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Interview with Calgary Congress Speaker
LEON CRAIG
On the weekend of September 29, Calgary played host to a remarkable
national event called the Calgary Congress. It’s a special
assembly open to the public to debate and resolve better federal
principles for governing Canada.
Though all other speakers at the Congress are firmly federalist, University
of Alberta political philosophy professor emeritus Leon Craig will
argue the case for Alberta independence. On two valid opinion
polls within the past year, over 40% of Albertans expressed interest in
(though not necessarily commitment to) separation. Dr. Craig will
present economic, cultural and political reasons for Alberta -- and
perhaps other western provinces - to exercise their constitutional
right to secede from the Canadian federation.Danielle Smith
He was interviewed recently on this subject by Calgary Congress
co-chair Danielle Smith.
The full interview follows:
Q: Let’s begin with that column you wrote in the Calgary
Herald last summer advocating Alberta separation -- indeed an Alberta
republic. It got a lot of support at that time, but in the meantime
there has been a major change in government at the federal level. Has
that or anything else changed your view about the need for Alberta
independence?
A: I want to make what might seem a minor clarification. I never called
for an “Alberta republic.” I favour an Alberta
Commonwealth. Many of my friends who favour independence go for the
republic version, but I like the Queen, so I would prefer to stay as a
Commonwealth. It’s part of our tradition. If we were to have
our own police force I think it would be nice if we could call it the
Royal Alberta Mounted Police.
With respect to your main question, has anything changed my view about
the desirability of independence? No, it hasn’t, but I am
less optimistic about the prospect of it in the immediate future.
On the one hand, rationally, this would be the time to go.
We’re prosperous, everything is going well for us, we can
afford the transition costs and so on. But it seems to me that most
people would be even more reluctant to take a chance. This is generally
the case when you’re enjoying great prosperity, you
don’t want to rock the boat.
We now have a Conservative government led by a Westerner doing several
things that most Albertans would approve of. We are pleased to see a
more serious interest in beefing up our military, improved relations
with the U.S. and so on. My own suspicion though, is this simply
arouses false hopes about the long run.
When you watch what the Conservatives are doing, they are a minority
government and, of course, they want to be a majority government. They
are not going to get that from the West; they have already pretty much
sewn up the West. So their behaviour is going to be what any government
in their situation would attempt, and that is to go all out to woo
Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes – that’s where
there’s votes to be won. So, sure enough, the structural
character of the Canadian regime will assert itself and nothing
essentially is going to change. That’s my prognosis.
So, it was rational for us to be independent before, it continues to be
rational for us to be independent now.
Q: Let’s talk then about why you say it is rational for us to
be independent. What are some of the big problems?
A: There is simply, first of all, the economic argument: what we are
paying in order to remain part of this federation. That’s not
negligible -- in fact, the bill has gone up, not down, since I wrote
that essay last year.
My concerns are not primarily material, in terms of how much more money
we could put in the pockets of Albertans; I’m concerned about
the effect of eastern Canada on the moral and cultural environment of
Alberta in the long run.
We have to realize the amount of subsidization we provide to the rest
of the country has been used in the past primarily to finance
a corrupt Liberal party. Upon recognizing that, it is not
just that we are being nice guys and generous, we are in fact morally
complicit in the corruption, and we have to put a stop to it. So, the
money factor has a moral dimension to it.
Second, almost all economists agree that the kind of subsidization the
so-called have-not provinces have been enjoying is really not in their
interest, either: Undermining their own self-sufficiency, retarding the
development of productivity and so on.
But inasmuch as we believe in democracy, I think we get something more
approaching the benefits of democratic government if we keep our
government closer to home. An independent Alberta with its capital in
Edmonton is within one day’s driving distance of any place in
the province. It is manageable for Albertan politicians, if they apply
themselves, to go out and meet the people. It takes time, but
I’m sure all the provincial [Conservative] leadership
candidates right now are traveling all over the province meeting with
groups and hearing what people have to say. This opens up the
opportunity for something like genuine democracy. There are some real
downsides to democracy, but in our present federal system we have the
downside and none of the benefits.
With a country as large as ours, and with government as large and as
remote as Ottawa is from Alberta, there would be real advantages to our
being able to actually rule ourselves. Because as things stand right
now, our voice counts for virtually nothing, and it really
doesn’t matter which party is in power. If we vote for a
party that is not in power, then we have negligible influence. But even
if we vote for a party as we have, that is actually in government, that
party is going to be dominated in its caucus by the eastern section of
the country. So, it really doesn’t matter whether we vote for
the winners or the losers, we have very little control over national
policies. Whereas if we were independent, we would potentially have
very effective control over cultural and social and economic and
educational policies, and particularly over the courts, and there are
real advantages to our doing so.
Q: Is this a problem of all large countries, or is it unique to Canada?
In the U.S. they don’t seem to have nascent separatist
movements.
A: You’re right. The whole background of my objection to our
remaining is what I see as the defects of the Canadian regime. In the
United States, when a person from Wyoming or Alabama votes for his
local representative or senator, those people that are elected are
answerable to their own constituency. Their fate does not hinge on
whether their party achieves a majority in Parliament, as in Canada.
Consequently you have an entirely different political system.
Local representatives or local senators actually have independent
power. They are answerable to their local constituency. Almost all
elections for the Senate and the House of Representatives are
determined by local issues. As such, that returns a certain amount of
democratic control to the electorate and that is what we lose here.
As has been the case now for several elections, the national Liberals
can, in effect, run against Alberta, they can treat Alberta as the
bogeyman. And once again it doesn’t matter who we elect.
So, it is a great difference in our two regimes. Though I think it
remains the case that the scale of polities that one finds in the
modern world does make democracy something of a charade.
If you are going to have a democracy and you want to enjoy the benefits
of a democracy, where people are actually able to exert some control
over their common lives, a smaller polity allows for that much more
than a larger one, for obvious reasons.
Q: How would you answer people who say, “My father or my
grandfather fought for this country and now you want to tear it
apart”?
A: It’s already been betrayed since the Trudeau era. The
Canada that people like to hearken back to – Dieppe, and that
sort of thing – Central Canada has turned its back on that,
it seems to me.
But there are competing moral claims having to do with obligations to
future Albertans. We have what could be a land of great promise, and it
will be, if we don’t allow it to be bled white.
I would add, it’s a land of promise to enterprising Canadians
everywhere. As we know, they are flooding into our province right now.
Alberta is not going anywhere. There’s no reason at all why
we can’t have continuing ties with the other Canadian
provinces, and very amicable ones. But there is no reason why we should
be supporting a whole other level of government, and a bloated one at
that, that doesn’t really serve our interests.
Q: The purpose of the Calgary Congress is to try to find a federal
alternative; to put forward constitutional amendments that would
mitigate against this culture of entitlement by moving toward an
equalization and transfer system that encourages productivity and
self-sufficiency. In your view, is there any realistic hope of this
actually happening?
A: When you say is there any hope, yes. The question is, is there much
hope? I think probably not a lot. International factors will impinge
upon the whole country in a way that’s going to pressure it
in that direction to some extent. But there’s an awful lot of
inertia. There’s a lot of vested interests against the kind
of changes that would have to take place.
I would go on to say there is almost no hope of Alberta being able to
promote such changes, unless we are genuinely prepared to declare
independence. Because if we’re not, why would the rest of
Canada pay any attention to us? Why would they care what we think?
There’s only one stick that we can wave, such that our words
would be listened to, and that is our independence. If we’re
not prepared for independence, psychologically prepared and materially
prepared, our protests aren’t going to carry significant
weight.
Q: Do you think the Quebec strategy would work in Alberta: They have
always threatened separation to get what they want – more
transfers from Ottawa. Don’t you think Albertans would reject
that hammer approach, having seen how Quebec has essentially been able
to blackmail the country?
A: As I said in the essay I wrote last year, I don’t believe
in that kind of strategy: bluster, get paid off, be quiet for a little
while, bluster some more. I genuinely would prefer independence and I
think that we ought to be genuinely committed to it as the only
alternative to very significant constitutional changes to the Canadian
regime.
As your use of the word blackmail indicates, that sort of Quebec
strategy is not morally attractive. I certainly wouldn’t be
framing it in those terms, to say the least.
I’m in favour of us being serious about independence. If as a
consequence of our seriousness, we got a significantly different
Canada, then I think anybody would say we would have to reassess the
situation.
But even a fixed Canada isn’t as attractive to me as an
independent Alberta. So there is still the case in favour of a
government that’s closer to the people, that is more in tune
with the social and cultural views of its people, and none of that is
touched by reforms of Canada.
Q: One of the things Preston Manning talks about is focused federalism.
Isn’t there some value in having Ottawa focus on defence,
international trade, foreign relations, and immigration, and for
provinces to focus on delivery of social services? Or do you see value
in Alberta having its own army, and undertaking its own trade
relations, and having independent foreign relations with other
countries?
A: Yes I do, because our interests are not identical with the interests
of Quebec. I was just reading of a poll on the war going on in the
Middle East, and how different the Quebec electorate responds from the
rest of country.
But with respect to material interests: We have our own independent
interests and we could pursue them vigorously without any need to
compromise with people whose interests are really at cross-purposes
with ours, so there are real advantages.
The one thing that causes me the most hesitation is international
terrorism. Could we have an intelligence operation that is as
potentially effective as CSIS? I think that is a tougher question to
answer. But as far as us having an effective military? Yes, we could.
We are already a province of four million, it is easy to conceive of
Alberta as a population of 10 million. The province of Alberta is
geographically as large as France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium
and Luxembourg combined. We are as large as the Iberian Peninsula. This
is not a small place and it’s very lightly populated as it
stands right now. It has a great deal of potential. Could we be a
middle power in the world within 20 years? Yes, I think we could.
Q: Is our success, our independence, predicated on having a larger
population?
A: I think our long-term success is predicated on our population
increasing, and this leads into a very, very dark subject, and that is
demographics. All of the Western representative democracies have wedded
themselves to a welfare state which requires a large working population
to support it. What is happening to Europe, it seems to me, dooms
Europe. Their birth rate has fallen so low they can’t
reproduce themselves, so they’ve got an aging population and
a shrinking workforce.
Given the demographic statistics on Canada generally, right now,
we’re in the same boat. It takes roughly 2.1 children per
woman to maintain the population. Canada-wide our actual figure is
about 1.5. There are enormous problems on the horizon and Alberta can
avoid those, but it does require that our population grow.
Q: What would make Alberta such a beacon that we could end up doubling
or tripling our population?
A: First of all, we offer, as things stand right now, the possibility
of an improved standard of living for a lot of people. If we were
independent and no longer had to support this bloated federal
government, again as I said in my essay last year, we could have the
most attractive tax base for both individuals and business in all of
North America. Consequently, we have an educated population, we could
be attracting corporations and businesses of all kinds and truly have a
diversified economy.
And Lord knows Alberta is an absolutely wonderful place to live. We are
blessed with our natural resources, and our natural resources include
our wonderful recreational areas. Our climate is not to
everyone’s taste – but we live here, we cope!
– and the summers are generally pretty nice.
Q: But perhaps the perception that Alberta is a limited-government,
low-tax regime is almost mythical. Our program spending is higher than
any other province. In B.C. the teachers and unions are saying they
need higher wages to catch up with Alberta. Our public sector is
growing spectacularly. So it almost seems like we’re offering
both: We’re offering socialism at a discount because we can
subsidize it with our royalties.
A: Yes. I don’t at all agree with last half a dozen years of
the Klein administration. But again, if we were a sovereign country,
every Albertan would be paying much more attention to what the
provincial government does. Right now virtually everybody thinks that
the government that really matters is Ottawa, and consequently, I think
the provincial government gets away with a whole lot that it
shouldn’t.
If we were independent, there would be much more rigorous scrutiny. We
would have an Auditor General with real power. I don’t
romanticize Alberta politics: we have had our fair share of scandals
and there is really no excuse for them.
That then becomes a choice: Do we want to just keep spending, spending,
spending and create a monstrous provincial political establishment or
do we want to have one that simply answers to genuine needs, and
let’s people keep their own money and spend it as they please.
Q: But are you saying we’ll never have that more honest
discussion until people are focused on the provincial level of
government?
A: I think that’s right. I think this leadership campaign is
a splendid opportunity to engage in that very debate. I already have
heard from a number of these candidates about all the programs they
want to institute. These things then become burdens for the entire
future. I think that’s what we want to avoid.
Q: What future do you see for Alberta under the existing federal
framework?
A: I would just expect continued exploitation. But
I would also expect that our provincial government, whoever leads it,
would continue to seek greater autonomy. With what success will depend
partly on their own abilities, but also on who’s in charge in
Ottawa.
I am especially leery of the continuing cultural influence of central
Canada, and for the most part, the kinds of autonomy that are sought by
the provincial government have to do with economic matters and not with
education, not with criminal justice, not with religion, and culture
and so on.
Q: But if Alberta were to secede, would there be natural pressure for
us to reunite in some way in a new federation: To refederate ultimately
down the road?
A: Yes, I think there would and there is nothing wrong with that.
If Alberta were to separate and make a success of it, and I have really
no doubt that we would, within very short order B.C. would do the same
– that would be my prediction. Is there a natural harmony of
interests with B.C., and perhaps Saskatchewan and even Manitoba? Yes, I
think there would be, to say nothing about the rest of Canada.
There is no reason at all why we should not be in a special economic
union with all the rest of what is now Canada, I see no problem with
that. But we would be entering into it as an autonomous commonwealth,
able to make of that arrangement something that suits us.
Q: So we would never again give up the powers that we should have
retained in the first place -- thereby avoiding this problem of Ottawa
dominating?
A: Exactly. We would avoid having a whole sector of our government
concerned with how to deal with Ottawa. We actually have a ministry
whose entire reason for existence is federal-provincial relations.
Q: Do you see anyone on the provincial Tory leadership horizon with the
drive to make this vision for an autonomous Alberta happen?
A: I don’t. What I intend to say at the Calgary Congress, as
strongly and persuasively as I can, is that the common ground between
people seeking to reform the Canadian regime and those such as myself
who would prefer an independent Alberta -- the common ground we have is
the Alberta Agenda [i.e. making maximum use of established provincial
rights]. Independence is not a realistic proposition unless we have our
own pension plan, our own police, and collect our own taxes. If we lack
those capacities, independence is not an option. So we ought to have
those regardless. And anybody that favours a resuscitation of the
Canadian polity should be in favour of those too. Consequently we
shouldn’t be supporting anybody for the leadership race who
is not committed to the Alberta Agenda.
In light of that, the one obvious candidate out there that is
identified with it – and I have the highest regard for him
even though he and I have a profound disagreement over the desirability
of independence – and that is Ted Morton.
Q: But if Alberta were to implement the Alberta Agenda, would that be
enough?
A: I don’t know that it would be enough. For me
it’s a necessary first step. It is a necessary first step
also for people who favour reforming the Canadian regime. I go back to
my initial point. We have nothing to bargain with other than our
independence. If we are not in favour of the Alberta Agenda, we are not
really serious about independence, and if we are not really serious
about independence, then we just talk.
Q: One last question: Do you think Ottawa would let us go? The Clarity
Act provides a mechanism to separate if we get a clear majority on a
clear question. It authorizes Ottawa to engage in negotiations to that
end. But do you think they would actually let us go, or do you think it
would result in armed conflict?
A: I don’t think armed conflict is a possibility. Absolutely
not – for reasons that are not altogether flattering to the
rest of Canada.
Q: Because we don’t have a functioning army?
A: That’s it – I’m not sure we could
defeat Uruguay.
But nobody is going to go that route. If we did get from our own
electorate a mandate to separate, and negotiations began,
there’s a whole range of things to negotiate about: our
continuing economic relations, our share of the national debt and so on.
But I don’t foresee that as a serious problem -- any more
than I foresee a problem with our lack of a port. The fact remains that
both national railroads run right through Alberta. That’s
enough.
Q: And we do have air travel.
A: Absolutely. And I think more than half of our extra-provincial trade
is North-South; it’s not East-West. |
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