with Premium Brands Holdings in January 2021 to purchase Clearwater Seafoods in a $1 billion deal.45 The impact of Membertou’s economic development efforts, over the past thirty years or so, is well documented and includes population growth, falling unemployment rate, attractive community projects, and new infrastructure.46 Membertou’s success has not gone unnoticed, The Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development has taken note of the community’s successes. There are several factors that explain the community’s success, starting with solid governance practices. I invite readers to consult membertou.ca and review the work of the Membertou Development Corporation. There is a can-do optimism that permeates all aspects of the community. Membertou operates on its own, or through partnerships, a number of successful ventures in addition to its business interest in the fishery, a trade and convention centre, a restaurant, a boat building enterprise, and a data centre. Membertou has shown that a community can operate businesses by defining and respecting a line that separates responsibility between the community and the business. Therein lies one of the most important lessons from Membertou.

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The community has a strong leadership and a robust approach to governance. The level of transparency at Membertou is as high, if not higher, than in other communities in Canada including many non-Indigenous communities. Anyone who wants to know the Chief’s salary only has to consult the community’s website. The same is also true for the twelve councillors who serve on the band council. Anyone who wants to know how all the businesses are doing can consult the annual reports of the Membertou Development Corporation which always contain an independent auditor’s report. The confidence the community has in the Chief and band council has enabled the community to hold elections every five years rather than every two years, which remains the case in many First Nations. The community’s success is all the more remarkable, given its difficult history from the beginning, as the federal government redefined the reserve’s geographical boundaries. Fred Wien writes that the Membertou First Nation community precedes Confederation. It may well date back as far as 1832 when 2.3 acres in Sydney, Nova Scotia, was granted to a Mr Paul. In 1852, the “title to all land reserved for Indians in Nova Scotia was vested in the Commissioner of Crown Lands to protect the interest of the Mi’kmaq” or to prevent the land from being taken over by non-Indigenous peoples. After Confederation, the deputy superintendent of Indian Affairs secured the land in 1882 in addition to another eight hundred acres “for the uses and purpose of an Indian reserve.” But that was not the end of the story. As Wien reports, in 1903, 0.66 acres were arbitrarily taken from the King’s Road settlement so that a rail line could pass through it, effectively splitting the reserve in two. Furthermore, neighbours and the City of Sydney tried on numerous occasions to force the Department of Indian Affairs to move the “Indians” away from this desirable location. They were successful. The Membertou First Nation was “legally forced” to relocate away from the King’s Road Reserve, and three kilometres from Sydney’s downtown core in 1926.47 Documented struggles to assert land rights are hardly limited to the Membertou community; they are also evident in many other First Nations communities across Canada. Faced with similar situations in other parts of the country where reserved lands stood in the way of the expansion, the federal government passed an amendment to the Indian Act in 1911, giving itself the means to take action. Specifically, the new section 49A permitted the federal government to refer such situations to a judge of the Exchequer Court of Canada for investigation and disposition.48 The point – First Nations communities in Canada, not just Membertou, were

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for a long time, always at the mercy of government decisions to make way for development – development that was designed for someone else, very rarely for them.

t h e c h a l l enge It is not possible to overstate the lasting negative impact of Canada’s reserve system on the Indigenous population. It was only in 1951, for example, that the Indian Act was amended to allow First Nations people to leave the reserve without a pass, gather in groups of more than three, hire a lawyer, practice their culture, and own a property.49 I ask non-Indigenous Canadians to think about how they would react if they knew that their parents or grandparents had to live under these conditions. But even the above hardly tells the whole story. Many of the reserves were and remain too small, making it difficult for Indigenous peoples to sustain themselves and their families. They are also often isolated, making it hard for them to access basic services including running water, the internet and, at times, electricity.50 The government of Canada has, since 1977, spent “billions” trying and sometimes failing to bring clear water to reserves.51 Progress in putting an end to drinking water advisories on public systems in First Nations has been very slow, despite the never ending commitments to resolve the issue come election time.52 As Jody Wilson-Raybould, the former Justice minister writes: “In politics, particularly in an election campaign, what the government often does is to focus on the ‘moment’ or what the moment requires rather than on the ‘substance’ of what needs to be done.”53 This applies to all Canadians but it resonates even more when it comes to commitments made to the Indigenous peoples during election campaigns. Notwithstanding a difficult history and unfulfilled promises, some Indigenous communities are performing at a very high level, notably Membertou in Nova Scotia and Elsipogtog in New Brunswick. They are not alone. Fort McKay, in Alberta, and the Osoyoos and Tsawwassen communities, in British Columbia, are also performing very well.54 These communities and a number of others do not consider themselves as victims. There are, however, other Indigenous communities that are struggling economically including the Birdtail Sioux and Roseau River First Nations in Manitoba.55 There are both economic challenges and opportunities confronting First Nations across Canada. I invite readers to consult the work of the National Indigenous Economic Development Board to gain a better

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understanding of them. I note that the board underlines the importance of entrepreneurship, outlines the challenges, reports on successful measures, and offers suggestions for self-sustaining economic growth.56 One thing is certain, a great deal more needs to be done. Canada has only made modest progress in closing the socioeconomic gaps between First Nations and other Canadians. About 24 per cent of Indigenous peoples in urban areas live under Canada’s official poverty line, compared to 13 per cent for non-Indigenous individuals; more than one in three Indigenous peoples in urban areas live in food insecure households, and educational and employment levels, as well as income levels, are considerably lower for Indigenous peoples than for non-Indigenous Canadians.57 Suicide rates among First Nations youth are five to seven times higher than for non-Indigenous young Canadians; life expectancy in First Nations communities is five to seven years less than in non-Indigenous communities; First Nations youth are more likely to end up in jail than graduate from high school; tuberculosis among First Nation citizens is thirty-one times the national average; and some 44 per cent of the existing housing stock need major repair.58 No matter the socioeconomic indicator one consults, Indigenous communities often come up short.59 If some Canadians think that the solution for economic development in First Nations is at hand, they are wrong. If they think that the solution is to tell Indigenous peoples to pick themselves up by their bootstraps, they are also wrong.

g r o wI n g t h e In dI g e n oUS economy The economic development challenges in most Indigenous communities are immeasurably more difficult than in most non-Indigenous communities. These challenges have been well documented elsewhere and they include: “access to equity or capital, barriers for Indigenous women in entrepreneurship, access to business networks, access to skilled employees, access to reliable internet, education and training, racial discrimination, alienation from community, access to resources, lack of infrastructure and language barriers.”60 There are also not nearly enough entrepreneurs in First Nations.61 Rodney Nelson adds one more challenge: “Canada’s historical and ongoing colonization has led Indigenous peoples to distrust and thus resent governmental policies and practices.”62 The government of Canada has nevertheless launched a series of programs and measures to promote economic development in First Nations communities. It has the Aboriginal Entrepreneurship Program, the Indigenous Growth Fund, business development programs, the

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Sustainable Forestry Initiative, a procurement strategy designed to assist Indigenous communities and the list goes on.63 The success of these initiatives, thus far, has been, at best, spotty. Reports evaluating federal government efforts have been, for the most part, critical or inconclusive. The Office of the Auditor General, for example, has produced a series of assessments and the verdict has been everything but positive.64 We know that the federal government has allocated substantial amounts of funds in support of economic development in First Nations. Reports document the amount of funds allocated but they are less forthcoming in determining if the programs have been effective.65 For the most part, government evaluation reports, which tend to be far more positive or forgiving than those produced by the Office of the Auditor General, reveal some important shortcomings. They urge policy makers to develop and implement “a performance measurement strategy” and allow “the programs to measure progress, make ongoing adjustments to programming and report results.” The reports neglect to add that the federal government has been implementing economic development programs for Indigenous communities for several generations and very little of these requirements have thus far been met. The courts have helped First Nations to carve a greater role in the economy, notably in resource development. Indigenous peoples have turned to their treaties and Indigenous rights recognized in section 35 of the Constitution Act to secure their right to resource activities and they have been successful in the Sparrow case (1990) and the Marshall decision (1999). It will also be recalled that the Supreme Court ruled that the Peace and Friendship Treaties of 1760–61 created a continuing Treaty right “to obtain necessaries through hunting and fishing by trading the products of those traditional activities.”66 It is easy to appreciate why First Nations believe that they will get a fair hearing before the courts, but less so in their dealings with governments. I have seen firsthand the positive impact the Marshall decision has had on First Nations in the Maritime provinces. One only has to visit a growing number of First Nations in the Maritime region to see the progress made. There is also hard data to support this view. In 1999 the value of Indigenous commercial landings in the fishery in the Maritimes and Gaspé region was $3 million – by 2018, the same landings were valued at $140 million, in addition to $52 million in indirect fisheriesrelated revenue.67 Ken Coates carried out a review of the Marshall decision after twenty years. He concluded that “opportunities for young people have improved, communities have more money to spend on locally selected

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programs … Mi’kmaq and Maliseet confidence has increased dramatically … and Governments have had to come to terms with First Nations’ independence and legal authority, generating an acceptance of the need to restructure relations with Indigenous peoples.”68 It is a start, a start that the courts, not governments, gave to the First Nations and no one should be surprised to see the Indigenous peoples continue to turn to the courts to assist them in carving out a role in the economy.

what now? Canadians, more often than not, look to the media to gain an understanding of life in Indigenous communities. For the most part, the media coverage is negative – reporting on a lack of clean water, a housing crisis, widespread poverty, wasted government funds, generously paid Chiefs and council members, family violence and too many young Indigenous people locked up in jail. One keen observer of relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians maintains that Canadians have a “one-sided public image of what’s going on, so we get this image that we’re not making much progress, so why are we trying?”69 Surveys report that two out of three Canadians believe that funds going towards First Nations communities are ineffective.70 I came across this view when I told friends and members of the business community that I was working on a chapter about Canada and Indigenous peoples. I heard comments along the lines of: “We certainly send a lot of money to them, why can’t they do something with it and why can’t they create jobs and get to work like everybody else?”; “Good luck with the chapter, but nothing much will happen; you are not the first and will not be the last to try to find solutions”; and “They get tons of government handouts and do not pay taxes, so what is the problem?” One told me: “See that new luxury car, the biggest model available, well an Indian Chief owns it – they do pretty good with our money.” Though my conversations hardly constitute a representative survey, I never once heard the view that Canada should do more or that non-Indigenous peoples need to assume the major share of the responsibility for the lack of self-sustaining economic activities in First Nations. Public opinion surveys also report that there are more Canadians who believe that governments spend “way too much/too much money” on Indigenous Canadians (33 per cent) than those who believe that governments spend “way too little/too little money” (28 per cent). Some 66 per cent of Canadians think that the money spent toward Indigenous issues is ineffective, in contrast to 14 per cent who think that it is effective.71

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There are many Canadians who would likely want to tell Indigenous peoples: “heal thyself” or “pull yourself up by your bootstraps.”72 This view conveniently absolves them and their governments of any responsibility. It is also a simplistic view that ties individual and community development to a light switch – just turn it on and economic development will happen. This view ignores history. It ignores generations of Canada’s political and bureaucratic leaders and their bigotry, misdeeds, and mismanagement. Only someone with an ignorance of history would tell Canada’s Indigenous peoples to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Early European settlers and Canada, both before and after Confederation have turned Indigenous peoples into victims. The challenges confronting the Indigenous peoples are not self-inflicted. European settlers and Canada, over four hundred years, destroyed any possible trust between non-Indigenous and Indigenous communities, they also destroyed the self-confidence that the Indigenous peoples and First Nations may have in themselves and purposely made them wards of the state – European settlers and Canada are to blame. Trust and self-confident people who believe in their communities are the key building blocks to community development. If you do not have this, it is very difficult to grow as a people or as a community. In the aftermath of the Mi’kmaq-Acadian fishery crisis in 2020, I received a number of calls from individuals insisting that my university and I should do something to help. In response, I published an op-ed for the Globe and Mail, making the case that the crisis “boiled down to its essence, it is about trust in an age of precarity. Indigenous peoples do not trust government for good and obvious reasons.” I urged both sides to meet at a negotiating table, away from government, if necessary, “to arrest the cancer of distrust, a cancer that no Canadian should assume is going to stop there.”73 I continue to receive calls from government officials and interested individuals making the point that my university, given its raison d’être and the deep historic ties between the Acadian and Mi’kmaq communities, should do something. I agree. That said, I hold that it is up to the Indigenous communities to decide who can help and how. Non-Indigenous Canadians have to accept that we have a great deal to answer for in the state of relations with Indigenous peoples. I hold that the development of Indigenous communities will continue to be extremely difficult unless Canada comes to terms with the fact that it has played an important part in holding back the development of the Indigenous peoples and their communities. Canada has to take ownership of its history and play its part in seeing more Indigenous peoples make the transition away from victimhood.

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Albert Levi, a highly respected former Chief of the Elsipogtog First Nation said that his Mi’kmaq people were “a broken people.”74 Prime Minister Justin Trudeau explained why in his response to the tragedy of the residential school system: “the fault of Canada.”75 In brief, telling a broken people to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps can only make sense for those who have little knowledge of the Indigenous peoples or of economic development. I offer the following suggestions: accept that it is a Canadian problem, not an Indigenous problem – if non-Indigenous Canadians cannot accept that the Indigenous peoples are their equals in all things, then progress will never be possible; recognize that it is not a federal government-only issue, and further, that provincial governments need to step up and play their part; and accept that Canadian natural resources belong to the Indigenous peoples as much as they do to the non-Indigenous Canadians. In short, the challenge belongs to all Canadians. We saw in earlier chapters that some communities and groups wish to continue to remain victims. There is government funding for groups that continue to paint themselves as victims, even after they have obtained the tools and support to prosper. The Indigenous peoples have a legitimate claim for ongoing government help – they have yet to obtain all the tools and support needed to prosper. The process is just now only beginning, in large part because non-Indigenous Canadians wanted it this way. This chapter’s central purpose is to make the point that Canada has, over the years, purposely held back Indigenous peoples. Past and even current government decisions have turned them into victims. I note, however, that many Indigenous communities have fought back successfully, organizing court challenges, and launching measures that are paying dividends. They have shown a remarkable degree of “resistance, resilience, perseverance and innovation to challenging circumstances.”76 Anyone who wishes to see evidence that solid progress can be made towards economic self-sufficiency or that some Indigenous communities can outperform neighbouring communities and lead their region on the economic development path, only needs to look at the Membertou First Nation. No one today can pin the victim status on Membertou. There are other important developments that hold promise for the Indigenous peoples. The Constitution Act, 1982 makes clear their special constitutional status. Many First Nations have also been able to grow their communities through judicial decisions. A growing number of First Nations have been able to make impressive economic gains in recent years, not just Membertou. But much more is needed. I return to this point in the concluding chapter.

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Victims Meet Victims

Several years ago, I asked the dean of science at my university, why there are now more women than men at our medical and law schools – his answer: “While the boys play video games, the girls study.” It is simplistic but there is an element of truth to his observation. Victims of yesterday can remain victims, while new ones are continually created. In my generation, women were expected to be secretaries, nurses, and teachers not executives, lawyers, medical doctors, or school principals. There were only three females in my undergraduate degree program in business and economics at l’Université de Moncton and seventy males. The three females were talented, leading the class in several areas. Looking back, I now see that their experience must not have been all positive because of students and faculty members, nearly all of them male. I now realize that I could have been much more supportive and there were moments where I could have voiced my support. I regret that I did not. But things do change. There are now far more women (63 per cent) than men (37 per cent) at my university and female students lead enrolment at our medical school (65.4 per cent) and law school (55.1 per cent).1 There are also far more women in my university’s graduate programs than was the case some thirty years ago and they are performing very well. This development is hardly limited to my university or to Canada. In the United States, for example, female students now account for 60 per cent of university and college students.2 Because of stereotypes and long-standing prejudices, Canada wasted important talent, over the years. A male graduate student asked, a few years ago, if there was any chance that he could ever work in the federal government – his top career choice. “Why not?” I asked. His response: “Well the girls are now

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getting all the jobs and promotions in government.” I explained that this was not the case and that there was a time when employment with the federal government saw women becoming secretaries and administrative assistants, notwithstanding their talent and skills for more senior positions, while men were on a fast track for managerial positions or became senior policy analysts. Those days are gone – as they should be. I added that it was only fitting that measures be put in place to ensure the full participation of both genders. I also told him that the federal government should always have room for the best and brightest, male or female, who want to serve the public. I am not confident that my views had much of an impact. He never joined the federal public service. My former student is hardly the first to raise the reverse discrimination issue. Many white males now see themselves as victims to various employment equity measures. There is also a growing body of literature on the issue.3

e mPl o y m e n t e qU Ity Pol I cI eS Governments are coming to terms with past policies and practices that strongly favoured members of the majority or the dominant groups in society and are realizing that something should be done. It explains why governments throughout the Western world have introduced employment equity or affirmative action measures. In Canada, both the federal and provincial governments have embraced employment equity policies, albeit some more determined than others. The argument is that past policies were discriminatory and that something is required to rectify long-standing practices that have seriously inhibited the ability of minority groups to participate in public institutions. The thinking behind employment equity measures is that designated groups are confronting historical challenges. In Canada, the designated groups include women, visible minorities, Indigenous peoples and persons with disabilities. The federal government passed into law a series of regulations to ensure that no one is denied employment opportunities for reasons unrelated to abilities – therein lies the problem for my former male student and others who think that they are better qualified than the person sitting next to them at interviews for government positions but that employment equity measures discriminate against them. Ottawa introduced the Federal Contractors Program under the Employment Equity Act (1986) and passed the new Employment Equity Act in 1996. Under the first measure, businesses looking for contracts

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with the federal government for goods and services over a certain amount ($1 million in 1986) were required to confirm in writing their commitment to employment equity. The Employment Equity Act, meanwhile, seeks to correct the conditions of disadvantage in employment for designated groups.4 The act requires the minister responsible for Labour to submit an annual report to Parliament on progress made in federally regulated private sector firms. At the close of 2018, 603 private sector firms had submitted the requested documentation to the minister of Labour, who compiled it in his report. The firms employed 771,698 employees, representing nearly 4 per cent of Canada’s workforce. The report documents efforts made since 1987, the year that firms began reporting under the act. The results show that some progress was made with regards to Indigenous peoples’ employment between 1987 and 2000, but that there has been limited progress since then. Important progress was made, meanwhile, for some members of visible minorities, since 1987. The same, however, cannot be said for the other groups. The report points out that: “Women, Aboriginal peoples and persons with disabilities remain under-represented. The representation of women decreased from 40.2% in 2017 to 39.4% in 2018, which is the lowest level of representation for this designated group since the implementation of the act in 1986. Aboriginal peoples remained at 2.3% and persons with disabilities increased from 3.3% in 2017 to 3.4% in 2018.”5 Things, however, are different in the public sector. The Government of Canada has a long-standing policy to build its public service to reflect “the makeup of the population it serves.” The government maintains that merit remains an important cornerstone of the public service but it is not clear how it squares with building a representative bureaucracy. Ottawa’s Employment Equity Act designates the same four employment equity groups in the public service as the ones targeted by employment equity measures in the private sector: women, Indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, and members of visible minorities.6 The federal government has clearly outperformed the private sector in pursuing employment equity measures. The annual report tabled in 2021 had this to say: “Representation of Indigenous Peoples has remained stable, and representation of women and members of visible minorities, which already met workforce availability, continued to increase. Hiring and promotion rates for women and members of visible minorities also showed positive signs, suggesting that the number

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of members of these two groups will continue to meet or exceed workforce availability.”7 The report adds that “the representation rate for women steadily increased, including for executives, and continues to exceed estimated workforce availability.”8 Things, however, are not nearly as positive for Indigenous peoples – they have yet to achieve representative levels at parity with workforce availability in the executive group. In addition, they are leaving the public service at a higher rate than their peers.9 The same can also be said about persons with disabilities. Their hiring and promotion is lower than employees in general and promotions are also decreasing compared to previous years.10 Members of visible minorities, however, are doing better. There is a “slight increase” in their numbers in executive positions and in their hiring and promotions.11 The government is planning to do more to promote employment equity for designated groups in the private sector. It unveiled a thirteen-people task force in July 2021 to carry out an extensive review of the Employment Equity Act with a goal of strengthening employment opportunities for the designated groups in the business sector.12 Ottawa also amended the Public Service Employment Act, in order to implement the Pay Equity Act, and pursue pay transparency measures and put in place more effective harassment and violence prevention policies in the workplace. How then do employment equity measures square with the merit principle? That, in essence, is what my student was asking. He assumed that he could secure employment in the federal government if the merit principle applied but not if other considerations entered into the hiring process, including considerations conceived to assist those from the four designated groups. Ironically, this was the same point that Englishspeaking male university students were making to me in the 1970s when Ottawa made a strong push to hire more Francophones. The point – changing the rules to assist victims of prejudices and stereotypes can create new victims. However, one can just as easily make the case that employment equity measures are necessary to arrest past employer bias where designated groups saw their qualifications systematically undervalued. The measures may well make winners out of those who should have been winners in years past but lost, or never even applied for job competitions, because they assumed that they never stood a chance. They had reasons to regard themselves as victims to a hiring process that downplayed their skills because they were not members of the dominant group. I am of the view that the merit principle is a moving target. I have sat on hiring committees with the Government of Canada and I have often seen the merit principle adjusted to fit what the senior executives

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or managers were looking for, even, at times, for a specific individual. In brief, bureaucratic patronage or favoritism is more widespread in the federal public service than political patronage, notwithstanding the requirements of the Public Service Employment Act. It will be recalled that the act was amended in 1997 to delegate more hiring authority directly to front line executives and managers and to transform the Public Service Commission into an oversight body rather than a hiring agency. In any event, the act was designed to protect the public service against politicians and partisan politics, not against itself. The revisions to this act gave executives and managers a freer hand in staffing their operations. This is not to suggest that there is no value in the merit principle. It is still possible to establish firm hiring criteria: for example, an engineering degree, a law degree, or a number of years of experience in a given field. However, when candidates meet basic requirements, the senior executive or manager can usually get who he or she wants. The point – merit can be objectively determined but only up to a point. Other factors like culture, gender, values, race, class, where one went to university, and other biases, also come into play. Past attitudes, stereotypes, and practices create invisible barriers that in turn create victims. Numbers matter, because a scorecard on who is in, who has been hired, and who was promoted not only creates winners but also victims. Numbers can also lead one to think that he or she was the best qualified for the position but lost because of employment equity or affirmative action programs. Winning a competition is hardly the end of the story. Once in government, an Indigenous person or a member of a visible minority can still come face to face with old prejudices and a traditional White male work culture or, more recently, a White male and female work culture. The culture and the tendency to stereotype certain groups may have become more subtle and more frowned upon in recent years in most government departments, but they are still there in certain places.13 It is increasingly difficult to determine who the victim is now. The Indigenous individual who may well have been hired but then discovers that he or she does not fit in Ottawa’s bureaucratic culture can legitimately claim that he or she remains a victim. The White man is losing standing in the pecking order inside government and he is now convinced that he has become a victim to employment equity measures. The White male who did not get promoted as fast or as far as he envisaged will now also view himself as a victim. Rather than look in the mirror to understand why he failed to win more competitions, he can look to employment equity measures as the culprit – not only is it easier to do, but it is also self-serving.

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Those who believe that they have become victims to employment equity measures can turn to the data to try to give weight to their argument. We know that women have made solid progress in the federal public service where they occupy more positions than in years past. They made up for over 55 per cent of the federal public service in 2018, up from 52 per cent in 2000 and 32 per cent in 1990.14 They also occupied about 49.4 per cent of executive positions in 2019, up from 43.7 per cent, as recently as 2010.15 I hasten to note, however, that this is not the case with the private sector, as data noted earlier clearly showed. It is the private sector’s loss given that it is not taking advantage of the available talent and skills. The Economist magazine, hardly a publication known for singing the praises of women in the workplace, recently ran an article that made the case: “Why nations that fail women fail?”16 There are numerous studies maintaining that the business community should hire more women if it wants access to the best available talent. More women on staff tends to reduce staff turnover and strengthen teamwork. The International Labour Organization also claims that having more women on staff increases productivity.17 Government can introduce measures to encourage private sector firms to hire more women and appoint them to senior management positions but, ultimately, it is up to businesses to see the economic advantages of bringing more women on staff and in senior executive and management positions. Employment of Indigenous peoples in the federal public service, meanwhile, has remained stable at 5 per cent. However, they only occupy 4 per cent of the executive positions which shows little progress from previous years. We also know that Indigenous peoples are promoted at lower rates than members of nondesignated groups. In addition, they are less likely to apply for positions in the federal public service than non-Indigenous individuals. They are also less likely to perceive public service staffing processes as fair, transparent, and merit-based.18 It is worth underlining the point once again that women have made solid progress, particularly over the past twenty years, both in numbers in the federal public service, and in executive positions. The progress is such that one could make the case that, when it comes to the federal government, they should no longer be included as a designated group under the Employment Equity Act, if one only looks at numbers. More to the point, at least when it comes to the federal public service, women are victims no more. If nothing else, the progress made raises the question – at what point should a designated group lose its standing when pursuing employment

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equity measures? As we saw above, there are now more women than men in the federal public service and women hold over 50 per cent of executive positions. That said, the private sector has not been nearly as successful in attracting women to its ranks, notably in senior executive positions, as noted earlier. Women are not alone in becoming full participants in the federal public service. Francophones (individuals with French as their first official language), who constituted 22.8 per cent of the Canadian population in 2019, accounted for 28.5 per cent of public service employees in 2016, which is essentially the same proportion as in 1990.19 This is a marked improvement from 1946, when Francophones only held 13 per cent of the federal service jobs and very few of them occupied senior management positions. At the time, they represented 30 per cent of Canada’s population.20 Why have some groups made substantial progress (women and Francophones) but not others? Put differently, how have some groups been able to shake off their victim label while others remain victims? Indigenous peoples have not succeeded in improving their participation in the federal public service either in numbers or in executive positions. It is not because they do not enjoy support at the most senior political level. We know that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has often publicly voiced his strong support for Indigenous peoples ever since his government came to power in 2015. But clearly that is not enough. Francophones and women, at least when it comes to the federal public service, have several things in common. Numbers matter because they translate into political clout. In New Brunswick, Acadians account for about one third of the province’s population. Francophones – as noted – account for 22.8 per cent of Canada’s population and women, over 50 per cent. In contrast, Indigenous peoples account for about 5 per cent, though visible minorities represent some 22.3 per cent of Canada’s population. Ottawa defines visible minorities as “persons, other than Aboriginal peoples, who are non-Caucasian in race or nonwhite in colour.” This population includes “South Asian, Chinese, Black, Filipino, Latin American, Arab, Southeast Asian, West Asian, Korean and Japanese.”21 Black Canadians make up about 4 per cent of Canada’s population.22 They have a solid presence in the federal public service (3.5 per cent), however, they are overrepresented in the administrative support category (5.1 per cent) and substantially underrepresented in executive positions (1.6 per cent) and in the operational category (1.7 per cent).23 This may lead Black Canadians to think that stereotypes come into play when it

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comes to their participation in government – the Ottawa bureaucratic system may well see them in various administrative support roles such as chauffeurs to Cabinet ministers and administrative assistants but not as senior executives or managers. Black Canadians, like Indigenous peoples, lack what Acadians in New Brunswick as well as Francophones and women had, to make the transition away from victimhood in the Canadian public service – numbers that translate into votes, political clout, and role models. Numbers and votes allow role models to emerge. Employment equity measures not only open up opportunities for designated groups, but they also benefit minority employees already in the public service by creating a critical mass. Numerical inferiority, together with history, explains, at least in part, why Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians have not been able to become full participants in the federal public service. I saw firsthand the impact the election of Louis J. Robichaud as premier of New Brunswick in 1960 had on the provincial public service. Shortly after he came to power, more and more Acadians joined the public service. He was a role model for those wishing to contribute to public life. It took thirty-forty years, but the transition is now complete. Acadians have a strong presence at all levels in the New Brunswick public service. I also saw firsthand what the appointment of Paul Tellier as clerk of the Privy Council in 1985 did for Francophones and what the appointment of Jocelyne Bourgon to the same position did for women in the public service. Both rose to the top because of their superior skills, not because they were a Francophone or a woman. They cleared the way for others to follow. Suddenly, it no longer made sense to say that someone was able to secure an executive position because they were a Francophone or a woman – one only had to point to Paul Tellier or Jocelyne Bourgon to prove this.

Bl a c k c a n a dI a n S aS vI ctI mS Role models showing the way is important but so is history. We saw earlier the unparalleled difficult history of the Indigenous peoples. Black Canadians also have a very difficult history, full of broken promises and hardships. I urge the readers to consult Blacks in Canada: A History. The widely acclaimed book provides a comprehensive and highly accessible history of Black Canadians that goes back to 1628. We know that, early on, New France turned to slaves from Africa for help to pursue opportunities in the New World in mining, fishery, and agriculture. Louis XIV, the Sun King, agreed to the request to ship

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African slaves to North America, albeit with one concern. He feared that the move could prove costly to New France because the “Negro” could have difficulty adjusting to “a radically different climate.”24 No matter, slavery became a fairly common practice in New France. Records show that when the British won the Battle of Quebec, there were some 3,600 slaves, both Blacks and Indigenous peoples. Slavery continued after the conquest in Upper Canada until 1793, when legislation was passed to make it illegal to bring enslaved people into the colony. The British Empire abolished the slave trade in 1807 and it later did away with slavery altogether in 1834.25 Great Britain’s decision to abolish slavery at home and in its colonies turned its North American colonies into a safe haven for slaves in the United States. Many made their way north through the Underground Railroad in search of their freedom and a fresh beginning. During the US War of Independence, Britain made it clear to enslaved people that they could earn their freedom, enjoy full protection from British forces, and be given land, if they fought against American revolutionaries. Black Loyalists arrived in the British colonies in the aftermath of the American Revolution. They represented about 10 per cent of all British Empire Loyalists that came to British North America. Before the American Revolution, there were a few thousand African slaves who came to the British North American colonies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. However, the American Revolution would change this. Britain gave passage to some three thousand “free” Blacks who had remained loyal to the Crown and they quickly responded.26 At one point, Nova Scotian Black Loyalists constituted the largest settlement of free Blacks outside of Africa. Another wave of Black Loyalists – having received the same promises but renamed Black Refugees – came to the Maritime region, Ontario, and Quebec after the War of 1812.27 In all, over thirty thousand slaves came to Canada through the Underground Railroad between the 1850s and the end of the US Civil War. They settled mostly in southern Ontario. Later, a number of Black people migrated to Canada in search of work and many became porters with railroad companies in all regions of the country.28 Black Loyalists and Black Refugees soon realized that promises of land were rarely kept. Those that were, delivered land plots that were much smaller than offered and they were located in areas very poorly fit for agricultural purposes. For example, the Regulus, carrying 371 escaped and liberated slaves from the War of 1812, arrived in Saint John in 1815. The promised land grants were only given in 1836, an inauspicious beginning for any chance of promoting an entrepreneurial culture.29 The land was also of very poor quality.

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W.S. MacNutt, in his history of New Brunswick, claims that Black Loyalists and Black Refugees “showed no disposition to farming.”30 He never, however, addressed whether the land granted was arable. It was not. Other historians report that Black Loyalists and Black Refugees were allocated only small rectangular, rocky plots and only after a long wait. Unlike White Loyalists, the allotted acreage to Black Loyalists was too small for multi-plot farming or to divide into smaller pieces.31 The land granted to Black Loyalists and Black Refugees was also not suitable for much else than farming or growing anything of value. In brief, promises were made but they were not kept, turning Black Loyalists and Black Refugees into victims. A British company decided to offer relocation to Sierra Leone, in West Africa, to Black Loyalists and about half accepted the offer, including seventy families from the Saint John area and over one thousand from Nova Scotia.32 They concluded that loyalty was a one way street – they were loyal to the British Crown but the Colonial Office was not loyal to them in return, never honouring promises it had made. Barry Cahill asserted that Black Loyalists were more myth than reality. He explained: “Neither the Black Loyalist hypothesis nor the myth to which it gave rise allows for the fact that it was racism tout court which prevented the fugitive-slave refugees from being, or being seen to be, Loyalists.”33 No matter how one may wish to classify people of African descent, they encountered – and still encounter – deep-seated prejudice and discrimination.34 A “Not Welcomed” sign to Canada went up to Black immigrants in 1911. The Wilfrid Laurier government passed an Order in Council designed to ban Black persons from entering Canada. The order came after about 1,500 Black Americans had migrated, mostly to Western Canada, arriving mainly from Oklahoma. It will be recalled that a number of Black Oklahomans were lynched by mobs of White supremacists between 1908 and 1916.35 Ottawa feared a sudden influx of Black fugitives and decided to put a stop to it. The Laurier government came up with a reason in its Order in Council that looks nothing short of absurd today, if not blatant racism: “the negro race … is deemed unsuitable to the climate and requirements of Canada.”36 The above to make the point that there are two groups – Black Canadians and Indigenous peoples – who remain victims. They remain victims not just in terms of their lack of participation in the federal public service, notably at the senior levels, but also in their ability to participate fully in Canadian society. They are victims because promises were made and most of them were broken.

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The unemployment rate among Black Canadians stands at 12.5 per cent compared to 7.3 per cent for nonracialized Canadians; Black men earned, on average, $37,817 in 2015, compared to $56,920 for Canadian men who are not visible minorities. Meanwhile, Black women earned, on average, $31,900 in the same year, compared to $38,247 for their nonracialized counterparts. Things do not improve for Black Canadians when looking at other data, including investment income.37 Indigenous peoples are also confronting extremely difficult economic challenges. They trail the Canadian average in all economic indicators: labour force participation rate is lower, unemployment rate is higher, income is substantially lower while income from transfer payments is higher, high school completion rate is lower, as is the self-employment rate and the list goes on.38 I can add that Indigenous peoples are overrepresented in Canada’s judicial system and that 47 per cent of First Nations children live in poverty.39 I return to these points later. I maintain that history, broken commitments, bigotry, and racism tout court,40 tied to misguided public policies, explain not only why they became victims but also why they remain victims to this day. Other groups were able to shake free of victimhood because of public policies and because they were given the tools needed to leave victimhood behind. Not so for Black Canadians and Indigenous peoples. It is extremely difficult, if at all possible, for an individual and even less so for groups, to start fresh one morning and simply ignore centuries of discrimination, prejudices, and abuse. Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians were brought low by government policies over many decades, if not centuries, in the case of the Indigenous peoples. I hold that there are now few in Canada that can tell governments that they need a helping hand to break free of their victimhood status, but Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians stand at the top of the list.

w h o IS r eS Po nS I Ble? I acknowledge that some of my friends and colleagues – by no means all – insist that we should not be held accountable for how governments and generations before us dealt with minority groups. One, for example, argued that it would not be proper to hold the current Federal Republic of Germany government responsible for the atrocities that Nazi Germany committed and that the same logic should apply to Canada when it comes to Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians. The argument goes that Canada today is not the Canada of 1867, or Sir

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Wilfrid Laurier’s Canada, and that it is not possible to hold politicians to account for past policies and decisions. I maintain, however, that Canadians, collectively, bear some responsibility for past deeds, the good as well as the bad. We cannot avoid coming to terms with the values that shaped the Canada of 155 years ago. I also argue that we need to make amends for past national shames such as removing Indigenous children from their families, or Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s decision to stop Black Americans from taking refuge in Canada because of our weather. Put differently, we need to come to terms with our country’s unacceptable past behaviour. While today’s Canadians and their politicians cannot be held accountable for past gross injustices, I do think that they and we have a responsibility to help make things right. I recognize that Canadians and their governments can offer any number of reasons to do little or do nothing. The cost of rectifying past injustices is high. Think of what the cost would be, for example, to compensate Acadians for the land grabbed after the 1755 Expulsion of the Acadians. Think also of the bureaucratic nightmare, trying to sort out who would be on the receiving end of any compensation package for how politicians dealt with the Indigenous peoples fifty, one hundred, one hundred fifty, and two hundred years ago. Some observers insist that the best that can be done is to establish a commission of inquiry, apologize and leave it at that. There are of course many ways to apologize – it can be done in a manner that minimizes past injustices and excludes financial compensation. A government can also address historical wrongs by praising the country’s laws and government and compare it to what existed one hundred years ago, essentially leaving it at that.41 Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians stand out because Canada had a direct hand in bringing them low. The federal government made commitments to both but failed to honour them. They were thus buffeted about as second-class citizens for years in a world where it did not matter what promises were made or if they were kept. Promises were made to get things done in the interest of the White majority and to meet the political moment or the economic requirement of the day, but once the moment passed, the commitments were ignored. In brief, in the eyes of the dominant groups in society, the two groups did not measure up as full citizens. Other groups, notably visible minorities, are also dealing with important challenges. They, too, confront racial discrimination. Hardly a day goes by without hearing the media reporting on somebody from a visible minority community being harassed in a public place. In a short period of time, two events in the Maritime region made this point.

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A Muslim family was subjected to physical and mental abuse in September of 2021 in Moncton. The media reported that the attacks may well have been motivated by the fact that Mohammed Benyoussef’s daughter was wearing a hijab. The attacker told Benyoussef to “go back to his country,” and “physically attacked” him. It may have been lost on the attacker that the Indigenous peoples could have told his ancestors the very same thing.”42 The same week, a twenty-three-year-old youth from India’s Punjab was murdered in Truro, Nova Scotia, in what was called a “racially motivated crime.” The victim worked for a local taxi firm and was also employed part-time in two restaurants. He had come to Nova Scotia to pursue his studies.43 Sadly, these are hardly isolated cases. It will also be recalled that four members of a Muslim family were killed in a “premeditated vehicle attack” in June 2021. An official with the London, Ontario, police said: “There is evidence that this was a planned premeditated act and that the family was targeted because of their Muslim faith.”44 Six Muslims were also killed in a Quebec City mosque in 2017, and anti-Asian hate crimes have been surging across Canada in recent years – by one count, there were 891 reported incidents over a several month period.45 Does the above make these groups victims? Yes, of course. They are victims of prejudices and racism – we should confront racism in Canada at every turn. Governments need to make every effort to educate Canadians on the dangers of racism. However, governments have a special responsibility towards the Indigenous peoples, in particular. In the case of Indigenous peoples, Canada is dealing with racism, broken agreements, broken promises, and government policies that have marginalized and destroyed the self-confidence of a people. Things are different for the other groups. They came to Canada for a fresh start. In a number of cases, they came in as refugees, leaving behind situations where they were victims. They were not lied to and given false promises. They were not pushed off their land and transplanted on small remote and isolated parcels of land. They responded by becoming productive participants in Canadian society. I see evidence of this in my community where, for example, Vietnamese refugees are leading the way in several sectors. There is also evidence that new Canadians are making solid contributions. Studies reveal that new Canadians have lower participation rates in government programs such as Employment Insurance and social assistance than native Canadians.46 All that new Canadians are asking for is a chance for a fresh start and many have made the most of the opportunity. They have launched a number of highly successful businesses in all regions. Immigrants also

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account for one out of every four health-care workers, including 36 per cent of our physicians and 23 per cent of registered nurses.47 New Canadians have produced numerous success stories. As just one of many examples, Dr Lap-Chee Tsui immigrated from China and led the team that discovered the gene responsible for cystic fibrosis at the Toronto Hospital for Sick Children. Immigrants now account for 33 per cent of all business owners with paid staff in Canada. Among many other examples, Karim Hakimi came to Canada and launched Hakim Optical, an optician chain with 161 stores and six hundred employees serving Canadians across the country.48 A recent study reports that new Canadians are more likely to launch a new business that grows more quickly and also creates more jobs than is the case for native-born Canadians. The overall entrepreneurial rate among new Canadians is more than double the rate for people born in Canada.49 New Canadians also have inspiring stories to tell. Jorge Fernandez, the father of Canadian teenager tennis star, Leylah Fernandez, told the media what Canada means to him: “We’re an immigrant family, and we had nothing. Got in with nothing. So, Canada opened up its doors, and if they wouldn’t have done what they did, I wouldn’t have had the opportunities that I have, and I wouldn’t have been able to give them to my daughter. That’s it, so, it means a lot.”50 He, like numerous new Canadians anxious for a fresh start, does not see himself as a victim after arriving in Canada. Canada did not break a commitment to Fernandez, nor did it push him off the land that he once owned, or make him a ward of the state. Canada did not use derogatory words like “savages” to describe his cultural backgrounds and tell him that he did not have the competence to vote or to become full participant in society. The country opened its doors to him and provided a fresh start. As a result, he and other new Canadians do not consider themselves victims. The Indigenous peoples have a different history and a different take on Canada and its opportunities.

w h a t Sh o U l d B e done? As we saw earlier, Black Canadians have a solid presence in the federal public service at 3.5 per cent. That said, the federal government could do more to develop the management skills of Black Canadians to enable them to access more senior positions. Ottawa can point the finger at provincial governments and argue that they also should do more to

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integrate Black Canadians into their economies. However, it also needs to point the finger at itself for not attracting more Black Canadians to the federal public service and provide them with opportunities to go up the ranks. This is the least it could do to right an historical wrong. Ottawa should also ensure that Indigenous peoples play an important role in the country’s public service. It is within the federal government’s capacity to ensure that Indigenous peoples are properly represented in the federal public service and given every opportunity for advancement. The federal public service has and continues to fail the Indigenous peoples at several levels. If the federal government and the federal public service is unable to ensure that Indigenous peoples can find a place in Canada’s public service, it is unlikely that they can do much else for them. Ottawa could look at how it was able to make Francophones and women full participants at all levels in the federal public service and then launch a sustained effort to do the same for Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians. If the prime minister and the Privy Council Office issue a directive to all deputy ministers or permanent heads of government departments and agencies that their performance, their annual bonuses and their future promotions are tied to their ability to better integrate Indigenous peoples in their organizations, more progress will be made. This is necessary because both groups lack the numbers, the critical mass, or the political clout that both women and Francophones had and have. It will be important for Indigenous peoples to have mentors, role models to lead the way. Paul Tellier and others did it for Francophones and any number of women paved the way in the 1990s for others to follow. The point – if there is a will among senior politicians and senior public servants in Ottawa to see Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians become full participants in the federal public service, then it will happen.

l o o kIn g Back The federal government has the capacity to help victims make the transition from victimhood to full participation in its institutions and society, starting with its public service. It decided in the late 1960s that, unlike in years past, Francophones would henceforth play an important role in the public service. It was successful. It decided in the 1990s to see women become full participants at all levels in the public service, and again, it was successful. The same is not true for Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians. The federal public service still falls short, both in their total number employed and in the number of senior management positions they hold.

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It is worth repeating the point that the federal government needs to do more, much more, to attract Indigenous peoples to the federal public service at all levels of the organization. However, the challenges confronting the Indigenous peoples, in particular, extend to all public policy fields and cover all aspects of socio-economic development. I return to this point in subsequent chapters.

8

Are There Others?

I discussed my thinking about victims with a well-known Moncton business leader in July 2021. He said: “Everybody sees themselves as victims.” I then asked: “Even the business community?” His response: “Yes, of course, because we are victims to government spending, government bureaucracy and government regulations.” Another local businessman told me: “Well, somebody has to pay the bills and that is us.” When discussing this book with an English-speaking Quebecer, he said: “Heh, we are the true victims in Canada. Just look at what the government of Quebec and now the federal government are doing if you want to see evidence of this. We even have to fill in forms if we want our children to attend English-language schools.” I was struck that, while working on this book, I did not hear anyone say that he or she or their group were not victims. This even includes highly successful businesspeople and senior government officials. Everyone, it seems, sees himself or herself as a victim at some level and the culprit is nearly always government or past government policies.

t h e B U S In eS S c ommU n Ity Canada owes a great deal to its business community, in particular its entrepreneurs. As I wrote elsewhere, it is the entrepreneurs who propel economies forward.1 Our business community has shown remarkable resilience and has been highly competitive in a very competitive global economy. How then can members of the business community see themselves as victims? I hasten to add that they only see themselves as victims of misguided government policies, not victims of society. I also note that my

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discussions with representatives of the business community took place during the covId -19 pandemic, at a time when the federal government introduced numerous measures to attenuate the sting of the pandemic’s economic impact on everyone and in every region. The business community, even in my own region where unemployment levels are consistently higher than the national average, now identifies labour shortages as the single most important challenge. Many point the finger at the federal government as the culprit. They argue that Ottawa’s various support programs for individuals during the pandemic encouraged workers to stay home, away from the workplace.2 They insist that generous government programs have given rise to a labour shortage, forcing some businesses to curtail operations or put growth strategies on hold. In my discussions, no one from the business community made any reference to Ottawa’s several support programs to the private sector to help it deal with the pandemic.3 However, I did raise the issue and one businessman told me: “Well, if the government is stupid enough to give me money, I am stupid enough to take it.” I replied: “Well, wouldn’t the same logic apply to the worker who is staying home and drawing benefits either from the Canada Recovery Benefit program or Employment Insurance?” He simply shrugged and did not respond. For the most part, the business community did very well under Ottawa’s covId -19 programs. Businesses, including some highly successful ones throughout the pandemic, were able to get wages partly bankrolled by taxpayers under the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (cewS ) program. Ottawa spent more on this program during the pandemic than it did on child benefits, health-care transfers, equalization payments, or pandemic benefits to individuals. Both the media and the Parliamentary Budget Officer called on Ottawa to be more transparent with regards to the amounts each company received and the pay period each amount covered. The call, however, fell on deaf ears. We know that hedge fund managers and “some of the largest wealth managers in the country … collected cewS .”4 We also know that between March 2020 and 10 May 2021 the federal government, under cewS , allocated more than $77 billion to “approximately 443,000 companies, making it one of the largest relief programs in the country’s history. Its size is linked to the fact that the program does not discriminate against companies that reported declining revenues for reasons other than the pandemic, or, like the hedge funds, that ended up performing well throughout the course of the year despite one or two quarters of poor performance.”5

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I accept that our business community has legitimate grievances with government. I sat on some private sector board of directors, collaborated with several of Canada’s leading entrepreneurs (Harrison McCain, Arthur Irving, and John Bragg), saw government operations from the inside and wrote about government bureaucracy and its shortcomings. The business community can make the case that the federal government is wasteful, that its bureaucracy is seriously overstaffed for what it does, that when challenged, the public service always claims that it falls short because it lacks sufficient resources, that it is incapable of dealing with nonperformers, that it is largely inapt at reallocating resources from low priority areas to important ones, that it has far too many management levels, that government bureaucracy in general has a bias for inaction, that it is too generous in compensating its employees – more generous than the private sector is to its staff.6 All of this is true. According to a 2015 report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, if federal government employees were compensated at the same rate as their private sector counterparts, Canadian taxpayers would save up to $20 billion a year.7 Many of these shortcomings are self-inflicted but some are not. Those that are not actually speak to the public and private sectors being different, where expectations are different and so are accountability and oversight requirements. Government bureaucracy, by definition, can never be as efficient as private sector firms, as people on the receiving end of government services understand. But Canada’s business community hardly qualifies as a victim. The community has the means – from organizations like the Business Council of Canada and high-priced lobbyists – not only to make its views known to government, but also to influence government decisions. Business leaders also have easier access to political and bureaucratic leaders than others in society. A leading member of Canada’s business community is likely to get his or her call to the clerk of the Privy Council or a senior minister returned. The average Canadian, much less so, if at all.

what a BoU t c hIn e S e a n d jaPane Se canad I an S ? Family members and friends told me that if I am to write about victims, then I need to report on how Canada treated Chinese and Japanese Canadians. They have a point. Historically, Canada has proven to be a hostile environment to both. As is well known, Chinese Canadians played an important role in the construction of the country’s national railway system. Chinese

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Canadians laboured under extremely difficult conditions to build the Canadian Pacific Railway. They were paid sub-standard wages and more than six hundred perished, because of dangerous working conditions.8 Things did not improve for them in the decades that followed. Chinese immigrants had to pay a “head tax,” making them the only ethnic group forced to pay a head tax to enter Canada. Things said one hundred years ago about Chinese and Japanese immigrants are extremely offensive, at least to today’s ears. I am also at a loss to explain why these words were not viewed as offensive and unacceptable even then. Ottawa established a Royal Commission on Chinese and Japanese Immigration in 1902 which concluded that Asians were “unfit for full citizenship, obnoxious to a free community and dangerous to the state.” The Chinese head tax was increased and on Canada Day 1923, the federal government enacted legislation that suspended immigration from China. The legislation was only repealed in 1947.9 Japanese immigrants to Canada did not fare much better. They were at first denied the rights given to other citizens, including the right to vote and to work in certain sectors, such as the public service and the practice of law. During the Second World War, Ottawa decided to intern and disperse over twenty thousand Japanese Canadians. Ottawa also ordered the removal of all Japanese Canadians residing within 160 kilometers from the Pacific coast. The federal government then decided to sell all Japanese Canadian-owned property in British Columbia between 1943 and 1946 “in preparation for their deportation after the war.”10 To their credit, both Chinese and Japanese Canadians did not wear the victim status for very long, if ever. Ottawa did, in time, apologize to both groups and provided compensation for past wrongs. The point – federal government policies were clearly discriminatory towards Chinese and Japanese Canadians. They hurt both communities and turned them into victims. However, the federal government later sought to make things right by making an apology and offer compensation. Prime Minister Brian Mulroney observed in 1988 that: “We cannot change the past. But we must, as a nation, have the courage to face up to these historical facts.”11 The federal government offered a $300 million compensation package to Japanese Canadians that included $21,000 for each of the survivors, $12 million for a Japanese community development fund, and $24 million towards a Canadian race relations foundation.12 Prime Minister Harper also offered a full apology to Chinese Canadians for the head tax and saying no to Chinese immigrants between 1923

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and 1947. He said: “For over six decades, these malicious measures, aimed solely at the Chinese, were implemented with deliberation by the Canadian state. This was a grave injustice, and one we are morally obligated to acknowledge.” Ottawa also decided to make a symbolic payment of $20,000 to living Chinese head taxpayers and surviving spouses, a $24 million national historical recognition program to support community projects and a $10 million national historical recognition program.13 Chinese and Japanese Canadians have and continue to make substantial contributions to Canadian society. This, even though they faced roadblocks along the way and they could, at one point, legitimately claim to have been victims of government policies – apart from the above, provincial laws also prohibited Chinese or Canadian Japaneseowned businesses from hiring White women. Both Chinese and Japanese Canadians have carved out a large presence in the public service, business, the arts, and in sports. Hong Kong-born and Canada’s 26th Governor General Adrienne Clarkson, had an award-winning and distinguished eighteen-year career in broadcasting. Tommy Shoyama, a Japanese Canadian, became one of the most widely respected public servants in Ottawa in the 1970s, serving as deputy minister of Finance between 1975 and 1979. He also had a distinguished career in the provincial public service. Patrick Chan, a Canadian of Chinese descent, is an Olympic silver and gold medalist in figure skating. Thomas Fung, a Chinese Canadian, built a media and real estate empire and has provided philanthropic support to numerous causes.14 I can easily add to the list. Chinese and Japanese Canadians have become full participants in Canada’s economy. Employment and participation rates among the Chinese Canadian population, for example, are comparable with those of non-visible minorities. I note, however, that the participation rate of Chinese Canadian youth is lower than the Canadian average, which is explained, at least in part, by their higher participation rate as full-time students. I also note that hourly earnings for Chinese Canadian men and women are higher than for other minority groups.15 We know that Chinese and Japanese Canadians attach a great deal of importance to education. Statistics Canada produced a comparative study in 2019 of academic achievement among immigrants that is revealing on several fronts. It shows that both Chinese and Japanese Canadians outperformed other groups, in some cases by a wide margin.16 Visible minorities have different histories and have been confronted to varying degrees of prejudices. Canada is hardly the only Western country to have a shameful history of racism and bigotry. I maintain, however,

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that Canada stands out among its peers in acknowledging its past, in coming to terms with it, and in extending a helping hand to victims of past negative government policies. I do not think that it is possible to compare one minority group with another to explain different levels of success. One friend asked after reading a first draft of the manuscript: “Why can’t the Aboriginals do like the Chinese Canadians and get on with things?” The question assumes that both have similar histories, the same experiences and the same opportunities. No victim and no minority group starts from the same position.

P o l ItI cIa n S a n d P U BlI c S ervant S A 2021 survey of Canadians reveals that politicians rank near the bottom among the most respected professions, only above car salespeople and owners of social media platforms. Firefighters, nurses, and farmers stand at the top.17 Politicians know well how to read public opinion surveys. Many politicians see themselves as victims and some have told me as such. They may well have a point. Social media and increasingly demanding transparency requirements have not helped matters, at least from the perspective of politicians. It is exceedingly more difficult to be a politician today than it was in years past. I remind readers that C.D. Howe, the so-called minister of everything in the Mackenzie King and Louis St-Laurent governments, would review his extensive personal stock portfolio every week on the basis of the government’s decisions and any information he had learned inside government during the week. No one thought anything of the fact that Howe was an active investor and a powerful minister at the same time: “There was no chorus of claims that he was corrupt or that his decisions were tainted by his own personal interests. It was felt that he would never take a decision as minister that was not in the public interest. Howe saw no contradiction between doing good for his country and doing well for himself. There was a high level of trust in public officials then. Those days are long gone.”18 One leading Canadian journalist wonders if we have gone too far in our suspicion of those who run for office: “Egged on by a voracious press, we have lost all trust in politicians and public servants. We have placed so many restrictions on them, stripped them of so much privacy, that many citizens decide to remain in private life rather than face such scrutiny.”19 In the process, politicians and public servants now face a level of public scrutiny that we would not tolerate anywhere, except in government.

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The age of deference toward politicians and career public servants is over. Blame it on the politicians themselves, on the rise of social media, on the polarization of Canadian politics, on demanding transparency requirements and “gotcha” journalism, but Canadians no longer hold the respect that they once had for their politicians. Neil Nevitte, in his book The Decline of Deference: Canadian Value Change in Cross National Perspective, argues that Canadians have undergone a transition of values – we are less deferential to political leaders and more willing to protest policies that we found lacking for any number of reasons.20 He published his findings in 1996 and, if anything, the decline of deference has only accelerated. Politicians are now subject to vile abuse. It will be recalled, for example, that unspeakable insults were hurled at federal Cabinet Minister Catherine McKenna in the fall of 2019. Maclean’s magazine wrote that behind the insults “is a powder keg of anxiety, resentment, and a lot of anger.”21 McKenna decided not to run in the next general election. The McKenna incident is hardly an isolated case.22 Gary Mason wrote: “Ms McKenna is precisely the type of person we hope to attract to politics: smart, articulate, passionate about important issues, a fierce advocate for women and girls. Her absence leaves a hole. But who can blame her for wanting to leave given the constant harassment she faced? Why would anyone want to go into politics these days?”23 Social media have made things much more difficult for politicians. The Economist wrote: “Social media provide platforms for monomaniacs who previously raged in the privacy of their bedsits. People who might hesitate to berate their fellow citizens in person show no such qualms when it comes to sounding off against virtual targets. Bad-tempered tweets, dashed off in seconds, elicit bad-tempered responses, creating a culture of vitriol.”24 Brad Lavigne, a long-time political adviser to the ndP , writes that: “Social media also amplifies the so-called bozo eruptions” in the political discourse.25 Taylor Owen asks, “Does Facebook threaten the integrity of Canadian democracy?” He provides the answer: “Yes.”26 Aspiring politicians need to understand that there is no such thing as yesterday’s news. What you said or did when you were sixteen years old remains with you, only to be discovered by the “war room” in any of the opposing political parties. This alone may well discourage otherwise highly qualified aspiring politicians to run for office for fear that a bad decision dating back ten to twenty years would jump up to embarrass them and their family. Canadians need to ask the same question Gary Mason inquired – why would anyone want to run for political office today? There was a time

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when politics attracted highly accomplished individuals – think of Louis St-Laurent, one of Canada’s leading corporate lawyers in his day, Lester B. Pearson, a Nobel laureate, Mitchell Sharp, who had a distinguished career in the public service before going into politics, and the list goes on. Today, Canadian politics is often populated by career politicians who understand the new political order, who have either grown a thick skin or who know how to manage the blame game. One politician explained how politicians have become victims, even to their own. He said that there is no need for politicians to submit their candidacy for a Senate appointment under the new process. He has a point. Ottawa has sent out signals that politicians need not apply since they would have little chance of success. I served on the Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments for New Brunswick and I was struck by the lack of candidacies from former politicians. Another former politician, Raymond Garneau, told me that it has become very difficult to attract top candidates to run for office. Prospective candidates know that they will be tagged as a Liberal, a Conservative, or an ndP after politics. He explained that politicians, win or lose, will wear their party’s label on their foreheads forever. This, he insists, will only hurt future career prospects. Politicians are not blameless. They and their “war rooms” turn to personal attacks and incendiary language during election campaigns, especially if polls suggest that they are losing support. Politicians and their partisan advisors also need to assess the impact of social media on politics. Some observers argue that social media are “creating a dangerous work environment for politicians” and there is evidence to support this view.27 Doing nothing is not an option. It means accepting that Canada will not be able to attract some of its best people to serve, with one keen observer of Canadian politics insisting that “this is already happening.”28

P U Bl I c S e r v a n tS aS vI ct I mS Federal public servants also no longer enjoy the support they once did from Canadians. They are all too aware that their standing in society has fallen sharply over the past thirty years. Politicians have told them as much, as have numerous public opinion surveys and the media. A major study, based in part on a public opinion survey of Canadians, public servants, and focus groups sponsored by the federal government, delivered a harsh verdict on the state of the Canadian public service. It concluded that Canadians see public servants as “disconnected, lazy and overpaid.”29

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In response, senior public servants have circled the wagons, fending off criticism and concentrating more and more personnel in the national capital region (ncr ). Given Canada’s geography and that the Senate has not been able to give voice to the regions in shaping or assessing national policies, the federal public service has not been as effective as it could be in bringing a regional perspective to bear when shaping policies and programs. As already noted, and for reasons that have never been made clear, the federal public service is far more concentrated in the ncr (48 per cent) than is the case in Australia (38 per cent), the United States (16 per cent), and France (22 per cent).30 Whenever challenged about their work or the size of the federal public service, senior career officials will point to the work of frontline employees with the Canadian Coast Guard or public health officials during a pandemic. They have nothing to say about the hundreds of policy, liaison, evaluation, and coordination units in Ottawa. A government survey carried out in the 1980s to identify all jobs that had at least some responsibility for serving the general public, even if that “some” amounted to 10 per cent of their work, found that only about 40 per cent of public servants dealt with the public as one of their responsibilities – again, even if it amounted to only 10 per cent of their work. That percentage has likely gone down in recent years in light of the trend to a greater concentration of public servants in the ncr .31 Thus, we have reached the point where well over 60 per cent of federal public servants work in policy advisory, coordination, oversight, and back-office functions and have little to no contact with Canadians. As I wrote elsewhere, many employees in these units are kept busy turning a crank that is not attached to anything. Public servants could, in the past, look to politicians to jump to their defence in the public arena. But no more – we have seen many instances in recent years when politicians on the government side did not hesitate to shoot at their own troops. The blame game in government is here to stay. Victims or those with victim reflexes will want to circle the wagons. They look inward to the safety of their own institution and its members. In one of my earlier publications, I described the federal bureaucracy as a “big whale that can’t swim.” The sentence generated a lot of reaction from public servants – to my surprise, a lot of them reacted positively to it, particularly frontline government workers. Though I would not suggest for a moment that it represented a representative survey, I received a number of emails and telephone calls from frontline managers and senior public servants saying that the federal public service did seem to be turning into a big whale that can’t swim. It is

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clear to me that there is a growing disconnect between senior Ottawabased officials and those in the field delivering programs and services. In brief, the federal public service has lost standing with Canadians, as public opinion surveys reveal.32 What is the public service now good at? It can respond when politicians have a clear message – a case in point is how well federal and provincial public servants responded to the covId -19 pandemic. The federal public service also has a well-honed capacity to manage transfer payments to both provincial governments and individuals. It is no longer as adroit, however, in defining bold new measures, in providing objective nonpartisan policy advice to politicians, in managing programs, and in gaining the confidence of Canadians. As Peter Aucoin and others have pointed out, senior public servants have become “promiscuously partisan” in their desire to help politicians run “government by permanent election campaigns.”33 A number of public servants, particularly frontline workers, may well see themselves as victims but they are unlikely to gain the support of Canadians to help them make things right. The federal public service has too many self-inflicted problems – it grows in good or bad times (it grew by 4.6 per cent in 2018–19), it is incapable or unwilling to deal with nonperformers and it is incapable or unwilling to recommend a reallocation of resources from activities that have long passed their best-by date.34 Federal politicians and senior public servants need to heal their institutions because no one else can or will. The cost of running government far outstrips the contributions it makes to Canadian society. Until politicians and career officials deal with this problem, neither will be able to regain fully the confidence and trust of Canadians. Considering themselves as victims and doing nothing about their institutions, starting with Parliament, Cabinet, and the senior echelons of the federal public service, with its ever-growing number of management levels, can only make a bad situation worse. In brief, far too many of its problems are self-inflicted, including piling on accountability and transparency requirements, for anyone else to see the federal public service requiring more support from Canadians. It is within the power of the public service to deal with nonperformers, to reduce management layers, to decentralize operations, and to generate evidence-based policy and program advice, rather than meeting the partisan political requirements of the day. Canadians have every reason to tell the federal public service – heal thyself.

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m In o rIt y l a n gU a g e comm Un I tI eS I was asked, in early spring of 2021, to serve as a member of an “expert panel” on official languages. The then minister responsible for official languages, Mélanie Joly, had pledged to establish the panel when she tabled the document English and French: Towards a Substantive Equality of Official languages in Canada.35 The panel was directed to assess how the act could apply in federally regulated private businesses. When the appointment was made, I received a number of phone calls and emails from friends and colleagues from around Canada, in several cases to offer advice, including two from Quebec Anglophones. It will be recalled that I opened this chapter with one Quebec English-speaking friend making the case that Anglophones are the new victims in Canada. He is hardly the only Quebec Anglophone now making the same case. It will also be recalled that my friend argued, how else would one describe Anglophone Quebecers when parents have to complete a form to send their children to an English-language school. I told him – though Acadians made up for about one-third of Moncton’s population, I could not go to a French-language high school because there was none in the city. I added: “My parents would have happily filled whatever form would have been necessary to be able to send me to a French-language high school and to avoid paying to send me to a private college.” His response: “I really did not know that.” Many Anglophone Quebecers now feel abandoned by Ottawa. The Quebec government tabled Bill 96, an act “respecting French, the official and common language of Quebec.” The legislation is designed to amend twenty-five pieces of provincial legislations and the Canada Constitution Act, 1982. It is also designed to update Bill 101 or the Charter of the French Language. The National Assembly adopted the legislation in May 2022. It declares that Quebecers form a nation, and French to be the only official language of the province of Quebec. The legislative package introduced new measures to strengthen the presence and use of French in Quebec. Among others, the measures include: a requirement that public signs include more French, a stronger effort towards customers being able to be served in French, a francization requirement for firms employing twenty-five or more employees, and more demanding penalties for noncompliance.36 The Quebec government declared that the legislation was designed to invoke the “notwithstanding provision” which in turn would exempt the changes to language laws from judicial scrutiny, ironically a clause in a constitution that Quebec never signed.

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that he was supportive of Quebec’s legislative package. The heads of the other political parties quickly followed his lead and Parliament passed a resolution in support of Quebec’s Bill 96, with 281 mP s voting in support of the motion and only two against, including ex-Justice minister and former attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould. She wrote that political partisanship and “pandering” drove law makers “to abandon core legal norms.”37 Quebec Anglophones have a different take. The Quebec Community Groups Network (qcgn ) – an organization that links English-language groups in Quebec – made the case that Bill 96 is turning English Quebecers into second-class citizens. It argues that the legislation sends a message “to all Quebecers whose mother tongue is not French that they are not truly welcome in the province.” One organization sponsored a series of public hearings while pointing out that the legislation restricts the use of English in Quebec, decreases access to justice in English, decreases access to primary and secondary education in English, decreases municipal services in English, and restricts admission to English-language general and vocational colleges (Collège d’enseignement général et professionnel – cegeP s).38 Former Quebec Cabinet Minister Clifford Lincoln wrote: “If the federal safeguards of Constitution, Charter and Official Languages Act are meaningless as a bulwark in equity, as the declaration of the prime minister appears to imply, where do we turn for a basic understanding and defence of our cause?”39 Marlene Jennings, a former Quebec mP wrote: “to grant language rights to one language group and not the other runs counter to the objective of the Official Languages Act and contravenes the government’s clear constitutional obligation to ensure respect for English and French as the official languages of Canada. It also fails to deliver on the promise of substantive equality for Quebec’s English-speaking minority and creates an asymmetrical approach to official languages.”40 In the eyes of many English Quebecers, Ottawa simply raised the white flag to the Quebec government on minority language rights in the name of political expediency. The age-old debate is straightforward: English-speaking Quebecers see the matter as basic minority language rights while the Francophone majority in Quebec see it as a matter of preserving their Francophone linguistic heritage on a continent that overwhelmingly speaks English. Anglophone Quebecers are also making the case that their unemployment rate is 2 per cent higher than their French-speaking counterparts (2016 census), that the prevalence of low income is higher at 18.1 per

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cent than it is for Francophone Quebecers, 13.9 per cent (2016 census) and that many English-speaking Quebecers continue to leave the province (more than half of English speakers from Quebec now live outside the province). English Quebecers can make these claims, but it seems that no one is listening, not the provincial government and increasingly not Ottawa. English Quebecers see themselves as victims because they view the legislation as discriminatory and violating Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Quebec government, no matter the political party in power, has made it clear that it will sacrifice minority language rights to its goal of promoting the use of French in the province. The federal government and the Canadian Parliament, in the name of partisan political considerations and the pursuit of political power, no longer have any desire to intervene in Quebec affairs when it comes to minority language rights. I can do no better than quote Andrew Coyne on this matter: “federal politicians, including the Prime Minister and the leaders of the other two main opposition parties, falling all over themselves to endorse it. Rather than stand up for Canada, minority rights, the constitution and the rule of law, they have sacrificed them all in an instant, on the altar of something far more sacred: winning seats in Quebec.”41 The political calculation was this – there are seventy-eight seats in Parliament from Quebec and supporting Quebec’s legislative package will have little impact in the rest of Canada. Results from the 2021 general election proved the calculation correct. More to the point, Anglophone voters in Quebec do not matter in deciding who wins power in Ottawa. In brief, Canadians outside Quebec, for whatever reasons, have lost interest in the internal affairs of Quebec – either they have other pressing things to attend to, or they feel that they have little influence in the internal affairs of Quebec. Their lack of interest in the legislation, particularly in debates around Bill 96 speaks volumes. I could not help to think that for many Canadians – Quebec was just being Quebec and that there is nothing much they can do about it. Francophones outside Quebec could be natural allies to Quebec Anglophones pushing for minority language rights. However, they too, were remarkably silent on Bill 96. They do not see Quebec Anglophones as victims or the need to jump to their defence. They look to Englishlanguage McGill and Concordia universities, Montreal’s strong English-language business community, and to some of Canada’s leading health-care facilities that are Montreal-based English-language facilities and ask – why should they come to their defence?

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F r a n c oP h o n eS oU t SI de q U eB ec Francophones outside Quebec were victims of Confederation in 1867. They were not invited, let along consulted, to the three conferences that led to Confederation. To the extent that language rights were discussed at these conferences, they dealt only with the French-language majority and the English-language minority in Quebec. Francophones outside Quebec had a long struggle to secure education rights before the Charter of Rights and Freedoms became a part of the Constitution in 1982. The Ontario government, in 1912, adopted Regulation 17 which stipulated that English had to be the language of instruction in all schools in the province, after two years of elementary school.42 I note that over one hundred years later or in 2016, the premier of Ontario apologized for outlawing public French-language education in the province.43 Manitoba adopted the Manitoba Schools Act, 1890 which created a single province-wide school system in English only.44 In New Brunswick, Acadians also had a long struggle to secure education and religious rights, a struggle that lasted in some regions until the 1960s.45 The New Brunswick Common Schools Act, 1871 was designed to do away with church-run schools and, by ricochet, French-language education in much of the province.46 Ottawa’s desire to promote French-language communities from coast to coast to coast, starting in earnest under former Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau, and Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms changed everything. New Brunswick, Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba have made solid progress in securing minority language rights in education. And there is more. Since the charter, new French language schools have been built from Newfoundland and Labrador to British Columbia. Francophones outside Quebec have also been able to secure new or protect existing health-care facilities. They continue to make progress in institution building with many now carving out an important presence in the business world. The above to make the point that Francophones outside Quebec are fast shedding their victim status. Government policies, some dating back over one hundred years, did hinder the development of French-speaking communities outside Quebec, turning them into victims, at least in their eyes. However, recent government policies and programs have turned them into productive members of Canadian society. More is said about this later.

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rU r a l c anada There is an urban-rural divide taking form in Canada. One sees evidence of this in the country’s voting pattern and on issues such as gun control. John Ibbitson, Globe and Mail columnist, explains: “Downtown voters – who are more likely to be well educated, affluent, progressive and comfortable with all kinds of diversity – too often look on their country cousins as uneducated, intolerant and unenlightened. Rural voters see the way downtowners seek to reshape the country into something they barely recognize.”47 To be sure, politics and partisan political calculations hold a powerful influence in shaping economic policies. Rural communities matter a great deal less to politicians than they did in years past. Elections today are won and lost in cities, at least when it comes to federal elections. Fifty-six seats were added to the house of Commons between Pierre Trudeau’s final term as prime minister in the 1980s and Justin Trudeau’s first term, beginning in 2015. Urban areas gained the bulk of these new seats, reflecting population growth patterns.48 Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver have witnessed a veritable population explosion in recent years for a host of reasons. They have been able to attract many new Canadians who tend to go where other new Canadians already are. The shift towards a service economy also favours cities. Canadian cities are home to some of the country’s best universities, which gives them a distinct advantage in creating a pool of highly skilled workers that, in turn, draws businesses to locate there. The challenges confronting rural Canada have been well documented and there is no need to go over the data in any detail. Suffice to note that we are witnessing “social and economic restructuring; decline in the significance of the primary industries; decline in the manufacturing sector; demographic ageing as young people leave their home communities, never to return; and the diminishing of the social safety net.”49 One can add yet another factor: Indigenous peoples are now addressing the “historic injustices of social exclusion” and continue to pursue their Indigenous and treaty rights. No one should question the legitimacy of Indigenous communities righting a series of historical wrongs. The point is that dealing with historical injustices falls largely on rural communities, not large urban centres. We know that the proportion of Canada’s population living in rural areas has been declining ever since the country was born. At the time of Confederation, over 80 per cent of Canadians lived in rural communities.

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Today, only about 20 per cent do. Politicians and their political advisors can read demographic change and public opinion polls better than anyone. Top career officials in government are, for the most part, located in urban centres – in Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Halifax, and Edmonton. When the government of Canada decides to launch an ambitious R&D and innovation agenda, it brands the effort “Smart Cities” rather than “Smart Communities.”50 When governments decide to initiate public consultations on virtually all public policy issues, they look to urban centres. One ought not to be surprised then that when public consultation reports come in, they have an urban bias. There are a number of reasons why Canada looks to its urban centres for growth while it sees its population in rural areas declining, with many small communities struggling simply to survive. Government policies are hardly the only reason for the economic challenges confronting rural Canada. The agricultural structure has changed significantly in recent years. The number of farms in Canada has fallen sharply, while farm sizes have grown substantially, and the age of farm operators has increased.51 Rural advocates and supporters have consistently expressed concerns over the ups and downs of the priority status given to rural development in the Ottawa system. They have a point. Ottawa has the Rural Secretariat but it has had, over the years, many ups and downs. It was established in 1998 by the Chrétien government, then abolished in 2013 by the Harper government. In 2019, responsibility for rural development was parked with Infrastructure Canada under the label Centre for Rural Economic Development.52 In June 2019, Ottawa, only a few months before the general election, outlined an ambitious Rural Economic Development Strategy. The report called for the following investments in rural areas: high-speed internet, affordable housing, tourism, business development, immigration, infrastructure, skills development, and measures to increase labour availability. It added that the government was working with communities to build their economy, create good middle-class jobs, and ensure their sustainability.53 It was an ambitious policy agenda that fell off the radar screen shortly after the 2019 election. Trudeau appointed a junior minister responsible for rural development who was also responsible for a variety of mandates, including women and gender equality.54 In unveiling his new Cabinet in October 2021, however, Trudeau appointed another junior minister, Gudie Hutchings, with specific responsibility for promoting rural economic development.55 We now know that federal government spending dedicated to the economic fallout from covId -19

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flowed to urban centres to a much greater extent than to rural regions, in part, because some of the sectors most directly affected were in cities – hotels, tourism, and manufacturing. The odds are stacked against rural Canada. The country’s intelligentsia, its political and economic elites, and Canada’s top journalists all live in urban areas. The perception, if not the reality, is that a more integrated global economy also favours urban areas. The information technology (It ) sector requires specialized skills and a capacity to push back the frontiers of knowledge. These skills are found where our leading universities are located, and that happens to be in large urban areas. It is revealing that whenever the issue of It in rural Canada comes up, the focus is invariably on narrowing the “broadband gap” between urban and rural Canada, nothing more.56 Cities need rural communities for food, energy and beautiful places to visit and to experience outdoor activities. To be sure, rural Canada is here to stay. However, it can never perform at the level of large Canadian urban areas. Rural residents have a choice – keep enjoying the lifestyle that rural Canada has to offer, including more affordable housing and an attractive physical environment, or move to an urban centre and enjoy the various economic opportunities that it has to offer. There are benefits and drawbacks to both – it depends on perceptions and lifestyle preferences.

l o o kIn g Back Canada is home to many who look to misguided government policies to explain their economic challenges. This chapter also makes the case that Canada also has a well-developed capacity to give groups and communities a helping hand to address their challenges. Canada’s business community often argues that government policies fall short on several fronts. It points out that it competes in a global marketplace where government policies can help or hurt. However, I note that the World Economic Forum ranked Canada 12th out of 140 countries in 2018, as the best place to be in business.57 Two years later, another Switzerlandbased review ranked Canada at 8th in the world’s most competitive business environment, ahead of the United States.58 The government of Canada played a pivotal role in developing Canada’s competitive manufacturing sector through public investments during the Second World War. It continues to do so through public investments in research and development and in virtually every sector from energy to agriculture. Canada has also atoned for past discriminatory policies against Chinese and Japanese Canadians. Both have become highly productive

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and valued members of the Canadian family. As we will see once again in a subsequent chapter, the Government of Canada has apologized to Chinese and Japanese Canadians and other groups and provided financial compensations for past wrongs. Politicians and career public servants have lost standing in Canadian society. Few Canadians, however, view them as victims. If they are victims, they are, for the most part, the authors of their own misfortune. I would like to underline the point that they are in a better position than other groups to set things right by undertaking a frank assessment of why Canadians are losing confidence in their institutions and then introduce measures to fix what is ailing them. English Quebecers feel abandoned by political institutions in Quebec and in Ottawa. When political expediency meets minority rights and if politicians are not constrained by legal requirements, minority language rights will end up on the losing end. The future of English-speaking Quebecers is tied at the hip to a future where Quebec remains a part of Canada. Quebec Anglophones have built an impressive list of political, education, and health-care institutions and developed a strong presence in Quebec’s business community. They have institutions in place to continue to make strong contributions to their region and to Canada. They will need these institutions more than in years past because they have recently discovered that Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms is of limited value to them to protect minority language rights. Francophones outside Quebec have made remarkable progress over the past sixty years in all sectors. They may have been victims of the Confederation in 1867 and of past government policies ever since, but they no longer are. The federal government, through its policies, programs, and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, has played a pivotal role in turning things around. Rural Canada was once Canada’s favoured child. It had a strong presence both in Parliament and Cabinet. It has, however, lost standing in recent years and can now point to federal government policies that strongly favour urban centres. There has been a large demographic shift away from rural Canada to urban centres. Canada is no different than other Western countries. The urban-rural polarization is even more acute in the United States than in Canada.59 In 2010 the world’s urban population, for the first time, passed 50 per cent and it is envisaged that by 2030, six out of every ten people will live in urban centres.60 All to say that rural depopulation is hardly a Canadaonly development.

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The European Commission has sponsored a series of studies on rural development, pointing to rural depopulation as an important reason for rural poverty, much like is the case in Canada.61 Canada’s rural areas also fall short on most socio-economic indicators (earned income, employment, and participation rates). I note that about 65 per cent of Indigenous people live in rural areas.62 Rural Canada, however, holds a number of advantages – as noted, the cost of housing in rural Canada is much more affordable than it is in urban centres. Canada also has a social safety net that benefits its rural regions. A comparative study of United States-Canada social safety nets points out that if one applied United States programs in Canada, poverty levels would rise in Canada but, conversely, if one applied Canada programs to the United States, poverty levels in the United States would fall.63 Without Canada’s social safety net programs, rural Canada would be far more affected by government policies and “in much worse shape than it is.”64

9

Play “Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” and Make Me Feel Canadian

Colleagues and friends that I consulted while working on this book saw a great deal of merit in the argument that Canada is or was a country of victims. But several asked the same question: “How does Canada differ from other countries?” Some argued that maybe everyone, every community, and every region think that they are victims, so that, everybody is now part of a victimized group? I lived for extended periods in Great Britain and the United States and, to be sure, these countries do have victims – for example, Black and Indigenous peoples in the US. However, in both cases, there are regions and peoples who do not view themselves as victims. Things are different in Canada. I believe that this stems from victimhood being at the core of Canadian culture.

Be I n g c a n a dIan mean S h a vIn g t o S a y y oU are S orry As we have seen, all regions in Canada view themselves as victims to some degree, as do many Canadians. Governments have responded. We have seen Ottawa apologize to Japanese Canadians (1988), Italian Canadians (2021), the lgBtq 2 community (2017), to Chinese Canadians for the Chinese Head Tax (2006), to Jewish Canadians for turning away Jewish refugees in 1939 (2018), and to the only Black military unit that served in the First World War, because it was only given noncombat support roles overseas (2022).1 Ottawa also apologized to Indigenous communities for a multitude of past wrongs, and the Queen, on the advice of the Government of Canada, acknowledged the wrongs committed against the Acadians in the name of the Crown (2003). This is not a complete list of past wrongs that governments in Canada, at both

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the federal and provincial levels, felt the need to apologize for. In all cases, Canada or a provincial government had done somebody wrong and saw the need to apologize. The federal government’s penchant for apology transcends political parties and leaderships – Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney apologized to Japanese Canadians on behalf of the government of Canada, Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper did the same for former students of residential schools and Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently apologized to Italian Canadians and other groups. It is not just an Ottawa approach. Among several other premiers, former Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams apologized to the Inuit of Labrador for shutting down the communities of Nutak and Hebron (2005).2 Former British Columbia Premier Christy Clark issued an apology on behalf of the province for “160 historical racist and discriminatory policies imposed in Bc.” to the detriment of Chinese Canadians (2014).3 I could also add other provinces to this list.4 Earlier prime ministers and premiers were not as forthcoming in offering apologies on behalf of Canadians. Pierre Elliott Trudeau, for example, resisted apologizing to the Japanese Canadians, telling the House of Commons: “I do not think the purpose of a government is to right the past. It cannot rewrite history. It is our purpose to be just in our time.”5 Sir John A. Macdonald, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and Sir Robert Borden did not see a need to apologize for past government misdeeds either. Canada stands out among countries for knowing how to apologize often and properly. Michael Tager argues in a comparative study that Canada has produced a strong “apology” to the Indigenous communities and insists that without this apology “relations with Indigenous peoples might have deteriorated more quickly.”6 In contrast, he maintains that the United States has not been able to attain “the proper content and context necessary to apologize successfully.” He reports that in the case of Indigenous communities, the first “US apology in 2000 came at a ceremony marking the 175th anniversary of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIa), delivered by BIa head Kevin Gover to tribal leaders, BIa employees, and federal officials. Despite its powerful text, it ‘suffered a death by silence.’ President Bill Clinton neither signed the apology nor attended the ceremony and no White House official commented on it.”7 Australia has done better than the United States in apologizing to its Indigenous communities. However, Tager points out that Australia’s apologies became enmeshed in partisan politics and that, at one time,

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the prime minister acknowledged the misdeed without issuing a government apology and at another time, an apology was made without attributing guilt.8 Canada takes its past wrongs seriously and it is always at the ready to offer an apology. The discovery of gravesites near former residential schools plunged Canadians into a soul-searching exercise in the summer of 2021. One member of Parliament described Canada as “an imperfect country that has been built on the genocide of Indigenous people and the recognition of that is important.”9 Calls were made to “Cancel Canada Day” and several Canadian cities did just that. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau declared: “Many, many Canadians will be reflecting on reconciliation, on our relationship with Indigenous Peoples and how it has evolved and how it needs to continue to evolve rapidly. I think this Canada Day, it will be a time of reflection on what we’ve achieved as a country, but on what more we have to do.”10 The government decided to introduce legislation to make 30 September a federal statutory holiday and labelled it “National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.” It asked Canadians to look to 30 September “as a day of quiet reflection or participation in a community event.” The day was designated as a paid holiday for federal public servants.11 Many employers, including my university, followed Ottawa’s lead and declared 30 September a day of reflection and a paid holiday. My assistant made an insightful observation when my university decided to follow Ottawa’s lead. She said: “How can that help the Indigenous Peoples? Few of them work in the federal public service or here at the university. So we get a paid holiday, while they sit there and watch us having a day off.” That governments in Canada did wrong when they interned Japanese Canadians in 1942, when they imposed a head tax on Chinese Canadians, and when they turned away Jewish refugees in 1939, is irrefutable. The fact that governments did wrong and could do better in their interactions with Indigenous peoples is undeniable. No historian can dispute this and we are not dealing with ancient history. In short, that Canada did wrong to groups and even regions in the past and, in some cases to this day, is not the issue here – it did. The question is what to do about it? Many Canadians did celebrate Canada Day. I walked around my neighbourhood on 1 July 2021 and I saw as many Canadian flags on front lawns in my neighbourhood as I did in previous years. I came across a lady proudly wearing a Canada Day shirt covered with a maple leaf. I said: “I see that you are celebrating Canada Day.” I suspected that

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she understood the point in my question – what about the Indigenous peoples and the residential schools issue? She responded without any hesitation: “Yes, I am a proud Canadian.” The next day, my local newspaper ran an article stating that Canada needs to rethink a nationalism that has “too often been framed in opposition to America, accompanied by gratuitous stereotypes that reveal us to be not so nice, caring or polite, as we claim.”12 Some 156 years after Canada was born, Canadians continue to search for a Canadian identity, with Ontario still leading the way. Many Canadians will acknowledge their strong bonds to Great Britain, France, and the United States, but they insist that they are not the same as any of them. We are different, but how? Why is Canada far more willing to offer an apology for having wronged somebody than are other countries? No other country has had such an outpouring of apologies, acts of contrition, and compensation as have all levels of government in Canada. In Canada, affected groups have launched redress efforts to force the hand of governments to apologize for their role in historic injustices committed against their members. In other countries, notably the United States, Great Britain, and France, either affected groups did not mount a campaign to secure apologies, or much more often, the governments ignored most of the calls that were made. Great Britain stands accused of many past wrongs. As is well known, it played a pivotal role in the transatlantic slave trade. It was one of the most successful slave-trading nations in the world – together with Portugal – accounting for some 70 per cent of all Africans sent to the Americas. It sent about 3.1 million Africans to its different colonies, with 2.7 million arriving in North and South America and the Caribbean. The Africans were shipped to the colonies to work on plantations and as domestics, not much else. The British military and the Royal Navy also owned slaves to carry out menial work.13 King Louis XIII made the slave trade legal in 1642 and Louis XIV promoted it by giving a subsidy for each slave introduced into the colonies. Great Britain abolished the African slave trade in 1807 and France abolished slavery in 1848. I note, however, that the slave trade was temporarily abolished in the immediate aftermath of the French Revolution. Napoléon Bonaparte decided to re-establish slavery and, by doing so, condemned 300,000 people to a life of bondage. Bonaparte struck the decision to extend France’s colonial empire to control the Caribbean.14 French settlers could buy slaves from “slave ships” brought to the colonies. Historian Jean-Marie Desport outlined the humiliating conditions slaves had to endure. They were placed at the front of slave ships, women

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on the lower deck. Many had to suffer unbearable conditions including diseases and madness, as they went to an unknown world on the other side of the Atlantic. Many died crossing the Atlantic. But the slave trade continued because both France and Great Britain needed a large workforce to produce tobacco, cotton, coffee, and sugar cane. Slaves helped, in no small measure, and both became economic powerhouses.15 The United States had a 246-year association with slavery. As recently as 1860, there were four million slaves in a total US population of thirty-one million. Slave labour made a substantial contribution in developing the American economy. They even had a hand in building the White House and the Capitol. Slavery was abolished in the United States in 1865. But it was soon followed with Jim Crow laws, that denied equal opportunity under the law until 1965, when civil rights laws were passed. The above to make the point that Great Britain, France, and the United States have carried out wrongs that Canada would easily apologize for. However, apologies do not come easy for these three countries. To complicate matters, there is an ongoing debate in the US about reparation or whether the federal government should compensate the descendants of former slaves to make up for the country’s slavery legacy. The argument is that slaves provided years of unpaid labour which explains not only the growth of the US economy but also the striking wealth gap between Black ($24,100) and White families ($188,200). Those in support of reparation point out that the United States compensated slave owners in 1862 for the loss of property. They also maintain that reparation could take various forms including scholarships, community funds, or business grants.16 The debate continues and there is no end in sight. A 2019 US-wide public opinion survey revealed that 60 per cent of Americans think that the history of slavery continues to have an impact on Black people. However, the survey also revealed that only 35 per cent of White people believe that the US government should apologize for slavery.17 The House of Representatives in 2008, and a year later, the Senate, put forward resolutions apologizing for slavery “but no joint bill ever passed.”18 The United States, Great Britain, and France are all superpowers, with Great Britain and France being two of the largest colonial powers in history. If one accepts that colonialism did serious harm to the affected groups, then these countries have reasons to apologize. The US, though it fought a war against a colonial power to gain independence, is also not without a colonial past. American troops, for example, invaded the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1893 without just cause.

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By the end of the nineteenth century, there were few territories left for the imperial powers to annex. Hawaii was one, and both Great Britain and France had established economic relations with it, but so had the United States. The Hawaiian Islands held economic promise and the United States was busy establishing strong ties with Hawaiian sugar growers.19 Without presidential approval, US marines stormed the Hawaiian Islands. The issue was debated in Washington for several years to decide what to do after the invasion. President William McKinley eventually signed a resolution annexing the islands. The US Department of State explained the motivation: “For most of the 1800s, leaders in Washington were concerned that Hawaii might become part of a European nation’s empire.”20 For the United States, the islands were there for the picking, and it was either the US or European power. Things were not much different in the way Texas became part of the United States federation. The Texas annexation evolved from several conflicts, treaties, and compromises. Suffice to note that it gave rise to many border disputes between the United States and Mexico. The Americans sent military forces marching as far south as the Rio Grande, where they built a fort. The move added more than 500,000 square miles of territory to the United States. The US had tried to buy the land but when Mexico refused, the Americans simply invaded and took it. In the process, the United States also gained parts of California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, Wyoming, Kansas, and Oklahoma, while Mexico lost 55 per cent of its territory. Several Mexico-US military conflicts soon followed, with the Americans winning virtually all of them. The US-Mexico military conflicts were no different from how other colonial powers behaved. In short, the United States was and remains a dominant political power and it did not hesitate to violate Mexico’s sovereignty.21 This was hardly the only time the United States invaded a country while making the claim that it was done to help its inhabitants. President George W. Bush explained after the first US military action in Afghanistan that “the oppressed people of Afghanistan will know the generosity of America and its allies.”22 Great Britain made the same argument in India, and France in Africa. Things were no different in Algeria, Mali, and Côte d’Ivoire, among others. Shashi Tharoor, former under-secretary-general of the United Nations, published a book that provides persuasive arguments against the presence of Great Britain in India until 1947, and the negative impact it had which continues to be felt to this day. Among many other arguments, he writes: “In their entire 200-year rule,” the British “never made

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up no more than 0.05% of the population. And, yet, for most of that period, no Indian was allowed to join the Indian Civil Service, in part because the British could not bear to take orders from a Brown man. When they were finally admitted, more direct racism was in store. High scorers in the civil service examinations were accused of cheating, for how else could brown men do so well.”23 Tharoor goes on to document the negative impact British rule had on all aspects of India’s political and economic life.

n o n e e d F o r a n aPology While a student at Oxford, our nextdoor neighbour said: “I do not know why all those Indians are moving here?” I responded: “Well they may have been asking the very same question when you folks went over there.” His response was very telling: “It is not the same thing at all, we went over there to help them.” He is not alone in thinking this. A 2020 public opinion survey reveals that about a third of Britons believe that the British empire is “something to be proud of,” that another 37 per cent “are indifferent,” that 12 per cent “do not know” and that only “19 per cent” consider it “something to be ashamed of.”24 By contrast, only 23 per cent of Belgium respondents see their empire as something to be proud of, the same percentage of those who consider it “something to be ashamed of.”25 Establishing whether an empire was good or bad is a matter of debate and history. However, there were some things colonial powers did that were clearly bad – consider, for example, the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre where British troops killed 379 innocent civilians and wounded another 1,137, including children. The commanding officer boasted that “barely a bullet was wasted,” and though he was removed from command, he retired to a generous pension. The Indians had no idea why their meeting was considered illegal or why they were shot at.26 Great Britain has never apologized for the massacre. Unlike Canada, Great Britain, France, and the United States are not in the habit of offering an apology for past misdeeds. In the US, past presidents, the House of Representatives and the Senate separately have, at various times, made reference to the wrongs of the slave trade. President Bill Clinton, for one, said it was wrong for the US to benefit from slavery.27 Several states have offered an apology to Black Americans. Yet, the House and the Senate have never reconciled apologies for the slave trade to be signed by the president.28 The various apologies, to the extent that they were made, also failed to outline any remedial action.

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I note that more Americans believe that their government should not apologize (49 per cent) than those who think it should (42 per cent). This, even though a large percentage of Black Americans (66 per cent) believe that their government should apologize.29 The United States has not issued an apology to Mexico, Afghanistan, Iraq, or Japan for Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It did not apologize for spraying Agent Orange in Vietnam, nor did it express regret to the Iranians for organizing the successful coup that led to the overthrow of their democratically elected prime minister to reinstate the Shah of Iran. The US did not apologize to Iraq for the failures of its intelligence community that led to an invasion that killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. The United States Government did produce a watered-down apology to Native Americans. This apology was not a direct apology and when it came, there “were no public announcements, there were no press conferences, there was no national attention.” It was tucked away on page forty-eight of a sixty-seven-page 2010 spending bill. The apology was also never publicly acknowledged by then President Obama.30 The United States government did apologize, however, for shielding a former Nazi officer (Klaus Barbie), for the internment of Japanese citizens during the Second World War and for a medical experiment on Black Americans that went wrong. As we saw, it also produced an uncoordinated apology (the House of Representatives, the Senate and the president acting independently of one another) pertaining to slavery and Jim Crow laws.31 But that is where the apologies end. The director for the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women spoke to the double standard Americans have when it comes to violence against Native and White women. She explained that four hundred Indigenous women went missing between 2011 and 2020 in Wyoming alone, that Native women are murdered at up to ten times higher rates than the national average of all races and that sexual violence against Native American women is 2.5 times more likely than is the case for White women. She laments the lack of consideration demonstrated by both governments and the national media around the issue. She contrasts this with the attention given by the media when Gabby Petito, a twenty-two-year-old White woman went missing in Wyoming in September 2021.32 Her disappearance dominated the American media for weeks. In brief, as Danny Lewis wrote in the Smithsonian magazine, “there are a few instances where the US admitted it had done wrong,” be it for the slave trade, violence against Native women, or other historical wrongs.33

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g r e a t B rIt a In a n d F rance a lS o In n o m o o d to aPolog I ze French President Emmanuel Macron made it clear in January 2021 that there would be no official apology from France for the occupation of Algeria, the bloody eight-year war and the atrocities France committed during that war.34 Pap Ndiaye, director of the National Museum of the History of Immigration in Paris, explains that the “French are highly reluctant to look at the dark dimensions of their own history.”35 Macron made Ndiaye’s point when he described France’s colonial past as “a serious fault of the Republic” but went no further.36 He also never apologized for France’s role in promoting the slave trade in Senegal, the Ivory Coast, and Benin. France had the Code Noir (Black Code) that governed how colonies should manage their slaves. The sixty article code regulated the lives of slaves from their birth, their purchase, and their religion, to their death. Among other requirements, it prohibited slaves from owning property and gave no legal standing to them. It also governed their marriages, their punishments, and even their burials. I note that the French Parliament passed a law in 2001 (the Taubira law) that reads: “The French Republic acknowledges that the Atlantic and Indian Ocean slave trade on the one hand and slavery on the other, perpetrated from the fifteenth century in the Americas, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean and in Europe against African, Amerindian, Malagasy and Indian peoples constitute a crime against humanity.”37 This is as far as France is willing to go. The country’s leading politicians see no problem in describing past colonial practices simply as a “crime against humanity.” President Macron recently made the same observation in acknowledging his country’s role in the Rwandan genocide. He said that France had “an overwhelming responsibility” in the 1994 genocide but he saw no need for an apology from France.38 A Macron advisor explained why: “There is no question of repentance. Repentance is vanity.”39 The British government is no less reluctant to apologize for atrocities committed in its colonial past. Former British Foreign Secretary William Hague did express “sincere regret” for crimes committed by the British officials during the “Kenya Emergency” in the 1950s. He did not, however, offer an apology. The Hague statement came after a long legal battle in which the government argued that it was not responsible for the actions of its colonial administration. The court rejected the argument.40

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Tony Blair did establish a precedent for an apology of sorts on the part of the British government for an historical wrong. As a freshly elected prime minister, he had this to say about Great Britain’s failings during Ireland’s Great Famine. Blair said in a statement on the 150th anniversary of the famine read out not by him but rather by an actor at a televised event in Ireland: “Those who governed in London at the time failed their people through standing by while a crop failure turned into a massive human tragedy.”41 Blair and his actor-representative went no further. Leaving aside Blair’s statement, British prime ministers have always stopped short of apologizing for the misdeeds of their nation’s colonial past. Some simply see no need for an apology. Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson wrote that the African “continent may be a blot, but it is not a blot upon our conscience. The problem is not that we were once in charge, but that we are not in charge any more.” He explained that the British showed African countries what to plant and what could sell on the export market, like coffee, cotton, and tobacco. He concluded: “The best fate for Africa would be if the old colonial powers, or their citizens, scrambled once again in her direction; on the understanding that this time they will not be asked to feel guilty.”42 There is also a concern among British policy makers that an apology could lead to legal issues and a substantial financial case made against Great Britain, since countries would likely be asking for compensation. The issue of reparation to postcolonial states has been raised by several bodies without a clear answer.43 As we saw, some argue that it would be unfair to burden today’s generation financially for their ancestors’ wrongdoing, while others argue that reparations have been paid to slave owners. In the case of Great Britain, the compensation was so large (£300 billion in today’s currency) that it was not paid off until 2015.44 Some also argue that an apology from colonial powers should not be about money, a different standard than was the case for slave owners. Though there is far from a consensus on this point, many insist that those who have suffered from colonial injustices are now long deceased and that compensation can take several forms (for example, a community development fund or scholarships to members of the affected groups). Countries have, in the past, apologized for past wrongs without offering financial compensation (Japan and victims of war crimes and the US and the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom are examples).45 Still, others insist that an apology or at least an acknowledgement of past colonial injustices is needed for colonial powers to come to terms with their history. Maighna Nanu writes: “How can children be expected

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to reject racist attitudes, when Britain’s white-washed education system leaves them wholly unequipped to understand the context of colonialism and imperialism which continues to affect the social and economic dynamics of the world they live in?”46

ha v e a c aU S e ? c a n a d a wI ll a P olog I ze Canada has never hesitated to apologize for past wrongs and in a number of cases the apology came with compensation. This is true for both the federal and provincial governments. Canada has also met the criteria for an effective apology, which entails that: “When some of the victimized group’s major demands are ignored, apologies will likely be less effective. When tailored to match the concerns of the victim group, apologies appear to contribute to the process of healing and reconciliation.”47 We outlined earlier several cases where the government of Canada apologized. Suffice to note that, by one count, the federal government apologized to thirteen different groups between 1988 and 2019 alone.48 Provincial governments from Newfoundland and Labrador to British Columbia have also issued a number of apologies to groups that the provinces had offended in years past. In Canada, we have seen provincial governments apologize for Nova Scotia’s Africville, for the Komagata Maru case, for the Sons of Freedom Doukhobor Children, and there are more. Some apologies have divided Canadians.49 Recent federal government apologies prompted the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBc ) to ask: “Does Justin Trudeau apologise too much?”50 Canada does not have a colonial past (leaving aside its relations with Indigenous peoples, about which more is said later) to defend or justify before its voters. This would suggest that governments in Canada have less reasons to apologize. But there is more to it. There are other countries without much of a colonial past, such as Australia, that do not apologize nearly as often as Canada does. Even when Australia does apologize, it is more controversial than is the case in Canada. I note that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, on 13 February 2008, issued a formal apology to Australia’s Indigenous peoples but the apology was hotly debated in some political circles.51 Canada has always brought a nonpartisan approach to its apologies. The Mulroney government (a Progressive Conservative government), the Chrétien (Liberal), Harper (Conservative), and Justin Trudeau (Liberal) governments have all issued apologies to groups with little, if any, opposition from the other political parties. Political ideology does not seem

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to matter. In a comparative study of government apologies, the authors ranked, for example, the Stephen Harper government apology for the Chinese Head Tax and Exclusion Act among the top three.52 The apparent willingness of governments in Canada to apologize for past wrongs, whether at the federal or provincial level and notwithstanding a government’s political ideology may well be explained by Canada’s political makeup, its history, and its political institutions. Canadians everywhere have, at one point, carried the victim label. That is the case for Loyalists (Ontario and the Maritimes), Acadians, Quebecers, Western Canadians, Maritimers, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, Black Canadians, Indigenous peoples, and political refugees. Peter Russell summed things up nicely when he wrote that “Canada might always be a work in progress” at least, in part, because it is a country based on a series of incomplete conquests.53 This may well explain, in some measure, why after 155 years, some Canadians are still searching for a national identity that resonates in all regions. The incomplete conquests do not tell the whole story. Our Constitution and our national political institutions do not easily square with Canada’s geography or the country’s socio-economic makeup. Governments have had to adjust on the fly as they have tried this and that to even an uneven playing field. Canada’s political culture, shaped by its Constitution and national political institutions, makes it easy to identify who wins and who loses as a result of federal government policies and spending. This produces victims, or at least, the basis for groups to view themselves as victims. In turn, this motivates governments to fix things by apologizing and offering financial compensation. The next chapter looks to the Constitution and to the workings of national institutions to assess how they have shaped Canada’s political culture.

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Why?

We saw earlier that, in Canada, regions view themselves as victims to federal government policies but that regions in other countries, be it California, Texas, New York, La Loire, Brittany, London or England’s South East, do not. Groups in other countries, in most cases, seem to blend in more easily to a national identity than is the case in Canada. Canada’s political leaders, no matter where they sit on the political spectrum, are a great deal quicker than their counterparts in other countries to offer an apology to groups that were wronged by past government policies. I argue that Canada’s history and its political institutions have shaped its political culture – a culture that, in turn, has transformed institutions into something that they were not designed to be and forced them to handle issues that they were not equipped to address. But they did and they made it work. In the process, however, they struck policies and decisions to meet the political requirements of the day, often with an eye on securing and preserving power or laying the groundwork to generate necessary compromises to make Canada work. Canada’s political leaders continue to be largely unhobbled by the Constitution and national institutions, be it Parliament and now Cabinet. They prefer it that way, not only because it enables them to more easily exert political control in the era of permanent election campaigns, but also because they see this as the only way to strike policies and make decisions. Canada’s Constitution and institutions were and are viewed by politicians and by the most senior public servants as obstacles to be overcome. The solution – work outside the constraints imposed by the Constitution and political institutions and look to federal-provincial agreements. Government leaders consider that federal-provincial agreements are difficult to achieve, given their different political interests and

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diverging regional interests. Adding more rules and requirements to the process, including having institutions play a role in the negotiations and bringing their own set of transparency and accountability requirements, would make achieving agreements impossible in most instances. When a country’s political leaders are able to play fast and loose with political institutions and when policy and decision processes are at the mercy of the political leadership of the day, identifying winners and losers becomes effortless. Institutions impose processes which need to be respected and are often transparent. Canadian political leaders are anxious to strike decisions quickly (they have a four-year mandate, at times less than that) and place their governments in a positive light, especially before regions and groups that hold a lot of votes. This also leads regions, groups, and individuals to identify themselves as victims or winners. They can point the finger at political leaders to explain their difficulties and why they have fallen behind other groups, communities, and regions. In brief, it is easier for those who view themselves as victims to point to political leaders as the reason rather than blame institutions. If we apply this logic, Sir John A. Macdonald would be responsible for the plight of the Indigenous peoples and Pierre E. Trudeau for Western alienation, and not Parliament, not even their government.

I n t h e B e gI nn Ing Canada did not have a promising start. It is worth repeating the point that the country was born out of the desire of the two Canadas to break their political impasse, a Colonial Office anxious to reduce its spending in the North American colonies and two Maritime colonies that were instructed to toe the Confederation line by superior political powers, including the Colonial Office in London. But this hardly tells the whole story. The key architect of Canadian federalism who was asked to take the lead in making it work did not believe in federalism. As we noted earlier, Sir John A. Macdonald made clear his deep reservations about federalism at every opportunity. In June 1864, for example, Macdonald voted against the recommendation of a House Committee for a federation of all British North American colonies because he did not see federalism working in Canada or with the British-inspired political institutions he envisaged. When Quebec forced Macdonald to embrace federalism, he explained: “We have strengthened the General Government. We have given the general Legislature all the great subjects of legislation. We have

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conferred upon them not only specifically and in detail all the powers which are incident to sovereignty, but we have expressly declared that all subjects of general interest not distinctly and exclusively conferred upon the local government and local legislatures, shall be conferred upon the General Government and Legislature.” He added: “My own opinion is that the General Government or Parliament should pay no more regard to the status or position of the Local Governments than they would to the prospects of the ruling party in the corporation of Quebec or Montreal.”1 Macdonald had every reason to favour a unitary state, enamored as he was with British political institutions and convinced that federalism contained fundamental flaws that made it ill-suited to Canada. The problem is that Canada was and is not possible without federalism. Quebec, without some degree of autonomy to protect the French language and culture, would have joined Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and walked away from the negotiations, and this would have put an end to the discussions. Canada’s geography could not then, and much less now, accommodate the requirements of a unitary state. And yet, the Fathers of Confederation led by Macdonald and George-Étienne Cartier concocted an arrangement that barely qualifies as a federation. Indeed, the 1867 Confederation deal had the markings of a unitary state – among other things, it even gave Ottawa the power to disallow provincial legislation. One of the first orders of business for Macdonald as prime minister was to demonstrate to provincial governments that they were, at best, junior partners. He went to Nova Scotia shortly after Confederation in an effort to address the province’s disenchantment with Confederation. It will be recalled that the province sent eighteen anti-Confederation members of Parliament out of nineteen to Canada’s first Parliament. Macdonald completely ignored the then Nova Scotia Premier William Annand and decided instead to meet with the local members of Parliament to discuss the matter. Premiers and provincial governments, for Macdonald, had little legitimacy, even to deal with provincial or local matters, let alone ones that would involve relations between Ottawa and the regions.2 The Quebec premier organized a First Ministers’ meeting in 1887 but Macdonald refused to attend, insisting that federal mP s were the sole legitimate representatives for the provinces.3 Canada has not evolved into a unitary state. Rather, it has gone in the opposite direction. Federal mPs are hardly the sole or even important representatives of their provinces. Provincial premiers are

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the unchallenged spokespeople representing provincial interests and provincial governments are now far from playing the role Macdonald had envisaged for them. Former Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau said that opposition mPs are “nobodies,” fifty yards off Parliament Hill, while Ned Franks, a leading voice on the workings of the Canadian Parliament, observed that mPs – whether on the government side or in opposition – are “nobodies” on or off Parliament Hill.4 If mPs are nobodies in Ottawa, Parliament itself cannot be far behind. It is not too much of an exaggeration to write that the role of Parliament is now limited to deciding who sits in the prime minister’s chair. The decision, however, is straightforward – the party leader who wins the most seats wins political power. The Constitution became hopelessly dated as governments expanded the scope of their responsibilities. To add to the challenge, the Constitution did not even have an amending formula, making it rigid or unbending from the very beginning. When Australia was established in 1901, it equipped its Constitution with provisions that make it possible to make changes without having to go to the British Parliament. The Constitution Act, 1982 has an amending formula but, as history has since shown, Canada’s Constitution has remained no less rigid, as the failures of the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accords made clear.5 In short, Canada was and is trying to make institutions designed for a unitary state that do not correspond to Canada’s political-economic and geographical circumstances, work. Canada’s political leaders have carried on, making Canadian federalism functional through patchwork, by striking deals and side deals between governments and by ignoring the Constitution and, to the extent they could, also sidestepping national political institutions and their requirements. This gave rise to hybrid federalism. The Fathers of Confederation could not have foreseen hybrid federalism. If they could, they would likely have taken measures to stop it dead in its tracks. One only needs to look at the British North America (bna ) Act, for example, to see that they saw no merit in federal-provincial shared-cost agreements. Section 118 of the bna Act provides grants to the provinces to support “their Governments and Legislatures (Ontario $80,000, Quebec $70,000, Nova Scotia $60,000, and New Brunswick $50,000),” but adds: “Such Grants shall be in full Settlement of all future Demands on Canada.”6 It did not work out as envisaged. Grants had to be provided to other provinces as they joined Confederation. Here, again, Ottawa believed that it would bring the matter to an end by insisting, in 1907, that the grants

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constituted “a final and unalterable settlement of the amounts to be paid yearly to the several provinces.”7 Again, things did not work out as envisaged. The Fathers of Confederation and Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Canada’s prime minister at the time, could not have predicted that, in time, provinces and local governments would be responsible for about 70 per cent of total government spending in Canada and that health care, education, and social services would come to dominate public spending. Today, while provincial and local governments account for the bulk of public sector spending in Canada, they only generate about half of total government revenues.8

an e co n o mIc d e Pr eS S Io n , a royal comm I S SIon, an d a Po l I t Ic a l wIl l t o do S ometh I ng The economic depression of the 1930s changed everything. Provincial governments could no longer be relegated to a junior status, as the role of government began to extend far beyond managing tariff and trade issues and keeping Canadians safe. The bna Act did not deal explicitly with relief for the poor – including the unemployed – other than looking to the provinces to take charge of municipal institutions, charitable organizations, and matters of a local nature.9 By the 1930s, this covered a lot of ground, something that the Fathers of Confederation could not possibly have foreseen. Governments everywhere realized that something needed to be done. In Canada, the unemployment rate jumped to 25 per cent and people went on relief by the thousands, while several provincial governments did not have the capacity to plan or deliver the required measures, let alone pay the bills to support them. The Constitution and the inability of governments to amend it in order to adjust responsibilities for changing economic circumstances did not help matters.10 Robert B. Bryce documents the negotiations between Ottawa and provincial governments in the 1930s, as the prairie provinces teetered on the verge of bankruptcy.11 Serious economic difficulties were also felt across Canada, but the federal government did not have the capacity to deal with them.12 Provincial governments may have had the will and the jurisdiction to respond but they did not have the resources, financial or otherwise, to do so. Keynesian economics also made its way to Canada during the 1930s and early 1940s. Ottawa policy makers saw the positive impact the Roosevelt’s New Deal programs were having in the United States and they wanted to pursue similar initiatives in Canada, but the Constitution would not allow it.

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William Lyon Mackenzie King decided in 1937 to establish a royal commission (the Rowell-Sirois Commission) to carry out “a re-examination of the economic and financial basis of Confederation and of the distribution of legislative powers in light of the economic and social developments of the last seventy years.”13 The problem, as seen from Ottawa and the Rowell-Sirois Commission, was straightforward. Canada’s Constitution, the bna Act, had granted the federal government all the necessary powers to implement the National Policy, but times had changed, and the act was now ill-suited to respond to the country’s current socio-economic challenges. The priority issues for Canada were no longer about tariffs and trade and the other jurisdictions that the bna Act had delegated to the federal government. In brief, they were now in the areas of social welfare and the implementation of macroeconomics policies, such as those inspired by Keynesian economics. It came as no surprise, then, that the 1940 Rowell-Sirois Report stressed the need for integrating federal-provincial fiscal policies more effectively and, at the same time, recommended giving Ottawa a much stronger hand in managing them. By the time the report was tabled, Ottawa had already moved in to carve out a role for itself in the social policy field. As part of managing the wartime economy, the federal government was able to convince the provinces to leave the income tax field for the duration of the war in return for grants calculated on estimates of what the provinces would have collected. When Prime Minister Mackenzie King raised constitutional issues and sought to overhaul Canada’s taxation and social policy infrastructures and implement the findings of the Rowell-Sirois Report at a federal-provincial conference, he was met with firm and highly vocal opposition from Ontario and Quebec. King was told, in no uncertain terms, by the premiers of both provinces that his proposals were a nonstarter, so much so, that Ontario Premier George Drew “hysterically characterized (the reform package) as Hitlerism.”14 This would not stop Ottawa from expanding the scope of its responsibilities. It would turn to its spending power to move into whatever policy field it decided it should play a role in. Questions were raised about how best to avoid playing to regional favourites, how to hold government to account if responsibilities were shared, and how would program costs be shared, given that the fiscally stronger provincial governments could afford to share the cost of more federal provincial programs. Few answers to the questions raised were forthcoming. Senior Ottawa policy makers also decided best to ignore the Constitution if it could not be amended, and grab hold of the key

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policy levers via Ottawa’s spending power, to get things done. They would let others down the organizational ladder look after the finer points of implementing the policies.

h yP h e n a t e d F e deral I Sm Under hyphenated federalism, institutions and established processes give way to powerful personalities because only powerful personalities can make hyphenated federalism work. Only they can cut through cumbersome bureaucratic processes and, at times, complex federal-provincial negotiations. Deals and even side deals have to materialize, and these deals always come with government spending. This makes it easy for everyone inside or outside government to identify who wins and who loses. One only has to do the math. This, in turn, generates victims or at least enables regions, groups, and individuals to compare who was able to get what from Ottawa. Two federal-provincial conferences aiming to give life to Rowell-Sirois recommendations and the welfare state – one in 1941 and the other in 1945 – failed to secure permanent arrangements through the Constitution. But, as Donald Smiley writes, “Almost from the day the conference (of 1945) was finished federal officials began to seek limited and piece-meal agreements with the provinces on particular matters designed to change how Canadian federalism operates.”15 They set out to address, through other means, the “inflexibility of the system in effecting periodic redistributions of the powers and responsibilities of government between the two levels by constitutional amendment, judicial review or the delegation of legislative powers by one level on the other.”16 Thus, the federal spending power was born, a development unique to Canadian federalism.17 Ottawa’s spending power brought about assistance for those with visual impairments and disabilities in 1951 and 1954, social assistance in 1956, hospital care insurance in 1958, youth allowances in 1964, the Canada Pension Plan in 1965, Medicare in 1968, and countless federal-provincial agreements in virtually every economic sector as of 1972.18 Hyphenated federalism has had remarkable staying power because, in Canada, governments have nowhere else to go. It is the key to getting things done. The Constitution continues to force the hand of policymakers to look for solutions through federal-provincial negotiations. They saw and still see it as the only avenue available to give life to the Rowell-Sirois Report, the welfare state, and the development of a modern economy.

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Federal-provincial committees of officials are tasked with managing the process. Provincial governments now have public servants keeping a running tab on which province is getting what from Ottawa and which ones might be getting more than they are. Provincial governments have every reason to put forward anything and everything if Ottawa is paying anywhere between 50, and up to 100 per cent, of the cost in exceptional cases.19 Again, the accounting of who gets what creates winners and losers, depending on how Ottawa decides. Under hyphenated federalism, every provincial government, association, or group has a chance of securing federal government spending except one – Indigenous peoples. They are the responsibility of Ottawa’s Indigenous Affairs and Northern Development. Provincial governments will remind the federal government that it is responsible for Indigenous Affairs, not them. In any event, hyphenated federalism is a one-way street – the federal government will turn to its spending power to move into areas of provincial jurisdiction, but provincial governments will not financially support initiatives that belong to Ottawa. The provinces have little choice but to compete for federal dollars. In my The Politics of Public Spending in Canada, I explained the impact of Ottawa’s spending power on Canadian federalism with an analogy: Ten people meet over lunch. They must decide whether they will share one check or ask for ten separate ones. In theory, if they decide on one shared check, they will all choose the most expensive items. But if each were paying individually, they would probably have chosen differently; nobody would want to miss the best food or wine while paying for someone else to have it.20 This describes well how Ottawa and the ten provincial governments, in addition to the three Northern Territories, function. Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau mocked the then Progressive Conservative Leader Joe Clark by labelling him a “head waiter to the provinces.”21 It would have been more accurate to describe himself and other prime ministers since Mackenzie King in the same way. It will be recalled, for example, that the Toronto Star argued in 2021 that: “Justin Trudeau is acting as head waiter to the provinces.”22 It was under the Pierre E. Trudeau government that federal-provincial committees of officials and cost-shared agreements became a prominent fixture of provincial government programming. By the late 1970s, some provinces could not point to a single sector that did not have a federal-provincial agreement.23 These officials operated as if the Constitution did not matter and were convinced that political institutions are at their best when they are ignored. Provinces sitting at the

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lunch table know who ordered what and who was getting the better deal from Ottawa. Winners are happy, at least right after the lunch, but losers are not. Canadian federalism has become a potpourri of federal-provincial agreements, federal-provincial policies, federal-provincial measures, federal-provincial initiatives, and federal-provincial regulations. It has given rise to a multitude of federal-provincial committees managing a myriad of shared-cost programs. All federations have different forms of collaborative arrangements between levels of government, but no other federation has taken the matter as far as Canada. It is in this environment that decision-making flexibility is at the highest and that political institutions are relegated to a secondary role. It is also in this environment that the provinces will see themselves as victims to federal government spending or to the lack of it in relation to the other provinces. It is in this sense that Canada’s Constitution accentuates rather than help overcome the tendency of regions and provinces to view themselves as victims to an Ottawa that has favorites in its programs. Problems with the Constitution became obvious as soon as senior Government of Canada officials decided to implement ambitious socio-economic programs, most of which were in areas of provincial jurisdiction. These officials only saw one possible solution, if Ottawa were to intervene – signing agreements with the provincial governments. The Rowell-Sirois Commission had, however, warned governments that federal-provincial cost-shared agreements came with challenges. The commission argued that they would take away from provincial autonomy, that they would make accountability particularly difficult and that they would push provincial governments to spend more, even on low priority initiatives, because Ottawa would be paying. In brief, Ottawa had a choice: agree with the Rowell-Sirois recommendations and ignore the Constitution or do nothing because amending the Constitution was not in the cards. Ottawa decided to do something. Doing something meant pushing important policy and program decisions into the backrooms, where negotiating federal-provincial agreements began to look like international relations and treaty negotiations.24 Much like in international treaty negotiations, federal-provincial agreements are, for the most part, negotiated in secrecy. A defining characteristic of international diplomacy is that participants keep their objectives and strategies close to their chest until the deal is done. Secrecy makes it easier to negotiate agreements successfully – leaks to the media, unless they are generated by governments to strengthen their hand, are

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rarely a positive development. The fact that career government officials, by instinct and experience, prefer to operate away from public scrutiny serves to make the process even more secretive.25 The key players in the federal-provincial negotiating process are prime ministers, premiers, the responsible ministers, and relevant career public servants. As is the case when negotiating international agreements, Parliament and even Cabinet, at times, are kept in the dark until the agreements are struck. Involving other players could open up the door for the media and interested parties and give ammunition to those who would like to kill proposed agreements or score political points. Political and federal-provincial issues are difficult enough to manage even when they are handled away from public view. Heated political debates between regions that are widely reported in the media run the risk of not reaching federal-provincial agreements on most things. In brief, managing the process in secrecy paves the way for signing federal-provincial agreements deals and side deals. However, operating outside of public scrutiny with a restricted number of actors can generate distrust. As is the case for international diplomacy, participants are anxious to see the final product and assess who was able to get the most. Those that come out on the short end can call foul, but only after the fact, when speaking to their constituents back home. They will also point to Ottawa as the culprit because Ottawa is the one that cuts the cheques. Provincial governments can claim that they put forward solid proposals, but that the federal government rejected them. They can also ask why another province was able to get a generous deal for its priorities. Hyphenated federalism invites provincial governments to compare the deals they secured from Ottawa and see how well they are doing. A case in point is when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced in July 2020 a $6 billion transfer to Quebec for childcare but did not attach any conditions, so that, the province is free to spend the money as it wishes.26 It is safe to assume that officials in the other nine provinces were quick to brief their premiers on the Quebec deal and review prospects for their province to secure a similar agreement. Ontario swiftly raised questions about Ottawa’s approach to sharing the cost of childcare. After the $6 billion deal with Quebec and other agreements with several other provinces became public, Ontario came calling for its share. The federal government has allocated $30 billion to childcare in its 2021 budget. Ottawa sent out a message that Ontario would receive $10 billion or a third of the national envelope. Ontario made it clear that it was not enough, since the province accounted for nearly 40 per cent of Canada’s population.27 The province was later

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taken to task by Ottawa for trying to negotiate a deal in the media rather than at the negotiating table behind closed doors. We have reached the point where for any dollar a have province sends to Ottawa, it expects a dollar back, and if this does not happen, then provincial governments will cry foul.

h o w d o eS c a n a d a com Pare? In contrast, the United States has a Constitution that goes a great deal further in deciding which level of government is responsible for what. An elaborate checks and balances process, securely embedded in the Constitution and inside political institutions, also ensures that deals and even side deals with individual states, to the extent that they may happen, are produced in full public view or at least in full view of Congress. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives, unlike the Canadian Parliament, have the capacity to keep a close eye on relations between the executive and the states. They never hesitate to make full use of their powers, as outline in article 1, section 8 of the US Constitution which includes the “Power of the Purse” notably allocating “money to provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States.”28 The US is different from Canada in that both the executive (here read the president) and the legislative branch have central agencies to look after the budget process. Both branches have an important say in shaping the expenditures process as it takes form and both sides know what the other branch is proposing. Negotiations often take place in full public view as Senators and representatives of the White House jockey for positions before their voters. In contrast, Germany’s Constitution, or its basic law, is longer, more detailed, and better outlines how governments decide than either the United States or Canada’s Constitutions. The German Constitution has 146 articles and has been amended fifty times since 1949.29 Germany also has a body with a clear mandate to speak to the country’s regional interest in its national legislature – the Bundesrat (Germany’s Upper House). The national government dominates in Germany. The Constitution provides a detailed list of responsibilities that clearly belong to the national government (articles 87, 87 a, b, d, and f, and 88–9). They include social insurance, telecommunications and issues that extend beyond a single Lander (province). The Landers meanwhile play an important administrative role. Germany has been often referred to as “administrative federalism.” In brief, at the federal level, it is a policy and lawmaking state, while at the Lander level it is an administrative state.30

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Regional tensions in Germany are kept in check mainly through the work of the Bundesrat. While they do exist, it is rarely as a result of the role the national government plays. The tensions have more to do with voting patterns, with some regions in eastern Germany having a greater tendency to vote for far-right candidates.31 The same can be said about the United States. To be sure, there are political tensions in both countries, but they have less to do with how Washington and Berlin deal with individual states or Landers than with political ideology.

c a n a dIa nS h a v e ada Pted Modern day Canadians have grown up with hyphenated federalism and they have adapted. There are several studies reporting that Canadians are satisfied with how democracy works in Canada (13 per cent are “very satisfied” and 63 per cent of Canadians are “satisfied”). Some 25 per cent of Canadians have “a strong degree of respect” for their political institutions, while 14 per cent say that they do not respect them.32 There is, however, one group that holds a different view. Two-thirds of Indigenous people think that the federal government does not respect their communities.33 Canada outperforms many other countries when it comes to trust in national political institutions and confidence in their national government. Among oecd countries, Canada ranks fifth for confidence in its national government – behind only Switzerland, Norway, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.34 Another study gives even higher marks to Canada when it comes to confidence in the national government. A Gallup World Poll reports that 63 per cent of Canadians have confidence in their national government, which compares to 34 per cent for France, 59 per cent for Germany, 23 per cent for Italy, 38 per cent for Japan, 42 per cent for the Uk , and 33 per cent for the US.35 This in spite of, or because of, hyphenated federalism. Hyphenated federalism, with all its drawbacks, has served Canada well. It taught Canadians and their political leaders the importance of compromise in building a country where the Constitution and political institutions do not square with its geography and socioeconomic circumstances. It enabled Canada to accommodate English Canada, French Canada, and a multicultural policy, as well as vastly different regional economies. As Northrop Frye once put it: “The Canadian genius for compromise is reflected in the existence of Canada itself.”36 This genius for compromise is found in our Constitution and political institutions and

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they continually force our political leaders to work outside of their constraints to generate compromises and get things done. This explains why Canadians have, from a comparative perspective, a great deal of confidence in their governments, higher than it is the case in France, Italy, Japan, Great Britain, and the United States, and in some cases, by a wide margin.37 I argue that mastering the art of the compromise is crucial when tackling a constantly changing global economy, continuing calls for intergovernmental cooperation to deal with wicked problems like climate change and recent developments, such as the rise of social media, which have all made governing more difficult. It also has distinct advantages over the need to adhere to a rigid Constitution and rigid national political institutions, because it promotes flexibility in shaping policies and programs. Canada’s political leaders continue to face challenges peculiar to Canada. No other federation has a province or a state that is dominated by a national minority (here Quebec). No other federation is deprived of an Upper House in its national political institutions that can speak to regional interests. No other federation engages in an asymmetrical transfer of powers from its national government to a province or state (Canada has government measures that do not apply in Quebec). No other country has embraced multiculturalism to the extent that Canada has. And no other federation has as many nations within its political structures than Canada does. Canada is now a “multination state rather than a bi-national state.”38 Canada was the first country to adopt an official multiculturalism policy in 1971. Other countries followed. But Canada has been able to make multiculturalism work where other countries, with limited diversity, have failed.39 Canada has been able to make it work because it has learned the importance of accommodating diversity. Two-thirds of Canadians (67 per cent) say that they are “satisfied” with how well new immigrants are integrating into their communities.40 Canada is well known for welcoming new Canadians. In a cross country survey, Canadians ranked at the top for welcoming immigrants – 29 per cent favoured increasing immigration levels, followed by Australia at 23.4 per cent, the US at 11.2 per cent, and Great Britain at 5.8 per cent.41 Canada welcomed over 411,000 new arrivals in 2022 and will welcome another 421,000 in 2023.42 There is also evidence to make the case that New Canadians quickly see the merit in adapting to their new home.43 The Constitution and Canada’s political institutions forced the hand of the country’s political leaders to innovate, to compromise, and to lead by adjusting policies along the way, as needs required it. This has

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generated a distinct political culture and has shaped Canadian values. When the cBc held a competition in 1972 to define Canada’s equivalent to “as American as apple pie,” the winning entry came up with “as Canadian as possible under the circumstances.” Our political culture has responded to Canada’s challenges, over the years, by doing precisely that and, in the process, binded Canada together in a country that is difficult to govern. It has done all of that with one glaring exception – the Indigenous peoples. Canada has also outperformed other nations in apologizing for historical wrongs. Canada’s political culture is tied to its ability to generate compromises, and to see all sides of an argument. It is the reason behind Canada’s success and why the great majority of Canadians do not want to be anything or anybody else. The political culture also explains why sharp ideological differences have not taken root in Canada.

l o o kIn g Back Canada came face to face with an outdated Constitution at a time when governments saw the need to deal with an economic crisis – the Great Depression. Senior Ottawa policy makers decided that something had to be done, the Constitution be damned. They saw the urgent need to build a welfare state to which one needed to attach national standards to make it work. Policy makers in Ottawa would take charge because provincial governments did not have either the expertise in their ranks or the financial resources required to go at it alone. Getting the welfare state up and running became the overriding goal. If the Constitution and political institutions had to be pushed aside and if it made accountability in government more difficult to accomplish this, so be it.44 Hyphenated federalism has served Canada well. It has provided the basis to grow a distinct political culture that has enabled Canada’s political leaders to build the modern Canadian state. This culture explains how Canada has been able to accommodate a national bilingual policy, multiculturalism, non-White immigration, refugees, free trade with the US and Mexico, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the growing strength of provincial governments. Canada has also led the charge in introducing lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (lgBt ) rights. In 2020, a government-sponsored public opinion poll revealed that 91.8 per cent of Canadians said that they would be comfortable if the nextdoor neighbour was gay, lesbian, or bisexual.45 Canada was only the fourth country in the world making same-sex marriage legal.46

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John L. Manion, former secretary of the Treasury Board of Canada and associate clerk of the Privy Council Office, told me: “Academics are quite good at telling us what’s wrong about government and why things are the way they are. They have a point.” However, he then added: “I cannot think of a single academic in recent years telling us: Here is how things should work, here is how you can improve government operations or here is a solution. I can tell you that I would truly welcome such a contribution, and I am sure many of my colleagues feel the same way.”1 Manion was not the first or last senior public servant to tell me this. My Governing from the Centre book, which has enjoyed a wide readership among practitioners, identified problems in the federal government’s policy-making process but was short on prescriptions. I accept that it is much easier for academics to define problems, identify flaws, and outline challenges than it is defining a new approach. Given the points made in this book, I decided it is best to offer suggestions on the way ahead in this and in the concluding chapter. The more Canadians come forward with ideas about strengthening Canada, the more effective Canadian representative democracy will be. The ties that bind Canadians together will also grow stronger. The question that kept coming to me while working on this book was: how can we strengthen Canadian unity? I decided that I would, as best as I can, focus on what unites us rather than what divides us. I see no reason why any region, community, or individual would want to continue to view themselves as victims. Seeing oneself as a victim is not the way to make the transition away from victimhood. I fail to see how focusing on past grievances can pave the way for regions, groups,

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and individuals to a better future. And yet, given its history, why and how Canada was born, and the fact that national policies have greatly benefitted some regions but others less so, I can see why regions and communities have or continue to see themselves as being treated unfairly by governments and their policies. But things do change, and Canada and its governments have made substantial contributions to help regions, groups, and individuals make the transition away from past injustices and misguided public policies, at least viewed from their perspective. This chapter takes stock of these efforts.

h IS t o r y t e a c h eS US what canada ha S d o n e a n d w h y w e need to do Better I wish that I could go back in time and change history. If I could, I would make sure that the “Red Coats” would not put my ancestors on boats and disperse them to far away communities or burn down their houses and confiscate their land and all their assets. Acadians were packed like sardines on these boats – two persons shared a space four feet wide and only six feet long. The conditions led to disease and ultimately to the death of one for every seven Acadians on board. As we saw, some escaped and fled with their children into the forest, exposed to the harsh weather and famine.2 Acadians were victims of a war in which they wanted no part, a war that had little to do with them or their communities. My ancestors knew, far better than those that followed, how to exploit to the fullest the rich farmland along the Nova Scotia shoreline. One can speculate that if Acadians had not been brutally removed from their homes, some of them would have emerged as titans of Canada’s food industry. But I cannot change history and I accept that. If history could be rewritten by its victims, it would constantly be rewritten and history would not matter. There are, of course, historical facts and interpretations of history. The Expulsion of the Acadians took place in 1755; Wolfe won the Battle of Quebec; and the establishment of residential schools to assimilate Indigenous children, over a hundred years plus period, are historical facts. Historical facts should not be up for debate. I admit, however, that historians have added colour or their biases to history and the history of some groups or regions have not been suitably treated. We can debate the second point but not the first. It is not possible to delete historical facts and personalities, however misguided we may come to see them.

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Some twenty-five years ago, a number of community leaders in Francophone New Brunswick launched an effort to rename my university. The Université de Moncton is named after the community in which it sits. The city, in turn, is named after Robert Monckton. Monckton was a British military leader who played a pivotal role in the Acadian expulsion, in capturing Fort Beauséjour and in the Battle of Quebec, as the second-in-command to General Wolfe. I accept that the name Moncton can generate strong emotions in Acadian communities. I could not accept, however, that we could rewrite history because it did not work out well for us. Monckton, as a British military leader, did as he was told and carried out orders given by his political and military superiors. This is an historical fact and no interpretation or re-interpretation can change it. Several of us met with the then Université de Moncton President JeanBernard Robichaud in the late 1990s to make the case that the Moncton name should remain associated with the university. I simply argued that we could not rewrite history, that history is history and the key to success for Acadians is not the past but the future. Other participants at the meeting made powerful arguments to retain the Moncton name. My university still bears the British military leader’s name. Acadians are hardly the only Canadians who would wish to change history, if they could. Maritimers now see that Albert Smith was right in his views on Confederation and that Sir Samuel Tilley was wrong. Tilley has a statue in Saint John, while Smith has none. The Tilley statue was vandalized in early July 2021. I never had a high opinion of Tilley’s work leading New Brunswick into Confederation. But, whether one agrees with his work or not, Tilley played an important part in our history and his work can never be denied. Smith was not opposed to Confederation, only the terms of Confederation outlined at the Charlottetown, Quebec, and London conferences. I can understand why Indigenous peoples would want to vandalize statues of certain Fathers of Confederation and I do not wish to pass judgment on their actions, assuming that it was some of them who vandalized Tilley’s statue. Suffice to say that, from my perspective, I see little value in tearing down statues or in burning down churches, though I readily appreciate why some could be mad at how history treated them. If Canada’s Indigenous peoples could go back and change history, they would, and I would walk with them. Canada has made a mess out of its relations with Indigenous peoples. It is the darkest page of our history, but it is our history, warts and all. If Western Canadians could turn back the clock, they would tell Sir Wilfrid Laurier that they, not he, would decide how they would join

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Confederation. They would also insist on a more effective capacity in national political institutions to speak on behalf of their interest when shaping national policies. If French speaking Quebecers could rewrite history, they would see to it that Montcalm, not Wolfe, would have won the Battle of Quebec. Some Ontarians may well look back and conclude that the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and the North America Free Trade Agreement (naFta ) worked out quite well for them and they should not have opposed it. They may also conclude that Ottawa and Canada’s National Policy have helped them a lot in building a strong economy. Looking back to history, some Black Loyalists may regret fighting alongside other British Empire Loyalists and later declining passage from the Sierra Leone Company to leave Canada. I do not think that there are individuals, groups, and regions that would not change at least some segment of history, if they could. But historical facts are historical facts and they cannot be altered, even if they do not square with how one would prefer them to be.

F r o m w h e re I S It I view the world from where I sit and my prescriptions for a better Canada are shaped by my experience and that of the Acadian community. I have seen firsthand the transformation of a society from a broken people to a dynamic community, full of promise. I had an epiphany or perhaps more accurately a rude awakening in the fall of 1977, shortly after I arrived at the University of Oxford to pursue my doctoral studies. Within days, I met Nevil Johnson, my thesis tutor at Nuffield College. Johnson had an imposing physique. He looked German, with blond hair, broad shoulders, and no fat. I do not remember ever seeing him smile. He never saw a joke, except by appointment. He was dour, sour, and stern. His office, unlike those of other Oxford tutors, was always neat with everything in its place. He had positioned his desk so that he faced the wall, not the student or any visitor. Nevil would swivel around in his chair to talk across a coffee table that separated him from his visitor. One invariably felt that he was impatient to kick his chair back and continue working on whatever had occupied his attention before he was so inconveniently interrupted. Nevil was a top scholar, and his work was widely respected everywhere by students of federalism and political institutions. He was a member of Britain’s Conservative Party and an adviser to Margaret Thatcher. His

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work on German federalism and the British Constitution continues to be widely quoted. He became my thesis tutor because I wanted to write on federalism, from a Canadian perspective. Our first meeting was brief and to the point. We agreed that I would write a twenty-five-page paper on policy and program coordination in federal states. A few weeks later, Nevil summoned me to his office. There was little in the way of, “How are you enjoying Oxford?” He looked me straight in the eye and declared: “This is an awful paper. I have rarely seen such a poorly written paper. I really do not understand what you are trying to say.” I attempted to employ a strategy that had worked for me while at the University of New Brunswick (UnB ) where I was allowed to write my papers in French if I wanted to. “Oh,” I said, “I am an Acadian.” His response: “What on earth is that?” To which I replied: “My mother tongue is French.” Nevil said, “I see,” and continued, “Well, you know, there are some very good universities across the channel in France. Why not go there?” I protested, “No, I want to be here at Oxford.” Picking up a book, he said, “Well then, here is an English grammar.” Tossing it on the coffee table, he added, “Read it very carefully.” With that, he kicked his chair around to face the wall. I was left staring at the back of his head and at the grammar book resting on the coffee table. I picked it up and left without saying another word. So this is Oxford, I thought. I was intimidated. Being Acadian was not going to help me here and it was clear that playing the victim card would not work. I remember thinking that perhaps Nevil was right, maybe I should have gone to France. I could do one of three things: go to France, go home, or buckle down and do it. I decided to give it my best shot. The next three years were all about work and very long hours seven days a week. I read Nevil’s grammar book and it did help. But it was not enough. I went to Blackwell’s, Oxford’s famous bookstore, and bought a kit – New Course in Practical English. It was a one-hundred-page, twelve-week course that included a number of exercises to improve one’s grammar and writing style. I still have the kit. I patiently completed every single exercise and read and reread all the material in less than twelve days rather than twelve weeks. It proved invaluable, and it has had a lasting effect. Several weeks after our initial meeting, I decided to write another essay for Nevil. Shortly after, I was in his office waiting for the verdict. The tone was not friendlier, but his message was. He said it was “much improved.” I thanked him, placed his grammar book back on his coffee

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table, said that it had been helpful, and left. He again swivelled his chair to face the wall. By Nevil’s standard, this was a positive assessment of my work. By late spring-summer 1979, my thesis was done. Sir K.C. Wheare, an Australian and the first non-British head of Oxford University and arguably the world’s leading authority on federalism, was asked to chair my viva (oral defence of my thesis). I had no difficulty defending my thesis and I was able to turn it into my first book Federal-Provincial Collaboration: The Canada-New Brunswick General Development Agreement. I felt that Nevil was nearly as happy as I was with the outcome. A few days later, Nevil invited me to dine with him at high table at Nuffield College. I asked him if he remembered our first meeting, when he had said that I should think of going across the channel to France. “Yes, of course,” he said. He added “What you were looking for was a crutch and I was not about to give you one. You would either meet the standards or you would not.” To my surprise, he then talked about l’Acadie, revealing a fairly deep knowledge of our history. Do I think that my experience can apply to other Canadians? Yes, for some, but no for others. I cannot isolate my experience from my community and every community has a different history. I can only speak to my own and the Acadian experience. Oxford gave me the confidence to pursue my academic career. I arrived there some twenty years after Louis J. Robichaud had been elected premier of New Brunswick and some fifteen years after he had set out to fundamentally change the province, in particular, New Brunswick’s Acadian regions. The election of Louis J. Robichaud as premier of New Brunswick was a turning point in Acadian society. Robichaud played the pivotal role in seeing Acadians go from a broken but tenacious people in 1955, when we were commemorating the bicentennial of our expulsion, to a thriving society, not only full of accomplishments over the past sixty years, but also full of potential for the years ahead. As noted, Robichaud changed everything. He gave us a new school system, overhauled the province’s tax regime, established the Université de Moncton, made room for Acadians to serve in government at both the political and bureaucratic levels, introduced a highly ambitious Equal Opportunity Program, and his government passed the province’s Official Languages Act. Quebec had its Quiet Revolution in the 1960s while New Brunswick was also having its own, albeit, not so quiet. Robichaud literally brought New Brunswick kicking and screaming into the twentieth century. Maclean’s magazine had this to say in 1967 about

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his reform measures: “The Establishment is worried, the have-nots are restless, and the government is shaking up a province that will never be the same again. Quebec? No, it’s happening now in Louis Robichaud’s New Brunswick.”3 We have, over the past sixty years, witnessed a veritable Acadian renaissance. We did it in every sector. We did it in the arts, in academe, in sports, in government, and in business. Entrepreneurship has now taken root in all Acadian regions. The number of new business start-ups in one Acadian community, in per capita terms, is the highest in the Maritime provinces. Acadians have become important business leaders in several economic sectors and are exporting their products internationally.4 It will be recalled that Moncton saw a serious economic downturn in 1988, when Ottawa’s Crown Corporation – cn – decided to shut down its Moncton repair yard and transfer the work to Montreal. The federal government never explained why it made more economic sense for cn to shut down the Moncton yard in favour of Montreal. The decision led to two thousand Moncton shop workers losing their jobs. Monctonians reminded Ottawa that, on a per capita basis, shutting down the repair yard and putting two thousand workers out of a job was like shutting the auto sector in Southern Ontario. The Montreal economy could have coped with the closure of the cn repair shop better than the much smaller Moncton economy. The city was able to turn its economy around, in large measure, thanks to a new generation of Acadian entrepreneurs and to Moncton’s bilingual character. Much has been written about the economic “Moncton Miracle” including an article by the New York Times that had as its headline – “The Moncton Miracle: Bilingual Phone Chat.”5 Acadians have become the dominant players in the Moncton business community and we did it all in a city that bears the name of Robert Monckton, the British military leader who led the charge in the Acadian expulsion. That is the best way to get back at history. Louis J. Robichaud and I became very close friends. As noted earlier, he asked me to organize his state funeral. I did as I was asked, and it was a particularly difficult, emotional moment for me and for Acadians. My friendship with Robichaud allowed me to ask numerous questions about his stay in power. He saw injustice and unequal opportunities in New Brunswick and set out to do something about it. Government policies became his vehicle of choice. He held a central belief which applied to both Anglophones and Francophones that guided his work – government needed to intervene to give an equal chance at success to everyone. He never shied away from taking on powerful forces or striking difficult

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decisions. He saw government as a major actor in the development of the Acadian community and never hesitated to introduce one measure after another to make the Acadian community more self-sufficient. He did not consider this to be self-contradictory. Indeed, he believed that, unless government intervened, Acadians would remain victims of past policies and political and military decisions. I have seen many politicians come and go without leaving a trace. Robichaud left deep footprints on New Brunswick that are still visible to this day. He saw education as the key building block. He realized that the government had few Acadians working in departments and agencies and decided to do something about it. He concluded that economic and business development in New Brunswick were slow and he set out to change the pace of economic growth by establishing a government agency with an economic development mandate and asked a British expatriate to lead it. Acadians have now taken their rightful place in society thanks to the Robichaud years and the various federal government programs introduced during the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s with a focus on Francophones outside Quebec. In the process, we have become productive Canadians who are deeply committed to Canada. In brief, government measures enabled us to come out of our shell, gain confidence, and play an important role in our communities. The question: can the experience be duplicated for other groups notably the Indigenous peoples? I have often asked myself the question: could Louis J. Robichaud do today what he was able to accomplish in the 1960s? I doubt it. Notwithstanding the strength of his character, it was easier for governments to launch an ambitious reform agenda and implement a wide array of programs some sixty years ago than it is today. Back then, New Brunswickers and Canadians saw the role of government in a positive light and had confidence that the public sector could deliver what it promised. Social media did not exist nor did 24-hour news channels. Government officials did not have to deal with a constantly growing number of oversight bodies. Access or right to information legislation was not even on the horizon. No one was making the case that government bureaucracy had been turned into a big whale that can’t swim. Election campaigns had a beginning and an end rather than what we have today – permanent election campaigns. I recall, several years ago, an Acadian friend telling me: “You know Louis Robichaud getting elected as premier of New Brunswick in 1960, in that environment, would be much like an Indigenous person being

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elected premier today. The power elites in New Brunswick must have fought off Robichaud at every turn. Can you imagine an Aboriginal elected as premier?” I said no then, and I still say no today. Robichaud could count on an Acadian base of voters, which amounted to over one-third of total voters in 1960. The Indigenous peoples now only account for 2.4 per cent of New Brunswick’s population. In addition, policy making in New Brunswick today is different than it was in the 1960s, for reasons outlined above. It would likely be very difficult, if at all possible, to apply the forces that paved the way for Acadians to succeed in all sectors to the Indigenous peoples. First Nations will need many Louis Robichauds, not just one. Canadians will have to show tolerance, as governments negotiate new governance arrangements and introduce ambitious plans to assist the Indigenous peoples in taking their rightful place in Canadian society. More is said about this in the concluding chapter.

t h e m a rIt Ime S I know of no publication claiming that federal government policies, from 1867 to the early 1990s, benefitted the economy of the Maritimes. In contrast, many, including Ernest Forbes and myself, have documented how federal policies have actually hindered development in the three Maritime provinces.6 The Maritimes, more than any other region, can rightfully wear the victim label when looking at Ottawa’s decisions over the years in all sectors from procurement policies, the Second World War effort, industrial and R&D policies and even regional economic development efforts.7 However, federal transfer payments to the Maritime region and Newfoundland and Labrador have been and continue to be more generous than is the case for other regions.8 But even here, questions were raised regarding whether transfer payments have inhibited economic development by making the region overly dependent on them.9 To be sure, the road to a strong and more self-sustaining economy for the Maritimes remains difficult. There are signs, however, that the region is moving in the right direction. As we saw earlier, free trade agreements are opening up new markets for businesses from the Maritime provinces. Businesses, like they did before Confederation, are looking to the export market and they are making important headway, particularly on the eastern seaboard of the United States, Western Europe, and Asia. The region has long suffered population loss to other Canadian regions and New England. But things are changing. The three Maritime provinces

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have seen, in recent years, a net immigration gain, a rare accomplishment since 1867. From July 2019 to June 2020, Halifax’s population grew by 2.1 per cent or over nine thousand people, with international immigration accounting for 64 per cent of the growth.10 The population of Prince Edward Island grew at a faster rate than Canada between 1 April 2019 and 1 July 2021.11 The Halifax to Moncton corridor is generating impressive economic growth that compares to the national average, employing several well-known socio-economic indicators.12 The corridor is also attracting new Canadians as well as migrants from other Canadian regions. Statistics Canada reported, in the second-quarter figures for 2021, that the Maritimes saw the biggest quarterly population increase on record. The agency also indicated that the net immigration to the region is the highest in sixty years or since Statistics Canada has been tracking this data.13 Population growth is a sure sign of economic development. Ottawa recently did something that it was reluctant to do in the past, at least, when it came to the Atlantic provinces. It tailored its immigration efforts to the economic circumstances of the region. The Atlantic Immigration Pilot Program has been a success and it continues to pay important dividends for the region.14 It is a government success story and the region’s business community is asking for more programs like it. This is true in all parts of Atlantic Canada, from small communities like Saint-Quentin in New Brunswick, to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Urban centres, notably Halifax, Moncton, and Charlottetown, are performing as well as any other urban centre in Canada when it comes to key economic indicators.15 Economists at one of Canada’s largest banks also paint a positive outlook for the Maritime region’s post-covId -19 economic recovery, predicting that it will outperform other regions.16 To be sure, important challenges persist. The region has a fast-aging population, which entails wide implications for public finances, health care, and productivity. It also remains much more rural than is the case for other regions. The Maritimes are still overly dependent on federal transfers in the case of both provincial governments and individuals. Maritimers should come to terms with the fact that the more important benefit that they received from Confederation are transfer payments, or guilt money, sent our way from Ottawa. We now have plenty of evidence to show that federal transfer payments are not the way to promote self-sustaining economic growth. Nonetheless, federal government economic development policies have and will continue to favour the economic interests of the more populated provinces (Ontario and Quebec). That is the Canadian way.

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I fault the three Maritime provinces for not joining the Western provinces in their fight for a reformed Senate, from the 1980s to 2010. Western Canada, like Atlantic Canada, has a legitimate grievance against Ottawa’s inability to properly address regional interests when shaping national policies. The difference is that Western Canada has the political and economic clout to do something about it and Ottawa needs to pay attention. I also maintain that Maritimers need to come to terms with the fact that, unless we change how our national political institutions decide, having a strong central national government is never to our advantage. Decisions will continue to favour the more populated provinces because this is where the votes are. The Maritimes can likely continue to count on Ottawa sending transfer payments to the region. In return, Ottawa has, particularly over the past seventy years or so, been able to count on the Maritime provinces whenever it looked to expand its role. Maritime premiers have known how to turn guilt into federal dollars. Guilt money is not the way for the economic development of the Maritime provinces, as history has shown. Adjusting national policies to accommodate regional economic circumstances works, as it was recently done in the case of immigration. naFta has broken down old barriers and opened new markets for Maritime businesses. These developments are helping the Maritime provinces to make the transition away from a dependency on federal transfer payments.

o n t a rI o Premiers of Ontario, starting with Bob Rae and continuing to this day, have been promoting a “fair share federalism” agenda for Ontario. They have met with success. This is not surprising, given the province’s political clout in deciding who holds power in Ottawa. It will be recalled that former Premier Dalton McGuinty, for one, argued that Ottawa was “shortchanging Ontarians by about $1.1 billion a year in health care and higher education.”17 Ontario has long argued for Ottawa to shift transfer payments to the provinces for health, social services, and postsecondary education to a per capita basis which would, of course, favour the more populous provinces at the expense of small have-less provinces. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Finance Minister Jim Flaherty agreed to the shift in his 2007 budget. Flaherty declared: “Starting in 2007–08 we will put the Canada Social Transfer payments on an equal cash basis to support post-secondary education, social assistance and

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social services equally in all provinces.” He added: “We are also committing to move the Canada Health Transfer to an equal per capita cash basis when the current arrangement expires in 2014.”18 Ontario won the debate – hardly the first time since Canada was born. But even this does not tell the whole story. Government spending can take different forms. Some expenditures can create an economic dependency, while others can have a positive structural impact on a region’s economy. A federal dollar spent under the Employment Insurance program, for example, will have a far different impact than a dollar spent on a consulting contract, on creating jobs in the automobile sector or on helping to launch a new It business. A federal dollar spent on a federal public servant’s salary will have a different impact than a dollar spent on Old Age Security. As has been well documented, have-less provinces and older people rely a great deal more on transfer payments than the have-more provinces, and the more productive younger generations.19 Ontario’s fair share federalism argument does not take into account the positive impact Ottawa’s National Policy had on the Ontario economy, and conversely the negative impact it had on the economy of the Western and Atlantic provinces, the substantial investments the federal government made in the automobile sector, that Ottawa looked to Ontario to build Canada’s war effort (1940–45), the fact that Canada’s national capital and all its accompanying benefits are located in Ottawa, and the large investments Ottawa has committed to R&D in Ontario over the past sixty years. When one considers all the above, Ontario as a victim of Confederation or federal transfer payments to other regions rings hollow. Looking at transfer payments without regard to history or past federal policies that strongly favoured Ontario is misleading. Looking at transfer payments in isolation of other federal government programs is no less misleading. It is worth repeating the point that tariffs imposed to implement Canada’s National Policy subsidized each person in Ontario by $15.15 a year but cost each person in Nova Scotia $11.67 and $28.16 in Saskatchewan. Ontario’s present and past premiers have nothing to say about this. Ontario dominates the House of Commons, Cabinet, major economic portfolios, notably the Department of Finance, and is very well represented in the senior echelons of the federal public service. The province also never has to worry about an effective Upper House in Parliament speaking to the interest of the smaller provinces because there is no such House in Canada’s Parliament. Ontario dominates where it matters when deciding who should form the government: the House of Commons.

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When Ontario decides that federal policies and transfers need to be adjusted, it has the political clout to see to it that the federal government will change course. Winning the fair share federalism argument is a case in point. The province’s campaign has generated dividends for Ontario. In 2007, Ontario received eighty-two cents for every dollar it sent to Ottawa. By 2019, the figure was eighty-five cents. From the early 1990s, Ontario started to voice that it was a victim to misguided federal government policy on transfer payments to provinces. It argued that the policy would remain unfair as long as transfer payments are not calculated on a per capita basis. For a long time, Ottawa adjusted transfer payments in health care and social services to take into account issues raised by the Rowell-Sirois Report and others, including how best to deal with the provinces, given that they differ on the strength of their economies, with some having “an easier time raising revenue than others.”20 No matter, Ontario won the day.

w eS t e r n c a nada Western Canada has a legitimate claim when it argues that its voice does not carry the weight that it should in national political and administrative institutions, given its population and its contributions to the Canadian economy. The region can point to numerous instances, over the years, to make this point – the implementation of National Policy, the National Energy Program, the cF-18 maintenance contract, the circumstances in which Alberta joined Confederation, and I can easily add to the list.21 Given the Supreme Court decision, there is now little likelihood that we will ever see Senate reform, a Western Canada priority for the past forty years. Western Canada also makes the case that its contributions to federal government coffers far outweigh any benefits it gets back from Ottawa. For every dollar Alberta sent to Ottawa in 2019, it only received sixty-four cents back and British Columbia eighty cents. However, things are different for Manitoba $1.47 and Saskatchewan $1.07. The region believes that it does not have the political clout to make its case successfully before national political institutions on a wide range of issues. It is important to underline the point that Western Canada is only asking the federal government to accept that national unity concerns are not always about Quebec and that it needs to have its voice heard more effectively in shaping policies. The region’s economic contribution to the national economy has been well documented and accounts for 38

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per cent of Canada’s real domestic product (gdP ) and 37 per cent of the country’s exports, a disproportionately large amount in relation to its share of the national population.22 The challenge is that few Canadians see Western Canada, notably Alberta, as a victim of federal government policies. Andrew Coyne, for example, asked: “What province in Canada would not trade places with Alberta if it could?” and added: “The province’s government imposes the lightest tax burden in the country.”23 The problem is political, it is based on a widely held view in Western Canada that its economic contributions are taken for granted and that the region’s perspectives are too easily ignored in Ottawa. I have also long believed that the national media, with their head offices and leading journalists and columnists located in Ontario and Quebec, and the federal bureaucracy increasingly concentrated in the National Capital Region (ncr ), have not given Western Canada’s perspectives the attention that they deserve. Ottawa can change its ways to give a stronger voice to Western Canada without looking to the Constitution, as it has when introducing major reform measures in several sectors. Ottawa can make Cabinet government work and decentralize the federal public service away from Ottawa, notably at the senior levels. There is strong public support for Ottawa to reverse the trend of centralizing the public service in the ncr . A recent public opinion survey reveals that some 80 per cent of Albertans and Saskatchewanians support moving more government offices out of Ottawa. The support falls to 65 per cent for Ontarians, which indicates that there is still a strong level of support for government decentralization. Studies point to several benefits when moving units out of Ottawa – it reduces staff turnover, strengthens national unity, reduces cynicism toward government, and government units are less costly to operate in the regions than they are in the National Capital Region.24 Ottawa could even move parts of the Privy Council Office and the Department of Finance (the key policy advisory capacity inside the federal government) to Western Canada and organize an annual Western Canada conference to give voice not only to the region’s priorities but also to take stock of how well federal policies apply in the region. I know Ottawa well enough to know that senior policy makers would view the above suggestions as, at best, inconvenient and best to ignore. Influence, like power, in Ottawa is a zero sum game – you give to one; you have to take it from someone else. The unstated Ottawa perspective, which permeates its decision-making processes, is that, in the end, political power decides. They point out that Ontario and Quebec are where

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the majority of Canadians live and vote and nothing is about to change that. In the popular parlance of the day – it is what it is and Western Canadians have to deal with it or get over it. The easy and convenient solution for Ottawa is to do nothing, to go with the status quo. Prime ministers and their advisors know better than anyone where the votes are and how one secures political power in Canada. In the end, this is what truly matters to them. Meanwhile, senior career officials have little reason to make their jobs more demanding. If the federal government wants a healthy Canada, a greater unity of purpose, and wishes to address the point that national unity concerns are not only about Quebec, Ottawa has to change its ways. I note, however, that Western Canada will be gaining four seats (Alberta three and British Columbia one), with Ontario only gaining one and Quebec actually losing one seat in the redistribution of seats process that takes place every ten years to account for Canada’s population changes. The redistribution of seats will take place in 2022–23.25 Time will tell if Quebec, in the end, actually loses a seat. Today, Western Canada is not an economic victim or a victim of National Policy, as it was one hundred years ago. If anything, it is victim of Ottawa’s indifference to its interests, both political and economic. The full dream of a united Canada requires Ottawa to keep evolving and giving Western Canada a strong voice should be high on the agenda.

q Ue Be c Quebec’s victim label is wearing thin, everywhere except in Quebec. I can well understand why Alberta sees problems with Quebec receiving over $13 billion in federal equalization payments annually, at the same time as it runs a surplus and continues to apply pressure on Ottawa to slow growth in the oil and gas sector. Quebec denouncing Alberta’s “dirty energy” on one hand and grabbing federal transfer payments, fuelled in part by Albertans’ taxes, with both hands is not easily swallowed in Western Canada. As previously noted, Quebec played an important role in killing the Energy East project. Quebec has been on the receiving end of federal transfers and many federal government projects and procurement contracts, some of which, it did not win through a competition process. Ottawa also requires that Air Canada, Canadian National Railway (cn ) and the Public Sector Pension Investment Board locate their head offices in Quebec. We saw earlier that the federal government awarded Quebec-based Davie

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shipyard a number of contracts only because it is located in Quebec. Quebec members of Parliament successfully argued that Canada should ensure “fairness among the Canadian shipyards, independent of who wins the bidding process.”26 It will also be recalled that Ottawa awarded a contract of over a billion dollars for the maintenance of cF-18 fighter jets to a Quebec firm, even though Manitoba-based Bristol won the competitive bid. Quebec politicians, including the then Premier Robert Bourassa and former Premier René Lévesque, applauded Ontario’s decision, arguing that Quebec deserved the contract because the province “had received a small portion of the $2.4 billion in benefits from the original cF-18 purchase in 1980.”27 They were making the point that Quebec was a victim of an earlier federal government decision, without elaborating on how Quebec was short-changed. Fairness is a one-way street for many Quebec politicians. They never questioned why several provinces received even less than Quebec in benefits from the earlier cF-18 contract, or if the province had the capacity to deliver what was required by the manufacturer. One Montreal mP said that the decision was “bound to make someone happy and someone unhappy, and my area is happy.”28 Ottawa, apart from realizing that Quebec was and is vote rich, decided to direct the project to Quebec either for purely partisan political reasons or because the province is viewed as a victim. In doing so, however, Ottawa created a new victim – Manitoba. Quebec won and Manitoba lost because, at times, Canada’s national political institutions allow losers to win and winners to lose. Market forces did not grow the aerospace industry in Quebec – government policies did, going back to the Second World War. The federal government efforts continue. Ottawa and Quebec unveiled new investments worth $2 billion in July 2021 “to breathe new life into Canada’s bruised aerospace sector.” Ottawa’s Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said that there was more funding to come and explained that Ottawa was in talks with Bombardier about new projects.29 Ottawa has, time and again, come to the rescue of Quebec-based Bombardier which, in turn, grew from Canadair and De Havilland assets, both of which stem from the federal government nationalized wartime production plants. Ottawa started supporting Bombardier as far back as 1966, when the firm secured $35 million in grants. Bombardier has since received over $1 billion in funding.30 The fairness argument only works, it seems, when it favours Quebec. The fairness argument, if it would have been applied to the aerospace sector, would have pushed Ottawa

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to locate activities in other regions. Quebec politicians lose sight of the fairness argument when it comes to sectors that Ottawa has actively supported in Quebec over the years – think of the aerospace and pharmaceutical sectors. Canadians outside Quebec are often told not to engage in “Quebec bashing” when they point to Ottawa decisions that favour Quebec. They have to tread very carefully when they raise issues about the cF-18 maintenance contract, Davie shipbuilding, the province’s aerospace industry, and Bombardier. Federal and Quebec politicians have, over the years, warned that Quebec bashing would fuel separatist sentiments. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently declared: “Enough with Quebec bashing.” Maryse Potvin argues that Quebec bashing is tied to an “obsession with national identity” on the one hand and the “logic of ideological victimization of a political project” on the other.31 Former Quebec Premier Lucien Bouchard often spoke of Quebec’s “humiliation.” He wrote in his letter of resignation as federal minister of the Environment that the federal government was “making an alliance with those who want Quebec to continue to be humiliated.”32 Quebec’s interests are today very well represented in Ottawa and the province has been able to redefine its position in the federation by declaring, with little consultation with the other provinces, that “Quebecers form a nation” and “French should be the only official language of Quebec.” Canada’s House of Commons also passed a motion in 2006 that recognized that Quebecers form a nation. It is very rare for a country to allow one of its minorities to declare that they constitute a “nation.” I do not see Quebec as a victim, given the ability of its politicians to shape federal government policies and decisions. I also note that, in the era of governing from the centre, five of Canada’s last six prime ministers are from Quebec. In brief, I argue that Quebec has made the transition away from victimhood and that Canada and Canadian federalism have played a major role in the transition. I also do not accept that I am engaging in Quebec bashing when I write that Quebec has occupied a privileged position in Canadian political circles in recent years and that much of their economic woes have had more to do with their economic history, as described earlier, than with federal government policies. It is not Quebec bashing to write that Ottawa has played a pivotal role in strengthening the Quebec economy, thanks to the above-noted measure and others. It is not Quebec bashing to write that for every dollar the province sends to Ottawa, it gets $1.21 back.33 I note that Quebec received $1.16 for every dollar it sent to Ottawa in 2007, which suggests that Quebec is

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becoming more dependent on federal transfers. It is not Quebec bashing to write that Quebec premiers in recent years, with few exceptions, want the provincial government to be in charge of most things, leaving Ottawa to be in charge of cutting cheques. I am puzzled by the Canadian Parliament and non-Quebecer Canadians in their dealings with Quebec. I see Quebec politicians, both at the provincial level and in the Canadian Parliament, continually pushing and pulling for more “powers” for Quebec. They are always responding to Quebec demands, with few asking what Canada needs. I am also at a loss to explain why Canadians from nine provinces should accept to have less influence on Quebecers than Quebecers have on them. Some federal policies apply in nine provinces but not in Quebec but Quebec Cabinet ministers and mP s continue to have a say on all policies34 I am hardly the first one to make the case that the French language has a better chance of success with Quebec in the Confederation than outside it. If Quebec leaves Canada, it will turn its back on one million Francophones outside Quebec, of which 12 per cent are immigrants.35 If Quebec leaves Canada, it will not change the fact that the English language will continue to dominate in nearly all of North America. Quebec may well have been a victim when Lord Durham wrote his report, when Upper and Lower Canada were joined, with Upper Canada being placed on an equal footing with Lower Canada even if it had less population in the first half of the nineteenth century, but it is victim no more. The federal government has played an important role in the transition, particularly under the leadership of Pierre E. Trudeau, Brian Mulroney, Jean Chrétien, and Justin Trudeau.

w o m en Women faced a long struggle to be able to serve on an equal footing as men in the federal public service. There have been well-documented incidents of harassment and of stereotyping women as secretaries and administrative assistants. Ottawa wasted away considerable talent, over the years. But things are changing. Women can now drop the victim label, at least when it comes to employment in the federal public service. They are well represented in Cabinet and their share of employment in the federal public service is equal to their share of Canada’s population. As we also saw earlier, they now occupy their fair share of senior executive positions in the federal public service, again, in relation to Canada’s population.

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The agenda, however, is not complete and more work needs to be done to ensure that women have a safe, harassment-free work environment. We saw throughout 2021 a constant stream of harassment and sexual assault cases, particularly in the Department of Defence, based on gender. The progress made in employment equity, however, is largely limited to the federal government and other public institutions. The private sector trails badly in opening up its ranks to women. This is its loss. Women still only make eighty-nine cents for every dollar men make, there is still a pronounced wage gap between male and female equity partners inside Canada’s largest law firms and women remain underrepresented in senior leadership positions in the private sector.36 They only hold 25 per cent of vice president positions and 15 per cent of chief executive officer positions.37 We saw earlier that Ottawa recently announced new efforts to motivate the private sector to hire more women in senior management positions. Ottawa needs to keep applying pressure on the business community to follow its lead in that direction and also in narrowing the wage gap between men and women. However, when it comes to the federal public service, the progress has been substantial and, at least in terms of numbers, women are victims no more. The federal government has outperformed other jurisdictions in making sure that women become full participants at all levels of its public service.

m o r e n e e dS t o Be done Ottawa has made progress in attracting Black Canadians to its ranks. However, not all is well for them in the public service and more needs to be done. There is evidence that Black Canadians continue to deal with employer discrimination in the federal public service.38 As we saw earlier, few make it to executive positions in the civil service. In addition, Black public servants decided to join forces in 2021 to launch a $2.5 billion class-action lawsuit alleging years of discrimination. One employee revealed that her manager praised “the good old days when we had slaves” and another reported being systematically overlooked for promotions notwithstanding advanced degrees, including a law degree, while non-Black colleagues “rose up the ranks.”39 The federal government recognizes that more needs to be done and has committed funds to promote a more diverse workforce.40 Progress in attracting, retaining, and promoting Indigenous peoples to the federal public service has been unacceptable. Like Canada itself, the

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federal public service has failed Indigenous peoples. Two Indigenous public servants have also launched a legal action against the federal government, stating that they experienced discrimination at work because of their Indigenous identities.41 They still remain victims of Canada, of its history, of its policies, and of its federal public service. Canada’s agenda to help them requires a much more ambitious agenda than finding ways to attract them to the public service and we return to this in the concluding chapter.

l o o kIn g Back I recognize that the word victim conjures up all manner of images, none positive. I understand why some people do not react well to it. The term is recent. Johanna Ray Vollhardt explains that: “The term victimhood was virtually absent until the 1980s, but it has grown exponentially ever since.”42 The focus on human rights, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the establishment of reconciliation commissions have generated a keen interest in the rights and needs of the “collective victimization of individuals and groups.”43 I employ the term not in the sense that victimhood is self-generated, but rather, brought about by history and past government policies that deliberately held back and still hold back the development of a people, a region, or a community. I knew, growing up, that Acadians were victims to the 1755 deportation, and to government policies that prevented us from getting a proper education. I was fortunate to see the Acadians come of age and shed their own victim status because governments decided that they needed to change policies, not only for Acadians, but also to promote growth in New Brunswick and in our part of Canada. I experienced shedding the victim label personally when my tutor at Oxford decided that I had performed by his university’s standards and did not rely on my status as a victim. I realized then that there is not much positive that can flow out of victimhood, other than bringing groups together for a common purpose. In the case of Moncton and Acadians, Mayor Leonard Jones’ anti-French diatribes became the force bringing Acadians together to promote a common agenda. However one does it, the key is to overcome victimhood, because it disempowers both individuals and groups by looking to past grievances and magnifying challenges. It also provides a readymade explanation for regions, groups, and individuals wishing to avoid assuming responsibility for their failures. Canada has done remarkably well in assisting individuals, groups, and regions in making the transition away from victimhood – it is the case

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for Acadians, Maritimers, Quebecers, and Ontarians, in light of their fair share federalism campaign, and also for women in the federal public service. However, more needs to be done. Canada has not only turned the Indigenous peoples into victims, it has failed to assist them in making the transition away from victimhood. The next chapter explores what can be done.

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Canada: We Have a Problem

Canada stands out from other countries on several fronts. As this book documents, no other country has been as willing to apologize for past wrongs, has shown such an ability to extend a hand to groups and regions to help them grow, has shown a higher degree of tolerance towards new Canadians and refugees, and has been able to make national political institutions designed by and for another country, work in a challenging political, economic, and geographical environment. Canada did all of this and more but it has failed badly in dealing with the Indigenous peoples. In its history and to this day, Canada has humiliated the Indigenous peoples. The shame, the abuse, the bigotry, and racism never seem to end. In short, the Indigenous peoples are Canada’s true victims and the responsibility for this is on us and our ancestors. The reader will ask: how is it that other groups and regions have been able to break free from victimhood but not Indigenous communities? Again, I am well aware that the word “victim” conjures up negative images. Residents of Membertou and of other First Nations across Canada will dispute applying the term to their communities and rightly so. In several cases, against all odds, they are outperforming neighbouring communities and they are victims no more. I am applying the term victim to make the point that no other group, no other region, and no other community in Canada has suffered as deeply and as long as the Indigenous peoples. They are the victims of past and current government failures and racism tout court. It is on all of us to repair the relationship and we need to do so with a sense of urgency. Because I maintain that other groups, other communities and regions are moving away from victimhood, I decided to devote this concluding chapter to Indigenous peoples, their challenges, the need to

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right an historical wrong, and I explore some of the possibilities on the way ahead. Groups and regions themselves, together with government programs, were the driving force behind their ability to break away from victimhood. Canada now needs to play its part in supporting Indigenous communities as they continue to grow and prosper. I recognize that I view the situation from a privileged position, sitting in a lovely office, warm or cool depending on how I prefer it, on the fourth floor of the Taillon building on the Université de Moncton campus. My economic future has always been secured and I continue to enjoy an enviable career lifestyle. Contrast this with many Indigenous individuals who have every reason to be angry, to feel violated, and to see Canada’s political institutions foreign to their interests. It seems that the mistreatment never ends – as recently as September 2021, Indigenous Services Canada gave residents of the Saugeen First Nation covId -19 vaccines that had expired weeks earlier.1 Why, one can ask, does this never happen to others or, if it does, it is never reported? I ask Canadians to ponder how they would react, if they were Indigenous, if they had been deliberately frozen out of economic activities over the years, and if they and their community had been belittled at every turn and on every issue while knowing that Canada’s first prime minister had said: “The executions of the Indians ought to convince the Red Man that the White man governs.”2 As noted earlier, I often think back of when I was a small boy in Saint-Maurice looking up the road to see two Mi’kmaq women walking towards us selling hand woven baskets, with folks in the village saying that they had to buy baskets, otherwise the “Indians” would put a curse on their family, home, and animals. This is not history going back to the days of Sir John A. Macdonald or Sir Wilfrid Laurier. To this day, I still hear derogatory comments about Indigenous peoples. As already mentioned, I have often asked myself – would I be angry and bitter if I were growing up in an Indigenous community in New Brunswick knowing Canadian history and being aware that six of the ten poorest postal codes in Canada are First Nations communities in New Brunswick?3 I accept, however, that it is a great deal easier for me to call for radical change than it is for the White fisher or the White forest worker. They have a direct economic stake in the issues – therein lies the problem. White Canadians have had it easy because Canada’s political institutions have been accommodating them at every turn. We control these institutions and we have made them work for us and for our economic interests. The very same institutions, however, have turned a deaf ear to

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Indigenous peoples, year after year. White Canadians now have to share the stage with Indigenous peoples and make certain that they get an equal opportunity to pursue their potential to the fullest. Unable to get a fair hearing before our political and administrative institutions, Indigenous peoples turned to the one arena where they could – the courts. They put together convincing cases before the justice system. The courts have and continue, for the most part, to rule in their favour. The Indigenous peoples have also turned to their treaties and to section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982 to secure their rights to resource activities. The courts (the Marshall decision) decided that Indigenous people could fish. Leaving aside the merit of the court’s decision, I have long believed that it was absurd that Indigenous peoples, living a few kilometers from tide water, could not fish or participate in the commercial fishery like other Canadian fishers. Assuming that the courts continue to rule in the favour of Indigenous peoples, non-Indigenous Canadians will have to adjust. Unless both communities sort out how to implement court decisions, we may well see more of the violence that we saw in 2020. Both sides have basic economic interests to protect, unlike observers like me who sit in comfortable offices, far from Canada’s fishing grounds or logging sites. Figuring how to bring both sides to work together and avoid resorting to violence, given how the Indigenous peoples have been treated down through the ages will require the wisdom of Solomon. I do not qualify but I do have suggestions.

m U c h m o r e IS needed Giving Indigenous peoples access to the fishery and dealing with land claims can never constitute the full agenda. There is a wide array of issues that need to be addressed including governance issues, public finances, and building trust between the Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians. I do not have the answers, nor do I think that any single individual or groups have all the answers. We now have a full menu of reports, studies, and the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, although few of its recommendations have been implemented. I also do not believe that the federal government has the answers, as history has shown time and again. I will once again draw from my own experience to make some suggestions. But first, Canadians need to accept that Canada turned Indigenous peoples into victims when Europeans first arrived, and that Canadians

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have not been able to properly repair either the damage or the relationship. The challenge is not to recognize that Canada has wronged Indigenous peoples – that is a given and beyond debate. The challenge is to answer the question: what now? It is simply not possible to overstate the challenge. For four hundred years, governments first in New France, later in British North American colonies, and later still in Canada, have brought Indigenous peoples low. The Government of Canada has recently intensified efforts to right the wrongs, but they continue to fall short. The Government of Canada currently spends more than $18 billion a year on Indigenous peoples programming. This represents over $11,000 a year on every Indigenous adult and child.4 But even these numbers do not tell the whole story. The $18 billion is allocated to two federal departments – Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (cIrnac ) and Indigenous Services Canada (ISc ). I know a number of other federal departments that are also making important contributions to Indigenous peoples.5 In addition, provincial governments are increasingly making spending commitments to Indigenous communities. When I raise Indigenous peoples in conversations with friends and colleagues, I all too often hear the comment: “We spend a lot of money and they have nothing to show for it, they do not even have running water.” The comments overlook the fact that some progress is being made. Ottawa now regularly reports on the progress made in ensuring clear running water in First Nations.6 But this remains small comfort to the thirty plus communities that continue to experience water advisories.7 In any event, having clean running water constitutes a very low bar in assessing how well Indigenous peoples are doing economically. I look at First Nations from an economic development perspective because of my academic interest in regional economic development and my Acadian roots. Ever since Adam Smith published his Wealth of Nations in 1776, most economists have sought to explain the wealth or poverty of nations by looking to climate, soil, and abundance or scarcity of natural resources. Many who took their cue from Smith have sought to explain why nations and regions have had more economic success than others by looking mainly to natural resources. These attempts, however, have always fallen short of the mark, as Switzerland and Japan have so clearly demonstrated over the years, given that neither is hardly rich in natural resources. If natural resources endowment does not always explain the wealth of nations or regions, what does? I have long argued that the people factor plays a pivotal role in a community or region’s economic health. By people

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factor, I hold that culture and history matter in economic development to a much greater extent than is generally believed by economists and government officials. I am hardly the first to point to the people factor as one of the key determinants in economic development. Nobel laureate Gary Becker made the case when he wrote: “The primary determinant of a country’s standard of living is how well it succeeds in developing and utilizing the skills, knowledge, health and habits of its population.”8 The people factor encompasses historical processes, attitudes, education, and all the other forces that affect the capacity of a people to contribute to their community’s economic development and well-being. It also speaks to the skills, energy, and self-confidence that are essential for a people or individuals to conceive, launch, and manage new economic activities or to take an active part in the affairs of their communities. It is worth repeating the point that Louis J. Robichaud and several government programs laid the groundwork for Acadians to develop their “people factor.” Dealing with the people factor in First Nations requires more than government funding. It speaks to a community’s self-confidence, education levels, and governance. The three go hand-in-hand. In virtually all cases where a people or a community went from a have not to a have status, education was the key. Self-sustaining economic development is made possible when a people (here one can read the Acadians) or a community (here one can read a number of First Nations) have taken full responsibility for their communities. I go further – self-sustaining development cannot work without handing power to the communities or the individuals who were the victims of past wrongs. This entails investments in education and giving life to self-government. Self-government, however, needs to come first. There is a great deal to be done by both government and Indigenous communities. There is no need to revisit the impact Europeans had on the communities, over the years. However, recently governments have continued to miss the mark in helping Indigenous communities grow. For one thing, provincial governments have simply walked away from the responsibility for Indigenous peoples, insisting that it properly belonged to the federal government. This is important because provincial governments have, over the past eighty years or so, worked closely with local businesses to identify opportunities, find new markets, and help produce business and market plans. The federal government did work with Indigenous communities, starting in the 1920s, but the focus was on providing welfare payments to individuals and families.9 It essentially ignored the need to rebuild

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communities and invest in infrastructures, and failed to pay attention to entrepreneurship or to help launch or grow local businesses. Relief, welfare, and a dependency on government became the answer. More to the point, while provincial governments washed their hands of helping Indigenous communities launch economic development measures, the federal government ignored the people factor, relying mostly on relief and welfare payments. This only made things worse.

the

indian act

Everyone agrees that the Indian Act is hopelessly dated, it in fact goes back to 1876 and, though it may have made sense to parliamentarians at the time, it is nothing short of being highly offensive to the modern eye, even when one includes the various amendments. Before the amendments, the act gave the untampered power to Ottawa to identify who was an “Indian,” to stop Indigenous peoples from defining their own cultural identities, and to replace traditional structures of governance with band council elections. It also gave “Indian agents,” the upper hand in all things and was purposely designed to assimilate Indigenous peoples into the Euro-Canadian culture. It will be recalled that the act was only amended in 1960, to give “Status Indians” the right to vote in federal elections. I note that it was the 1958 Canadian Bill of Rights that forced Ottawa’s hand to give Indigenous peoples the right to vote without losing their status. As we saw in an earlier chapter, there are a number of excellent studies on the Indian Act and there is no need to go over the material in any detail here.10 Suffice to note that there is wide agreement that the Indian Act has and continues to undermine development in First Nations and that something needs to be done about it. But the questions remain – what to do and how, but also what not to do? It will be recalled that the Pierre E. Trudeau government tabled a White Paper in 1969 declaring its desire to do away with the Indian Act and the Department of Indian Affairs and, by ricochet, the special constitutional status of the Indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples were quick to react against the move. The Indian Association of Alberta produced a Red Paper which was highly critical of the government’s White Paper. In brief, the government’s White Paper recommended the removal of “Indian” in the Constitution, ensuring that the “Indians” would receive the same level of services through the same government channels as all other Canadians, and a helping hand in economic development for the reserves who are the “furthest behind.”

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The Red Paper and many First Nations identified problems throughout the White Paper. They argued for the need to preserve “Indian culture,” to have measures that would help all First Nations rather than just the furthest behind, and asked Ottawa to recognize that land titles belong to First Nations rather than to the Crown.11 Representatives of Indigenous peoples also argued that the Indian Act constituted the only tangible evidence of their special status and rights. They were not prepared to see the act repealed without some assurance that their historic rights would be respected. They saw repealing the Indian Act as a sign from Ottawa that the federal government was planning to phase out its responsibility for First Nations and bring to a close the relationship it had with them.12 Harold Cardinal summed things up: “We would rather continue to live in bondage under the Indian Act than surrender our sacred rights.”13 In the eyes of many politicians and senior public servants in Ottawa, the White Paper saw the world as Liberals do in an ideological – not partisan – sense. The values underpinning the White Paper were anchored in individual rights, equality, and laws from universal institutions. They saw Indigenous peoples as individuals, not as a people or as a community. The White Paper stated: “This Government believes in equality. It believes that all men and women have equal rights. It is determined that all shall be treated fairly and that no one shall be shut out of Canadian life,” and it added: “the government believes that services should be available on an equitable basis.” It then concluded: “To argue against this right is to argue for discrimination, isolation and separation.”14 The White Paper also met stiff opposition outside of First Nations, and the government was forced to withdraw it in 1970. A Globe and Mail journalist saw what government officials did not see – collective rights are as important to Indigenous peoples as individual rights are to other Canadians. William Johnson explained that the paper “meant that Indians would lose their centuries-long unique status. Treaties would be scrapped. Indian lands, long owned collectively under the trusteeship of the Crown, would be privatized and distributed to Indians individually.”15 Government officials also overlooked the fact that it is the Canadian Constitution that racialized Indigenous peoples and that the treaties were signed with First Nations, not with individuals. The British North America Act, by employing the words “Indians” and “Lands reserved for the Indians” (section 91(24)), created a racial classification of Canadians and, as a result, the Constitution defined and still defines Indigenous peoples as a collectivity. The Constitution Act, 1982 recognizes Indigenous

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peoples as a collectivity (section 35) that defines “aboriginal peoples of Canada.” The Constitution Act, 1982 also commits to their participation in future constitutional conferences and refers to “treaty rights.” The above to make the point about what not to do. We need to accept that the onus is now on non-Indigenous peoples to extend their hand to develop and grow positive relations at all levels with the Indigenous peoples. But we must let them take the lead. Only when First Nations take the lead can they complete the transition away from victimhood. I write “complete the transition” because a number of First Nations in all regions are well on their way including in New Brunswick where, for example, the Marshall decision has had a profound and very likely lasting impact on such communities as Elsipogtog. In brief, the Government of Canada, in efforts to promote an assimilation agenda, and to benefit the economic interests of the White majority, has, over time, deliberately created a collectivity and they cannot change the rules of the game to suit the moment. The Government of Canada, not provincial governments, made a mess of things in its dealings with the Indigenous peoples, through the years, and Ottawa has the responsibility to make things right. The Indigenous peoples, in turn, have a responsibility to bring forward proposals that help both their communities and Canada grow.

n o a h aUg U S tIne It is not for me to decide what to do with the Indian Act and it is not up to the Government of Canada to decide alone what to do with the Indian Act. The Pierre E. Trudeau government learned this lesson with its 1969 White Paper. It is the Indigenous leaders who need to take the lead. There are, however, some delicate issues that Indigenous peoples need to address as they define governance structures for their communities. I can do no better than quote Noah Augustine, a once charismatic and powerful Mi’kmaq leader. He looked to governance issues to address problems among First Nations. He fought hard to separate community-owned businesses from First Nations political leadership. He argued that a council’s responsibility was to develop sound policies, not manage businesses or business funds. He advocated at every opportunity for more transparency and accountability in First Nations. He told a local newspaper: “If you don’t have transparency, then you’re opening the door for [the] opportunity for corruption.”16 Indigenous communities themselves will decide how best to separate politics and business and Noah Augustine offered a solid roadmap. This

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is not to suggest that Indigenous communities should avoid launching businesses. Membertou has shown that an Indigenous community can launch a business, run a business, and partner with other businesses and keep politics out of the businesses. Membertou has strong leadership and a sophisticated governance structure that separates community decisions from running the businesses.17 I had a personal connection with Noah Augustine. I do not remember exactly when or how I first met him, but we did have a number of discussions. I developed a great deal of respect for Noah, his abilities, and his deeply felt commitment to his Mi’kmaq People. I saw in Noah Augustine what I also saw in Louis J. Robichaud. Augustine, like Robichaud, had both a willingness and capacity to challenge anyone – friend or foe – and clearly understood good governance practices. Like Robichaud, Augustine was never short of political courage to say things as he saw them. I told him this on several occasions and also said so in a local cBc radio interview. I remember that one of his relatives called me the next day to thank me for the comment. Noah understood well the implications – he knew how Louis J. Robichaud had led Acadians to become full participants in the New Brunswick society and economy. I saw that he took my observations in but he did not pursue the discussions with me on this matter. Noah Augustine was a born leader, a highly gifted orator, a poet, a businessman, and a politician all rolled into one. He was elected Chief of the Metepenagiag Mi’kmaq Nation at age thirty-three. Robichaud was elected premier at age thirty-four. Maclean’s magazine had this to say about Noah: “Media-savvy and articulate, he seemed to be the perfect new-style leader for a native community looking to assert its independence.”18 Augustine not only served as Chief of his First Nation, he was president and co-chair of the Atlantic Policy Congress of First Nations Chiefs. He also co-founded the New Brunswick First Nation and Business Liaison Group. He, like Robichaud, did not back down from a conflict when it came to his community. He led the charge in securing rights to open the province’s forest to Indigenous peoples. As Chief of his First Nation, he struck a $1.4 million land claim settlement with Ottawa. Rather than divide the money among the members, he secured his community’s approval to invest half in economic development projects. He opened a $7-million park and interpretive centre to showcase the Mi’kmaq’s threethousand-year occupancy of the land formally called Red Bank. Under his leadership, the community invested in land outside his Metepenagiag community, which is now showing strong economic potential. He also

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initiated energy and gaming initiatives to promote long-term economic growth for his Frist Nation. In brief, Augustine sought to instill in his people and in his community the self-confidence required to shake free from victimhood. In late September 1998, I received a telephone call from Noah Augustine. He simply said: “Donald, I need your help.” I said, “Sure, how can I help?” Noah was calling from a telephone booth in Florida. He was on the run after having shot and killed Bruce Barnaby on 19 September 1998. I told Noah that I wanted to help but first he had to turn himself in. I suspect that I was not the only one that gave him this advice. I never heard from him after this call, but I do know that he called the rcmP and said: “I did it,” but “I’m not a coldblooded murderer.”19 He was later acquitted of the murder charge on the basis that he acted in self-defence.20 A few years later, Noah Augustine died in a crash when his truck left the road and hit a tree near his community. Many New Brunswickers, and myself included, felt a very deep loss. Bud Bird, former New Brunswick Cabinet minister and later Conservative member of Parliament, said it all: “He was a young man with a tremendous natural intelligence and capability who believed deeply that he could help to bring better economic life to his community and to First Nations everywhere in New Brunswick, and he worked very hard at it.”21 New Brunswick Premier David Alward issued a news release saying that Noah Augustine had “distinguished himself in many roles” and that “the passing of such a strong leader is a tremendous loss to the people of the Metepenagiag First Nation and all New Brunswickers.”22 The then federal minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development also issued a statement calling Augustine “a respected leader who accomplished much in his life and showed great vision for the future.”23 Noah left his footprints not just in his community. He showed a way forward by focusing on governance. He told a Senate committee that the Indian Act was at the root of the problem: “I get very upset when I think about the Indian Act. Our electoral system is symptomatic of a bigger problem with this archaic piece of legislation; the Indian Act is the problem. With everything Chiefs and councils do to try to develop their communities, they are stopped in their tracks by the Indian Act, from the management and leasing of lands, to additions to reserves, to land-claim referendums, to market-based housing, to converting tangible assets into active capital; the list goes on.” He added: “With elections every two years, there is a constant division of families, and emotions tend to run deep. When you are talking about people’s livelihoods,

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matters around the election are of the highest importance. This is why we have such high voter turnouts on the reserve at about 95 per cent. The tendency is for people to strike out at each other and do things to hurt one another for the most celebrated positions of power – Chief and council. After an election, a community might begin to heal, but that healing is never complete because, before you know it, another election is around the corner.”24 The government has since passed legislation to allow First Nations to hold elections every five years rather than two and a number of them have moved their elections to the five-year cycle. This helps but the fundamental problem remains – the governance structure under the Indian Act does not square with the traditions and circumstances of the Indigenous peoples. Though he showed the way, Noah Augustine’s job is not done.

w h a t aBo Ut Ind I geno US P e oP l e S a n d F IrS t nat I onS ? To be sure, the challenge is much greater for the Indigenous peoples than it was for Acadians or for Noah Augustine than for Louis Robichaud. First, the history of the Indigenous peoples in Canada has been a great deal more brutal than it was for Acadians and that is saying a lot in light of the 1755 expulsion. Second, Acadians had the numbers to elect one of their own to lead New Brunswick. Acadians needed one Louis J. Robichaud to lead the way and he did. As already noted, Indigenous communities need many Robichauds or Augustines, given that there are some 630 First Nations communities in Canada. Third, Acadians were able to find a place in government bureaucracies at both the federal and provincial levels, where they could exert some influence, while Indigenous peoples are still on the outside looking in. Fourth, Acadians became a card Ottawa could play in Quebec to show that French Canada existed outside its borders. Fifth, Acadians came in fashion when the role of government in society was more widely accepted and when government bureaucracies were not as hobbled by red tape and oversight bodies as they are today. The postwar period, until the 1980s, were the golden years for government bureaucracy to produce and implement comprehensive economic development plans. Sixth, there were a limited number of victims identified during the Robichaud and Pierre Trudeau years, with Acadians being one of them, which made it easier for governments to focus on programs and resources. Seventh, Acadians were able to establish their own institutions, from school systems to a university

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(Université de Moncton), and also give new life to another (Université Sainte-Anne). Eighth, Acadians are concentrated in one region (the Maritime provinces) and could turn to a strong leader to show the way. Most First Nations remain rural, isolated communities spread throughout the vast Canadian landscape. Promoting economic development in these communities is like pulling against gravity.

I t St a r t S wIt h Se l F-government There are fundamental governance issues that need to be attended to for the people factor to take root in First Nations. The Government of Canada and First Nations are not always on the same page when it comes to self-government. Indigenous peoples maintain that they have an inherent right to self-government because they never surrendered their autonomy to European settlers. They rightfully made the case that self-government is needed to preserve their culture, secure control over their land, and put in place a governance structure that corresponds to their political and socioeconomic circumstances. They also correctly argued that the Constitution (the Canada Constitution Act, 1982) supports their position and that the federal government confirmed their right to self-government in 1995.25 Self-government is of decisive importance for Indigenous communities to grow to their full potential. It only takes a moment’s reflection to appreciate that Indigenous communities are better served by Noah Augustine-type leaders with direct responsibility and accountability to the community, than a mid-level career official sitting in an office tower in Gatineau or Ottawa, more preoccupied by managing the blame game. Joseph P. Kalt, drawing on years of study and numerous case studies sponsored by the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, insists that self-government is the key ingredient to economic development. He writes: “One of the interesting phenomena that we see in the United States is that tribes who have broken out economically and really begun to sustain economic development are uniformly marked by an assertion of sovereignty that pushes the Bureau of Indian Affairs into a pure advisory role rather than a decision-making role.”26 The federal government does support self-government and it has outlined several principles it intends to follow in the negotiations. It states that the negotiations need, among other requirements, to recognize that relations with the Indigenous peoples begin with their “right to selfdetermination,” that it recognizes that Indigenous self-government is part of Canada’s system of federalism and distinct orders of government

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and that “meaningful engagement with Indigenous peoples aims to secure their free, prior, and informed consent when Canada proposes to take actions which impact them and their rights.”27 The government adds: “self-government will be exercised within the Canadian Constitution … federal funding for self-government will be achieved through the reallocation of existing resources … laws of overriding federal and provincial importance will prevail, and federal, provincial, territorial, and Aboriginal laws must work in harmony.”28 It then goes on: “The inherent right of self-government does not include a right of sovereignty in the international law sense, and will not result in sovereign independent Aboriginal nation states. On the contrary, implementation of self-governments should enhance the participation of Aboriginal peoples in the Canadian federation, and ensure that Aboriginal peoples and their governments do not exist in isolation, separate and apart from the rest of Canadian society.”29 The above may not be as straightforward as Ottawa may wish it to be. The Mohawk First Nation, for example, is partly in Quebec, partly in Ontario, and partly in the State of New York. To add to the difficulty, the Supreme Court has yet to deal directly with self-government, declining to do so in three cases – Sparrow (1990), Pamajewon (1996), and Delgamuukw (1997).30 This is where the wisdom of Solomon needs to come in. Thomas Courchene gave a lecture on Aboriginal self-government from a comparative perspective. He acknowledged that he was not “an expert on aboriginal self-government in Canada.” But he was also quick to add: “Few people probably are, given the complexity and the dimensions of the issue, particularly when one realises that aboriginal self-government will eventually entail hundreds of separate negotiations.”31 He looked abroad for lessons learned on Indigneous self-government but concluded that Canada will need to look to its own institutions to define a new relationship with the Indigenous peoples. Lessons learned from abroad are of little help, though Australia, New Zealand, and the United States all have to tackle the issue, in light of the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Canada initially objected to the declaration, making the case that it would have an impact on the country’s resource development. The Justin Trudeau government, however, decided in 2016 to endorse the declaration “without qualification” and “committed to its full and effective implementation.”32 The US Indian Self-Determination Act of 1975 gave sovereignty to what the Americans label “Tribal government” by delegating to them a degree of autonomy in managing federal funds and federal programs.

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New Zealand introduced a mixed-member electoral system in 1995 and allocated four parliamentary seats for Maori representatives which was later increased to fifteen in the 120-member Parliament. The Maori population constitutes 16.5 per cent of New Zealand’s population. Indigenous peoples in Australia, unlike Canada, do not enjoy constitutional or treaty recognition. To the extent that they are mentioned in the Constitution, it was to ensure that they would be excluded from certain provisions.33 The road to self-government, or self-determination in the above countries remains a work in progress.34 The four countries have different histories, different geography, different economies, a different legal framework, and different political cultures so that they, Canada included, will have to map their own future relations between their national government and Indigenous peoples. In Canada, the road ahead for Indigenous peoples begins with good governance, and for Indigenous peoples, it means eventually getting rid of Ottawa’s bureaucracy that deals with Indigenous affairs. The ministry, embedded deeply in the Ottawa system, does not have the creativity, the flexibility, nor the credibility with the Indigenous communities to change course. To be sure, the move to self-government raises difficult governance issues. What powers would the First Nations governments have? How would these governments relate to Canada’s other institutions? How would these governments be financed? What taxing powers would these governments have, and could they create tax havens? How would leaders be elected or chosen? How then would First Nations relate to one another? Would self-government be land-based (a difficult proposition because it could not possibly be contiguous)?Again, I do not have answers to these questions. There are many in Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities who have long studied these questions and are in a far better position than I can ever be, to shed light on them. The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples published Partners in Confederation in 1993 which outlines the case for self-government, answers a number of questions, and explores how self-government could be implemented.35 The publication is as relevant today as it was thirty years ago. This speaks to both the complexity of the issues and the slow progress made towards self-government. One thing is clear, as Ottawa and First Nations map out a strategy to implement self-government, all parties will have to show flexibility in setting new governance structures. There are some fifty First Nations with reserve land covering 626,000 km2 which is held by the

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Crown for the benefit of bands.36 It is worth reminding readers that a number of these reserves “are frequently little more than muskegs, rock and sand.”37 The answers have to emerge from a political process in which the Indigenous peoples are at the table as equal partners – anything short of this will fail. Non-Indigenous Canadians need to remember that Canada has, over the years, overpromised to the Indigenous peoples and badly underdelivered. With history as a guide, Indigenous peoples have every reason to not always take Canadian governments at their word. Indigenous peoples also know full well that there is still some deepseated racism in Canada. As recently as 2021, Manitoba’s premier said: “The people who came here to this country before it was a country, and since, didn’t come here to destroy anything. They came here to build.”38 In New Brunswick, the provincial government directed all its employees not to make territorial or title acknowledgements in reference to First Nations land. The minister of Justice explained why: “As you may be aware, the Government of New Brunswick (gnB ) is currently involved in a number of legal actions which have been initiated by certain First Nations against the province, including a claim to ownership and title to over 60% of the Province.”39 A public opinion survey reports that Canadians believe that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is “paying too much attention to Indigenous issues,” that funds spent on the “indigenous is not effective,” and that 66 per cent of Canadians think that Indigenous communities should be governed by the same system and rules as other Canadians.”40 I accept that Indigenous rights should not be conditional on public opinion, but only the politically naïve would think that it will not have any influence on politicians at the negotiating table. If nothing else, there is a need to educate Canadians about the history of the Indigenous peoples and how Canada has interacted with them since Europeans first arrived in North America. The land claim negotiating process raises important issues for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians that have yet to be resolved. There is a great deal of misinformation circulating in non-Indigenous communities that need to be addressed. Someone, be it the federal government or Indigenous organizations, need to take the lead to explain the implications flowing out of land claims negotiations. If an elected provincial premier thinks that Europeans came here to build, one can only imagine how many Canadians misunderstand the historical relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians.

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The point – an ambitious public information initiative is required to pave the way for self-government and for a productive relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians. Prime ministers and Ottawa cannot decide, from on high, what needs to be done and assume that things will neatly fall into place. Change is rarely straightforward or easy. Non-Indigenous fishers and forestry workers, for example, will need to make important adjustments and recent developments suggest that it will not be easy. There is also a perception problem that needs to be addressed with a sense of urgency – too much public funds are committed to First Nations and too much of it is wasted. The perception does not always square with reality but, as is often said, in politics perception is reality. That said, Canada is not walking into completely uncharted territory in pursuing self-government for the Indigenous peoples. There are things to avoid doing but also positive lessons learned from past efforts to pursue self-government and the fishery is a case in point.

F r o m t h e F IS h e r y : w hat not to do The Supreme Court struck the right decision in the Sparrow (1990) and Marshall (1999) cases. The Court ruled that Indigenous peoples had the right to fish and, in the case of the Marshall decision, it went further and concluded that they also had the right to earn a “moderate livelihood” from the fishery. The Court, however, did not establish what it meant by “moderate livelihood” and this remains a work in progress. The Esgenoôpetitj First Nation in New Brunswick went lobster fishing, operating under its own rules according to local non-Indigenous fishers. This led to a violent backlash and prompted the Supreme Court to strike another decision.41 The Court, in the Marshall case, clarified its earlier decision, stating that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (dFo ) could regulate Mi’kmaq fishing for conservation purposes. The Court, however, did not recognize that the Indigenous peoples could have their own laws and regulations to manage the fishery. It is for Parliament and the government to define what “moderate livelihood” means, not the courts. I can understand the political appeal of shunting the responsibility to the courts. However, the government is responsible for managing the fishery, not the courts. Thus far, by kicking the can down the road, the federal government has shown a remarkable lack of leadership on this issue and only made matters worse. Some First Nations, including Sipekne’katik, see the Marshall decision as a green light to set up their own fishery system, with its own rules and

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regulations. White commercial fishers see their future in jeopardy, if they have to fish in accordance with dFo rules, while First Nations are free to fish by their own rules. The fishery is a finite resource and it needs to be regulated for future generations. Not only has the federal government never defined what “moderate livelihood” entails, it has also never clearly said that it is either for or against Indigenous peoples having their own distinct management plan outside the Fishery Act. The lack of leadership once again led to violence. This time, it erupted in St Mary’s Bay, Nova Scotia, in 2020.42 As noted earlier, a lobster plant, where Indigenous fishers were storing lobsters, was burned to the ground and two other facilities were vandalized. The rcmP charged a man for assaulting an Indigenous Chief.43 Indigenous fishers felt that the time had long passed for them to enter the fishery on their own terms. Non-Indigenous commercial fishers, meanwhile, felt abandoned by Ottawa. They have been fishing in the coastal region of Nova Scotia for generations and they see a “free for all” taking shape. Right or wrong, they see a federal government populated by political and bureaucratic elites in Ottawa dealing with a guilt complex and looking to the fishery to deal with it. They asked: “Why can’t governments re-allocate milk quotas or mining rights in Quebec and Ontario to the Indigenous peoples on the basis of past wrongs?” Indigenous peoples, meanwhile, were subjected to racial taunts and their fishing tools were vandalized.44 They can, nevertheless, point to a growing number of remarkable success stories since they were able to secure commercial fishing licenses. Every Canadian, not just the Indigenous peoples should applaud the success that some First Nations have been able to produce over the past several years. The lesson: the federal government cannot let the situation drift and hope that somehow things will work out between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians on a variety of issues, not just the fishery. We have had four federal governments since the Marshall decision (the Chrétien, Martin, Harper, and Trudeau governments) and they have somehow all come to the view that the Court decision was clear and that there was no need to review the Fisheries Act or the regulatory regime of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (dFo ). They were wrong. What to do with the fishery? There is an urgent need to connect government officials to problems and challenges on the ground. The fact that Ottawa has decided to pull more and more of its public servants into the National Capital Region and away from the regions does not help matters (forty-five years ago, 72 per cent of public servants were in regional and field offices, today the number is down to 58 per cent).

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The more government pushes decisions down to the field, the better the chances of making the decisions stick and avoid playing the blame game or creating new victims. In the case of the fishery in St Mary’s Bay, there are only two groups that matter here – the Mi’kmaq and non-Indigenous fishers. Both groups have a legitimate place in the fishery. However, trust between the two is seriously lacking. What is needed is a venue for the two sides to meet and sort out their differences. They should create a parallel process to the negotiations that will take place between the federal government and First Nations, so that both sides can gain a better understanding of the other’s position. Announcing a decision from the top, like a bolt of lightning, and then hoping that somehow it will work out, is not the way to build trust. Bringing both sides to the table and having government officials on the ground working with them is required to arrest the cancer of distrust that is spreading in our fishing communities – again, a cancer that no Canadian should assume is going to stop there. The St Mary’s fishery incident has taught us that there is a heavy price to pay if we let things fester. There are a number of issues around the corner that could have a profound impact on economic development in all regions including land claims, the right to consult and the transition to self-government.

t h e r o a d t o S e lF - g overnment The road to self-government, however, cannot be a one-way street. The Indigenous peoples have issues to resolve and only they can resolve them. Noah Augustine’s roadmap included a call for transparency because it is not always present in all communities. The fault, however, does not always fall on First Nations – it goes back nearly 150 years, when the federal government enacted the Indian Act with ill-suited governance requirements to the ways of the Indigenous peoples. No matter, the call for transparency in government spending is now heard in all areas of public sector activities. Transparency in government is akin to market forces in the private sector – it is the public sector’s bottom line. Noah Augustine understood the requirements of modern governance. He understood that Canadian taxpayers will not turn a blind eye to unclear, unaccountable, real or perceived, excessive spending. That said, there is also a need to inform Canadians that tangible progress is being made in many Indigenous communities across Canada. I recall as a young Acadian, being told that I needed to be “twice as good” as the English because they had the majority, they had the upper

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hand, and they carried an underlying prejudice that Acadians can never be “as good” as them. Early in my career, many women in the federal public service told me they had to be twice as competent as their male colleagues to get promoted. Indigenous peoples have the same problem today that Acadians and women had thirty to fifty years ago. Public opinion surveys consistently reveal that Canadian taxpayers hold the belief that the federal government already spends too much money on Indigenous affairs.45 Indigenous peoples can just as easily point the finger at government spending in other sectors and ask – if government waste is the issue, where should we look? They would have a point but it does not solve the problem that Canadians are more and more concerned with government waste and are constantly asking for more demanding accountability requirements. Noah Augustine understood the power of the media. It will be recalled that the media ran a series of stories on the “salary’s tax-free status” of Native Chiefs and band councillors. One news story reported that eighty First Nations politicians make more than the Canadian prime minister. Another reads that the Chief of a ninety-member First Nation in British Columbia could well be Canada’s highest paid politician. The media also reported that calls made to “Native associations” for comments are not returned.46 The point is that transparency is paramount as Indigenous peoples move to self-government and it is an issue that First Nations need to address.

F r o m t h e yUk o n a n d Br ItI S h col UmBI a: It c a n B e done The road to self-government for Indigenous peoples has already begun. Eleven of the fourteen Yukon First Nations have successfully negotiated agreements to establish Indigenous governments outside of the Indian Act. They signed the Umbrella Final Agreement with both the governments of Canada and Yukon. The agreement gives the First Nations legislative and executive powers along the lines provincial governments have. It took twenty years to negotiate the agreement and, at one point, the negotiations broke down. The First Nations were offered a very generous compensation package but not self-government. They resisted until self-government was put back on the negotiation table and they eventually won the day. The Yukon First Nations’ experience speaks to the importance of flexibility – different First Nations in the Yukon have different requirements, and they have the right to produce their own constitutions. The

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Umbrella Final Agreement is a binding framework designed to help develop agreements with individual First Nations in the Yukon. Each First Nation has developed its own governance models. There were three First Nations still negotiating the terms of their self-government agreement when I was working on this book. The terms of the Yukon First Nations Self Government Act are easily accessible to all Canadians.47 We also have a growing body of literature on First Nations selfgovernment in the Yukon.48 The verdict is positive.49 The approach has generated new relationships between First Nations and the federal and Yukon governments, and with non-Indigenous peoples. I note, however, that some criticism has been directed at the slow pace in reaching the agreement and also that the Umbrella Final Agreement is now dated.50 In British Columbia, the Nisga’a self-government treaty dates back to 11 May 2000 and it also holds important lessons for other Indigenous communities. It is a success story that should be duplicated. The Nisga’a can point to major improvements from better roads, to stronger economic growth, better government, more transparency, and improved relations with both the federal and provincial governments.51 The more important lesson is that self-government for First Nations is possible, the sky does not fall when Indigenous peoples assume responsibilities that properly belongs to them, new productive relationships can be forged, and Canada can finally turn its back on its colonial past. There is also strong evidence that self-government leads to major improvements in all sectors from education to economic growth. In brief, it empowers communities to take responsibility for their future and is the key building block to solid economic development. I return to making the same point that I made on the very first page of this book. I have long believed that Canada offers more advantages to its citizens than any other country. Canada has also produced its share of victims and our political leaders have apologized for our country’s past wrongs far more than is the case for leaders of other countries. Canada has also outperformed other countries in helping regions, groups, and individuals in making the transition away from victimhood. It defines us as Canadians. Canada’s work, however, is not done. There is a glaring hole in our history. Murray Sinclair explained the challenge, one that belongs to all Canadians because collectively and through our history we and our ancestors had a hand in it. Sinclair said: “I think we ran the whole gamut from being totally forgiving to being totally confrontational. There are elements of the Indigenous community that are still living their victimization on a daily basis, which is that they don’t speak out, they don’t

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act out, they don’t do anything to be demanding. They don’t see their situation as a loss of rights, they see their situation as almost their fault. They see their poverty as their fault. It is about understanding one’s own sense of victimization without being maudlin about it.”52 Canada and Canadians need to help the Indigenous peoples correct an historical wrong and remove the blot on Canada’s character.

Epilogue

Writing about Canada has always brought me great satisfaction. This book, even more so, because I was able to draw on my own personal experiences and because it gave me the opportunity to show how Canada gave a helping hand to Acadians to make the transition to become full participants in Canada’s political and economic life. I argue that the same has and can also be said for other groups, communities, and regions. I did something that I never did before when working on a book. I reached out to family, friends, neighbours, colleagues, and former colleagues to discuss the victim theme. The discussions were very rewarding and revealing. It gave me fresh insights into the issue, at times confirming my thinking, but at other times challenging it. No one was hesitant about voicing views on the theme. One said: “So, you are arguing Canada has created victims and also that Canada has been great at assisting victims becoming nonvictims … would it not be better if Canada does not create victims in the first place?” I replied: “Good point if history did not matter, but history and past government policies do matter.” The topic was of interest to everyone and everyone had opinions. This is in contrast to my other books. There was not much interest from friends and neighbours when working on say, What Is Government Good At? or Democracy in Canada. However, after working on my I’m from Bouctouche, Me, my assistant Ginette Benoit was happy to tell me: “This book is very different from all your previous books. This one is very interesting.” She said the same thing when working on this manuscript. I found the discussions for this book particularly useful. Some of my friends became worried that employing the word “victim” would stir strong negative emotions and that I should expect some sharp criticism.

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Others insisted that I should not let governments off the hook by making the case that their policies have helped regions and groups make the transition away from victimhood. They feared that doing so would cause governments to back away from their commitments to their region or their cause. Most, however, applauded my decision to write about victims in the Canadian setting, including one of Canada’s best-known former politicians who said: “It is about time.”1 I do not suggest for a moment that my discussions with family and friends were representative of Canadians. They were not. My discussions and emails had a strong Maritime flavour. I also had some discussions with friends and former colleagues from Quebec and Ontario. I completely ignored demographic categories. In all cases, I knew the respondent personally. I never accepted that Canada lacks a national identity. However, I have had to deal with the issue in my work, including in this book, because it is difficult to avoid the topic when reviewing the literature on Canada. I know that I am a Canadian because I never want to be anything else and because Canada has a distinct political culture. In New Brunswick, I am an Acadian, in Ottawa I am a Maritimer and in Great Britain, the United States, and France, I am a Canadian.2 I suspect that the building blocks are the same for an Albertan, a Newfoundlander, or for many Quebecers. Being Canadian is having several identities merged into an overarching one.3 Accordingly, our Canadian identity is built from the bottom up, not from the top down because of our history and the way our national political institutions took shape. They all had a direct hand in forging Canada’s political culture. As Canada took form and as the role of government expanded, senior policy makers came to terms with the fact that Canadian federalism, as defined in 1867, was ill-conceived for getting things done and the country’s national political institutions did not fit with Canada’s socio-political, economic, and geographical make up. They set out to make Canada work by mastering the art of the compromise, by developing a capacity to see all sides of any argument, by not paying close attention to the requirements of federalism, and by avoiding dealing with the constraints of our national political institutions. There is a price to pay for this, as my earlier work has argued. However, it may well have been the price to pay to make Canada work. I gathered from my discussions that there is a deep attachment to Canada. I note that various public opinion surveys also report that Canadians have a strong attachment to Canada, albeit with some variations by region and by age.4 Here is why I do not want to be

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anything else than Canadian, and I suspect that the same logic applies to many Canadians. No other country offers the following as well as does Canada: political and economic stability; civility in our public discourse, at least when compared to other countries; a strong educational system; a quality of life that is the envy of the rest of the world; a willingness and capacity to extend a helping hand to individuals, groups, and regions that have been wronged by past government policies; a willingness to recognize passed wrongs and to come to terms with them; and the ability to welcome new Canadians and to make a multicultural policy work. I need not look any further in search of my Canadian identity. Canadians and their political leaders know how to search for solutions and how to strike the necessary compromises when confronting intractable divides because there is no other way to make Canada work. Our Constitution set the scene by anchoring our politics in “peace, order and good government.” It then forced policy makers to improvise and sort things out on their own and, at times, on the fly because of its inflexibility. My sense is that Canadians understand that this has given regions with more voters a much louder voice than is the case in other federations with different political institutions. For example, few other federations have a Quebec, at times ambivalent about its place in Canada. All other federations have an Upper House in their legislative branch with a clear mandate to speak to the country’s regional interests but not Canada. This book also gave me great satisfaction because it allowed me to celebrate Canada’s successes. Other countries readily see Canada’s strengths and advantages, as multi-country public opinion surveys consistently reveal.5 My hope is that this book will encourage Canadians to celebrate Canada’s successes. But Canada’s work is not done. As earlier chapters make clear, Canada needs to work with its Indigenous communities to repair the damage done to them. There are also deep frustrations in Western Canada that need to be addressed. If Canada’s past is any indication, its senior policy makers will show the way towards solutions. One colleague from academe familiar with my work, told me: “You have consistently pointed to important flaws in our national political institutions. Now, you are saying that Canada leads the world in quality of life and in helping victims of bad past government policies turn things around. How do you square this?” I replied that the flaws in our institutions are still there and they still need to be fixed. I wrote Governing from the Centre and Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our

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Institutions hoping to improve things, not to weaken our institutions, and I remain convinced that revisions to our national political-administrative institutions are needed. The fact that Canada continues to prosper speaks to the ability of Canadians and our senior policy makers to make do with what they have to work with.

S t a n dIn g o n gU a r d F or Pol I tI cIan S I am bringing this book to a close by speaking on behalf of politicians. I am quick to add that this is not at the suggestion of friends and neighbours. Most of my friends will not understand why I decided to close the book by supporting our politicians. I very often heard negative comments from some family members and many friends, colleagues, and neighbours, even at times snide remarks, directed at our politicians. In brief, if there was a consensus in my consultations, it was not to come to the defence of politicians. I continue to believe that politicians are the ones that should heal their institutions because no one else can. They could start by dismantling their political war rooms, refrain from denigrating one another, and avoid launching personal attacks. If the medical community, for example, engaged in the same practice, I doubt that its members would enjoy the level of community support that they currently do. But Canadians also need to do their part. The widespread denigration of our politicians is unhealthy for representative democracy and for Canada. I believe that many accusations hurled at our politicians are all too often exaggerated, if not inaccurate. I also do not think that one can defend representative democracy without defending politicians – the two are joined at the hip. I have worked with politicians from all three major political parties in Canada – Liberals, Conservatives and New Democrats. I have served on transition teams for all three political parties when they came to power in Ottawa or in provincial capitals. I have also served in various advisory capacities for all three political parties when in office. I have had numerous conversations with prime ministers, premiers, federal and provincial Cabinet ministers, leaders of the official opposition and backbench mP s and mla s. In nearly all cases, I have found them to be honest and concerned with public service, albeit with a bias towards their political parties, constituencies, and regions. Leaving aside former prime ministers and premiers, they very rarely become better off economically because of politics and I know some who have lost their marriages because of it.

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I take some comfort in the fact that the denigration of politicians is hardly a Canada-only phenomenon. It is everywhere in the Western World. In the United States, public opinion surveys reveal a sharp decline in the opinion that Americans have of their politicians.6 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBc ) sponsored a series on how politicians are viewed and went out on the streets of Great Britain to ask respondents to say in one word what they think of politicians. The most frequent answers were: “corrupt, rubbish, useless, not a word I could repeat on radio, liar, crook, untrustworthy,” and the list goes on.7 Precious few were prepared to give a positive one-word view of politicians. I know that many of my friends and neighbours would have responded in the same fashion. Frank Graves, a Canadian pollster, reports that the “paucity of trust in politicians is almost cartoonishly low.”8 I have a very different take. I ask readers to ponder for a moment a Canada without politicians. It would be a Canada in chaos, where the strong would be able to have their own security or paramilitary forces and consumers would be left at the mercy of the economically successful, selling whatever they wanted to sell. The business community could not function as it does now, our trade arrangements would be in a constant state of disorder, and it would open the door to everyone looking after himself or herself with no sense of community. The list goes on and on. I know full well that politicians can be self-serving, vain, and prone to generating inflated expectations. For most, getting elected is what truly matters and many will often do whatever is necessary to win. One of the most revealing observations I have ever heard of in Canadian politics was from a sitting mP participating in a discussion to plan the next federal election campaign. He wanted more and more spending commitments in the party’s electoral platform. Some at the table pushed back, concerned with Ottawa’s fiscal situation. As already noted, his response was: “Well, if we have to keep our promises, it means we won.” His overriding objective was to see his party win the election. But are politicians different? Among others, businesspeople, career government officials, and my colleagues in the academic community also very rarely lose sight of their self-interest. We should not be surprised that politicians behave according to the same incentives that define competition in society, in business, in sports, and in academe. We may well have a case of “he or she who is without sin, among us, let him or her cast the first stone.” The difference is that politicians work in a fishbowl environment, while the rest of us do not. The level of transparency that guides the work of politicians now leaves nothing to chance. We keep adding layers

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of transparency requirements, rather than peeling some off. Consider the following: Ottawa now has an information commissioner, a privacy commissioner, a conflict of interest and ethics commissioner, a commissioner of lobbying, a public sector integrity commissioner and an auditor general. They and their staff go to work every morning looking for things that went wrong and trying to find the culprit. If they should overlook missteps, the media – both traditional and social – may not. Things are different for other Canadians who, like me, go to work every morning without a shadow on their shoulder, looking at everything they do and how they do it. In brief, we stripped politicians and aspiring politicians of their privacy and imposed a level of scrutiny that we would not tolerate anywhere else. To be sure, transparency is very important in public life and in our public institutions. The point is that Canadians should not lose sight that our politicians deal with transparency requirements that would not be tolerated in other sectors. As a citizen, I want to know how and why public funds are spent, who is appointed to a position in public institutions, why changes are made to the machinery of government, and whether established rules, processes, and administrative requirements are respected. I am less interested in the private affairs of our elected officials. I admit that in all my dealings with politicians, I have always sought to understand their challenges and their work rather than instantly take them to task or condemn them. I accept that many successful Canadian politicians dislike absolutes and will search for a compromise. That is the Canadian way, at least for our senior policy makers. Contrast this with someone watching the evening news at home, seeing politicians struggling with a problem or a controversial issue or trying to strike the right decision. He or she will be quick with an answer, frustrated that the politicians cannot see it or do not want to see it. However, the individual likely forgets that another individual watching the same newscast in a neighbouring community or in another province will also have an answer but it may well look very different. It is easy to answer a question on its own merit, in isolation of its impact on other issues or other government policies. The decision-making process in government does not work like that. I have seen in my own community sharp disagreements among residents over whether or not a bike lane should be added on a busy street, or if a traffic light is needed on street corners with limited traffic. Try then striking an agreement on a tax rate, on limiting development in the oil and gas sector, on the proper level of transfer payments to the provinces and individuals, on abortion, and the list goes on. We look to

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politicians to deal with these thorny issues. The media and indeed all of us are also quick to react when a politician lies but the media pay little interest when politicians tell the truth. I believe that we have set the bar too high in politics and for our politicians. The test for our politicians should not be whether they always come up with the right answer or the right decision. We also need to look at the ability of our politicians to avoid picking the wrong answer. Representative democracy assumes that there is rarely a definitive or settled answer to any issue.9 Politics remains the art of the possible and this is particularly the case in Canada. Politicians – no one else – are in the public arena searching for a solution and trying to strike the right compromise. Theodore Roosevelt put it succinctly: “It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena.”10 It is in the arena that compromises, large and small, are struck which enables Canada to work. It is in the arena that differences are ironed out and competing demands are resolved “without resorting to authoritarian modes of control.”11 Tony Wright explains that politics is a “messy business of accommodating conflicting interests, choosing between options, negotiating unwelcome trade-offs, and taking responsibility for decisions that may often represent the best of the worst option.”12 That is politics and politics is now only for the brave. Canada needs safe pairs of hands at the political level to guide it through challenging times, including defining a new relationship with Indigenous communities, managing regional tensions, promoting healthy democratic institutions, and addressing growing economic inequalities. Thomas Piketty correctly argues that extreme inequality in wealth is not only bad for economic growth but also for representative democracy.13 These are only some of the more difficult issues or wicked problems confronting Canada. There are many more, including those that have yet to surface – who could have predicted, for example, in January 2020 that covId-19 would plunge Canada into a health care and economic crisis? Do we really need to make things more difficult for politicians? The question – who wants to go in the arena in an anti-political and anti-politician world and given the move to depoliticise decision making to the courts and to arm’s length organizations? Going into the arena requires laying bare all of what you have done in the past, dealing with what political war rooms and the social media will dredge up and putting on hold your career projects in whatever sector other than politics. Running for political office requires putting your nonpolitical life on

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hold, including your private life and often your family life. If elected, you are then expected to deal with a growing array of oversight bodies watching you and your every word, with social media always at the ready to pounce. Canadians should be able to have a stress-free holiday with their families, except, it seems, for our political leaders. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was taken to task by opposition politicians and the media for taking a two-week holiday with his family to Costa Rica in August 2022.14 This is hardly the way to encourage Canadians to run for political office. We should never lose sight of the fact that Canada will pay a heavy price if it cannot attract some of the best and brightest to serve. It is no exaggeration to write that politicians represent the last line of defence between representative democracy and whatever else would await us. Canadians should not assume that their representative democracy is here to stay, come what may. Until the twentieth century, representative democracy was considered a bad idea. It explains, in part, why we have an appointed rather than an elected Senate. The thinking was that government was too important to turn things over to the people. James Madison feared that the masses would simply “vote themselves free beer and pull down the churches and country houses.”15 Canadians only need to look south of the border to the oldest federation and one of the oldest representative democracies to see disturbing signs. Election results are now openly challenged on the flimsiest of evidence and forty-seven out of fifty states have recently introduced legislation to restrict access to voting.16 These and other developments explain why two out of three Americans now believe that United States democracy is under threat.17 Canada is not the United States, but a sizable minority of Canadians are angry about the way things are going in the country.18 Anger can translate into political power, as Donald Trump has shown the world. Maxime Bernier showed Canada, in the 2021 general election, that Canadians are not completely immune to expressing their anger at the “system” and politicians.19 There is also a growing “authoritarian temptation” across the world. Canada has, relatively speaking, been able, thus far, to keep this temptation in check. However, as the saying goes, “citizens of democracy are the authors of their own destinies.”20 We will write Canada’s future through our elected representatives, because it is the only legitimately democratic way to do so. Canadians watching 24-hour news channels or turning to social media and getting angry will not help. I have a better suggestion – get involved, join a political party, meet your elected officials or their staff,

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try to walk in their shoes, consider the conflicting advice that they have to reconcile on issues large and small, and recognize that our politicians have played a pivotal role in making Canada what it is today. Those who think that they can do better should get in the political arena and fight for the policies that they think can make Canada better. My hope is that more brave ones will get into the arena. Canada’s political and economic future needs the country’s best and brightest to get in the arena and Canadians should not make it more difficult for those who want to get in the arena to serve.

Notes

PreFace 1 Jack Mintz, Tom Flanagan, and Ted Morton, eds., Moment of Truth: How to Think About Alberta’s Future (Toronto: Sutherland House, 2020). 2 Greg Mercer and Kristy Kirkup, “Ottawa Condemns Violence against Mi’kmaq Fishermen, Says Their Rights Must Be Upheld,” Globe and Mail, 19 October 2020. 3 Taryn Grant, “Un Committee Calls on Canada to Respond to Claims of Racist Violence against Mi'kmaw Fishers,” cBc News-Nova Scotia, 10 May 2021. 4 Kate McKenna, “Quebec Seeks to Change Canadian Constitution, Make Sweeping Changes to Language Laws with New Bill,” cBc NewsMontreal, 13 May 2021. 5 “215 Children,” Greenpeace Canada, 2 June 2021. https://www. greenpeace.org/canada/en/story/48616/215-children/. 6 The surveyors asked 1,536 Canadians about their trust in leaders and institutions. See Aly Laube, “‘All-Time Low’: Report Finds Canadians Don’t Have Much Trust in Government,” Daily Hive, 9 February 2022.

I nt r o dUct I o n 1 Elliot Davis, “Canada Ranks No. 1 in US News Best Countries Ranking,” US News & World Report, 13 April 2021. 2 Matthew Johnston, “The Economy of Canada: An Explainer,” Investopedia, 5 October 2021, https://www.investopedia.com/articles/ investing/042315/fundamentals-how-canada-makes-its-money.asp. 3 Government of Canada, Global Affairs Canada, “Key Facts about Canada’s Competitiveness for Foreign Direct Investment,” May 2021,

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12 13

14 15 16 17 18

Notes to pages 3–8

https://www.international.gc.ca/trade-commerce/economist-economiste/ analysis-analyse/key_facts-2020-12-faits_saillants.aspx?lang=eng. John Ibbitson, “Why Is Canada the Most Tolerant Country in the World? Luck,” Globe and Mail, 2 July 2014, A6. Gerald L. Gall, “Quebec Referendum (1995),” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 4 March 2015, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/ article/quebec-referendum-1995. “Is the West Fed Up with Canada? What a New Survey Shows about the Federation’s Fault Line,” Globe and Mail, 22 March 2019. “Arctic Being ‘Neglected’ by Canada Special Senate Report Finds,” aPtn National News, 11 June 2019. John R. English and David A. Wilson, “Great Coalition of 1864,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 11 October 2019, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/great-coalition. F.G. Stanley, “Act or Pact? Another Look at Confederation,” Report of the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Historical Association vol. 35, no.1 (1956): 7, https://doi.org/10.7202/300387ar. Ged Martin, “Faction and Fiction in Canada’s Great Coalition of 1864,” the Winthrop Pickard Bell Lecture mimeo., Mount Allison University, Sackville, nB , November 1991, 3. Richard J. Gwyn, John A.: The Man Who Made Us – The Life and Times of John A. Macdonald, Volume One: 1815–1867 (Toronto: Random House of Canada, 2009), 292 and 439. George Grant, Lament for A Nation (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1965). Jordan Goldstein wrote a PhD thesis that ties hockey and Lord Stanley to Canada’s identity. See, Jordan Goldstein, Stanley’s Political Scaffold: Building Canadian National Identity within the State and through Ice Hockey: A Political Analysis of the Donation of the Stanley Cup, 1888– 1893, A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy, University of Western Ontario, 2015. Canadian Identity, 2013 (Canada: Statistics Canada, 1 October 2015), 3. Ibid., 12. I benefitted greatly from a luncheon I had with Hon. Michael Wilson, Toronto, 13 September 2016. See, for example, Alex Pinard-Bineau, La Conquête, les Rebellions, l’Acte d’Union,” memoir, (Quebec: University Laval, 2017), 22. See, among others, Donald J. Savoie, Visiting Grandchildren: Economic Development in the Maritimes (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006).

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19 Robert J. Lawson, “Understanding Alienation in Western Canada: Is Western Alienation the Problem? Is Senate Reform the Cure?,” Journal of Canadian Studies vol. 39, no. 2 (Spring 2005): 127–55. 20 Jessica Zheng, “Not So Nice After All: Growing Polarization in Canadian Politics,” Democratic Erosion, 12 May 2021, https://www.democraticerosion.com/2021/05/12/not-so-nice-after-all-growing-polarization-incanadian-politics/. 21 Guy Lawson, “Trudeau’s Canada, Again,” New York Times, 8 December 2015. 22 Margaret Atwood, Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1972), 58. 23 Quoted in “Searching for a Canada of the Soul Not the Census,” Globe and Mail, 18 June 2016, F3. 24 Ramsay Cook quoted in Northrop Frye, The Bush Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination (Toronto: Anansi, 1971), i–ii. 25 J.J. McCullough, “Opinion: Who Gets to Decide Canada’s Identity?, Washington Post, 29 June 2017. 26 Jeffrey Goldsworthy made a similar observation in his The Sovereignty of Parliament: History and Philosophy (Oxford; Clarendon Press, 1999), 135. 27 For a brief but insightful account of the importance of history, see Stephen Fry, “The Future’s in the Past,” Guardian, 9 July 2006. 28 James H. Marsh, “Acadian Expulsion – The Great Upheaval,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 15 July 2015, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/the-deportation-of-the-acadians-feature. 29 Steve McKenzie, “Apology Sought for War Crimes in Culloden’s Aftermath,” BBc News-Scotland, 7 April 2011, https://www.bbc.com/ news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-12996911. 30 For an account of the editorial’s impact, see Donald J. Savoie, Governing from the Centre: The Concentration of Power in Canadian Politics (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999) 177–8. 31 I report on this discussion in my Whatever Happened to the Music Teacher: How Government Decides and Why (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2013), 54. 32 “All Hail the Supreme … Prime Minister?” Globe and Mail, 8 May 1999, dIo. 33 Michael Ignatieff, True Patriot Love: Four Generations in Search of Canada (Toronto: Penguin, 2009). 34 J.L. Granatstein, Yankee Go Home: Canadians and Anti-Americanism (Toronto: HarperCollins Canada, 1997).

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Notes to pages 17–22

35 I am thinking, among others, of various political biographies by former Canadian prime ministers. 36 Mark Milke, The Victim Cult: How the Culture of Blame Hurts Everyone and Wrecks Civilizations (British Columbia: Thomas and Black, 2019). 37 See, for example, Tom Flanagan, Ted Morton, and Jack Mintz, eds, Moment of Truth: How to Think About Alberta’s Future (Alberta: The Sutherland House, 2020). 38 See, for example, Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning, The Rise of Victimhood Culture: Microaggressions, Safe Spaces, and the New Culture Wars (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). 39 Charles J. Sykes, A Nation of Victims: The Decay of the American Character (New York: St Martin’s Press, 1992), 11 and 248. 40 Mark Milke, The Victim Cult. 41 Frank Furedi, “New Britain – A Nation of Victims,” Society vol. 35, no. 3: 80–4. 42 Caroline Fourest, Génération offensée: de la police de la culture à la police de la pensée (Paris: Bernard Grasset, 2020); and Yascha Mounk, “Is French Secularism the Reason for Those Terrorist Attacks? (No.),” The Good Fight Podcast, Apple Podcasts Preview, 21 November 2020. 43 Jonathan Montpetit, “François Legault Endorsed a Book by Hardline Conservative. Here’s Why That Matters,” cBc News-Montreal, 4 August 2019. 44 Omar Al-Ghazzi, “We Will Be Great Again: Historical Victimhood in Populist Discourse,” European Journal of Cultural Studies, 14 January 2021. 45 Sean Speer and Jamil Jivani, “Pondering Populism in Canada,” Policy Options, 10 July 2017. 46 “The Pros and Cons of Canada’s First-Past-the-Post Electoral System,” cBc News-Politics, 17 June 2015; and Albert Trithart, “Stemming the Populist Tide: How Electoral Rules May Hold Back the World’s Le Pens,” IPI Global Observatory, 25 April 2017, https://theglobalobservatory. org/2017/04/france-populism-le-pen-macron-trump-brexit/. 47 John Porter, The Vertical Mosaic: An Analysis of Social Class and Power in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1965).

c haP t e r o n e 1 “Saint-Maurice, New Brunswick,” Roadside Thoughts, undated, www. roadsidethoughts.com/nb/saint-maurice-xx-kent-profile.htm. 2 I owe this insight to Maurice Basque in an email dated 31 October 2021.

Notes to pages 22–9

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3 “What Was the Truth about the Madness of George III?” BBc News, 15 April 2013. 4 This was told to me by Arthur Irving, K.C. Irving’s son. 5 See, among others, undated, www.1755band,amp.en/google-info.ca. 6 George C. Kohn, “Seven Years’ War,” in Dictionary of Wars (New York: Facts on File, 2000), 417. 7 “Charles Lawrence,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, undated, http:// www.biographi.ca/en/bio/lawrence_charles_3E.html. 8 See, among others, Naomi E.S. Griffiths, From Migrant to Acadian: A North American Border People 1604–1755 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2004). 9 Ibid. 10 My translation – Marc Poirier, “Charles Lawrence au tribunal des historiens,” Acadie Nouvelle, 11 September 2021, 10. 11 Quoted from unesco Dossier Chapter 2 – Decription, undated, http:// www.landscapeofgrandpre.ca/deportation-and-new-settlement1755ndash1810.html. 12 John English, Borden: His Life and World (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1977). 13 “Paradise Lost in Ethnic Cleansing,” New York Times, 9 February 2005. 14 John Mark Faragher, A Great and Noble Scheme: The Tragic Story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from Their American Homeland (New York: W.W. Norton, 2006). 15 See, for example, undated “The Truck System,” www.heritage.nf.ca. 16 W.S. MacNutt, New Brunswick, A History: 1784–1867 (Toronto: Macmillan, 1963), 453. 17 Arthur I. Silver, The French-Canadian Idea of Confederation, 1864–1900 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982). 18 Gaétan Migneault, “Le Canada français et la Confédération: Les Acadiens du Nouveau-Brunswick,” in Le Canada français et la Confédération: fondements et bilan critique, eds, Jean-François Caron and Marcel Martel (Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval, 2016). 19 Léon Thériault, “L’Acadie 1763–1978 – Synthèse historique,” in Les Acadiens des Maritimes: études thématiques, ed., Jean Daigle (Moncton: Centre d’études acadiennes, 1980), 49–94. 20 R. Baudry, Les Acadiens d’aujourd’hui: rapport de recherche préparé pour la Commission royale d’enquête sur le bilinguisme et le biculturalisme, Canada, Commission royale d’enquête sur le bilinguisme et le biculturalisme, 1966, 77. 21 Canada, Report of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism – Part I, Introduction (Ottawa, Queen’s Printer, 1967).

258

Notes to pages 31–40

22 See Donald J. Savoie, I’m from Bouctouche, Me (Montreal: McGillQueen’s University Press, 2009), 103. 23 David Foster, “The Trials of Leonard Jones,” Maclean’s, 25 July 1983. 24 Ibid. 25 Canada, Français et anglais: Vers une égalité réelle des langues officielles du Canada (Ottawa: Patrimoine canadien, 2021). 26 “Its Black Eye Gone, Moncton Goes Bilingual,” Globe and Mail, 7 August 2007. 27 Claude told me this, shortly after the meeting took place. 28 Donald J. Savoie, “All Things Canadian Are Now Regional,” Journal of Canadian Studies 35, no. 1 (Spring 2000): 203–17. 29 “L’héritage du Sommet de la Francophonie de Moncton, 20 ans plus tard,” Radio-Canada, 4 September 2019. 30 Savoie, I’m From Bouctouche, Me, 248. 31 Donald J. Savoie, Moi, je suis de Bouctouche: Les racines bien ancrées (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2009). 32 Claude Bourque in an email to me and to Yvon Fontaine dated 28 September 2009. 33 Some Acadians in the Boston area are well established in the business world and rank high in net worth, notably Raymond Bourque, an nhl star with the Boston Bruins who now lives in the Boston area. 34 I return to this point in more detail in the next chapter. 35 “Welcome to the Homes & Condominiums at Andover Country Club,” undated, https://www.homesatandovercountryclub.com/. 36 Seymour Martin Lipsett, Continental Divide: The Values and Institutions of the United States and Canada (Toronto: C.D. Howe Institute, 1989), 136; see also Charles Hirschman, “America’s Melting Pot Reconsidered,” Annual Review of Sociology vol. 9, no. 1 (2003): 397–423. 37 Will Kymlicka makes this point in his “Citizenship, Communities and Identity in Canada,” in Canadian Politics, eds, James Bickerton and Alain G. Gagnon (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2021), 24.

c ha P t e r t w o 1 Daniel Baugh, The Global Seven Year’s War 1754–1763: Britain and France in a Great Power Contest (New York: Routledge, 2011). 2 “Key Facts of the Seven Years’ War,” Encyclopædia Britannica, undated, https://www.britannica.com/event/Seven-Years-War. 3 See, for example, Katherine L. Morrison, “The Only Canadians: Canada’s French and the British Connection,” Journal of Canadian Studies, 37 (2008): 178.

Notes to pages 41–8

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4 Dale Miquelon, Louis Massicotte, and Andrew McIntosh, “The Conquest of New France,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 26 August 2019, https:// www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/conquest. 5 Nancy Christie, The Formal and Informal Politics of British Rule in Post-Conquest Quebec, 1760–1837 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), 4. 6 Quoted in Cécile Chevrier, Acadie: esquisses d’un parcours (Dieppe: Société nationale de l’Acadie, 1994), 55. 7 Quoted in Maxime Dagenais, “Quebec Act, 1774,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 12 August 2013, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/ en/article/quebec-act. 8 Ollivier Hubert and François Furstenberg, eds, Entangling the Quebec Act: Transnational Contexts, Meanings and Legacies in North America and the British Empire (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2020), see chapters 1 and 3. 9 J.M.S. Careless, The Union of the Canadas: The Growth of Canadian Institutions (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1967). 10 John George Lambton, “1st Earl of Durham,” Britannica.com, updated on 8 April 2021. 11 Lord Durham, Report on the Affairs of British North America Abridged to Highlight Constitutional Defects and Recommendations with Context, Report to the Queen’s Most Excellent Majesty, mimeo., undated, 11. 12 Ibid., 23. 13 Her Majesty’s High Commissioner, Report on the Affairs of British North America (Durham Report), by Earl of Durham (London: 1839), https:// primarydocuments.ca/report-on-the-affairs-of-british-north-americadurham-report/. 14 Ibid., 12. 15 Ibid., 14. 16 Ibid., 18. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid., 19. 19 Goldwin Smith, Canada and the Canadian Question (Toronto: Macmillan and Co., 1891), 19 and 97. 20 See, for example, William Ormsby, “Lord Durham and the Assimilation of French Canada,” in On Canada: Essays in Honour of Frank H. Underhill, ed., Norman Penlington (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1971), 39. 21 Ibid., 44. 22 Ibid., 48. 23 See, for example, Jean-Paul Bernard, “Montréal Riots,” The Canadian

260

24

25 26 27 28 29 30

31 32 33

34 35 36 37 38

39 40 41

Notes to pages 48–54

Encyclopedia, 7 February 2006, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/ en/article/montreal-riots. Careless, The Union of the Canadas. See also Gordon Stewart, The Origins of Canadian Politics: A Comparative Approach (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), 59. Richard Gwyn, John A.: The Man Who Made Us, Volume I, 1815–1867 (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2008), 271. Smith, Canada and the Canadian Question, 136. Ibid., 8. David Cameron, Self-Determination: Canada and Quebec (Ottawa: Social Science Research Council, Working paper, March 2007), 2. Sir John Bourinot, Canada (New York: G.P. Putnam and Sons, 1898), 438–9. J.P. Beaulieu, Province of Quebec Industrial Expansion Publication (Quebec: Office provincial de publicité pour le ministère de Commerce et Industrie, 1952). “George Brown: A People’s History,” cBc -Learning, undated, https://www.cbc.ca/history/EPCONTENTSE1EP8CH3PA3LE.html. Desmond Morton, A Short History of Canada, (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2001), 92. Claude Bélanger, “Supremacy of Parliament and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” Quebec History (Montreal: Marianopolis College, 19 February 2001), http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/quebec history/federal/parl.htm. “Cartier, Sir George-Étienne,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, undated, http://www.biographi.ca/en/theme_cartier.html. See, among others, Marcel Martel, “An Example for the World? Confederation and French Canadians,” Canada Watch, 29 June 2016, 7–8. Smith, Canada and the Canadian Question, 7. Donald J. Savoie, Looking for Bootstraps: Economic Development in the Maritimes (Halifax: Nimbus, 2017). Quebec Senators are appointed on a regional basis to protect the English linguistic minority. No other provinces, even those with a large linguistic minority group, have such requirements. Quoted in “The Great Enterprise,” undated, www.cbc.ca/history/ EPCONTENTSE1EP8CH4LE.html. Ged Martin, “Faction and Fiction in Canada’s Great Coalition of 1864,” 3. Alastair Sweeny, George-Étienne Cartier (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1976).

Notes to pages 54–9

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42 Lower Canada, undated, www.bac-lac.qc.ca. 43 Carl Berger made this point in his introduction to Smith, Canada and the Canadian Question, vii. 44 La Minerve, 1 July 1867. 45 Ralph Heintzman, “La Temporaire durera plus longtemps – The Long Career of Providential Independantism,” mimeo., undated, 7. 46 Ibid., 3. 47 Ibid. 48 “Qui était Lionel Groulx?,” undated, www.fondationlionelgroulx.org. 49 Katherine L. Morrison, “The Only Canadians: Canada’s French and the British Connection,” International Journal of Canadian Studies vol. 37 (2008):180. 50 “Legault Proposes Constitutional Recognition of Quebecers as a Nation,” iPolitics, 13 May 2021, https://www.ipolitics.ca/news/ legault-proposes-constitutional-recognition-of-quebecers-as-a-nation and “Legault écrit à Trudeau pour défendre sa réforme de la loi 101,” Radio-Canada, 15 May 2021. 51 Jacques Poitras, Irving vs. Irving: Canada’s Feuding Billionaires and the Stories They Won’t Tell (Toronto: Penguin, 2014), 248. 52 Martin Ouellet, “Davie Shipyard: Quebec Tired of ‘Begging’ Ottawa for Contracts,” Montreal Gazette, 14 May 2015. 53 Steven Chase, “Tories Begin Talks with Quebec Shipyard to Build Navy Supply Ship,” Globe and Mail, 23 June 2015, http://www. theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tories-lease-commercial-supply-shipfor-navy-from-quebec-shipyard/article25075797/. 54 “Brian Really Was Lyin’,” Winnipeg Free Press, 14 August 2010. 55 Quoted in “The Night of Long Knives,” cBc , undated, https://www.cbc. ca/history/EPISCONTENTSE1EP17CH1PA3LE.html. 56 Jean-Marc Salvet, “Couillard veut rouvrir le dialogue constitutionnel,” Le Soleil, 1 June 2017. 57 Robert Dutrisac, “Politique d’affirmation du Québec: l’exil intérieur, encore et toujours,” Le Devoir, 6 January 2018. 58 Andrew Coyne, “Quebec’s Anglophone Minority Is a Target, Once Again – and No One Is Coming to the Rescue,” Globe and Mail, 19 May 2021. 59 Jonathan Montpetit, “Quebec’s Proposed Changes to Constitution Seem Small, but They Could Prompt Historic Makeover,” cBc -Analysis, 19 May 2021.

262

Notes to pages 59–63

60 “Market View: Economics and Strategy,” National Bank of Canada, 6 June 2021; and “Quebec’s Economic and Financial Summary: Highlights of the Budget 2021–2022,” 25 March 2021, budget-finances.gov.qc.ca.

c h aP t e r t h re e 1 See, among others, Ernest Forbes, ed., Challenging the Regional Stereotype: Essays on the 20th Century Maritimes (Fredericton: Acadiensis Press, 1989); and P.A. Buckner, “The Maritimes and Confederation: A Reassessment,” Canadian Historical Review 71, no. 1 (March 1990). 2 James P. Bickerton, Nova Scotia, Ottawa and the Politics of Regional Development (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 66. 3 Luke Flanagan, The Political Union Debate in Canada’s Maritime Provinces, 1960–1980: Why Did a Union Not Happen? (PhD dissertation, University of Edinburgh, 2012), 201. 4 Quoted in H. Wade MacLauchlan, Alex B. Campbell: The Prince Edward Island Premier Who Rocked the Cradle (Charlottetown: Prince Edward Island Museum, 2014), 234. 5 Louis J. Robichaud, quoted in ibid., 158. 6 James Hiller, “The Origins of the Pulp and Paper Industry in Newfoundland,” Acadiensis 11, no. 2 (Spring 1982): 43. 7 See, among others, “Grimes Floats Law Suit against Ottawa,” 13 May 2003, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/ grimes-floats-law-suit-against-ottawa-1.393759. 8 The reader may wish to consult the minutes of proceedings of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, various dates. 9 Andrew McIntosh, Gerald L. Gall, R. Hudson, and Tabitha Marshall, “Confederation’s Opponents,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, published online 8 April 2021, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ confederations-opponents. 10 John R. Grodzinski, Peter Vronsky, “Fenian Raids,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, published online 11 March 2021, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/fenian-raids. 11 “Annand, William,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Volume XI (1881–1890), undated, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/annand_ william_11E.html. 12 Ed Whitcomb, A Short History of Nova Scotia (Ottawa: From Sea to Sea Enterprises, 2009), 30. 13 Ralph Heintzman in a telephone conversation with the author, 11 June 2021.

Notes to pages 63–7

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14 Quoted in, C.M. Wallace, “Smith, Sir Albert James,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Volume XI (University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003), http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/smith_albert_james_11E.html. 15 P.A. Buckner, “chr Dialogue: The Maritimes and Confederation: A Reassessment,” The Canadian Historical Review 71, no. 1 (March 1990): 49. 16 See, among others, the Honourable Noël A. Kinsella, “Forewords,” The Senate Report on Activities, 2010, undated, https://sencanada.ca/portal/AnnualReports/2009-2010/forewordhnk-e.htm. 17 “Quebec Premier Couillard Addresses Ontario Legislature, First Premier to Do So in over 50 Years,” National Post, 11 May 2015. 18 “This Is Not Federalism,” National Post, 13 May 2015, A8. 19 Ibid. See also “Premiers Wynne and Couillard Set Seven Criteria for Energy East,” Globe and Mail, 21 November 2014. 20 Richard Saillant, A Tale of Two Countries: How the Great Demographic Imbalance is Pulling Canada Apart (Halifax: Nimbus, 2016). 21 Claude Bélanger, The Maritime Provinces, the Maritime Rights’ Movements and Canadian Federalism, mimeo., undated, 3 and 4. 22 C.M. Wallace, “Sir Samuel Tilley” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. XII, (1891-1900), http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tilley_samuel_ leonard_12E.html. 23 Quoted in C.M. Wallace, “Albert Smith, Confederation, and Reaction in New Brunswick: 1852–1882,” The Canadian Historical Review vol. 44, no 4 (December 1963): 298–9. 24 Janine Brodie, The Political Economy of Canadian Regionalism (Toronto: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990), 145. 25 Whitcomb, A Short History of Nova Scotia, 33. 26 Donald E. Armstrong and D. Harvey Hay, The Chignecto Canal (Montreal: Economic Research Corporation Limited, April 1960), 6; and Chignecto Canal Committee, The Story of the Chignecto Barrier (1950). 27 Armstrong and Hay, The Chignecto Canal, 5. 28 Robert F. Legget, “Canals and Inland Waterways,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, last edited 4 March 2015, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/canals-and-inland-waterways. 29 Armstrong and Hay, The Chignecto Canal, 6. 30 See, for example, “Commission to Investigate the Nature and Extent of the Commercial Advantage to be Derived from the Construction of the Baie Verte Canal,” Archives Canada, caIn no. 257773, http://www. archivescanada.ca/. 31 Armstrong and Hay, The Chignecto Canal, 6.

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Notes to pages 67–73

32 Savoie, Looking for Bootstraps: Economic Developement in the Maritimes (Halifax: Nimbus, 2017), 147. 33 Armstrong and Hay, The Chignecto Canal, 13. 34 Ibid., 13. 35 Ibid., 6. For a contrary view, readers should consult C.R. McKay, “Investors, Government and the cmtr : A Study of Entrepreneurial Failure,” Acadiensis 9, no. 1 (1979): 71–94. McKay maintains the Ketchum proposal did not make economic sense. 36 Canada, Report of the Chignecto Canal Commission (Ottawa: Printer of the King’s Most Excellent Majesty, 1939), 10. 37 Gordon C. Shaw and Viktor Kaczkowski, “Saint Lawrence Seaway,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 17 February 2009, www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/st-lawrence-seaway/. 38 Corey Slumkoski, Inventing Atlantic Canada: Regionalism and the Maritime Reaction to Newfoundland’s Entry into Canadian Confederation (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 97. 39 The committee members were Mayor N.S. Sanford, G. Fuller, and A.R. Lusby of Amherst (nS ), and Mayor H.A. Beale and E.R. Richard of Sackville (nB ) 40 Arthur Irving tells me that K.C. Irving made this point at various public meetings. 41 Armstrong and Hay, The Chignecto Canal, 5. 42 Slumkoski, Inventing Atlantic Canada, 100. 43 K.C. Irving quoted in Jacques Poitras, Irving vs. Irving: Canada’s Feuding Billionaires and the Stories They Won’t Tell (Toronto: Penguin, 2014), 19. 44 See, for example, Looking for Bootstraps. 45 D.A. Muise, “The 1860s: Forging the Bonds of Union,” in E.R. Forbes and D.A. Muise, The Atlantic Provinces in Confederation (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 24. 46 David Alexander, Atlantic Canada and Confederation: Essays in Canadian Political Economy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1983), 4. 47 Hugh Thorburn, Politics in New Brunswick (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1961), 16. 48 Ernest Forbes, quoted in “Shafted,” Atlantic Progress (Halifax), June 1999, 36. 49 Thorburn, Politics in New Brunswick, 16. 50 Ibid. 51 Carman Miller, “The 1940s: War and Rehabilitation,” in The Atlantic Provinces in Confederation, eds, E. R. Forbes and D. A. Muise (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 325.

Notes to pages 74–8

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52 Donald J. Savoie, Visiting Grandchildren: Economic Development in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006). 53 Harry Bruce, Down Home: Notes of a Maritime Son (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 1988). 54 Ernest Forbes, Challenging the Regional Stereotype: Essays on the 20th Century Maritimes (Fredericton: Acadiensis Press, 1989), 174. 55 Ibid., 180. 56 Ibid., 181. 57 Ibid., 178. 58 Ibid., 174–98. 59 See, for example, Canada, “Speech from the Throne to Open the First Session of the 38th Parliament of Canada,” 5 October 2004, 4. 60 Gordon Osbaldeston made this observation at a meeting attended by the author in Ottawa in March 1982. 61 Premier Frank McKenna speech at the Atlantic Vision Conference, Moncton, New Brunswick, 9 October 1997, 5. 62 Roméo LeBlanc made this comment to me in 1985. 63 Poitras, Irving vs. Irving: Canada’s Feuding Billionaires, 248. 64 Jeffrey Simpson, “At Last, a Cure for Government Procurement,” Globe and Mail, 26 October 2011. 65 Poitras, Irving vs. Irving, 287. 66 Martin Ouellet, “Davie Shipyard: Quebec Tired of ‘Begging’ Ottawa for Contracts,” Montreal Gazette, 14 May 2015. 67 Steven Chase, “Tories Begin Talks with Quebec Shipyard to Build Navy Supply Ship,” Globe and Mail, 23 June 2015. 68 See, among others, Savoie, Looking for Bootstraps, 91–4 and 141–3. 69 John Ibbitson, Loyal No More: Ontario’s Struggle for a Separate Destiny (Toronto: Harper Collins, 2001), 5. 70 Janine Brodie, The Political Economy of Canadian Regionalism (Toronto: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990), 145. 71 Quoted in Richard W. Phidd and G. Bruce Doern, The Politics and Management of Canadian Economic Policy (Toronto: Macmillan, 1978), 324. 72 Donald J. Savoie, Regional Economic Development: Canada’s Search for Solutions (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986). 73 Ibid. 74 Ibid. 75 Canada, Economic Development for Canada in the 1980s (Ottawa: Department of Finance, 1981).

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Notes to pages 79–83

76 Donald J. Savoie, “Ottawa’s Decades-Old Approach to Regional Development Is Creaking under Its Own Weight,” Globe and Mail, 29 December 2020, A7. 77 See, for example, Fred McMahon, Fiscal Federalism and the Dependency of Atlantic Canada (Vancouver: Fraser Institute, 2021). 78 Janine Brodie makes this point in The Political Economy of Canadian Regionalism (Toronto: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990), 145. 79 See, among others, R. Kenneth Carty, Big Tent Politics: The Liberal Party’s Long Mastery of Canada’s Public Life (Vancouver: UBc Press, 2015). 80 See, for example, Thomas J. Courchene, “A Market Perspective on Regional Disparities,” Canadian Public Policy vol. 7, no. 4 (1981): 515. 81 “Diane Francis: With More Seats Than It Deserves Atlantic Canada Is Awash in Federal Handouts,” Financial Post, 30 April 2021. 82 Quoted in “Campbell: There’s Plenty of Reason to Be Hopeful about New Brunswick’s Future,” Telegraph Journal, 28 August 2021, https://tj.news/ telegraph-journal/101650489.

c haP t e r Fo Ur 1 See, among others, Michael J. Sendel, “Populism, Liberalism, and Democracy,” Philosophy and Social Criticism vol. 44, no. 4 (May 2018): 353–9. 2 Sean Speer and Jamil Jivani, “Pondering Populism in Canada,” Policy Options, 10 July 2017, https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/ july-2017/pondering-populism-in-canada/. 3 See, for example, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages “Alberta and Saskatchewan Join Confederation,” undated, https://www.clo-ocol. gc.ca/en/timeline-event/alberta-and-saskatchewan-join-confederation. 4 Bill Waiser, “Teaching the West and Confederation: A Saskatchewan Perspective,” The Canadian Historical Review vol. 98, no. 4 (December 2017): 760. 5 Preston Manning, “Are We Little or Big Westerners?” in Moment of Truth: How to Think About Alberta’s Future, eds, Jack M. Mintz, Ted Morton, and Tom Flanagan (Toronto: Sutherland House, 2020), 1. 6 Claude Bélanger, “The National Policy and Canadian Federalism,” (Montreal: Marianopolis College, April, 2005), http://faculty.marian opolis.edu/c.belanger/quebechistory/federal/npolicy.htm. 7 Robert Craig Brown, “National Policy,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 7 February 2006, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ national-policy.

Notes to pages 83–7

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8 See, for example, Joe Martin, “Opinion: A Very Good Thing Sir John A. Macdonald Did,” Financial Post, 8 July 2021. 9 Peter McCormick and David Elton, The Western Economy and Canadian Unity (Calgary: Canada West Foundation, 1987), 9. 10 T.W. Acheson, “The National Policy and the Industrialization of the Maritimes, 1880–1910,” Acadiensis 1, no. 2 (Spring 1972): 28. 11 See, W.L. Morton, The Progressive Party in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1950). 12 Claude Bélanger, “The Powers of Disallowance and Reservation in Canadian Federalism,” Studies on the Canadian Constitution and Canadian Federalism, Marianopolis College, 19 February, http://faculty. marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/quebechistory/federal/disallow.htm 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 Howard Pawley, “Mulroney, Me and the cF-18 ,” Winnipeg Free Press, 19 March 2011. 16 Don Ray, “Western Separatism: Counter-Elite of the Marginalized,” in Stampede City: Power and Politics in the West, ed. Chuck Reasons (Toronto: Between the Lines, 1984), 146–73. 17 Alan C. Cairns, “The Constitutional, Legal, and Historical Background to the Elections of 1979 and 1980,” in Constitution, Government and Society in Canada: Selected Essays by Alan C. Cairns, ed. (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart), 95. 18 Shawn Henry, “Revisiting Western Alienation: towards a Better Understanding of Political Alienation and Political Behaviour in Western Canada,” (a dissertation, University of Calgary, December 2000), 31. Submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy. 19 The reader should consult Donald V. Smiley and Ronald L. Watts, Intrastate Federalism in Canada, vol. 39 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, c1985) 20 Alan C. Cairns, From Interstate to Intrastate Federalism in Canada (Kingston: Institute of Intergovernment Relations, Queen’s University, 1979), 1. 21 Donald V. Smiley, “Territorialism and Canadian Political Institutions,” Canadian Public Policy 3, no. 4 (Autumn 1977): 453. 22 Canadian Press, “Montreal-Area Mayors’ Energy East Criticisms ‘Short Sighted,’ Notley Says,” ctv News Atlantic, 22 January 2016. 23 “Trudeau Warns Against ‘National Divisions’ After Energy East Pipeline Decision,” Huffington Post (Canada), 7 October 2017.

268

Notes to pages 88–91

24 Jean-Marc Léger, Jacques Nantel, and Pierre Duhamel, Cracking the Quebec Code: The 7 Keys to Understanding Quebecers (Montreal: Juniper Publishing, 2016); and Derek Abma, “Quebec Sovereignty Could Be Ignited by Pipeline Decision, PQ Win, Says Léger,” Hill Times, 17 October 2016. 25 Gary Mason, “Why a Pipeline Could Cost Justin Trudeau the Next Election,” Globe and Mail, 13 April 2018. 26 “Oil Supply and Demand,” Markets, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, undated, www.capp.ca. 27 Daniel Leblanc, “Trudeau Advisor Mathieu Bouchard More Than Just Pmo’s Quebec Guy,” Globe and Mail, 29 January 2016. 28 See, John F. Helliwell and Robert N. McRae, “Resolving the Energy Conflict: From the National Energy Program to the Energy Agreements,” Canadian Public Policy vol. 8, no. 1 (Winter, 1982): 14–23. 29 “Corbella: 40 years later, National Energy Program has lessons to teach today,” Calgary Herald, 24 October 2020. 30 Allan Gotlieb, The Washington Diaries 1981–1989 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2007), 4 and 71. 31 “The National Energy Program’s Bitter Aftertaste Has Lasted 40 Years and Provided a Hard Lesson to Ottawa,” Toronto Star, 21 November 2020. 32 See Steven Chase, “Liberal mP McGuity Apologizes for Comments; Resigns as Energy Critic,” Globe and Mail, 21 November 2012, A3. 33 Kenneth Harold Norrie and Doug Owram, A History of the Canadian Economy, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Harcourt Brace, 1996), 419. 34 See Canada, Recent Trends in Canadian Automotive Industries (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 20 June 2013). 35 See Canada, Statistics Canada, “Total Manufacturing Jobs – Motor Vehicle and Motor Vehicle Parts,” Table 2810024. 36 See, among many others, “Project Would Secure about 4,000 Jobs at Plant,” Globe and Mail, 8 September 2004, B18. 37 Paul Vieira, “Canada Auto-Bailout Funds Issued with Limited Research: Watchdog,” Wall Street Journal, 25 November 2014. 38 Greg Keenan, “Canadian Taxpayers Lose $3.5 billion on 2009 Bailout of Auto Firms,” Globe and Mail, 7 April 2015. 39 Supreme Court of Canada, Reference re Senate Reform, Scc 32, File no. 35203 (Ottawa: Supreme Court of Canada, 2014). 40 See, among many others, David E. Smith, The Canadian Senate in Bicameral Perspective (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003), 114; and “Canada’s Senate Speaker Pierre Claude Nolin Dies,” Toronto Star, 24 April 2015.

Notes to pages 91–6

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41 Quoted in Serge Joyal, ed., Protecting Canadian Democracy: The Senate You Never Knew (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003). 42 Janet Ajzenstat, “Bicameralism and Canada’s Founders: The Origins of the Canadian Senate,” in ibid., 18. 43 Canada, Report of the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, vol. 2 (Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada, 1985), 72. 44 “Why the Senate Should Be Abolished,” Maclean’s, 8 March 2013. 45 David C. Docherty, “The Canadian Senate: Chamber of Sober Reflection or Loony Cousin Best Not Talked About,” The Journal of Legislative Studies 8, no. 3 (Autumn 2002): 27–8 and 38. 46 David E. Smith, Coming to Terms: An Analysis of the Supreme Court Ruling on Senate, 2014 (Toronto: Ryerson University, 2014), 7. 47 See, among others, “Le poids du Québec et le Sénat,” Le Devoir, 12 June 2013. 48 Derek Ferguson, “A Personal and Lonely Decision – Peterson Resigns after Loss,” Toronto Star, 7 September 1990, A9. 49 Roger Gibbins, Regionalism: Territorial Politics in Canada and the United States (Toronto: Butterworths, 1982), 195. 50 Niles Hansen, Benjamin Higgins, and Donald Savoie, Regional Policy in a Changing World (New York: Plenum Press, 1990), 195. 51 Matthew Mendelsohn, “Abolish the Senate? Forget it: Change the Senate? Maybe,” Globe and Mail, 24 May 2013. 52 Stéphane Dion, “Institutional Reform: The Grass Isn’t Always Greener on the Other Side,” in Political Leadership and Representation in Canada: Essays in Honour of John C. Courtney, eds, Hans J. Michelmann, Donald C. Tory, and Jeffrey S. Steeves (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007), 185. 53 Robert Schertzer, “Why Regional Representation on the Supreme Court Does (and Doesn’t) Matter,” Policy Options, 17 April 2016, https:// policyoptions.irpp.org/fr/magazines/aout-2016/why-regional-representationon-the-supreme-court-does-and-doesnt-matter/. 54 Ted Morton, “No Statecraft. Questionable Jurisprudence: How the Supreme Court Tried to Kill Senate Reform, Calgary,” The School of Public Policy spp Research Papers vol. 5, issue 21 (April 2015): 8 and 12. 55 I am thinking of changes to federal transfers to provincial governments for health care and his decision to sell the Canadian Wheat Board. 56 Jason Markusoff, “The Quixotic Quest to Get Elected Senators into the Red Chamber,” Maclean’s, 15 June 2021.

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Notes to pages 96–9

57 “Reference re Senate Reform, 2014 Scc 32,” 25 April 2014. 58 Australian Public Service Commission, State of the Service Report 2014–15 (Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia, 2015), 13. 59 Civil Service Statistics, 2015, www.officefornationalstatistics. 60 “Policy, Data, Oversight. Data, Analysis, and Documentation, Federal Civilian Employment by Major Geographic Area,” Office of Personnel Management, 2015, www.opm.gov. 61 Savoie, Whatever Happened to the Music Teacher, 201. 62 There are various ways in the Government of Canada to establish the size of the federal public service. First, there is the core public administration, including separate employees for which the Treasury Board is the employer; second is the broader public service that includes Crown corporations, military personnel, the rcmP , and other entities not included in schedules I, 4, and 5 of the Financial Administration Act. 63 “Employment Trends in the Core Public Administration: A Geographical Profile,” Statistics Canada, www.statcan.gc.ca; and “Population of the Federal Public Service by Province,” undated, www.canada.ca/en/treasuryboard-secretariat.ca. 64 See, among others, Donald J. Savoie, Governing from the Centre: The Concentration of Power in Canadian Politics (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999). 65 Donlad J. Savoie, Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our Institutions (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019), chapters 12 and 13. 66 Dale Eisler, “Anxiety and Anger on the Prairies: The Challenge to Federalism,” Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy, 15 November 2019, https://www.schoolofpublicpolicy.sk.ca/research/ publications/policy-brief/the-challenge-to-federalism.php. 67 “Royal Commission on Renewing and Strengthening Our Place in Canada,” a report prepared by Pollara Inc., March 2003. 68 “Albertans Reject Equalization Payments and Permanent Daylight Time in Referendum,” Globe and Mail, 26 October 2021. 69 See, Herman Bakvis, Regional Ministers: Power and Influence in the Canadian Cabinet (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991). 70 “Prime Minister Welcomes New Cabinet,” Office of the Prime Minister, 20 November 2019, www.pm.gc.ca. 71 See, “Joe Oliver: Liberals Just Don’t Get It When It Comes to Alberta,” Financial Post, 28 July 2021. 72 Ibid.

Notes to pages 100–4

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73 Jonathan Montpetit, “Quebec Nixes lng Plant That Would Have Carried Western Canadian Natural Gas to Markets Overseas,” cBc News, 21 July 2021. 74 Ted Morton, “The Status Quo Must Go,” in Moment of Truth: How to Think About Alberta’s Future, eds, Jack M. Mintz, Ted Morton, and Tom Flanagan (Toronto: Sutherland House, 2020), 43. 75 Mintz, Morton, and Flanagan, Moment of Truth. 76 Northrup Frye, The Bush Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination (Toronto: Anansi, 1971). 77 See, among others, Alan C. Cairns, From Interstate to Intrastate Federalism in Canada, discussion paper no. 5 (Kingston: Institute of Intergovernmental Relations, 1979). 78 See, among others, Mintz, Morton, and Flanagan, eds, Moment of Truth, chapters 2, 11, and 13. 79 Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty referred to Ontario “as the goose that lays the golden egg.” See, for example, Ontario, Official Report of Debates (Hansard), 17 February 2005, 3.

c ha P t e r F I ve 1 Bruce G. Wilson, “Loyalists in Canada,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 2 April 2009, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/loyalists. 2 Alan Taylor, “The Late Loyalists: Northern Reflections of the Early American Republic,” Journal of the Early Republic vol. 27, no. 1 (Spring 2007): 2. 3 John Graves Simcoe to the Duke of Portland, 22 January 1795, in Ernest Alexander Cruikshank, ed., The Correspondence of Lieut. Governor John Graves Simcoe, With Allied Documents Relating to His Administration of the Government of Upper Canada, 5 vols. (Toronto: Ontario Historical Society, 1923). 4 Taylor, “The Late Loyalists,” 6. 5 Ibid., 21 and 22. 6 Quoted in Alexander Cain, “The Loyalist Refugee Experience in Canada,” Journal of the American Revolution, 26 January 2015, https://allthings liberty.com/2015/01/the-loyalist-refugee-experience-in-canada/. 7 Desmond Morton, A Short History of Canada (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2001), 65. 8 W.S. MacNutt, “The Loyalists: A Sympathetic View,” Acadiensis vol. 6, no. 1 (1976): 9.

272

Notes to pages 104–7

9 Walter Stewart, True Blue: The Loyalist Legend (Toronto: Collins, 1985), 6. 10 Quoted in Ann Mackenzie, “A Short History of the United Empire Loyalists,” mimeo., undated, 3. 11 J.M.S. Careless, Canada: A Story of Challenge, 2nd edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 113. 12 W.G. Shelton, “The United Empire Loyalists: A Reconsideration,” Dalhousie Review vol. 45, no. 1 (1965): 6. 13 Ibid., 10. 14 Maya Jasanoff, “The Other Side of Revolution: Loyalists in the British Empire,” The William and Mary Quarterly vol. 65, no. 2 (April 2008): 206. 15 David Mills, “Family Compact,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 7 February 2006, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/family-compact. 16 Alexander Brady, “The Meaning of Canadian Nationalism,” International Journal vol. 19, no. 3 (Summer 1964): 353. 17 Quotation in ibid., 352. 18 I attended a briefing in Ottawa on 28 November 1989, where the proposal was outlined in detail. 19 “Beatty Baffled by Millions in Bear Head Lobby Fees,” Toronto Star, 29 April 2009. 20 Elizabeth Thompson, “Mulroney Didn’t Promote Bear Head, Exec Testifies,” Kingston Whig-Standard, 22 April 2009. 21 See Steven Chase, “Ottawa Aims to Keep Lid on Details of Saudi Arms Deal,” Globe and Mail, 27 May 2015; and Steven Chase, “Canada’s Arms Deal with Saudi Arabia Shrouded in Secrecy,” Globe and Mail, 21 January 2015. 22 Steven Chase, “Foreign Affairs Found No Red Flags for Israel in Saudi Arms Deal,” Globe and Mail, 27 August 2015. 23 Steven Chase, “Amnesty Wants Ottawa to Reveal Details of $15-billion Saudi Arms Deal,” Globe and Mail, 29 May 2015. 24 Steven Chase, “Critics Push Ottawa to Explain Justification for Saudi Arms Deal,” Globe and Mail, 5 January 2016. 25 Ibid. 26 Richard Blackwell, “London, Ont. Defends Saudi Arms Deal as Integral to Region’s Economy,” Globe and Mail, 7 January 2016. 27 Steven Chase, “Liberals Committed to Saudi Arms Deal Even After Concerning Un Report, Dion Says,” Globe and Mail, 28 January 2016. 28 Steven Chase, “Liberals Distance Themselves from Saudi Arms Deal but Won’t Block It,” Globe and Mail, 18 February 2016.

Notes to pages 107–12

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29 Steven Chase, “Saudi Arms Deal Exempt from Global Treaty, Ottawa Says,” Globe and Mail, 9 February 2016. 30 Steven Chase “The Big Deal,” Globe and Mail, 4 February 2016. 31 Steven Chase, “Cancelling Saudi Arms Deal Would Have No Effect on Human Rights: Dion,” Globe and Mail, 29 March 2016. 32 See, among others, “Canada Doubles Weapons Sales to Saudi Arabia Despite Moratorium,” Guardian, 9 June 2020. 33 “Canada Urged to Stop Fueling War in Yemen with Saudi Arms Sales, Un Report Says,” Globe and Mail, 8 September 2021. 34 Quoted in “Rich and Poor Provinces Split,” Globe and Mail, 26 October 2004. 35 Erich Hartmann, Jordann Thirgood, and Andrew Thies, A Fair Fiscal Deal: Towards a More Principled Allocation of Federal Transfers (Toronto: Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, 2018). 36 See, Richard Saillant, A Tale of Two Countries: How the Great Demographic Imbalance Is Pulling Canada Apart (Halifax: Nimbus, 2016). 37 “Health Transfer Data Shows Alberta Wins at Other Provinces’ Expense,” Global News, 21 March 2012. 38 Quoted in “covId -Zero: Why Atlantic Canada Excels at Slowing the Spread of covId -19,” National Post, 1 May 2021. 39 “Doug Ford’s Muddled Response to Pandemic Mirrors Ontario’s Own Confusion,” Toronto Star, 8 April 2021. 40 See, for example, “Majority of Ontarians Feel Doug Ford Has Failed Pandemic Response, Poll Finds,” City News, 9 April 2021. 41 “Should Canada Divert Vaccines from Regions with Low covId -19 Levels to Hot Spots?” cBc News, 30 January 2021. 42 Sheila Copps, “We Should Have Had a National Rollout Vaccine Strategy,” Hill Times, 26 April 2021, 10. 43 “nS Won’t Divert Vaccines to Ontario but Could Help in Other Ways,” The Coast, 24 April 2021. 44 “covId -19: Military, Red Cross Being Sent to Ontario’s Hospitals after Provincial Request for Help,” Global News, 26 April 2021. 45 See, for example, Donald E. Abelson and Michael Lusztig, “The Consistency of Inconsistency: Tracing Ontario’s Opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement,” Canadian Journal of Political Science vol. XXIX, no. 4 (December 1996): 681–98. 46 “US Targets Autos with naFta Demands,” Globe and Mail, 13 October 2017. 47 John Turner quoted in John Duffy, Fights of Our Lives: Elections, Leadership, and the Making of Canada (Toronto: Harper Collins, 2002), 58.

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Notes to pages 113–16

48 Alexander Brady, “The Meaning of Canadian Nationalism,” International Journal vol. 19, no. 3 (Summer 1961): 351. 49 Alexander Brady, “National and International,” University of Toronto Quarterly vol. 36, no. 4 (July 1968): 471. 50 See, for example, “US Image Up Slightly But Still Negative,” Pew Research Center, 25 June 2005. 51 J.L. Granatstein, Yankee, Go Home? Canadians and Anti-Americanism (Toronto: Harper Collins Canada, 1997). 52 P.A. Buckner, “How Canadian Historians Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Americans,” Acadiensis vol. XXV, no. 2 (Spring 1996): 117. 53 George Grant, Lament for a Nation: The Defeat of Canadian Nationalism (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1965). 54 P.A. Buckner, “‘Limited Identities,’ Revisited: Regionalism and Nationalism in Canadian History,” Acadiensis vol. 30, no. 1 (Fall 2000): 4–15. 55 Doug Owram, “Intellectual History in the Land of Limited Identities, Journal of Canadian Studies vol. 24, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 122. 56 Buckner, “Limited Identities,” 11. 57 See, for example, John H. Sigler and Dennis Goresky, “Public Opinion on United States-Canadian Relations,” International Organization vol. 28, no. 4 (1974): 647. 58 Barry J. O’Sullivan, “Canada’s Foreign Investment Review Act Revisited,” Fordham International Law Journal vol. 4, no. 1 (1980): 175–98; and “Invest Nova Scotia,” undated, https://novascotia.ca/invest-nova-scotia/. 59 Lydia Miljan and Barry Cooper, “The Canadian Garrison Mentality and Anti-Americanism at the cBc ,” (Vancouver: A Fraser Institute Occasional Paper, 2005), 1. 60 Albert J. Kennedy, “The Provincials,” Acadiensis vol. 4, no. 2 (Spring 1975): 85. 61 Ibid.; and Canada, The Maritime Provinces Since Confederation (Ottawa: Dominion Bureau of Statistics, 1927), 32. 62 Kennedy, “The Provincials,” 86. 63 See, for example, Stephen J. Hornsby and John G. Reid, eds, New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparisons (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2006). 64 Government of Alberta, “Country and Regional Relations,” undated, https://www.alberta.ca/country-regional-relations.aspx. 65 Charles F. Doran and James Patrick Sewell, “Anti-Americanism in Canada?” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science vol. 497, no. 1 (May 1988): 105–19.

Notes to pages 116–23

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66 J.J. McCullough, “Opinion: Canadian Anti-Americanism Remains Toxic – and Americans Are Helping,” Washington Post, 21 May 2020. 67 Richard Gwyn, The World’s First Anti-Americans: Canada as the Canary in the Global Mine (Toronto: Munk Centre, 2008), 8. 68 Ibid., 12. 69 Gwyn, The World’s First Anti-Americans, 1. 70 See, for example, Samuel E. Moffett, The Americanization of Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1972). 71 William M. Baker, “The Anti-American Ingredient in Canadian History,” The Dalhousie Review vol. 53, no. 1 (1993): 71. 72 Ibid. 73 Granatstein, Yankee, Go Home?

c h aPt e r S Ix 1 See, among many others, Suzanne Methot, Legacy: Trauma, Story, and Indigenous Healing (Toronto: ecw Press, 2019) and Ken Coates, #IdleNoMore: And the Remaking of Canada (Regina: University of Regina Press, 2015). 2 René R. Gadacz, “First Nations,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 7 February 2006, last edited 25 February 2022, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia. ca/en/article/first-nations. 3 Ronald Labelle, “Native Witchcraft Beliefs in Acadian, Maritime and Newfoundland Folklore,” Ethnologies vol. 30, no. 2 (2008): 138. 4 Aaron Hutchins, “Few Canadians Ever Set Foot on a First Nations Reserve, and That’s a Problem,” Maclean’s, 8 June 2018, https:// www.macleans.ca/news/canada/ever-visited-a-first-nations-reserveprobably-not/. 5 Richard Wagamese, Indian Horse (Madeira Park, Bc : Douglas and McIntyre, 2022), 81. 6 Canada, Report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, “Volume 1 – Looking Forward, Looking Back,” October 1996, 661, https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/aboriginal-heritage/royalcommission-aboriginal-peoples/Pages/final-report.aspx. 7 Senate Canada, How Did We Get Here? A Concise, Unvarnished Account of the History of the Relationship Between Indigenous Peoples and Canada (Ottawa: Interim Report of the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples, April 2019), 10 and 11. 8 See, for example, “Building a National Identity,” in John Douglas Belshaw,

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16 17 18 19 20 21

22

23 24

Notes to pages 123–7

Canadian History: Post-Confederation, undated, https://opentextbc.ca/postconfederation/chapter/12-6-building-a-national-identity/. See, among others, James Tully, “Aboriginal Property and Western Theory,” in Property Rights, eds, (Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1995). See, among others, James Daschuk, Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life (Regina: University of Regina Press, 2013). Quoted in Lawrence Martin, “Why Is America’s History in Dealing with Indigenous Peoples Held in a Harsher Light Than Canada’s?” Globe and Mail, 7 July 2021. Canada, “Volume 1 – Looking Forward, Looking Back,” 17. Michael Tutton, “For Acadian Fisherman, Early Mi’kmaq Fishery in nS Bay Can Never Be Respected,” ctv News-Atlantic, 22 October 2020. John L. Tobias, “Protection, Civilization, Assimilation: An Outline History of Canada’s Indian Policy,” in As Long as the Sun Shines and Water Flows: A Reader in Canadian Native Studies, eds, Ian A.L. Getty and Antoine S. Lussier (Vancouver: UBc Press, 1983), 39. Andrew McIntosh, P.B. Waite, and Ged Martin, “Charlottetown Conference,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 2 September 2010, https:// www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/charlottetown-conference. Martha Elizabeth Walls, “Confederation and Maritime First Nations,” Acadiensis vol. 46, no. 2 (Summer–Autumn 2017): 155–76. Don McCaskill, “Native People and the Justice System,” in As Long as the Sun Shines and Water Flows, 289. Quoted in “Here Is What Sir John A. Macdonald Did to Indigenous People,” National Post, 28 August 2018. Quoted in ibid. Quoted in ibid. If the reader is looking for a brief but telling study about the Indian Act, I suggest Bob Joseph, 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act: Helping Canadians Make Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples a Reality (Port Coquitlam, Bc : Indigenous Relations Press, 2018). Harvey A. McCue, “Reserves,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 31 May 2011, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/aboriginalpeople-education. Canada, “Annual Report of the Department of the Interior,” no. 9 in Sessional Papers (1876), xii–xiii. I invite readers to consult a report prepared by John Giokas, The Indian Act: Evolution, Overview and Options for Amendment and Transition, Ottawa, mimeo., 22 March 1995.

Notes to pages 128–31

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25 Lesley A. Jacobs, Mapping the Legal Consciousness of First Nations Voters: Understanding Voting Rights Mobilization (Ottawa: Elections Canada, 2009), 16. 26 Canada, Indian and Northern Affairs, “A History of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada,” undated, https://publications.gc.ca/collections/ collection_2016/aanc-inac/R5-128-2011-eng.pdf. 27 John Millroy, “Indian Act Colonialism: A Century of Dishonour, 1869– 1969,” research paper for the National Centre for First Nations Governance, May 2008, 8. 28 E.B. Titley, A Narrow Vision: Duncan Campbell Scott and the Administration of Indian Affairs in Canada (Vancouver: UBc Press, 1986). 29 Quoted in “Canada’s Dark Side: Indigenous Peoples and Canada’s 150th Celebration,” undated, https://origins.osu.edu/article/canada-s-dark-sideindigenous-peoples-and-canada-s-150th-celebration?language_content_ entity=en. 30 Canada, “Volume 1 – Looking Forward, Looking Back,” 42. 31 Don McCaskill, “Native People and the Justice System,” in As Long as the Sun Shines and Water Flows, 291. 32 Canada, The Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada-Canada’s Residential Schools, vol. 6 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2015), 7. 33 Sean Fine, “Chief Justice Says Canada Attempted ‘Cultural Genocide’ on Aboriginals, Globe and Mail, 28 May 2015. 34 Quoted in Andrew Coyne, “The Shame of Residential Schools Must Be Worn by Us All – Not Just Historical Figures,” Globe and Mail, 4 June 2021, A7. 35 Canada, Honouring the Truth, Reconciling for the Future – Summary of the Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (Ottawa: The Truth and Reconciliation of Canada, 2015), 1 and 2. See also J.R. Miller, Shingwauk’s Vision: A History of Native Residential Schools (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996). 36 Canada, “Prime Minister Harper Offers Full Apology on Behalf of Canadians for the Indian Residential School System,” Office of the Prime Minister, Ottawa, 11 June 2008, https://www.canada.ca/en/news/ archive/2008/06/prime-minister-harper-offers-full-apology-behalfcanadians-indian-residential-schools-system.html. 37 Holly Honderich, “Why Canada Is Mourning the Deaths of Hundreds of Children,” BBc News, 15 July 2021, https://www.bbc.com/news/worldus-canada-57325653. 38 Courtney Dickson and Bridgette Watson, “Remains of 215 Children Found Buried at Former Bc Residential School, First Nation Says,” cBc

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41 42 43

44

45 46

47 48 49 50 51

52

53

Notes to pages 131–5

News, 29 May 2021, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/ tk-eml%C3%BAps-te-secw%C3%A9pemc-215-children-former-kamloopsindian-residential-school-1.6043778#. John Paul Tasker, “Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Issues Final Report with Sweeping Calls for Change,” cBc News, 3 September 2019, https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mmiwg-inquirydeliver-final-report-justice-reforms-1.5158223. Donald Kerr and Deryck Holdsworth, eds, Historical Atlas of Canada, Vol. III, Addressing the Twentieth Century, 1891–1961 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990). Indian Act (rSc , 1985, c.1–5). Canada, Annual Report to Parliament 2020 (Ottawa: Indigenous Services Canada, 2020), 7. Randy Boswell, “Time to Acknowledge Evidence: Parliament Hill Sits on Indigenous Territory,” iPolitics, 9 November 2018, https://ipolitics. ca/2018/11/09/time-to-acknowledge-evidence-parliament-hill-sits-onindigenous-territory/. Mary Beth Doucette and Fred Wien, “How Does First Nation Social and Economic Development Contribute to the Surrounding Region? A Case Study of Membertou,” mimeo., 26 October 2021, 13. Greg Mercer, “Membertou’s Moment: How a Mi’kmaq Nation Found Prosperity and a Seafood Empire,” Globe and Mail, 10 January 2021. Doucette and Wien, “How Does First Nation Social and Economic Development Contribute to the Surrounding Region? A Case Study of Membertou,” 11–12. See, “Membertou-Community,” undated, https://membertou.ca/community/. Fred Wien, “Membertou Profile,” a paper prepared for the Conference Board of Canada, mimeo., 17 April 2005. Kory Wilson, Pulling Together: Foundations Guide (Vancouver: Press books, undated), 51. Ibid., 54. Editorial Board, “Since 1977, Ottawa Has Spent Billions Trying – and Failing – to Bring Clean Water to Every Reserve.” Globe and Mail, 5 March 2021, A6. Canada, “Ending Long-Term Drinking Water Advisories,” undated, Indigenous Services Canada, updated 21 March 2022, https://www. sac-isc.gc.ca/eng/1506514143353/1533317130660. Jody Wilson-Raybould, “When It Comes to Indigenous Reconciliation, the Liberals Have Not Kept Their Promises,” Globe and Mail, 14 September 2021.

Notes to pages 135–8

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54 See, for example, Jake MacDonald, “How a Bc Native Band Went from Poverty to Prosperity,” Globe and Mail, 29 May 2014. 55 Gregory C. Mason, “Charting an Economic Path Forward for First Nations,” The Conversation, 7 July 2019, https://theconversation.com/ charting-an-economic-path-forward-for-first-nations-119912. 56 See, for example, The Indigenous Economic Progress Report – 2019 (Gatineau: The National Economic Development Board, 2019). 57 See, among many others, “Indigenous People in Urban Areas: Vulnerabilities to the Socioeconomic Impacts of covId -19,” Statistics Canada, 26 May 2020, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/45-280001/2020001/article/00023-eng.htm. 58 “Fact Sheet – Quality of Life of First Nations,” Assembly of First Nations, June 2011. 59 See, for example, Canada, Annual Report to Parliament 2020 – Part 1 (Ottawa: Indigenous Services Canada, 2020). 60 “11 Challenges for Indigenous Businesses,” Indigenous Corporate Training Inc., 15 May 2017, https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/11-challengesfor-indigenous-businesses. 61 “Success Stories: Economic Development,” undated, www.aac.isc.gc.ca/eng. 62 Rodney Nelson, “Beyond Dependency: Economic Development, Capacity Building, and Generational Sustainability for Indigenous People in Canada,” The Journal of Environment & Development (July–September 2019): 1. 63 For a more complete list, see: Canada, “Business and Economic Development for Indigenous Peoples,” undated, https://www.canada.ca/ en/services/indigenous-peoples/business-and-economic-developmentindigenous-peoples.html. 64 See, for example, Canada, Spring Reports of the Auditor General of Canada, Report 5 – Socioeconomic Gaps on First Nations ReservesIndigenous Canada (Ottawa: Office of the Auditor General, 2018). 65 See, among others, “Summative Evaluation of Inac ’s Economic Development Programs,” undated, www.rcaanc-cinac.gc.ca. 66 See, among others, Heather Conn, “Marshall Case,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 11 April 2020, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/ article/marshall-case. 67 Canada, Department of Fisheries and Oceans, “Our Response to the Marshall Decisions,” undated, https://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/publications/ fisheries-peches/marshall-1999-eng.html. 68 Ken Coates, The Marshall Decision at 20 (Ottawa: Macdonald Laurier Institute, October 2019), 5.

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Notes to pages 138–43

69 Ken Coates, quoted in Hutchins, “Few Canadians Ever Set Foot on a First Nations Reserve and That’s a Problem,” Maclean’s, 8 June 2018. 70 Aaron Hutchins, “On First Nations Issue, There’s a Giant Gap between Trudeau’s Rhetoric and What Canadians Really Think: Exclusive Poll,” Maclean’s, 7 June 2018. 71 “Truths of Reconciliation: Canadians Are Deeply Divided on How Best to Address Indigenous Issues,” Angus Reid Institute, 6 June 2018, http:// angusreid.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/2018.04.23_indigenous_ fullreport.pdf. 72 Environics, Canadian Public Opinion on Aboriginal Peoples (Toronto: Environics, 2016), 11. 73 Donald J. Savoie, “Resolving Nova Scotia’s Fishery Conflict Will Require Inviting Both Sides to the Negotiating Table” Globe and Mail, 19 October 2020. 74 Quoted in Donald J. Savoie, Aboriginal Economic Development in New Brunswick (Moncton, The Canadian Institute for Research on Regional Development, 2000), 119. 75 “‘Deaths of Residential School Children, the Fault of Canada,’ Trudeau Tells Debate,” Global News, 1 June 2021. 76 Chris Googoo, Catherine Morton, and Fred Wien, “Honouring Entrepreneurial Resilience: Atlantic Region Lifetime Achievers,” Fred Wien made the document available to me on 26 October 2021, mimeo., 1.

c h aP t e r Se ve n 1 See figure, “Femmes, hommes et non déclarés (en date du 21 septembre 2020),” Rapport à la communauté 2019–2020, Université de Moncton, Moncton, nB . 2 This is based on data provided by National Student Clearinghouse, as reported in Wall Street Journal, 6 September 2021, https://www.wsj. com/articles/college-university-fall-higher-education-men-womenenrollment-admissions-back-to-school-11630948233. 3 See, for example, Michael Kimmel, Angry White Men (New York: Bold Type Books, 2017). 4 Government of Canada, “Employment Equity Act (Sc , 1995, c. 44),” Justice Laws Website, https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/e-5.401/. 5 Canada, Employment Equity Act: Annual Report 2019 (Ottawa: Labour Canada, 2019), 56.

Notes to pages 143–7

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6 Canada, Employment Equity in the Public Service of Canada 2019–2020 (Ottawa: Treasury Board of Canada, 2021), 1. 7 Ibid., 3. 8 Ibid., 7. 9 Ibid., 11. 10 Ibid., 14. 11 Ibid., 17. 12 See Canada, “Government of Canada Launches Task Force to Review the Employment Equity Act,” news release, 14 July 2021. 13 See, among others, Canada, Beneath the Veneer (Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services, 1990) volumes 1, 2, and 3. 14 See, Canada, “Demographic Snapshot of Canada’s Public Service,” 2018, https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board-secretariat/services/innovation/ human-resources-statistics/demographic-snapshot-federal-publicservice-2018.html. 15 Canada, “Demographic Snapshot of Canada’s Public Service,” 2019, https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board-secretariat/services/innovation/ human-resources-statistics/demographic-snapshot-federal-publicservice-2019.html; and Canada, “Employment Equity in the Public Service of Canada for Fiscal Year 2019 to 2020,” https://www.canada.ca/en/ government/publicservice/wellness-inclusion-diversity-public-service/ diversity-inclusion-public-service/employment-equity-annual-reports/ employment-equity-public-service-canada-2019-2020.html. 16 “Why Nations That Fail Women Fail?” The Economist, 11 September 2021, https://www.economist.com/leaders/2021/09/11/why-nationsthat-fail-women-fail. 17 Tufts University, “Women in Leadership: Research on Barriers to Employment and Decent Work for Women. Literature Review,” working paper, International Labour Organization, 16 January 2013, https://www. ilo.org/jakarta/whatwedo/publications/WCMS_215007/lang--en/index.htm. 18 “Employment Equity in Canada’s Federal Public Service,” Library of Parliament, 13 August 2020, https://hillnotes.ca/2020/08/13/ employment-equity-in-canadas-federal-public-service/. 19 Canada, “Statistics on Official Languages in Canada,” 26 November 2019, https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/officiallanguages-bilingualism/publications/statistics.html. 20 James Ross Hurley, Highlights of the History of the Public Service, Government of Canada, 18 January 2021, https://www.canada.ca/en/ privy-council/services/highlights-history-public-service.html.

282

Notes to pages 147–50

21 Statistics Canada, “Visibile Minority of Person,” 1 November 2021, https://www23.statcan.gc.ca/imdb/p3Var.pl?Function=DECI&Id=257515. 22 Statistics Canada, “Diversity of the Black Population in Canada: An Overview,” 27 February 2019, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/ 89-657-x/89-657-x2019002-eng.htm; and “Black History Month … by the Numbers,” 2022, https://www.statcan.gc.ca/en/dai/smr08/2022/ smr08_259. 23 Canada, “Distribution of Public Service of Canada Employees by Designated Sub-Group and Occupational Category – Members of Visible Minorities,” as of 31 March 2020, https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board-secretariat/services/innovation/human-resources-statistics/ diversity-inclusion-statistics/distribution-public-service-canadaemployees-designated-sub-group-occupational-category-visible-minorities. html#toc02. 24 Robin W. Winks, Blacks in Canada: A History, Fiftieth Anniversary Edition (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2021), 5. 25 Matthew McRae, “The Story of Slavery in Canadian History,” The Canadian Museum for Human Rights, undated, https://humanrights.ca/ story/the-story-of-slavery-in-canadian-history. 26 “Black History Canada,” Historica Canada, undated, http://www. blackhistorycanada.ca/. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid. 29 W.A. Spray, The Blacks in New Brunswick (Fredericton, nB : Brunswick Press, 1972). 30 W.S. MacNutt, New Brunswick: A History (Toronto: Macmillan, 1963), 83. 31 Harvey A. Whitfield, “The Development of Black Refugee Identity in Nova Scotia,” Left History 10, no. 2 (Fall 2005): 16. 32 MacNutt, New Brunswick, 84. 33 Barry Cahill, “The Black Loyalist Myth in Atlantic Canada,” Acadiensis 29, no. 1 (Autumn 1999): 82. 34 See, among others, George Elliott Clarke, “White Niggers, Black Slaves: Slavery, Race and Class in T.C. Haliburton’s The Clockmaker,” Nova Scotia Historical Review 14, no. 1 (June 1994): 13–40. 35 See, for example, Oklahoma Historical Society, https://www.okhistory. org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=LY001. 36 Eli Yarhi, “Order-in-Council Pc 1911-1324 – the Proposed Ban on Black Immigration to Canada,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 30 September 2016, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/order-

Notes to pages 151–4

37

38

39 40 41

42

43

44 45 46

47

48 49

283

in-council-pc-1911-1324-the-proposed-ban-on-black-immigrationto-canada. See, for example, Sheila Block, Grace-Edward Galabuzi, and Ricardo Tranjan, Canada’s Colour Coded Income Inequality (Ottawa: Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 2019). For an excellent review of socio-economic conditions among Indigenous peoples, see The Indigenous Economic Progress Report – 2019 (Gatineau, qc : The National Indigenous Economic Development Board, 2019). “Nearly 50 per cent of Indigenous Children in Canada Live in Poverty, Study Says,” Globe and Mail, 9 July 2019. See Constance Backhouse, Colour-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada, 1900–1950 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999). See, for example, Craig W. Blatz, Karina Schumann, and Michael Ross, “Government Apologies for Historical Injustices,” Political Psychology vol. 30, no. 2 (2009): 2019–241. Aidan Cox, “Incidents of Islamophobia on the Rise, Says President of Moncton Muslim Association,” cBc News, 3 September 2021, https:// www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/muslim-islamophobia-newbrunswick-1.6162846. “Indian Found Murdered in Canada’s Nova Scotia; Friends Suspect Racial Crime, Police Treat It as Homicide,” Financial Express, 9 September 2021. Ian Austen, “Truck Attack That Killed a Muslim Family in Canada Was Planned,” New York Times, 22 June 2021. Stephanie Liu, “Reports of Anti-Asian Hate Crimes Are Surging in Canada during the covId -19 Pandemic,” ctv News, 17 March 2021. See, for example, Michael Baker and Dwayne Benjamin, “The Receipt of Transfer Payments by Immigrants to Canada,” The Journal of Human Resources vol. 30, no. 4 (Autumn 1995): 650–76. See, for example, Canada, “Immigration Matters in Health Care,” undated, https://www.canada.ca/immigration-refugees-citizenship/ campaigns/immigration-matters/growing-canada-future.html. Ibid. The study was produced by the Business Development Bank of Canada (Bdc ) as reported by Shelby Thevenot, “Immigrants More Likely to Start a Business and Create Jobs Than Those Born in Canada,” cIc News, 8 November 2019, https://www.cicnews.com/2019/11/immigrants-morelikely-to-start-a-business-and-create-jobs-than-those-born-incanada-1113140.html#gs.k9fl85.

284

Notes to pages 154–60

50 “Leylah Fernandez’s Father Emotionally Details Canadian Immigrant Experience,” Yahoo! Sports, 10 September 2021, https://ca.sports.yahoo. com/news/leylah-fernandez-father-jorge-emotionally-shares-canadianimmigrant-experience-012904434.html?

c h aP t e r eI g h t 1 See Donald J. Savoie, Thanks for the Business: K.C. Irving, Arthur Irving and the Story of Irving Oil (Halifax: Nimbus, 2020). 2 Government of Canada, “covId -19: Financial Support for People, Businesses and Organizations,” undated, https://www.canada.ca/en/ department-finance/economic-response-plan.html. 3 Ibid. 4 Vanmala Subramaniam, “Wealthy Hedge Funds, Money Managers Received Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy,” Globe and Mail, 10 May 2021, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-wealthy-hedgefunds-money-managers-received-canada-emergency-wage/. 5 Ibid. 6 On the point about never having enough resources see, among many others, The Hill Times, https://www.hilltimes.com/2021/09/16/ legislative-change-needed-on-access-to-information-but-overheatedrhetoric-doesnt-help-says-wernick/316246; and on compensation for public servants, see a Treasury Board of Canada study on the matter, https://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/report/orp/2007/er-ed/vol1/vol102-eng.asp. 7 Marlene Leung “Private Sector Workers Earn Less, Work More: Report,” ctv News, 23 March 2015. 8 Anthony B. Chan, “Chinese Canadians,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 22 May 2019, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ chinese-canadians. 9 Ibid. and Report of the Royal Commission on Chinese and Japanese Immigration (Ottawa: Printed by S.E. Dawson, printer to the King’s Most Excellent Majesty, 1902). 10 Ann Sunahara, “Japanese Canadians,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 31 January 2011, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ japanese-canadians. 11 Martin Brian Mulroney, parliamentary speech, 33rd Legislature, 2nd Session, 22 September 1988, Linked Parliamentary Data, https://www. lipad.ca/full/permalink/3762617/. 12 Marc Montgomery, “History Sept. 22, 1988: Apology to Japanese Canadians of WWII,” Radio-Canada International, 22 September 2016,

Notes to pages 161–4

13 14 15

16

17

18

19 20 21 22

23 24 25 26 27 28 29

285

https://www.rcinet.ca/en/2016/09/22/history-sept-22-1988-apologyto-japanese-canadians-of-wwii/. Government of Canada, “Prime Minister Harper Offers Full Apology for the Chinese Head Tax,” press release, 22 June 2006. See, for example, Government of Canada, “Noteworthy Canadians of Asian Descent-Asian Heritage Month,” undated. Statistics Canada, “A Labour Market Snapshot of South Asian, Chinese and Filipino Canadians during the Pandemic,” 21 May 2021, https:// www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210521/dq210521b-eng.htm. Statistics Canada, “Intergenerational Education Mobility and Labour Market Outcomes: Variation Among the Second Generation of Immigrants in Canada,” 18 February 2019, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/ n1/pub/11f0019m/11f0019m2019006-eng.htm. “Firefighters, Nurses, Farmers Respected Most by Canadians, Social Media Owners the Least: Poll,” Financial Post, 26 May 2021, https:// financialpost.com/fp-work/firefighters-nurses-farmers-trusted-mostby-canadians-social-media-owners-the-least-poll. Howard R. Wilson, “The Constantly Rising Ethics Bar,” notes for a presentation to the Canadian Centre for Ethics and Public Policy, 7 November 2002. John Ibbitson, “Suspicion Fuels Deep Scrutiny of Politicians,” Globe and Mail, 10 May 2006, A4. Neil Nevitte, The Decline of Deference: Canadian Value Change in Cross National Perspective (Peterborough: Broadview Press, 1996). Shannon Proudfoot, “Why Would Anyone Hate Catherine McKenna?” Maclean’s, 4 November 2019. See, for example, Cédric Thévenin, “Les politiciens doivent avoir la couenne dure à l’heure des médias sociaux,” Acadie Nouvelle, 4 August 2021. Gary Mason, “Politics Has Become a Thankless, Dangerous Job,” Globe and Mail, 19 October 2021. “Get Stuffed,” The Economist, 22 July 2017, 46. Brad Lavigne, “The Whole New Ballgame of Social Media,” Policy vol. 3, no. 1 (January–February 2015): 7–9. Taylor Owen, “Is Facebook a Threat to Democracy?” Globe and Mail, 19 October 2017. Gary Mason, “Politics Has Become a Thankless, Dangerous Job.” Ibid. “Stop Talking about Fixing Government, Just Do It, Public Says,” Citizen, 21 April 2006.

286

Notes to pages 165–70

30 Donald J. Savoie, Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our Institutions (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019), 282. 31 Donald J. Savoie, The Politics of Public Spending in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 174. 32 Kathryn May, “Canadians Lack Faith in Upper Ranks of Public Service: Survey,” Ottawa Citizen, 7 September 2016. 33 See Patrick Diamond, The End of Whitehall? Government by Permanent Campaign (London; Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). 34 Savoie, Democracy in Canada and “Public Service Population Grows by 4.6% in 2018–19,” iPolitics, 7 February 2020, https://www.ipolitics.ca/ news/public-service-population-grows-by-4-6-in-2018-19. 35 Canada, “English and French: Towards a Substantive Equality of Official Languages in Canada,” 2021, https://www.canada.ca/en/canadianheritage/corporate/publications/general-publications/equality-officiallanguages.html. 36 See, for example, “Bill 96 – Top 10 Impacts of the Revised Charter of the French Language on Your Business and When to Expect Implementation of Such Revisions,” McMillan, 19 May 2021. 37 Ian Bailey, “Parliament Passes Bloc Motion Supporting Quebec’s Constitutional Plan,” Globe and Mail, 16 June 2021. 38 The information is based on an email that qcgn sent to the author on 10 September 2021. 39 Clifford Lincoln, “Opinion – Where Can English-Speaking Quebecers Turn Now?,” Montreal Gazette, 26 May 2021. 40 The document prepared by Marlene Jennings was made available by the qcgn in July 2021. 41 Andrew Coyne, “Mere Symbolism? Simple Statements of Fact? In a Constitution, There’s No Such Thing,” Globe and Mail, 21 May 2021. 42 Marilyn Barber and Paul-François Sylvestre, “Ontario Schools Question,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 7 February 2006, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/ontario-schools-question. 43 Government of Ontario, “Ontario Apologizes for 1912 Law on French in Schools,” Office of the Premier, 22 February 2016. 44 “Manitoba Schools Act 1890,” A Country by Consent, Canada History Project, undated, http://canadahistoryproject.ca/1890/index.html. 45 Peter M. Toner, “The New Brunswick Schools Question,” ccha vol. 37 (1970): 85–95. 46 See, among others, Richard Wilbur, The Rise of French in New Brunswick (Halifax: Formac, 1989)

Notes to pages 171–5

287

47 John Ibbitson, “Rural-Urban Divide Now Beats All Others, Risking Populist Backlash,” Globe and Mail, 9 December 2018. 48 Tom Spears, “How Ontario Is Failing Its Rural Residents – and Why It Matters,” Ottawa Citizen, 9 September 2016. 49 State of Rural Canada 2015 (Alberta: Canadian Rural Revitalization Foundation, 2015), 2–3. 50 “Smart Cities Challenge,” Government of Canada, infrastructure Canada, undated. www.infrastructure.gc.ca/cities-villes/index-eng.html. 51 See, for example, Statistics Canada, “Demographic Changes in Canadian Agriculture,” 18 February 2014, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/ 96-325-x/2014001/article/11905-eng.htm. 52 See Canada, “The Centre for Rural Economic Development,” Infrastructure Canada, https://ised-isde.canada.ca/site/rural/en/centrerural-economic-development. 53 Canada, “Rural Opportunity, National Prosperity: An Economic Development Strategy for Rural Canada,” Infrastructure Canada, June 2019, https://ised-isde.canada.ca/site/rural/en/rural-opportunity-nationalprosperity-economic-development-strategy-rural-canada. 54 Government of Canada, “Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Rural Economic Development Mandate letter,” Office of the Prime Minister, 13 December 2019, www.pm.gc.ca/en/mandate-letters/2019/12/13/ minister-women-and-gender-equality-and-rural-economic-development. 55 “Newfoundland and Labrador mP s O’Regan, Hutchings, Tapped in Trudeau’s Cabinet,” Saltwire, 26 October 2021, https://www.saltwire. com/atlantic-canada/news/newfoundland-and-labrador-mps-oreganhutchings-tapped-in-trudeaus-cabinet-100650227/. 56 See, for example, Broadband Access in Rural Canada: The Role of Connectivity in Building Vibrant Communities (Ottawa; Federation of Canadian Municipalities, 2014). 57 The Global Competitiveness Report 2018 (Geneva: World Economic Forum, 2019), chapter 2. 58 Daniel Tencer, “Most Competitive Economies Ranking puts Canada Ahead of US for 1st Time,” Huffington Post, 6 June 2020. 59 Emily Badger, “How the Rural-Urban Divide Became America’s Political Fault Line,” New York Times, 21 May 2019. 60 Rob Gamesby, “Global Patterns of Urbanisation since 1945,” Cool Geography, March 2019, https://www.coolgeography.co.uk/advanced/ Global_patterns_urbanisation_since_1945.php. 61 See, for example, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Rural Areas (Brussels: European Commission, 2008).

288

Notes to pages 175–8

62 2016 Census of Population (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 2016). 63 Rebecca M. Blank and Maria J. Hanratty, “Responding to Need: A Comparison of Social Safety Nets in Canada and the United States,” in Small Differences That Matter: Labour Market and Income Maintenance in Canada and the United States, eds, David Card and Richard B. Freeman (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), chapter 6. 64 Raymond B. Blake made this observation in his “Regional and Rural Development Strategies in Canada: The Search for Solutions” (St John’s: Royal Commission on Reviewing and Strengthening Our Place in Canada, March 2003).

c h aP t e r nIn e

1 2

3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 11

People who know popular music will know that I borrowed the chapter heading from B.J. Thomas’ song, “Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song,” recorded in September 1974. See, among others, “Ottawa to Apologize for Racist Treatment of allBlack First World War Battalion in 2022,” Global News, 10 July 2021. Anthony Germain, “Who’s Sorry Now? A Tale of 2 Trudeaus and Their Approach to Historical Wrongs,” cBc News (Nfld. & Labrador), 25 November 2017. “Chinese Community Gets Apology from Bc for Historical Wrongs,” cBc News (British Columbia), 15 May 2014. See, for example, “A Timeline of Official Apologies from the Federal Government,” National Post, 23 May 2019. Quoted in ibid. Michael Tager, “Apologies to Indigenous Peoples in Comparative Perspective,” International Indigenous Policy Journal vol. 5, no. 4 (October 2014): 11. Ibid., 3. Ibid., 5–7. Zainab Al-Mehdar, “Canada Day a Cause for Reflection, Redoubling Reconciliation Efforts, Say mP s, Senators,” Hill Times, 30 June 2021. Stephanie Taylor, “Trudeau Says Canada Day Should Be Time of Reflection on Reconciliation,” National Observer, 27 June 2021. “Federal Statutory Holiday: National Day for Truth and Reconciliation,” Government of Canada, National Defence, 20 July 2021, https:// www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/maple-leaf/ defence/2021/07/federal-statutory-holiday-national-day-for-truthand-reconciliation.html.

Notes to pages 179–82

289

12 Norbert Cunningham, “It’s Time for a Redefined Canadian Nationalism,” Times and Transcript, 2 July 2021, A9. 13 “Slavery and the British Transatlantic Slave Trade,” Uk Government, The National Archives, undated, https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-withyour-research/research-guides/british-transatlantic-slave-trade-records/. 14 “Remembering that Napoleon Reinstated Slavery in France,” dw , 5 April 2021,https://www.dw.com/en/remembering-that-napoleon-reinstated-slaveryin-france/a-57408273. 15 Jean-Marie Desport, De la servitude à la liberté: Bourbon, des origines à 1848 (Paris: FeniXX réédition numérique, 1988). 16 Neil Bhutta, Andrew C. Chang, Lisa J. Dettling and Joanne W. Hsu, “Disparities in Wealth by Race and Ethnicity in the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances,” Federal Reserve Board-FedS Notes, 28 September 2020. 17 Charles T. Clark, “Column: Reparations, Apologies and the Absurdity of ‘It Happened a Long Time Ago,’” San Diego Union-Tribune, 5 February 2021. 18 Mark Medish and Daniel Lucich “Congress Must Officially Apologize for Slavery before America Can Think about Reparations,” nBc News, 30 August 2019. 19 Helena G. Allen, The Betrayal of Liliuokalani: Last Queen of Hawaii 1838–1917 (Hawaii: Mutual Publishing, 1991). 20 “Annexation of Hawaii, 1898,” US Department of State Archive, undated, https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/gp/17661.htm. 21 See, for example, Lorenzo Meyes, “The United States and Mexico: The Historical Structure of Their Conflict,” Journal of International Affairs vol. 43, no. 2 (Winter 1990): 251–71. 22 Quoted in Joel Zapata, “Invading Other Countries to ‘Help’ People Has Long Had Devastating Consequences,” Washington Post, 10 September 2021. 23 Shashi Tharoor, Inglorious Empire: What the British Did to India (London: Hurst, 2017), 217. 24 See Matthew Smith, “How Unique Are British Attitudes to Empire?,” YouGov, 11 March 2020, https://yougov.co.uk/topics/international/ articles-reports/2020/03/11/how-unique-are-british-attitudes-empire; and “Jallianwala Bagh Massacre,” Britannica, undated, https://www. britannica.com/event/Jallianwala-Bagh-Massacre. 25 Smith, “How Unique Are British Attitudes to Empire?” 26 “Uk ‘Deeply Regrets’ Amritsar Massacre – but no Official Apology,” Guardian, 13 April 2019.

290

Notes to pages 182–5

27 Angelique M. Davis, “Apologies, Reparations, and the Continuing Legacy of the European Slave Trade in the United States,” Journal of Black Studies vol. 15, no. 45 (May 2014): 271–86. 28 Theodore R. Johnson, “How to Apologize for Slavery: What the US Can Learn from West Africa,” Atlantic, 6 August 2014. 29 Dalia Sussman, “Poll: Americans Divide over Slavery Apology,” aBc News, 12 July 2000. 30 Maighna Nanu, “Britain Doesn’t Need to Apologise For Its Colonial Past – It Needs to Acknowledge It,” Huffington Post, 22 November 2019. 31 “A Sorry Saga: Obama Signs Native American Apology Resolution; Fails to Draw Attention to It,” Indian Country Today, Indian Law Resource Centre, 13 January 2010. 32 Andrew Hay, “As Petito Case Captivates US, Missing Native Women Ignored,” Reuters, 22 September 2021; and Garet Bleir, Anya Zoledziowski, and News21 team, “Murdered and Missing Native American Women Challenge Police and Courts,” The Center for Public Integrity, 27 August 2018. 33 Danny Lewis, “Five Times the United States Officially Apologized,” Smithsonian Magazine, 27 May 2016. 34 “‘No Repentance Nor Apologies’ for Colonial Abuses in Algeria, Says Macron,” France 24, 20 January 2021, https://www.france24.com/ en/france/20210120-no-repentance-nor-apologies-for-colonial-abuses-inalgeria-says-macron. See also, Julie Fette, “Apology and the Past in Contemporary France,” French Politics, Culture & Society vol. 26, no. 2 (Summer 2008): 78–109. 35 Quoted in Sylvie Corbet, “Black Scholar: It’s Time France Confronts Its Colonial Past,” Associated Press-US News, 13 March 2021. 36 Yusuf Ozcan, “Analysis – French Colonialism More Than Just ‘Grave Mistake,’” Anadolu Agency, 24 December 2019. 37 Quoted in “Slavery in the French Colonies: Le Code Noir (the Black Code) of 1685,” Library of Congress, 13 January 2011, https://blogs.loc. gov/law/2011/01/slavery-in-the-french-colonies/. 38 “Macron Seeks Forgiveness for France’s Role in Rwanda Genocide, but Stops Short of Apology,” cnn , 27 May 2021. 39 Elis Gjevori, “France Justifies Non-Apology for Colonial Crimes: ‘Repentance Is Vanity,’” trt World, 21 January 2021. 40 Daniel Howden and Kim Sengupta, “59 Years Late – but Mau Mau Accept an Almost Apology,” Independent, 7 June 2013. 41 Caroline Davies, “Tony Blair’s Apology for Irish Famine Written by Aides, Papers Reveal,” Guardian, 20 July 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/

Notes to pages 185–90

42 43

44 45

46 47 48 49 50 51

52 53

291

world/2021/jul/20/tony-blairs-apology-for-irish-famine-written-by-aidespapers-reveal; and Darragh Roche, “It’s Time for the Queen to Apologise for the British Empire,” London Economic, 4 July 2020. Jon Stone, “Boris Johnson Said Colonialism in Africa Should Never Have Ended and Dismissed Britain’s Role in Slavery,” Independent, 13 June 2020. See, for example, Borja Martinovic, Karen Freihorst, and Magdalena Bobowik, “To Apologize or to Compensate for Colonial Injustices? The Role of Representations of the Colonial Past, Group-Based Guilt and In-Group Identification,” International Review of Social Psychology vol. 34, no. 1 (2021): 1–14. Afua Hirsch, “The Case for British Slavery Reparations Can No Longer Be Brushed Aside,” Guardian, 9 July 2020. Craig W. Blatz, Karina Schumann, and Michael Ross, “Government Apologies for Historical Injustices,” Political Psychology vol. 30, no. 2 (2009): 227. Nanu, “Britain Doesn’t Need to Apologise for Its Colonial Past,” Huffington Post, 22 November 2019. Blatz, Schumann, and Ross, “Government Apologies for Historical Injustices,” 237. “A Timeline of Official Apologies from the Federal Government,” National Post, 23 May 2019. See “Idea of Apology Splits Italian Canadians,” Vancouver Sun, 25 August 2021. Jessica Murphy, “Does Justin Trudeau Apologise Too Much?” BBc News, 28 March 2018. Patrick Belanger, Kara Gilbert, and Tom Goodnight, “The Apologies of Australia, Canada and the United States to Historically Subjugated Peoples: On Argumentation, Reconciliation, and Forgiveness,” a paper presented to oSSa Conference, 2009, 2. Blatz, Schumann and Ross, “Government Apologies for Historical Injustices,” 229. Peter Russell, Canada’s Odyssey: A Country Based on Incomplete Conquests (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017), 19.

chaPter ten 1 Quoted in Claude Bélanger, “John A. Macdonald, Confederation and Canadian Federalism,” Quebec History, February 2005, Department of History, Marianopolis College, http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/ quebechistory/federal/johna.htm.

292

Notes to pages 190–4

2 Donald J. Savoie, Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our Institutions (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019). 3 Margaret Conrad, Alvin Finkel, Donald Tyson, History of the Canadian People Beginning in 1867, vol. 1 (Toronto: Copp Clark Pitman, 1993). 4 “mP s Are Nobodies on the Hill, Like Pawns in a Chess Game: Franks,” Hill Times, 12 May 2008. 5 See Richard Albert, “The Difficulty of Constitutional Amendment in Canada,” Alberta Law Review vol. 53, no. 1 (2015): 85–113. 6 British North America Act, 1867, 30–31 Vict., c. 3 (Uk ) (cont.), https:// canada.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/constitution/lawreg-loireg/p1t14. html. 7 British North America Act, 1907, 7 Edw. VII, c. 11 (Uk ), https://canada. justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/constitution/lawreg-loireg/p1t141.html. 8 For an excellent review of federal transfers, see, Trevor Tombe, “Final and Unalterable – But Up for Negotiation: Federal-Provincial Transfers in Canada,” Canadian Tax Journal vol. 66, no. 4 (2018): 871–917. 9 For an excellent description of the changing role of government in the emerging welfare state, see Robert B. Bryce, Maturing in Hard Times: Canada’s Department of Finance Through the Great Depression (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1986), chapters 8, 9, and 10. 10 See, for example, J.L. Granatstein, The Ottawa Men: The Civil Service Mandarins, 1935–1957 (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1982). 11 Bryce, Maturing in Hard Times, chapters 9 and 10. 12 I note that some observers argue that Ottawa’s problem was its willingness or lack of will to act. See, for example, Edward Whitcomb, “Rethinking the Great Depression,” an essay, Literacy Review of Canada, June 2014. 13 Donald Smiley, ed., The Rowell-Sirois Report, book 1 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1963), 2. 14 Carman Miller, “The 1940s: War and Rehabilitation,” in The Atlantic Provinces in Confederation, eds, E.R. Forbes and D.A. Muise (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 326. 15 Donald V. Smiley, “Public Administration and Canadian Federalism,” Canadian Public Administration 7, no. 3 (September 1964): 377. 16 Ibid., 372. 17 Ronald L. Watts, The Spending Power in Federal Systems: A Comparative Study (Kingston: Queen’s University, Institute of Intergovernmental Relations, 1999). 18 See, for example, Donald J. Savoie, Federal-Provincial Collaboration: The Canada-New Brunswick General Development Agreement (Montreal:

Notes to pages 195–9

19 20 21 22 23 24

25 26 27

28 29 30 31 32

33 34

35

293

McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1981); and Richard Saillant, A Tale of Two Countries: How the Great Demographic Imbalance Is Pulling Canada Apart (Halifax: Nimbus, 2016), 124. Ibid. Donald J. Savoie, The Politics of Public Spending in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto press, 1990), 1. “Head Waiter to the Provinces,” undated, https://www.parli.ca/headwaiter-provinces.” Thomas Walkom, “Justin Trudeau Is Acting as ‘Head Waiter to the Provinces,’” Toronto Star, 3 June 2021. Savoie, Federal-Provincial Collaboration, chapter 6. Richard Simeon explained the similarities in Federal-Provincial Diplomacy: The Making of Recent Policy in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1972). See Donald J. Savoie, Breaking the Bargain: Public Servants, Ministers, and Parliament (Toronto: University of Toronto press, 2003). “Ottawa Announces $6B Transfer to Quebec Aimed at Strengthening Child Care,” cBc , 5 August 2021. “‘It’s Not Enough’: Money at the Heart of Child-Care Disagreement between Ontario and Ottawa, Sources Say – Liberals Have Already Concluded Agreements with 7 Provinces and one Territory,” cBc News, 12 October 2021. Akhil Reed Amar, America’s Constitution: A Biography (New York: Random House, 2012). Arthur Gunlicks, The Lander and German Federalism (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003), 53–5. Ibid., 62–5. “Germany AFD: How Far Right Caused Political Earthquakes,” 6 February 2020, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51400153. “Confidence in Democracy and the Political System: An Update on Trends in Public Opinion in Canada,” report by Environics, 11 September 2019, https://www.environicsinstitute.org/docs/default-source/default-documentlibrary/ab-democracy-report-revised-sept11_209.pdf?sfvrsn=bda257b6_0. “Two-Thirds of Indigenous People Don’t Feel Respected in Canada, According to Pre-Election Survey,” cBc News, 1 July 2019. Keith Neuman, “Canadians’ Confidence in National Institutions Steady,” Policy Options, 2 August 2018, https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/ august-2018/canadians-confidence-in-national-institutions-steady/. The survey results are available in “Confidence in Democracy and the Political System,” 10.

294

Notes to pages 199–210

36 Charles Blattberg, “Canadian Identity,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, last edited 4 December 2019, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/ article/canadian-identity. 37 Environics, “Confidence in Democracy and the Political System,” 10. 38 Will Kymlicka, “Citizenship, Communities and Identity in Canada,” in Canadian Politics, eds, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 23–44. 39 See, Kymlicka, “Citizenship, Communities and Identity in Canada,” 32. 40 Angus Reid Institute, “What Makes Us Canadian? A Study of Values, Beliefs, Priorities and Identity,” 3 October 2016, https://angusreid.org/ canada-values/. 41 Keith Banting and Will Kymlicka, “Canadian Multiculturalism: Global Anxieties and Local Debates,” British Journal of Canadian Studies vol. 23, no. 1 (2010): 59. 42 “No One Considers Canada’s Immigration Record to Be a Big Deal, and That’s Remarkable,” Globe and Mail, 22 October 2021. 43 See, for example, Canadian Identity – 2013 (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 1 October 2015), 12. 44 I made this point in my first book Federal-Provincial Collaboration: The Canada-New Brunswick General Development Agreement (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1981). 45 “Federal Government Asked Canadians If They’re ‘Comfortable’ with lgBt People,” Global News, 28 December 2019. 46 Margrit Eichler, “Same-Sex Marriage in Canada,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 21 September 2016, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia. ca/en/article/same-sex-marriage-in-canada.

c h aP t e r e l e ve n 1 John L. (Jack) Manion was a close friend. He made the observation in a private conversation while I was his deputy principal at the Canadian Centre for Management Development. 2 John Mack Faragher, A Great and Noble Scheme: The Tragic Story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from Their American Homeland, 349. 3 “The Other Quiet Revolution,” Maclean’s, 1 April 1967. 4 Savoie, Looking for Bootstraps. 5 “The Moncton Miracle: Bilingual Phone Chat,” The New York Times, section 3, page 4, 17 July 1994. 6 Ernest R. Forbes, “In Search of a Post-Confederation Maritime Historiography 1900–1967,” in Eastern and Western Perspectives, ed.,

Notes to pages 210–14

7 8 9 10

11

12 13

14

15

16 17 18

19

20 21

295

D.J. Bercuson and P.A. Buckner (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), 48–9. Savoie, Visiting Grandchildren. Richard Saillant, A Tale of Two Countries: How the Great Demographic Imbalance is Pulling Canada Apart (Halifax: Nimbus, 2016). See, among others, Thomas Courchene, “A Market Perspective on Regional Disparities,” Canadian Public Policy VII, no. 4 (1981): 506–8. “Strong Growth Despite the Pandemic,” Halifax Partnership, 2021, https://halifaxpartnership.com/research-strategy/halifax-index-2021/ people/. “Population Report, Second Quarter 2021,” PEI Population Report Quarterly, Government of Prince Edward Island, undated, https://www. princeedwardisland.ca/en/information/finance/pei-population-reportquarterly. See, among several others, Savoie, Looking for Bootstraps. Canada, Population Estimates Quarterly (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 2021), https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv. action?pid=1710000901; See also, David Parkinson “Atlantic Canada Grapples with Pandemic-Fuelled Population Boom,” Globe and Mail, 7 October 2021. See, among others, “Significant Increase in Immigration in Atlantic Canada,” Atlantic Provinces Economic Council, APEC Report Card, 12 January 2017, https://www.apec-econ.ca/about-us/news/view/?news.id=146. See, for example, “Nova Scotia Economic Indicators,” Government of Nova Scotia, Finance and Treasury Board, September 2021, https:// novascotia.ca/finance/statistics/topic.asp?fto=23w. “Stage Set for a Swifter Economic Recovery in the Maritime Provinces,” td Bank, 19 April 2021, https://economics.td.com/ca-maritime-economies. “Fair Representation,” 23 November 2007, www.premier.gov.on.ca. Ottawa, The Budget Speech 2007 – Aspire to a Stronger, Safer, Better Canada (Government of Canada: Department of Finance), 19 March 2007, 6; and Federal Transfer Programs to the Province (Quebec: Commission sur le déséquilibre fiscal, 2001), 8. See, for example, Erich Hartmann and Jordann Thirgood, Mind the Gap: Ontario’s Persistent Net Contribution to the Federation (Toronto: Mowat Centre, 2017). Tombe, “Final, Unalterable (and Up for Negotiation): Federal-Provincial Transfers in Canada,” 871. The unwillingness of the central and some of the Atlantic provinces to support Senate reform is a case in point.

296

Notes to pages 215–20

22 “Economic Overview – Western economy,” Government of Canada, 2018, https://www.wd-deo.gc.ca/eng/243.asp. 23 Andrew Coyne, “The Fatal Flaw in the Alberta Sovereignty Fantasy: People Want to Live in a Law-Based State,” Globe and Mail, 1 October 2021. 24 “Is It Time to Move Ottawa out of Ottawa?” Conversation, 24 May 2021, https://theconversation.com/is-it-time-to-move-ottawa-out-ofottawa-159409; and Mark Robbins, “The Long Road to a Distributed Federal Public Service,” Policy Options, 13 August 2020, https:// policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/august-2020/the-long-road-to-adistributed-federal-public-service/. 25 “House of Commons Seat Allocation by Province 2022 to 2032,” Elections Canada, 15 October 2021. https://www.elections.ca/content. aspx?section=res&dir=cir/red/allo&document=index&lang=e. 26 See, for example, Steven Blaney mP , “Davie Shipyard Funding More Equitable Since 2015, but Long-Term Contracts Needed for Stability, Say Experts,” Hill Times, 17 February 2021. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid. 29 “Ottawa, Quebec Back $2 Billion Investment in Aerospace Industry,” Globe and Mail, 15 July 2021. 30 Mark Milke, “Bombardier and Canada’s Corporate Welfare Trap,” Fraser Institute, undated, https://www.fraserinstitute.org/article/ bombardier-and-canadas-corporate-welfare-trap. 31 Maryse Potvin, “Some Racist Slips about Quebec in English Canada between 1995 and 1998,” Canadian Ethnic Studies vol. 32, no. 2 (Summer 2000): 24. 32 “Meech Lake: Exit Bouchard,” cBc , undated, https://www.cbc.ca/ archives/entry/meech-lake-exit-bouchard. 33 Canada, Statistics Canada, “Table: 36-10-0450-01 (formerly canSIm 384–0047),” 8 November 2022, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/ tv.action?pid=3610045001. 34 I am not alone in asking this question. See, Robert Asselin, “Who Will Speak for Canada?,” The Hub, 28 September 2021, https://thehub. ca/2021-09-28/robert-asselin-decline-is-a-self-fulfilling-prophecycanada-should-embrace-ambition/. 35 French-Speaking Immigrants outside Quebec (Ottawa: Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages, 18 September, 2020). 36 “Wage Gap between Male, Female Equity Partners at Top Law Firm Averages $371,596,” Globe and Mail, 30 September 2021.

Notes to pages 220–7

297

37 Lara Zink and Katie Squires-Thompson, “Companies, Get Your Pay Equity Act Together,” Globe and Mail, 1 August 2021. 38 Carol Agocs, “Affirmative Action, Canadian Style: A Reconnaissance,” Canadian Public Policy vol. 12, no. 1(1986): 148–62. 39 Shanifa Nasser and Farrah Merali, “Enough Is Enough: Black Civil Servants Vow to Press on with Discrimination Suit as Liberals Promise Change,” cBc News, 16 September 2021. 40 “Canadian Government Must Act to End Anti-Black Racism in Public Service, Advocates Say,” Global News, 2 May 2021. 41 Laura Ryckewaert, “Indigenous Public Servants Pursue Class-Action Lawsuit against Feds for Harassment, Discrimination in Workplace,” Hill Times, 29 September 2021, 16–17. 42 Johanna R. Vollhardt, “Introduction,” in The Social Psychology of Collective Victimhood: Examining Context Power, and Diversity in Experiences of Collective Victimization, ed., (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020), 2. 43 Ibid.

c h aPt e r t w e l ve 1 Laura Osman, “Residents of Saugeen First Nation Given Expired covId 19 Pfizer Vaccine for Weeks,” Globe and Mail, 24 September 2021. 2 Tristin Hopper, “Here Is What Sir John A. Macdonald Did to Indigenous People,” National Post, 28 August 2018. 3 “7 nB Communities among Canada’s Poorest,” cBc News, 23 February 2010. 4 Canada, 2021–22 Estimates, https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-boardsecretariat/services/planned-govermnent-spending/government-expenditureplan-main-estimates/2021-22. 5 I am thinking, among others, of federal regional development agencies. 6 See, Government of Canada, “Progress Update on Improving Access to Clean Water in First Nations Communities,” Indigenous Services Canada, 17 May 2021, https://www.canada.ca/en/indigenous-services-canada/ news/2021/05/government-of-canada-progress-update-on-improvingaccess-to-clean-water-in-first-nations-communities.html. 7 Safer Water for First Nations (Ottawa, The Council of Canadians, 2021). 8 G. Becker, “Human Capital and Poverty Alleviation,” working paper (Washington, dc : World Bank, Human Resources Development and Operations Policy, 1995), 1.

298

Notes to pages 227–34

9 Fred Wien, Rebuilding the Economic Base of Indian Communities: The Micmac in Nova Scotia (Montreal: The Institute for Research on Public Policy, 1986). 10 See, among others, Bob Joseph, 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act (Port Coquitlam, Bc : Indigenous Relations Press, 2018). 11 See, among others, Sally M. Weaver, Making Canadian Indian Policy: The Hidden Agenda 1968–70 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981). 12 Ibid. 13 Quoted in William Kurt Barth, Our Cultural Rights: The Equality of Nations and the Minority Legal Tradition (Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publications, 2008), 107. 14 Canada, Statement of the Government of Canada on Indian Policy (Ottawa: Department of Indians and Northern Affairs, 1969), 6–8. 15 William Johnson, “Indians and the Just Society,” Globe and Mail, 24 June 2009. 16 “Augustine Sought to Instill Confidence in Native Youth across the Province,” Daily Gleaner (Fredericton), 16 November 2010. 17 See, various reports available on the website membertou.ca. 18 John DeMont, “Activist on Trial,” Maclean’s, 3 May 1999. 19 Quoted in DeMont, “Activist on Trial.” 20 “Noah Augustine Found Not Guilty,” cBc News-Canada, 30 April 1999. 21 Quoted in “Augustine Sought to Instill Confidence.” 22 Government of New Brunswick, “News Release: Premier’s Message on Death of Former Chief of Metepenagiag First Nation,” 15 November 2010, https://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/news/news_release.2010.11.1757.html. 23 Government of Canada, “News Release: Statement of Condolence – Former Chief of the Metepenagiag First Nation, Noah Augustine,” 15 November 2010, https://www.canada.ca/en/news/archive/2010/11/ statement-condolence-former-chief-metepenagiag-first-nation-noahaugustine.html. 24 Senate of Canada, Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples, Second Session, Fortieth Parliament, 2009, Issue no. 19, 28 October 2009, 37. 25 The federal government committed to recognizing the inherent right to self-government in August 1995 and outlined several principles. See Jill Wherrett, Aboriginal Self-Government (Ottawa: Library of Parliament, Political and Social Affairs Division, 17 June 1999), 11. 26 Joseph P. Kalt, “Sovereignty and Economic Development on American Indian Reservations: Lessons from the United States,” in Sharing the Harvest: The Road to Self-Reliance (Ottawa: Report of the National

Notes to pages 235–8

27

28 29

30

31 32

33

34

35 36 37 38 39

40 41

299

Round Table on Aboriginal Economic Development and Resources, 1993), 37. Canada, Principles Respecting the Government of Canada’s Relationship with Indigenous peoples (Ottawa: Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, 2018). Wherrett, Aboriginal Self-Government, 7. Canada, Aboriginal Self-Government: The Government of Canada’s Approach to Implementation of the Inherent Right and the Negotiation of Aboriginal Self-Government (Ottawa: Justice, undated), 16. William B. Henderson, “Indigenous Self-Government in Canada,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, 4 December 2020, https://www.thecanadian encyclopedia.ca/en/article/aboriginal-self-government. Thomas J. Courchene, “Aboriginal Self-Government in Canada” (Canberra, Australia: Papers on Parliament no. 21, 1993), 1. Government of Canada, “Implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Canada,” undated, https://www. justice.gc.ca/eng/declaration/index.html. Coral Dow and John Gardiner-Garden, Indigenous Affairs in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, United States of America, Norway and Sweden (Canberra: Parliamentary Library, 1998). Katie Saulnier, Aboriginal Self-Determination: A Comparative Study of New Zealand, Australia, and the United States of America (Ottawa: Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada and ISId Aboriginal Policy Study Papers, McGill University, 2014); and Alison Vivian et al., “Indigenous Self-Government in the Australian Federation,” Australian Indigenous Law Review vol. 20 (2017): 215–42. Partners in Confederation: Aboriginal Peoples, Self-Government and the Constitution (Ottawa: Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, 1993). Linking Indigenous Communities with Regional Development in Canada (Paris: oecd , 2020), chapter 3. Courchene, “Aboriginal Self-Government,”3. Ian Bailey, “Politics Briefing: Pallister Apologizes for Remarks on Canadian History, Reconciliation,” Globe and Mail, 3 August 2021. Hadeel Ibrahim and Aidan Cox, “nB Employees Told to Stop Making Indigenous Title Acknowledgments, but Won’t Face Repercussions if They Do,” cBc News-New Brunswick, 15 October 2021. “Canadians Deeply Divided on Indigenous Issues: Poll,” aPtn National News, 11 June 2018. Vanessa Minke-Martin, “The Long, Expensive Fight for First Nations’ Fishing Rights,” Hakai Magazine, 23 October 2020.

300

Notes to pages 239–45

42 “For Acadian Fisherman, Early Mi’kmaq Fishery in nS Bay Can ‘Never’ Be Respected,” Global News, 23 October 2020, https://globalnews.ca/ news/7414976/acadian-fisherman-mikmaq-fishery/. 43 Paul Withers, “‘Moderate Livelihood’ Fishermen Must Operate during Commercial Season, dFo Says,” cBc News-Nova Scotia, 3 March 2021. 44 Linda Pannozzo, “In Search of Common Ground: An Interview with Arthur Bull about the Lobster Fishery Crisis in St Mary’s Bay,” Halifax Examiner, 1 November 2020. 45 More Canadians – one in three – believe that Ottawa allocates too many resources to Indigenous issues. See, “Truths of Reconciliation: Canadians Are Deeply Divided on How Best to Address Indigenous Issues,” Angus Reid Institute, 7 June 2018. 46 Richard Foot, “80 First Nations Politicians Make More than Pm ,” Global News, 22 November 2010, https://globalnews.ca/news/102553/80-firstnations-politicians-make-more-than-pm/; and “$267,309 Tax-Free: Chief of 90-Member Bc First Nation May Be Canada’s Highest Paid Politician,” National Post, 13 August 2015. 47 “Yukon First Nations Self Government Act,” Sc 1994, c. 35, CanLII, https:// www.canlii.org/en/ca/laws/stat/sc-1994-c-35/latest/sc-1994-c-35.html. 48 See, among others, Gurston Dacks, “Implementing First Nations SelfGovernment in Yukon: Lessons Learned,” Canadian Journal of Political Science vol. 37, no. 3 (September 2004): 671–94. 49 Julien Gignac, “Curing the ‘Colonial Hangover’: How Yukon First Nations Became Trailblazers of Indigenous Governance,” Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, 30 January 2021. 50 Ibid.; and “Yukon First Nations’ ‘Leading-edge’ Self Government Agreements, 25 Years in,” cBc News-North, 15 February 2020, https:// www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/yukon-land-claims-25-years-1.5464987. 51 “Understanding the Treaty,” Nisga’a Lisims Government, September 1998. 52 Murray Sinclair quoted in “Murray Sinclair on Reconciliation, Anger, Unmarked Graves – and a Headline for This Story,” Maclean’s, 18 August 2021.

e P I l o gUe 1 Frank McKenna told me this during a golf game in July 2021. 2 Others have made a similar point. See, for example, “Being as Canadian as Possible, under the Circumstances,” Globe and Mail, 1 September 2007.

Notes to pages 245–51

301

3 Will Kymlicka made a similar point in his “Being Canadian,” Government and Opposition vol. 38, no. 3 (2003): 357. 4 See, among others, 2019 Survey of Canadians: Canada: Pulling Together or Drifting Apart – Final Report (Toronto: Environics institute, April 2019). 5 See, for example, “Canada Is the No. 1 Country in the World, According to the 2021 Best Countries Report,” Wharton University of Pennsylvania News, 13 April 2021, https://news.wharton.upenn.edu/press-releases 2021/04/canada-is-the-no-1-country-in-the-world-according-to-the2021-best-countries-report/. 6 See “Public Trust in Government: 1958–2022,” Pew Research Center, 6 June 2022, https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/06/06/publictrust-in-government-1958-2022/. 7 The three-part series ran in 2011 and it was developed by Professor Matthew Flinders and was called “In Defence of Politics,” BBc Radio 4, undated, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b015fb6c. 8 Frank Graves quoted in Alison Loat and Michael MacMillan, Tragedy in the Commons: Former Members of Parliament Speak Out About Canada’s Failing Democracy (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2015), 33. 9 David Runciman also makes this point in “Why Replacing Politicians with Experts Is a Reckless Idea,” Guardian, 1 May 2018. 10 Quoted from “Teddy Roosevelt’s Man in the Arena Speech,” WorldAtlas, undated, https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/man-in-the-arena.html. 11 Mathew Flinders, “In Defence of Politics,” The Political Quarterly vol. 81, no. 3 (July–September 2010): 315. 12 Tony Wright, “Doing Politics Differently,” The Political Quarterly vol. 81, no. 3 (July–September, 2010): 321. 13 Thomas Piketty, Capital and Ideology (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2020). 14 Gerry Nicholls, “The Politics of Vacation Shaming,” Hill Times, 17 August 2022, https://www.hilltimes.com/2022/08/17/the-politics-ofvacation-shaming/377863; and “Justin Trudeau Slammed for Taking a Two-Week Family Vacation to Costa Rica,” Daily Hive, 2 August 2022, https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/justin-trudeaufamily-vacation-costa-rica?auto=true. 15 James Madison, “The Utility of the Union as a Safeguard against Domestic Faction and Insurrection,” essay no. 10 in The Federalist Papers series originally published by Daily Advertiser (New York), 22 November 1787, https://www.hursthistory.org/uploads/1/0/7/0/107013873/ federalist_10.pdf.

302

Notes to page 251

16 Emily Tamkin, “Why American Democracy Is under Threat,” New Statesman, 22 July 2021. 17 Courtney Vinopal, “2 out of 3 Americans Believe US Democracy Is under Threat,” PBS , 2 July 2021. 18 Michael Valpy, “Populist Anger Is Real, and Canada Had Better Wake Up,” Globe and Mail, 13 March 2017. 19 Richard Raycraft, “People’s Party Makes Vote Gains but Doesn’t Win a Seat,” cBc News-Politics, 20 September 2021. 20 Tom Nichols, Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within Our Modern Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), 187.

Index

Aboriginal Entrepreneurship Program, 136 Acadians: acknowledgment by Queen of wrongs committed against, 176; and agriculture, 23, 26, 203; assimilation of, 26; the awakening, 28–33; and businesses/ entrepreneurship, 23, 33, 36; and Confederation, 27–8; and education, 22–3, 28, 170, 209, 221, 233–4; expulsion of, 8, 11, 22, 24, 25–6, 152, 203, 204, 207, 208, 221; and fishery, ix, 23, 26, 124, 139; French-language education, 167; government intervention for, 209; government role in society and, 233; and Indigenous peoples, 34, 121, 124; Indigenous peoples compared to, 209–10, 233–4; and land, 26; and Mi’kmaq, ix, 24, 139, 225; and need to be “twice as good,” 240–1; neutrality of, 24, 25; in New England, 37–8; population percentage in New Brunswick, 147; public policies and, 221; in public service, 33, 148, 233; and Quebec, 27; Quebecois and, 34;

L.J. Robichaud and, 34, 36, 207, 227; and Roman Catholic Church, 26–7; Seven Years’ War and, 203; and Sommet de la Francophonie, 34; state sponsorship of, 35–6; as victims, 5, 23–4, 27, 35–7, 221, 233; working conditions, 23 L’Acadie, l’Acadie (nFB ), 30 access/right to information legislation, 14, 209 Acheson, T.W., 84 Act of Union (1841), 5, 129 aerospace sector, 59, 217–18 agriculture: Acadians and, 23, 26, 203; Black Loyalists/Refugees and, 150; decline in, 172; Indigenous peoples and, 128 Ajzenstat, Janet, 91–2 Alberta: alienation in, 3; in Buffalo province, 82–3; Canada-US Free Trade Agreement in, 112; Confederation and, 82, 100, 214; Energy East pipeline project and, 87; federal government and, 215; and federal public service decentralization, 215; and federal transfer payments, 214; in federalism, 100; fossil fuel sector in, 90;

304

Index

monetary contributions to federal government, 99; and National Energy Program, 89; and pipelines, 88; and Quebec, 89, 216; and referendum on equalization, 98; and Senate, 92, 94, 96; and separatism, 98; and US, 116; as victim, 215. See also Western Canada Alexander, David, 71 Algoma Steel Company, 74 Allan, Sir Hugh, 66–7 Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada, 32 Alward, David, 16, 232 American Revolution, 26; and Black Loyalists, 149; Canada as “by-product” of, 104; and English Canada, 102; and Ontario, 113, 119 Anglophone Quebecers: achievements, 174; and Bill 96, 168–9; la Conquête and, 8; federal government and, 167, 169; political institutions and, 174; unemployment rate, 168–9; as victims, 167, 169 Annand, William, 62, 190 apologies, 152; Australia and, 177–8, 186; to Black Americans, 182–3; to Black Canadians, 176; Canada and, 179, 201, 223; to Chinese Canadians, 160–1, 174, 176, 177, 187; for colonialism, 180, 185–6; and compensation/reparations, 185, 186; for Exclusion Act, 187; federal government and, 176–7, 178, 186– 7; France and, 182–3, 184; Great Britain and, 179, 180, 182, 184–5; to Indigenous peoples, 176, 177; to

Inuit of Newfoundland and Labrador, 177; to Italian Canadians, 177; Japan and, 185; to Japanese Canadians, 160, 174, 176, 177; to Native Americans, 183; political ideology and, 186–7; political leaders and, 188; provincial governments and, 176–7, 186–7; for residential schools, 130–1, 177; for slavery, 179, 180; US and, 177, 179, 180, 182–3 assimilation: of Acadians, 26; of French settlers, 129; of Indigenous peoples, 123, 125, 126–7, 128–9, 203, 228, 230 Atlantic Canada: alienation in, 3; and Confederation, 8; economic equality and, 78; employment in, 80–1; and Foreign Investment Review Agency, 115; free trade agreements and, 81; immigration and, 81; and international development sector, 118; Maritime provinces vs, 60–1; Ontario and, 106; and Quebec, 59; and regional economic development, 78–9; representation in Supreme Court, 95; and US, 115. See also Maritime provinces; Newfoundland; Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (acoa ), 15, 80, 106 Atlantic Immigration Pilot Program, 211 Atlantic Policy Congress of First Nations Chiefs, 231 Atwood, Margaret, 9 Aucoin, Peter, 166 Augustine, Noah, 230–3, 234, 240, 241

Index Australia: apologies by, 177–8, 186; Constitution, 191; immigration in, 200; Indigenous peoples in, 177, 178, 186, 235, 236; public service in, 97, 165; Senate/Upper House in, 86, 93, 94, 95 Auto Pact (Automotive Products Trade Agreement), 8, 90–1, 112 automobile sector, 90, 91, 101, 213 Baker, William M., 117–18 Bank Act (1871), 83 Barnaby, Bruce, 232 Basque, Maurice, 35 Becker, Gary, 227 Benoit, Ginette, 244 Benyoussef, Mohammed, 153 Bernier, Maxime, 251 Bickerton, Jim, 60 bilingualism: in Moncton, 29–33, 208; in Ottawa, 29; in Prince Edward Island, 33; Progressive Conservative Party and, 31 Bird, Bud, 232 Birdtail Sioux First Nation, 135 Black Americans: apologies to, 182–3; in Canada, 152; Loyalists, 149–50, 205; medical experiment on, 183; as victims, 5; in Western Canada, 150 Black Canadians: apologies to, 176; federal government and, 152; in federal public service, 147–8, 154–5, 220; unemployment rate, 151; as victims, 148–51; women, 151 Black people, slavery and, 180 Blacks in Canada: A History, 148 Blair, Tony, 185 Bliss, Michael, 114

305

Bock-Côté, Mathieu, L’empire du politiquement, 18 Bombardier, 59, 217 Bonaparte, Napoléon, 179 Borden, Samuel, 25 Borden, Sir Robert, 25, 177 Bouchard, Lucien, 218 Bouchard, Mathieu, 88 Bouctouche, NB, 21, 22, 23 Bourassa, Robert, 217 Bourgon, Jocelyne, 148 Bourque, Claude, 35 Brady, Alexander, 113 Bragg, John, 159 Bristol Aerospace, Winnipeg, 85, 217 British Columbia: apologies to Chinese Canadians in, 177; Confederation and, 82; and federal transfer payments, 214; fossil fuel sector in, 90; Indigenous selfgovernment in, 242; numbers of senators, 94; regional economic development in, 79. See also Western Canada British North America Act (1867). See Constitution Act/British North America Act (1867) Brodie, Janine, 77 Brown, George, 125 Bryce, Robert B., 192 Buckner, P.A., 114 bureaucracy. See federal public service; public service Bush, George W., 181 Business Council of Canada, 159 businesses/entrepreneurship: Acadians and, 23, 33, 36; and bilingualism, 32–3; covId -19 and, 158; federal government and, 159; and federal public service, 159; immigrants

306

Index

and, 153–4; Indigenous peoples and, 136, 228, 231; public policies and, 157–9; as victims, 157–9 Cahill, Barry, 150 Cairns, Alan, 86 Campbell, Alex, 60–1 Canada Day, 178–9 Canada Elections Act (1960), 128 Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (cewS ), 158 Canada Recovery Benefit, 158 Canadair, 85 Canada-US Free Trade Agreement (Fta ), 111–12, 205 Canadian Arsonals Limited, 73 Canadian Commercial Corporation, 107 Canadian National Railway (cnr ) repair shops, 75 Canadian Pacific Railway, 160 canals, 66–71 Cape Breton: coal, 72; Dominion Steel and Coal Corporation, 74; Newfoundland and, 60; Thyssen Industries and, 106 Cardinal, Harold, 229 Careless, J.M.S., 114 Cartier, Georges-Étienne, 27, 63, 70, 113 Central Canada: canals, 66; and Chignecto Canal, 69; Confederation and, 62, 63; Crown corporations in, 73; economic development focused on, 118; economic power, 72; federal government and, 78, 85–6; and federal public servants in central agencies, 97; force of, 64; House of Commons and, 84; manufacturing in, 73, 74, 84; and Maritime

provinces, 62, 63; National Energy Program and, 89–90, 101; national interest and, 101; national media concentration in, 215; National Policy and, 71, 72, 83, 101; national political institutions and, 86, 90; prime ministers and, 84, 85–6; and projects of national importance, 69; R&D in, 118; Second World War and, 77; Senate and, 84, 100; trade with Maritime provinces, 71; trade with Western Canada, 84; US branch plants in, 71–2; and Western Canada, 84, 85–6. See also Ontario; Quebec Centre for Rural Economic Development, 172 cF-18 maintenance contract, 85, 214, 217 Champagne, François-Philippe, 217 Chan, Patrick, 161 Charlottetown Accord, 191 Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Bill 96 and, 169; and education rights of Francophones outside Quebec, 170; and framers’ intent, 95; and Francophones outside Quebec, 174; and minority-language education, 170; notwithstanding clause, ix; and victimhood, 221 Charter of the French Language, 167 Chevrier, Lionel, 70 Chignecto Canal, 66, 67–9 Chinese Canadians, 160; apologies to, 174, 176, 177, 187; Canadian atonement for, 173–4; compensation to, 161; contributions to Canadian society, 161; and education, 161; employment rates, 161; head tax, 160, 176, 178, 187; Indigenous peoples compared, 162;

Index and national railway, 159–60; as victims, 160, 161 Chrétien, Jean, 14–15, 16; apologies by, 186; and Marshall decision, 239; and Quebec, 219; and Rural Secretariat, 172 Clark, Christy, 177 Clark, Joe, 14, 195 Clarkson, Adrienne, 161 Clearwater Seafoods, 133 Clinton, Bill, 177, 182 Coates, Ken, 137–8 Coderre, Denis, 87 Collette, Napoléon, 22 Colonial Office, 6; and Black Loyalists, 150; and Confederation, 61, 63, 80; and federalism, 63 colonialism, 180–2, 185–6; compensation/reparations for, 185; by France, 184; Great Britain and, 184–5, 186; and Indigenous peoples, 123–4; and Indigenous self-government, 242 Commission of Inquiry into the Sponsorship Program and Advertising Activities, 16 Common Schools Act (1871) (New Brunswick), 27 compromise(s): Canadian genius for, 199–200; and Constitution, 246; federalism and, 245; importance of, 200; and making Canada work, 38, 246; national political institutions and, 38, 245; political culture and, 201; politicians and, 249; public policies and, 188 Confederation: Acadians and, 27–8; Alberta and, 82, 100, 214; Atlantic Canada and, 8; Brady on, 113; and canals, 66; and Central Canada, 62, 63; Colonial Office and, 61, 63, 80;

307

and federal public service representation, 65; and federal transfer payments, 211; Francophone Quebecers and, 27; Francophones and, 27; and Francophones outside Quebec, 170, 174; and government portfolios, 65; and Indigenous peoples, 125–9; and Labrador, 61; Manitoba and, 82; and Maritime provinces, 60, 61–4, 71, 79–80, 115; and national political institutions, 86; New Brunswick and, 61–2, 63, 204; Newfoundland and, 6, 61, 190; Nova Scotia and, 6, 61, 62, 190; Ontario and, 9, 63–4, 80, 82, 83, 102, 105, 108; Prince Edward Island and, 6, 61, 190; Quebec and, 59, 64, 80, 82, 83, 190, 219; referendum on, 63; and representation by population, 62; Roman Catholic Church and, 27–8; Rowell-Sirois Commission and, 193; Saskatchewan and, 82; and Senate, 63, 92; statues of Fathers of, 204; and US, 117; and Western Canada, 82, 96–7, 99, 204–5 Constitution (Canadian), 6–7; amendments to, 191, 192, 193–4, 196; compromise and, 200, 246; equalization in, 98; federalprovincial division of power, 6; Great Depression and, 192, 201; Indigenous peoples in, 228; and National Policy, 193; as outdated, 191; patriation, 13, 96; political leaders and, 188–9; and provincial governments as victims, 196; and Senate reform, 96, 101; socioeconomic programs and, 196; and victimhood, 7, 100; and welfare state, 201

308

Index

Constitution Act (1982): on Aboriginal peoples, 120; amending formula, 191; Bill 96 and, 167; equalization clause, 13; and Indigenous constitutional status, 140; Indigenous peoples in, 229–30; and Indigenous rights, 137, 225; and Indigenous selfgovernment, 234; Quebec and, 7 Constitution Act/British North America Act (1867), 125, 126, 191, 192, 229 Cook, Ramsay, 114 Cooper, Barry, 115 Copps, Sheila, 111 Cormier, Yvon, 37 Cotler, Irwin, 130 Couillard, Philippe, 64 Courchene, Thomas, 111–12, 235 covId-19 pandemic: and business community, 158; and Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, 158; and Canada Recovery Benefit, 158; federal government and, 158; and Indigenous peoples, 224; and labour shortages, 158; in Maritime provinces, 110–11; in New Brunswick, 33; in Newfoundland and Labrador, 110; in Nova Scotia, 111; in Ontario, x, 110–11; public service and, 166; and rural vs urban areas, 172–3; vaccine distribution, x, 110, 111 Coyne, Andrew, 169, 215 Creighton, Donald, 113–14, 118 Cross, Arthur, 74 Crown corporations, 73, 75 Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (cIrnac ), 226

Daoust, Jacques, 76 Davie shipyard, Montreal, 216–17 Dawson, Robert MacGregor, 91 The Decline of Deference (Nevitte), 163 Delgamuukw case (1997), 234 Democracy in Canada (Savoie), 244, 246–7 democracy/representative democracy: anger in, 251; and answers to issues, 250; authoritarian temptation vs, 251; Facebook and, 163; politicians and, 247, 251; public opinion of Canadian, 199; social media and, 163; strengthening Canada and, 202 Department of Fisheries and Oceans (dFo ), 238, 239 Department of Global Affairs, 107 Department of Munitions and Supply, 73, 74 Department of Regional Economic Expansion (dree ), 15, 78 Desport, Jean-Marie, 179–80 Dexter, Darrel, 16 Diefenbaker, John, 98 Dion, Stéphane, 94, 95, 107 disabilities, persons with: in federal public service, 143, 144; in private sector, 143 Docherty, David, 92 Dominion Steel and Coal Corporation (doSco ), 74 Doran, Charles F., 116 Doucette, Mary Beth, 133 Drew, George, 193 Durham, Lord, 37, 219 economic development: equality, and Atlantic provinces, 78; federal

Index transfer payments and, 79, 210, 211, 212; Indian Act and, 228; Indigenous peoples and, 135–8, 139, 140, 226, 227, 228, 232, 234; Indigenous self-government and, 242; in Maritime provinces, 71, 211; Membertou First Nation and, 133–4; national institutions and, 80; national policies and, 101; National Policy and, 83; in New Brunswick, 209; Ontario, and strong national economy, 117; of Ontario, 105–9; people factor in, 226–7; power of Central Canada, 72; regional imbalance in, 77–9; Rowell-Sirois Commission and, 77; self-government and, 234; in Western Canada, 78, 83; of White vs Indigenous peoples, 230 economic recession of 30s. See Great Depression education: Acadians and, 22–3, 28, 170, 209, 221, 233–4; Chinese Canadians and, 161; church-run schools, 170; and equality, 209; Francophones outside Quebec and, 170; French-language, 23; Indigenous peoples and, 227; Indigenous self-government and, 242; Japanese Canadians and, 161; Quebec and, 27; Roman Catholic Church and, 27. See also residential schools elections/voting: Indigenous peoples and, 232–3; Membertou First Nation and, 134; numbers of votes from Ontario, 80; numbers of votes from Quebec, 80; permanent campaigns, 209; reserve elections,

309

232–3; restriction of voting rights, 251; rights of Indigenous peoples, 128, 228 Elizabeth II, queen, 176 Elsipogtog First Nation, 135, 140, 230 Elton, David, 84 L’empire du politiquement (BockCôté), 18 employment: abilities and, 142; affirmative action, 142; Chinese Canadians and, 161; equity, 142–8; Francophones and, 144; gender in, 141; historically challenged designated groups and, 142; Japanese Canadians, 161; labour shortages, 158; merit principle and, 144–5; numbers in, 145, 147, 148; in private sector, 143, 144; in public service, 142–8; in public vs private sectors, 143–4; rates of Anglophone vs Francophone Quebecers, 168–9; and victimhood, 144, 145–6; women and, 141, 220 Employment Equity Act (1986 and 1996), 142–3, 144, 146 Energy East pipeline project, 64, 87–8, 96, 99–100, 216 English and French (Joly), 167 English language, preservation of, 32 equalization payments: Alberta call for referendum on, 98; Constitution and, 98; for have-less provinces, 77 Esgenoôpetitj First Nation, 238 European Commission, 175 European settlers: and Indigenous peoples, 122–4, 139, 225–6; land for, 123–4, 132

310

Index

Faragher, John, A Great and Noble Scheme, 26 farming. See also agriculture Federal Contractors Program, 142–3 federal government: acknowledgment of past, 162; and Alberta, 215; and Anglophone Quebecers, 167, 169; and apologies, 176–7, 178, 186–7; and automobile sector, 91; and Black Canadians, 152; and Bombardier, 217; business community and, 159; and canals, 66, 67–8, 70; and Central Canada, 78, 85–6; and covId -19, 158; and Crown lands, 128–9; and Francophones outside Quebec, 209; Great Depression and, 192–3; and hyphenated federalism, 194–6; and manufacturing, 73–5; and Maritime provinces, 70–1, 72–3, 77, 210–12; members of visible minorities in, 143–4; monetary policy, 72–3; and more populated provinces, 211, 212; and natural resources, 83; Newfoundland and Labrador and, 61; and Ontario, 72, 114, 119, 213–14, 215–16; and provincial legislation, 85, 190; and provincial political power, 215–16; public opinion regarding, 199; and Quebec, 72, 78, 169, 215–19; Quebec Resolutions and, 64; and regional economic imbalance, 77–9; and regional interests, 212; and regional ministers, 99; and rural areas, 172–3; during Second World War, 73–5; and smaller provinces, 87, 98; and social policy, 193; spending power and policy, 193–4; and taxation, 64; and victims, 155; and welfare

state, 201; and Western Canada, 78, 82, 85–8, 91, 94, 215 federal government, and Indigenous peoples, 126, 129, 152, 225; Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada, 226; economic development promotion, 136–7; and fishery, 238–40; Indian Act and, 228–30; and Indigenous peoples in federal public service, 155, 156; and Indigenous self-government, 234–5, 236–7; Indigenous Services Canada, 226; legacy of relationship, 131–2; people factor, 228; program spending, 226; public policies, 131–2, 155; responsibility in relationship, 230; and victimhood of Indigenous peoples, 140; welfare payments, 227–8; White Paper in, 228–9, 230 federal public service: affirmative action in, 142; in Australia, 97; as big whale that can’t swim, 165–6; Black Canadians in, 147–8, 154–5, 220; bureaucratic vs political patronage/favouritism in, 145; business community and, 159; in central agencies, 97; Chinese Canadians and, 161; Confederation, and representation in, 65; cost vs contribution of, 166; decentralization of, 215; employment equity in, 142; Francophones in, 96, 148, 155; frontline employees, 165; gendered employment in, 141–2; Indigenous peoples in, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 155, 156, 178, 220–1; Japanese Canadians in, 161; location of offices, 97; Maritime province representation in, 65; members of visible minorities in, 144, 145, 147; in

Index

ncr, 80, 97, 165, 215, 239; persons with disabilities in, 143, 144; politicians and, 165; private sector compared, 159; public opinion regarding, 164–5, 166; in regions vs ncr , 97, 239; senior servants from Ontario/Quebec, 80; shortcomings of, 159, 166; in US, 97; women in, 143, 146, 147, 148, 155, 219, 220. See also public service federal transfer payments: Confederation and, 211; dependence on, 79, 210, 211, 219; and economic development, 79, 210, 211, 212; and Maritime provinces, 79, 108, 210, 211, 212; and more vs less populous provinces, 212–13; to New Brunswick, 64–5; to Newfoundland and Labrador, 79, 210; to Nova Scotia, 64–5; Ontario and, 65, 96, 109–10, 119, 212, 213, 214; per capita basis, 109, 212–13; Quebec and, 65, 99, 216, 218–19; representation by population and, 79; Western Canada and, 96, 99, 214–16 federalism: Alberta’s place in, 100; Canadian necessity for, 190; Colonial Office and, 63; compromise and, 245; fairness argument, 9, 217–18; federal spending power and, 195; in Germany, 198–9; hybrid, 10, 191; hyphenated, 194– 8, 199, 201; Macdonald and, 189– 90; national institutions and, 98; as pot-pourri, 196; and Quebec, 59, 78, 218, 246; Senate in, 86; unique Canadian challenges in, 200; unitary state vs, 94–5; and Western Canada, 100, 101

311

federal-provincial agreements, 188–9; cost sharing, 191–2, 193–4, 196, 197–8; provincial governments and, 195–6; Rowell-Sirois Commission and, 77; secrecy in, 196–7 Federal-Provincial Collaboration: The Canada-New Brunswick General Development Agreement (Savoie), 207 Fernandez, Jorge, 154 Fernandez, Leylah, 154 Fisheries Act, 239 fishery: Acadian-en-Mi’kmaq conflict over, 124, 139, 225; Acadians and, ix, 23, 26; conflicts over, 239, 240; federal government and, 61; Indigenous peoples and, 224; Indigenous rights to, 128, 137–8, 225, 238–40; Mi’kmaq and, ix; Newfoundland and Labrador, 61; White commercial fishers and, 239 Flaherty, Jim, 98, 110, 212 Forbes, Ernest, 72, 210 Ford, Doug, 111 Ford, Rob, 18 Foreign Investment Review Agency (FIra) , 115 Fort Beauséjour, 25, 204 Fort McKay First Nation, 135 Fowler, Robert, 106 France: and Algeria, 184; and apologies, 179, 180, 182, 184; colonialism by, 180, 184; and Hawaii, 181; location of public servants in, 165; public opinion regarding government in, 199, 200; public service in, 97; and Rwandan genocide, 184; in slave trade, 179–80, 184 Francophone Quebecers: and Acadians, 34; Anglophone

312

Index

Quebecer unemployment rates compared, 168–9; and Confederation, 27; Confederation and, 27; la Conquête and, 8, 113 Francophones: and Confederation, 27; employment equity and, 144; in federal public service, 96, 148, 155; population percentage, 147; in public service, 147 Francophones outside Quebec: 1960s and new beginning, 28; Acadians and, 233; and Bill 96, 169–70; Charter of Rights and Freedoms and, 174; Confederation and, 170, 174; federal government and, 209; health-care facilities for, 170; immigrants among, 219; in public service, 28; Quebec and, 219; and Quebec independence, 59; as victims, 170, 174 Franks, Ned, 191 free trade agreements (Fta s), 81, 210 French Canada: as nation of regions, 33–4; tension among Frenchspeaking communities, 34 French language: education in, 23; as official language in Quebec, ix, 59, 167–9, 218; Quebec in Confederation and, 219; in Université de Moncton, 32 French-language education: Acadians and, 167; in Manitoba, 170; in New Brunswick, 170; in Ontario, 170 Frye, Northrop, 100, 115, 199 Fung, Thomas, 161 Furedi, Frank, 18 Galt, Alexander, 65 Garneau, Raymond, 164

General Dynamics Land System Canada, 107 Germany: Constitution, 198–9; public opinion regarding government in, 199; Upper House/Senate in, 86, 198–9 Getty, Don, 112 Gibbins, Roger, 93, 94 Gomery, John, 16 Gotlieb, Allan, 89 Gover, Kevin, 177 governance: Indian Act and, 232–3, 240; Indigenous peoples and, 127–8, 230, 231, 232–3, 234–8; US Indigenous peoples and, 235 Governing from the Centre (Savoie), 16, 17, 202, 246–7 government intervention: and Acadian community development, 209; and dependence, 35; and equal success chances, 208–9 government spending: federal power in, 194, 196; federal spending power and federalism, 195; hyphenated federalism and, 194, 195; shared-cost federal-provincial, 191–2; and victimhood, 187 governments: blame game in, 165; and Indigenous peoples as victims, 140, 223, 226; public opinion regarding, 200, 209; responsibility for Indigenous peoples, 153; role in society, 209, 233. See also federal government; provincial governments Granatstein, Jack L., 113, 114; Yankee, Go Home, 17, 118 Grant, George, Lament for a Nation, 7, 114 Graves, Frank, 248

Index A Great and Noble Scheme (Faragher), 26 Great Britain: Admiralty Technical Mission, 74; and Africa, 185; and apologies, 179, 180, 182, 184–5; colonialism by, 180, 181–2, 184–5, 186; and Hawaii, 181; immigration in, 200; and India, 181–2; and Irish Great Famine, 185; politicians in, 248; public opinion regarding government in, 200; public service in, 97; and shipbuilding in Canada, 74; and slavery, 149, 179–80; Upper Canada and, 103; victimhood in, 176 Great Depression, 192–4, 201 Gwyn, Richard, 7, 116–17 Hague, William, 184 Hakimi, Karim, 154 Haldimand, Frederick, 103 Halifax, NS: economic performance, 211; Irving Shipyard, 76; population growth, 211; during Second World War, 74; shipbuilding in, 74 Harper, Stephen: apologies by, 186, 187; apology for residential schools, 130–1, 177; apology to Chinese Canadians, 160–1; and federal transfer payments, 212–13; and Marshall decision, 239; as powerful Western voice, 98; and Rural Secretariat, 172; and Saudi arms deal, 107; and Senate reform, 96; and shipbuilding, 76; and Western interests in Ottawa, 100–1 Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, 133, 234 Haultain, Frederick, 82–3

313

Hawaiian Islands, 181, 185 Heintzman, Ralph, 62–3 Hiller, James, 61 history: Indigenous peoples and, 154; and political culture, 188; rewriting, 177, 203–5; and victimhood, 151, 221, 242–3 Hodgetts, Ted, 17 Horgan, John, 131 House of Commons: and Central Canada, 84; numbers of seats from Ontario and Quebec, 119; seat redistribution, 216; urban vs rural seats in, 171; and Western Canada, 84 Howe, C.D., 73, 74, 98, 162 Howe, Joseph, 62, 65 Hutchings, Gudie, 172 Ibbitson, John, 3, 77, 171 identity: of Maritime provinces, 116; Quebecois, 116, 119; regions/ groups and national, 188; US and Canadian identity compared, 113; of Western Canada, 116 identity, Canadian, 179, 187; attachment to Canada and, 245–6; as bottom up vs top down, 245; compromise/pragmatism in, 38–9; Loyalists and, 117; Maritime provinces and, 115–16; Ontario and, 114, 116–17, 119; qualities of Canada and, 246; regions and, 188; search for, 179; US dominance vs, 117; US identity vs, 113 Ignatieff, Michael, 17 I’m from Bouctouche, Me (Savoie), 244 immigrants: on Canadian shared values, 8; entrepreneurship by,

314

Index

153–4; as Francophones outside Quebec, 219; as health-care workers, 154; Indigenous peoples compared, 154; international comparisons of welcome towards, 200; to Maritime provinces, 211; members of visible minorities as, 153–4; tolerance towards, 223; in urban areas, 171; as victims, 154 immigration: and Atlantic Canada, 81; in Australia, 200; in Great Britain, 200; regional economic circumstances and, 211 India, 181–2 Indian Act, 126–8, 131, 228–30; and governance, 232–3, 240; Indigenous rights in, 229; and Indigenous self-government, 241; and lands, 134; and permission to leave reserves without a pass, 135; on reserves, 132 Indian agents, 126, 127, 129, 130, 228 Indian Association of Alberta, Red Paper, 228–9 Indian Horse (Wagamese), 122 Indigenous Affairs and Northern Development, 195 Indigenous Growth Fund, 136 Indigenous peoples: Acadians and, 121, 124; Acadians compared to, 209–10, 233–4; and agriculture, 128; apologies to, 176, 177; assimilation of, 123, 125, 126–7, 128–9, 203, 228, 230; in Australia, 177–8, 186; band councils, 127, 129, 134; in British North America Act, 125; Canadians visiting communities, 121–2; Chinese Canadians compared, 162; colonial powers and, 123–4; Confederation

and, 125–9; in Constitution, 228, 229–30; and courts, 129, 137–8; covId-19 and, 224; culture/traditions, 127, 129, 130, 131, 132, 229; derogatory comments about, 224; diseases, 123; economic development, 139, 140, 151, 226, 227, 228, 230, 232, 234; elections, 232–3; and entrepreneurship, 136, 228, 231; European settlers and, 122–4, 139; federal government and, 126, 129, 152; in federal public service, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 155, 156, 178, 220–1; and fishery, 137–8, 224, 225; governance structures, 127–8, 230, 231, 232–3; government responsibility for, 153; health, 136; history and, 154; and hunting, 128, 137–8; hyphenated federalism and, 195; immigrants compared, 154; as independent nations, 123; Indian Act and, 126–8; and “Indian problem,” 125, 127, 129; institutions and, 126, 129; media and, 138, 241; mentors/role models for, 155; missing/murdered women and girls, 131; and National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, 178; and natural resources, 140, 225, 226; in New Brunswick, 120–1, 224; paternalism toward, 125–6; poverty, 224; in private sector, 143; provincial governments and, 126, 140, 195, 226, 227, 228; public opinion regarding, 138–40, 237, 238, 241; reports, studies, regarding, 225; Roman Catholic Church and, 132; in rural areas, 175; self-government, 227, 234–8, 241–2; as slaves, 149;

Index socio-economic development, 136, 151, 155; and statues of Fathers of Confederation, 204; as taking lead in relations with non-Indigenous peoples, 230; treaties with, 123–4, 225, 229, 230; in US, 177; and water, 226. See also federal government, and Indigenous peoples; reserves; residential schools; Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples Indigenous peoples as victims, 139, 150, 221, 222; Acadian victimhood vs, 34; as Canadian problem, 139–40; and courts, 225; education and, 227; equal opportunity vs, 225; European settlers and, 225–6; governments and, 140, 223, 226; history and, 242–3; Indian Act and, 228–30; people factor and, 227; performing First Nations vs, 223; political institutions and, 224–5; public policies and, 122; racism and, 223, 237; responsibility for, 139–40, 223; self-confidence vs, 232; self-government and, 227; transition away from victimhood, 122, 230 Indigenous rights, 122; Constitution Act (1982) and, 225; courts and, 137–8; fishery, 238–40; Indian Act and, 229; individual vs collective, 229–30; land, 134–5, 229, 237; and land, 234; to “moderate livelihood,” 238; rural vs urban areas and, 171; “treaty,” 230; voting, 128, 228 Indigenous Services Canada (ISc ), 226 institutions. See national institutions International Labour Organization, 146

315

International Rapids Power Development Act, 68 Inuit of Newfoundland and Labrador, apologies to, 177 Irving, Arthur, 159 Irving, K.C., 23, 69, 70, 73–4 Irving Shipyard, Halifax, 76 Italian Canadians, apologies to, 176, 177 Japanese Americans, Second World War internment, 183 Japanese Canadians: apologies to, 160–1, 174, 176, 177; Canadian atonement for, 173–4; compensation to, 160; contributions to Canadian society, 161; and education, 161; employment, 161; Second World War internment, 160, 178; as victims, 160, 161 Jasanoff, Maya, 104 Jennings, Marlene, 168 Jewish Canadians, apologies to, 176 Jewish refugees, turning away of, 178 Johnson, Boris, 185 Johnson, Nevil, 205–7 Johnson, William, 229 Joly, Mélanie, English and French, 167 Jones, Leonard, 29–30, 31–2, 221 Kalt, Joseph P., 234 Kennedy, Albert J., 115 Kenney, Jason, 96 Ketchum, H.C.G., 67–8, 70 King, William Lyon Mackenzie, 74, 193 Lalonde, Marc, 76, 89 Lament for a Nation (Grant), 7, 114

316

Index

land(s): Acadians and, 26; Black Loyalists/Refugees and, 149–50; in British North America Act, 229; claims negotiating process, 237; compensation for, 152; Crown, 128–9; European settlers and, 123–4; Indigenous rights, 134–5, 229, 234, 237; Indigenous selfgovernment and, 234; Loyalists and, 133; treaties and, 123–4 Lapointe, Ernest, 98 Laurier, Sir Wilfrid, 83, 150, 152, 177, 192, 204–5 Lavigne, Brad, 163 Lawrence, Charles, 24, 25 lBgtq community, 176, 201 LeBlanc, Roméo, 16, 76 Legault, François, ix, 18 Lévesque, René, 217 Levi, Albert, 140 Lewis, Danny, 183 Lincoln, Clifford, 168 Lipsett, Seymour Martin, 37–8 Louis XIII, king, 179 Louis XIV, king, 148–9, 179 Louisiana, 37 Loyalists, 26; and anti-American sentiment, 113, 118; Black, 149–50, 205; and Canadian identity, 117; and creation of reserves, 133; lands for, 132, 133; and New Brunswick, 102; and Ontario, 102–5, 119; in Upper Canada, 103, 112–13; and victimhood, 105 Macdonald, Sir John A.: and apologies, 177; and Canadian identity, 113; and federalism, 189–90; and Finance portfolio, 65; Gwyn on, 7; and Indigenous peoples, 126–7, 224; and Maritime

provinces, 70; and National Policy, 83; and New Brunswick in Confederation, 61–2; and provincial governments, 190, 191; and regional interests, 8; and residential schools, 130; and Senate, 63; and unitary state, 4, 63, 190 Macdonald, William A., Might Nature be Canadian?, 17 Macdonald Commission (Royal Commission on Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada), 92 MacEachen, Allan J., 13–14 Macfarlane, Emmett, 96 Mackenzie, Alexander, 67, 126 Mackenzie, William Lyon, 105 MacLennan, Hugh, Two Solitudes, 19 MacNutt, W.S., 104, 150 Macron, Emmanuel, 184 Madison, James, 251 Maillet, Antonine, 38 Manion, John L., 202 Manitoba: Bristol Aerospace, 217; cF -18 maintenance contract and, 214; and Confederation, 82; and federal transfer payments, 214; Indigenous peoples in, 237; Manitoba Schools Act, 170; minority-language education rights in education, 170; public opinion in, 98; as victim, 217. See also Western Canada manufacturing: in Central Canada, 73, 74, 84; Crown corporations and, 73; federal government and, 73–5; in Maritime provinces, 73–5; military, 73–5, 105–8, 118; in Nova Scotia, 106, 109; in Ontario,

Index 72, 105–8; in Quebec, 72; Saudi arms deal, 118; Second World War and, 73–5, 105–6 Maritime provinces: Atlantic Canada vs, 60–1; Canada-US Free Trade Agreement in, 112; and Canadian identity, 115–16; canals, 66, 67–9; and Central Canada, 71; Central Canada and, 62, 63; Confederation and, 60, 61–4, 71, 79–80, 115; covId-19 in, 110–11; economic growth, 71; exports, 71; federal government and, 70–1, 72–3, 77, 210–12; federal public service representation, 65; federal transfer payments and, 79, 108, 210, 211, 212; free trade agreements and, 210; identity, 116; immigration into, 211; imports, 71; manufacturing in, 73–5; “Maritimization of economy” and, 111–12; municipal structure, 64–5; naFta and, 212; national policies and, 71; National Policy and, 60, 71–3; national political institutions and, 79–80; Newfoundland and, 60–1; Ontario and, 63–4; out-migration from, 115; population aging, 211; population size, 13, 210–11; postsecondary education investment in, 110; Quebec and, 63–4, 75; rural areas, 211; during Second World War, 73–5; and Senate, 92, 212; shipbuilding in, 74, 75–7; taxation in, 64; union of, 61; and Upperen-Lower Canada impasse, 10, 60; urban centres in, 211; and US, 115– 16, 117; as victims, 80–1, 108, 210 Maritime Rights Movement, 77 Marshall decision (1999), 137–8, 225, 230, 238–9

317

Martin, Ged, 7 Martin, Paul, 239 Mason, Gary, 88, 163–4 Mazankowski, Don, 98 McCain, Harrison, 159 McCaskill, Don, 125, 129 McCormack, Peter, 84 McCullough, J.J., 116 McGeer, Allison, 110 McGuinty, Dalton, 109, 110, 212 McGuinty, David, 90 McKenna, Catherine, 163 McKenna, Frank, 16, 75, 80, 112 McKinley, William, 181 McLachlin, Beverley, 130 McLuhan, Marshall, 9 media: concentration in Central Canada, 215; and democracy, 163; and government role, 209; and Indigenous peoples, 138, 241; and politicians, 163, 164, 250, 251; on Senate/Senate reform, 92–3; and transparency, 249 Meech Lake Accord, 15, 93, 191 Melanson, E.P., 23 members of Parliament (mP s): numbers from Nova Scotia, 62; from Ontario, 119; as provincial representatives, 190–1; from Quebec, 119; Quebec numbers of, 109; as regional ministers, 99 Membertou First Nation, 133–4, 140, 223, 231 Mendelsohn, Matthew, 94 Metepenagiag Mi’kmaq Nation, 231, 232 Meulles, Jacques de, 66 Might Nature be Canadian? (Macdonald), 17

318

Index

Mi’kmaq, 230–3; Acadians and, ix, 24, 139, 225; and fishery, ix, 124, 139, 239, 240 mIl-Davie Shipbuilding, 76–7 Miljan, Lydia, 115 Milke, Mark, The Victim Cult, 17, 18 Mills, David, 126 minority language communities, 167–9 Mohawk First Nation, 234 Monckton, Robert, 24–5, 204, 208 Moncton, NB: Acadians in, 167; bilingualism in, 29–33, 208; Canadian National Railway repair shops in, 75; cn repair yard in, 208; economic performance, 211; Muslims in, 153 monetary policy, 72–3 Montcalm, Louis-Joseph de, 205 Montreal: Canadian National Railway repair shops in, 75; and cF-18 maintenance contract, 85; cn repair yard transferred to, 208; Davie shipyard, 216–17; regional economic development and, 78; shipbuilding in, 75, 76–7 more populated provinces/regions: federal government and, 211, 212; federal transfer payments and, 212–13; voice, 246 Morrison, Heather, 33 Morton, Desmond, 103 Morton, Ted, 95–6, 100 Morton, W.L., 113–14 Mulroney, Brian: and acoa , 15, 80; apologies by, 186; apology to Japanese Canadians, 177; and cF-18 maintenance contract, 85; and compensation to Japanese Canadians, 160; and Meech Lake Accord, 15; and military

manufacturing., 106; and national unity, 15; and Quebec, 219; Senate appointments, 92 multiculturalism, 200 municipal governments, 64–5 Muslim Canadians, 153 Nanu, Maighna, 185–6 A Nation of Victims (Sykes), 18 National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, 178 National Energy Program, 89–90, 101, 214 National Film Board of Canada (nFB ), L’Acadie, l’Acadie, 30 National Indigenous Economic Development Board, 135–6 National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, 131 national institutions: and Angophone Quebecers, 174; British, 4, 5, 48, 52, 55, 190; and Central Canada, 86, 90; Confederation and, 86; and economic development, 80; in federal system, 98; healing by politicians, 247; and Indigenous peoples, 126, 129, 224–5; as key to Canada’s future, xi–xii; making them work, 223; and Maritime provinces, 79–80; and national interest, 110; and Ontario, 80, 105, 110; and Ontario’s economic growth, 108; and political culture, 188; political leaders and, 188–9; and pragmatism/compromise, 38, 200, 245; public opinion of, 199; and Quebec, 80; reform, 12; and regional identities, 100; regional interests in, 86, 94; repair of, 246–7; territorial representation in,

Index 94; unitary state and, 191; in US compared to Canada, 38; and victimhood, 7, 100; and Western Canada, 86, 88, 99, 100–1; and White Canadians, 224; and winners vs losers, 217 national interest: Central Canada and, 69, 101; Ontario and, 110, 115; political institutions and, 110; provincial legislation and, 85; representation by population, 70 national policies: and economic development, 101; Maritime provinces and, 71; Ontario and, 112; and Ontario’s economic growth, 108; regional interests in, 165, 212; and US, 117; and Western Canada, 96–7 National Policy: and Central Canada, 71, 72, 83, 101; Constitution and, 193; and economic growth, 83; federal government and canals as precursor to, 70; and Maritime provinces, 60, 71–3; and New Brunswick, 72; and Nova Scotia, 110, 213; and Ontario, 110, 205, 213; prime ministers and, 84; provincial legislation and, 85; and Saskatchewan, 110, 213; and US, 84, 117; and Western Canada, 71, 83–5, 214, 216 national unity: Energy East pipeline project and, 87; prime ministers and, 15; and Quebec, 79, 85, 88, 100, 108, 214; regional identities vs, 100; strengthening of, 202; Western Canada and, 100, 214 nationalism, 113; Canadian vs US, 179; in Quebec, 28, 114 natural resources: federal government and, 83; Indigenous peoples and,

319

140, 225, 226; Western Canada and, 98 Ndiaye, Pap, 184 Nelson, Rodney, 136 Nevitte, Neil, The Decline of Deference, 163 New Brunswick: Anglophones as victims, 29; Black Loyalists/ refugees in, 149–50; Canada-US Free Trade Agreement in, 112; church-run schools in, 170; Common Schools Act, 27; and Confederation, 61–2, 63, 204; covId-19 in, 33; economic growth, 209; Energy East pipeline project and, 87; Equal Opportunity Program, 207; federal public service representation, 65; federal transfers to, 64–5; Fenians and, 62; fossil fuel sector in, 90; Indigenous peoples in, 224, 230–3, 237; languages in, 29; Loyalists and, 102; minority-language education rights in education, 170; National Policy and, 72; New Brunswick Common Schools Act, 170; numbers of senators, 94; Official Languages Act (1969), 28, 207; public opinion in, 98; revenues, 65; Robichaud and, 16, 207–10; during Second World War, 74; social reform, 16; and Upperen-Lower Canada impasse, 60 New Brunswick First Nation and Business Liaison Group, 231 new Canadians. See immigrants New England, 25–6, 37–8 New France: and reserves, 132; slaves in, 148–9 New Zealand Maori, 235, 236

320

Index

Newfoundland: and Cape Breton, 60; and Confederation, 6, 61, 190; and Maritime provinces, 60–1; and Prince Edward Island, 60 Newfoundland and Labrador: apologies to Inuit, 177; and Chignecto Canal, 69; covId -19 in, 110; federal government and, 61; federal transfer payments to, 79, 210; fishery, 61; fossil fuel sector in, 90 Nisga’a First Nation, 242 North America Free Trade Agreement (naFta ), 205, 212 Nova Scotia: Acadians in, 25–6; Africville, 186; and Confederation, 6, 61, 62, 190; covId -19 in, 111; federal public service representation, 65; federal transfer payments to, 64–5; fossil fuel sector in, 90; military manufacturing in, 109, 118; minority-language education rights in education, 170; National Policy and, 110, 213; numbers of mP s, 62; numbers of senators, 94; public opinion in, 98; revenues, 65; during Second World War, 74; and Upperen-Lower Canada impasse, 60 Obama, Barack, 183 official languages, ix, 33, 59, 167–9 Official Languages Act (1969) (New Brunswick), 28 oil and gas industry, 83, 87–8, 89–90, 99–100, 101 Olive, David, 89 Ontario: American Revolution and, 113; and Atlantic provinces, 106; and Auto Pact, 8, 112; automobile sector in, 90–1, 101, 213; and Canada West, 64; Canada-US Free

Trade Agreement (Fta ) and, 111–12, 205; and Canadian identity, 116–17, 119; childcare in, 197–8; and Confederation, 9, 63–4, 80, 82, 83, 102, 105, 108; covId-19 in, x, 110–11; and decentralization of federal public service, 215; economy, 105–9; and Energy East pipeline project, 64; English vs minority language instruction in, 170; and fair share federalism, 9, 109, 110, 212, 214; federal government and, 72, 114, 119, 213–14, 215–16; federal public servants in, 97; and federal transfer payments, 65, 96, 109–10, 119, 212, 213, 214; and have-less provinces, 109; industrial activity in, 72; Loyalists and, 102–5; manufacturing in, 105–8; and Maritime provinces, 63–4; military manufacturing in, 118, 213; minority-language education rights in education, 170; naFta and, 205; national institutions and, 80, 105, 108; and national interest, 115; national policies and, 108, 112; National Policy and, 110, 205, 213; numbers of mP s in, 119; numbers of senators, 94; numbers of votes from, 80; political institutions and, 110; postwar reconstruction in, 74–5; public opinion in, 98; R&D spending in, 109, 213; regional economic development and, 78, 79; representation in Supreme Court, 95; and RowellSirois Commission, 193; Second World War and, 105–6; and Senate, 93, 94, 96; and US, 103, 105, 108, 111–18; as victim, 9,

Index 102, 108–9, 111–12, 119, 214; Western Canada and, 83. See also Central Canada Osoyoos community, 135 Ouillet, André, 76 Owen, Taylor, 163 Owram, Doug, 114 Pamajewan case (1996), 234 Partners in Confederation (Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples), 236 Pawley, Howard, 85 Pay Equity Act, 144 Pearson, Lester B., 164 Peterson, David, 93 Petito, Gabby, 183 Piketty, Thomas, 250 political institutions. See national institutions political leaders: apologies by, 188; and change, 12; and Constitution, 188–9; and institutions, 12; national institutions and, 188–9; in US compared to Canada, 38; and victimhood, 189 political power: anger and, 251; federal government and, 215–16; public policies and, 188; representation by population and, 97; in US compared to Canada, 38 politicians: abuse against, 163; and compromise, 249; cost vs contribution of, 166; decision-making process, 249–50; deference towards, 163; denigration of, 247; expectations of, 250; faults, 164, 248; and federal public servants, 165; healing of institutions, 247; media on, 250, 251; public opinion regarding, 162, 174, 247–8; public

321

scrutiny of, 162; public service by, 247; reasons for running for office, 163–4; and representative democracy, 247, 251; and rural areas, 171, 172; and Senate, 164; social media and, 163, 164; transparency and, 248–9; as victims, 162, 164, 174; working conditions, 250–1 The Politics of Public Spending in Canada (Savoie), 14, 195 Polysar, 73 populism, 18–19, 82 Porter, John, The Vertical Mosaic, 19 Potvin, Maryse, 218 Premium Brands Holdings, 133 prime ministers (Pm s): and Central Canada, 84, 85–6; and National Policy, 84; and national unity, 15; on provincial governments, 195; from Quebec, 59, 218 Prince Edward Island: bilingualism in, 33; and Confederation, 6, 61, 190; immigration to, 211; Newfoundland and, 60; numbers of senators, 94; during Second World War, 74 private sector: employment equity in, 143, 144; federal public service compared, 159; Indigenous peoples in, 143; members of visible minorities in, 143; persons with disabilities in, 143; women in, 143, 146, 147, 220 Progressive Party, 84, 86 provincial governments: and apologies, 176–7, 186–7; and employment equity, 142; federal government, and provincial legislation, 85, 190; federal spending power and, 195, 196; federalprovincial agreements and, 195–6;

322

Index

Great Depression and, 192–3; and hyphenated federalism, 195, 197; and Indigenous peoples, 126, 140, 195, 226, 227, 228; and Indigenous self-government, 241; Macdonald and, 190, 191; premiers and provincial interests, 190–1; prime ministers on, 195; and taxation, 64; as victims, 196; and welfare state, 201 public opinion: in Alberta, 98; on British empire, 182; of Canadian democracy, 199; of federal government, 199; on federal public servants, 164–5, 166; of Indigenous peoples, 138–40, 237, 238, 241; of lBgtq * community, 201; in Manitoba, 98; in New Brunswick, 98; in Nova Scotia, 98; in Ontario, 98; of political institutions, 199; of politicians, 162, 174, 247–8; of public servants, 174; in Quebec, 98; in Saskatchewan, 98; in Western Canada, 98 public participation in politics, 251–2 public policies: and Acadians, 221; and Black Canadians, 151; and business community, 157–9; and compromise, 188; and Indigenous peoples, 131–2, 151, 155, 246; and political power, 188; and rural areas, 172; status quo in, 28–9; and victimhood, 151, 187, 221; and Western Canada, 246 public servants: deference towards, 163; public opinion regarding, 174; public scrutiny of, 162; in urban vs rural areas, 172; as victims, 166, 174 public service: Acadians in, 33, 148, 233; belief in role of, 209; and

covId-19, 166; employment equity in, 142–8; in France, 97; Francophones in, 147; Francophones outside Quebec in, 28; in Great Britain, 97; and parallel bureaucracy creation, 35; transparency in, 240; as whale that can’t swim, 209. See also federal public service Public Service Commission, 145 Public Service Employment Act, 144, 145 Quebec: Acadians and, 27; agrarian lifestyle, 50, 59; Alberta and, 89, 216; Atlantic provinces and, 59; “bashing,” 218; Battle of, 203, 204, 205; Bill 96, 167–9; Bill 101/ Charter of the French Language, 167; childcare in, 197; Confederation and, 59, 64, 80, 82, 83, 190, 219; and Constitution Act (1982), 7; economic development, 59; and education, 27; and Energy East pipeline project, 64, 87–8, 99–100, 216; federal government and, 72, 78, 169, 215–19; federal public servants in, 97; and federal transfer payments, 59, 65, 99, 216, 218–19; federalism and, 59, 78, 218, 246; and Francophones outside Quebec, 219; French as official language, ix, 59, 218; identity, 116, 119; industrial activity in, 72; Maritime provinces and, 63–4, 75; as nation, ix, 59, 218; national institutions and, 80; national unity and, 79, 85, 88, 100, 108, 214; nationalism, 28, 114; and natural gas transmission through Saguenay, 100; numbers of mP s in,

Index 109, 119; numbers of votes from, 80; office locations in, 216; official languages in, 167–9; oil in, 99; populism in, 18; postwar reconstruction in, 74–5; prime ministers from, 59, 218; provincial vs federal government and, 219; public opinion in, 98; Quiet Revolution, 207; regional ministers in, 75, 99; representation in Supreme Court, 95; Roman Catholic Church in, 50, 59; and Rowell-Sirois Commission, 193; and Senate, 93, 94; separatism, 28, 98, 218; shipbuilding in, 109, 216–17; sovereignty, 78; and US, 37; as victim, 9, 59, 119, 216, 217, 218, 219; Western Canada and, 59, 83, 99–100. See also Central Canada Quebec Community Groups Network (qcgn ), 168 Quebec Francophones. See Francophone Quebecers racism: and Indigenous peoples as victims, 223, 237; and members of visible minorities, 161–2; and victimhood, 151, 153; and visible minorities, 152–3 Rae, Bob, 212 Rankin, Iain, 111 Reform Party, 82, 86, 93 regional economic development: in Atlantic Canada, 78–9; and Montreal, 78; numbers of agencies, 78–9; and Ontario, 78, 79 regional interests: federal government and, 212; and immigration, 211; Macdonald and, 8; national institutions and, 94, 100; in national policies, 165, 212; regional

323

identities vs national unity, 100; and regional ministers, 75, 99; regional representation in Supreme Court, 95; Senate and, 86, 87, 92, 93, 94, 100, 165; Upper Houses and, 200, 246 regions: economic imbalance among, 77–9; federal public service in ncr vs, 97, 239; and national identity, 188; as victims, 188 Regulus (ship), 149 representation by population: and Confederation, 62; and federal transfer payments, 79; and national vs regional importance, 70; and political power, 97; and Senate, 95; smaller provinces and, 95 representative democracy. See democracy/representative democracy research and development (R&D): in Central Canada, 118; in Ontario, 109, 213 Research Enterprises Limited, 73 reserves, 127, 129–30, 132–5; characteristics of, 135; economic development, 135–8, 228; establishment of, 123–4; impact of, 135; land for European settlers and, 132; and Loyalist lands, 132; New France and, 132; purpose of structure, 131–2; quality of land, 132–3; residential schools paralleling, 132; self-government and, 236–7; statistics, 132; and transparency, 132; transparency in, 240 residential schools, 130–1; apologies for, 130–1, 177; establishment of, 203; gravesites near, 178; legacy of, 131–2; remains of children found at sites, x, 131; reserves paralleling, 132; J. Trudeau on, 140

324

Index

responsibility: in federal government-en-Indigenous peoples relationship, 230; of governments for Indigenous peoples, 153; for Indigenous peoples as victims, 139–40, 223; and victimhood, 151–2, 221 Richard, Maurice “Rocket,” 34 Richard, Zachary, 24 Robichaud, Jean-Bernard, 204 Robichaud, Louis J., 23, 207–10; and Acadians, 28, 34, 36, 227; Augustine compared to, 231; and changes in New Brunswick, 28, 34; election as premier, 28; and Maritime union, 61; and New Brunswick’s social reform, 16; and provincial public service, 148 Rodriguez, Pablo, 99 Roman Catholic Church: Acadians and, 26–7; and Confederation, 27–8; and education, 27; French Canada and, 34; and Indigenous peoples, 132 Roosevelt, Franklin D., 192 Roosevelt, Theodore, 124, 250 Roseau River First Nation, 135 Ross, Donald, 37 Rowe, Malcolm, 95 Rowell-Sirois Commission, 77, 193, 194, 196, 214 Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, 120, 124, 128, 129, 133, 225; Partners in Confederation, 236 Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism report (Laurendeau-Dunton report), 29 Royal Commission on Chinese and Japanese Immigration, 160 Rudd, Kevin, 186

rural areas: advantages of, 175; challenges in, 171; covId -19 and, 172–3; federal government and, 172–3; Indigenous peoples in, 175; Indigenous rights and, 171; It sector in, 173; lifestyle in, 173; in Maritime provinces, 211; politicians and, 171, 172; population size, 171–2; public policies and, 172; socio-economic indicators, 175; urban-rural divide, 171–3, 174–5 Rural Economic Development Strategy, 172 Rural Secretariat, 172 Russell, Jennifer, 33 Russell, Peter, 102, 187 Russia, Senate in, 95 Saint John, NB: during Second World War, 74; shipbuilding in, 76–7 Saint-Maurice, NB, 21–4, 28, 34, 35, 120–1 Saskatchewan: alienation in, 3; in Buffalo province, 82–3; and Confederation, 82; and decentralization of federal public service, 215; and federal transfer payments, 214; fossil fuel sector in, 90; National Policy and, 110, 213; and pipelines, 88; public opinion in, 98; and US, 116. See also Western Canada Saudi Arabia: military manufacturing for, 106–8, 118; oil from, 88 Saugeen First Nation, 224 Savoie, Claude, 29–33 Savoie, Donald J.: Democracy in Canada, 244, 246–7; FederalProvincial Collaboration: The Canada-New Brunswick General

Index Development Agreement, 207; Governing from the Centre, 16, 17, 202, 246–7; I’m from Bouctouche, Me, 244; The Politics of Public Spending in Canada, 14, 195; What Is Government Good At?, 244 Scott, Duncan Campbell, 129 Second World War: and Central Canada, 77; creation of Crown corporations, 73, 75; federal government during, 73–5; and federal-provincial fiscal policies, 193; Japanese Canadians internment during, 160; manufacturing during, 73–5, 105–6, 213; Maritime provinces during, 73–5; and Ontario, 105–6, 213; postwar reconstruction, 74–5 self-government, Indigenous, 227, 234–8; in British Columbia, 242; and economic development, 234, 242; and education, 242; federal government and, 234–5, 236–7; flexibility in, 241–2; governance issues, 236–7; Indian Act and, 241; provincial governments and, 241; and sovereignty, 234; transparency in, 241; as work in progress, 235–6; in Yukon, 241–2 Senate/Upper Houses: abolition, 92, 93; Alberta and, 92; appointed vs elected, 251; in Australia, 94, 95; and Central Canada, 84, 100; and Chignecto Canal, 69, 70; Confederation and, 63, 92; and federal procurement decisions, 77; and federal public service concentration in ncr , 97; in federalism, 86; in Germany, 198–9; and Maritime provinces, 92; and

325

National Energy Program, 89; Ontario and, 93, 94; politicians and, 164; Quebec and, 93, 94; reform, 90, 94, 96, 101, 212; and regional interests, 86, 87, 92, 93, 94, 100, 165, 200, 246; representation by population in, 95; Russian, 95; and “sober second thought,” 93; in US, 63, 94, 95; Western Canada and, 84, 86, 92, 93 separatism: Alberta and, 98; Quebec and, 98; in Western Canada, 86 Seven Years’ War, 24, 26, 203 Sewell, James Patrick, 116 Sharp, Mitchell, 164 Shelton, W.G., 104 shipbuilding, 73, 74; in Maritime provinces, 75–7; in Quebec, 75, 76–7, 109, 216–17 Shirley, William, 24 Shoyama, Tommy, 161 Sierra Leone, 150 Sierra Leone Company, 205 Sifton, Clifford, 98 Simcoe, John Graves, 103, 105 Simpson, Jeffrey, 17, 76 Sinclair, Murray, 242–3 Sipkne’katik First Nation, 238–9 slavery, 179–80, 182, 184, 185 Slumkoski, Corey, 68–9 smaller provinces: federal government and, 87, 98; representation by population and, 95 Smallwood, Joey, 60 Smiley, Donald V., 86–7, 194 Smith, Albert, 62, 63, 65, 204 Smith, David E., 92 Smith, Goldwin, 37, 105 Social Credit movement, 82 social media. See media la Société Nationale des Acadiens, 35

326

Index

Sommet de la Francophonie, Moncton (1999), 34 sovereignty: Indigenous selfgovernment and, 234; Quebec, 78 Sparrow case (1990), 137, 234, 238 St Lawrence Seaway, 68–9, 70 St Lawrence-Great Lakes canals, 68–9 St Mary’s Bay, NS, fishery conflict in, 239, 240 Stanfield, Robert, 31 Steel Company of Canada, 74 St-Laurent, Louis, 77, 84, 164 Supreme Court of Canada: on fishery rights, 238; and patriation of Constitution, 96; regional representation on, 95; reliance on framers’ intent, 95–6; and selfgovernment, 234; and Senate, 91, 93, 96; and Western Canada, 95–6 Sustainable Forestry Initiative, 137 Sykes, Charles J., A Nation of Victims, 18 Tager, Michael, 177 Taylor, Alan, 103 Tellier, Paul, 148, 155 Tharoor, Shashi, 181–2 Thériault, Léon, 27 Thorburn, Hugh, 72 Thyssen Industries, 106 Tilley, Sir Samuel Leonard, 61–2, 65, 104, 204 Trans-Canada Highway, 68 transparency: in Indigenous communities/reserves, 132, 240; in Indigenous self-government, 241; media and, 249; in Membertou First Nation, 134; politicians and, 248–9; in public service, 240 Treaty of Utrecht, 24

Trudeau, Justin: apologies by, 186; apology to Italian Canadians, 177; and Atlantic Canada representation in Supreme Court, 95; on Bill 96, 168; on Canadian identity, 9; and childcare in Quebec, 197; Costa Rican holiday, 251; and covId 19, 111; and Energy East pipeline project, 87–8, 99–100; and Indigenous peoples, 147, 237; on Indigenous peoples and Canada Day, 178; and Marshall decision, 239; and minister for rural development, 172; and provincial governments, 195; and Quebec, 218, 219; and regional ministers, 75, 99; on remains of Indigenous children found at residential school sites, x; on residential schools, 140; and Saudi arms deal, 107, 108; and United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, 235 Trudeau, Pierre E.: and apologies, 177; on Atlantic provinces, 78; and Canada-US Free Trade Agreement, 112; and Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 96; on Clark and provincial governments, 195; Constitution patriation, 96; and dree, 78; on economic equality, 78; and federal-provincial relations, 13; and Francophone rights, 28; and French-language communities, 170; as leader of Liberal Party, 13–14; on opposition mP s, 191; and Quebec, 219; and Quebec’s place in federation, 96; and shipbuilding in Quebec vs New Brunswick, 76; on Western wheat, 85; White Paper, 228–9, 230 Trump, Donald, 37, 113, 251

Index Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada report, 130 Tsawwassen community, 135 Tsui, Lap-Chee, 154 Tupper, Charles, 62 Turner, John, 112 Two Solitudes (MacLennan), 19 unitary state: federalism vs, 94–5; geography and, 190; and institutions, 191; Macdonald and, 4, 63, 190 United Farmers of Alberta, 86 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, 120, 235 United States: and Afghanistan, 181; Alberta and, 116; and apologies, 179, 180, 182–3; apologies in, 177, 183; Atlantic provinces and, 115; Auto Pact and, 90–1; branch plants in Central Canada, 71–2; Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIa ), 177; and Canadian national interest, 115; Canadian National Policy and, 84, 117; Canadian opinions regarding, 113–14, 118; and Chignecto Canal, 69; Civil War, 149; colonialism by, 180–1; Confederation and, 117; Constitution, 198; executive-state relations in, 198; federal public service in, 97; Foreign Investment Review Agency and, 115; and Hawaii, 181, 185; imperialism of, 113–14; Indigenous peoples, 177, 183, 235; location of public servants in, 165; Maritime provinces and, 115–16, 117; and Mexico, 37, 181; and National Energy Program, 89; New Deal in, 192; oil

327

from, 88; Ontario and, 103, 105, 108, 111–18; politicians in, 248; public opinion regarding government in, 199, 200; Quebec and, 37; representative democracy in, 251; rural-urban polarization in, 174; Saskatchewan and, 116; Senate, 63, 86, 94, 95; and shipbuilding in Canada, 74; and slavery, 149, 180, 182; and St Lawrence Seaway, 68; Supreme Court, 95; territorial representation in national institutions, 93–4; and Texas, 181; victimhood in, 176; violence against Native American women in, 183; Western Canada and, 116. See also American Revolution Université de Moncton, 28, 234; faculty members, 33; government assistance to, 35; renaming, 204; student protests, 29–33 Université Sainte-Anne, 33, 234 Upper Canada: and “family compact,” 105; impasse with Lower Canada, 10, 60; Loyalists in, 103, 112–13; loyalty to Crown, 103 Upper Houses. See Senate/Upper Houses urban areas: covId -19 in, 173; House of Commons seats, 171; immigrants in, 171; It sector in, 173; in Maritime provinces, 211; public servants in, 172; urban-rural divide, 171–3, 174–5 US Indian Self-Determination Act (1975), 235 The Vertical Mosaic (Porter), 19 The Victim Cult (Milke), 17, 18

328

Index

victimhood: accountability for, 151–2; advantages of, 35; bringing groups together, 221–2; Canadian acknowledgment of past, 162; in Canadian culture, 176, 187; Charter of Rights and Freedoms and, 221; Constitution and, 7, 100; employment equity and, 144, 145–6; government revenues in, 36; government spending and, 187; history and, 151; hybrid federalism and, 10; hyphenated federalism and, 194; of indifference, 59; national institutions and, 7, 100; opinions regarding, 244–5; political leaders and, 189; populism and, 18–19; public policies and, 151, 187; racism and, 151, 153; reconciliation commissions and, 221; responsibility and, 151–2, 221; transition away from, 147, 202–3, 221–2; universality of, 157; “victim” as term, 221; victimization and, 221; white males and, 4, 142, 145; winners/losers and, 187. See also subheading as victims under names of groups and places Vietnamese refugees, 153 visible minorities, members of: defined, 147; in federal public service, 143–4, 145; as immigrants, 153–4; prejudices against, 161–2; in private sector, 143; racism and, 152–3 Vollhardt, Johanna Ray, 221 Wagamese, Richard, Indian Horse, 122 Waiser, Bill, 83 Wall, Brad, 87 War of the Spanish Succession, 24

Waters, Stan, 92 welfare state, 194, 201 Welland Canal, 66, 68 Western Canada: and alienation, 8–9; annual conference, 215; Black Americans in, 150; Canada-US Free Trade Agreement in, 112; Central Canada and, 84, 85–6; Confederation and, 82, 96–7, 99, 100, 204–5; economic development, 78, 83; federal government and, 78, 82, 85–8, 91, 94, 215; federal public service decentralization and, 215; and federal transfer payments, 96, 99, 214–16; and federalism, 100, 101; and Foreign Investment Review Agency, 115; House of Commons and, 84; identity, 116; and international development sector, 118; malaise in, 98; National Energy Program and, 89–90, 214; national institutions and, 6, 86, 88, 99, 100–1; national policies and, 96–7; National Policy and, 71, 83–5, 214, 216; and national unity, 100, 214; and natural resources, 98; oil and gas industry, 83, 99; and Ontario, 83; pipeline issues in, 88; populism in, 18, 82; protest movements, 86; public opinion in, 98; public policies and, 246; and Quebec, 59, 83, 99–100; and Senate, 84, 86, 90, 92, 93, 96, 212; separatism in, 86; Supreme Court and, 95–6; third parties in, 84, 101; and US, 116; as victim, 98, 99, 101, 215, 216 Western Canada Concept, 86 What Is Government Good At? (Savoie), 244

Index Wheare, Sir K.C., 207 wheat, 84, 101 White Canadians, political institutions and, 224–5 white males, 4, 142, 145 Wien, Fred, 133, 134 Williams, Danny, 177 Wilson, Michael, 8, 98 Wilson-Raybould, Jody, 135, 168 Winnipeg, and cF -18 maintenance contract, 85 Wolfe, James, 203, 204, 205 women: Black Canadian, 151; employment, 141, 220; in federal public service, 143, 146, 147, 148,

329

155, 219, 220; population percentage, 147; in private sector, 143, 146, 147, 220; as university students, 141; as victims, 146, 219, 220; workplace environment, 220; and workplace productivity, 146 World Economic Forum, 173 Wright, Tony, 250 Yankee, Go Home (Granatstein), 17, 118 Yukon, Indigenous self-government in, 241–2 Yukon First Nations Self-Government Act, 242