National Post
Published: Wednesday, June 27, 2001 Policy is the antidoteWith our opposition parties terminally engaged in navel-gazing leadership and political structure battles, and the Liberals governing by press conference and photo-op, there is little, if any, substantive discussion of coherent public policy in this country. This absence of policy debate is as dangerous as the prospect of eternal one-party rule as discussed recently in this paper’s editorials. The current malaise is partly due to the homogeneity of party positions. Consider the unanimity of all parties on the health-care file during the last election. Each joyfully espoused the “more money equals better health care” fallacy and then quibbled over whom could best manage our Soviet-style, public health-care monopoly. What the parties must offer up instead are concrete and diverse policies that address the economy, governance, and social issues. Good policy is a prerequisite for political discourse grounded in principle and relevance. On economic matters, the challenges are self-evident. We must adjust our tax mix away from income taxes (personal and corporate) toward consumption taxes. The mantra of tax reform efforts must be simpler, lower and flatter. These efforts should be coupled with expenditure reductions through privatization, Crown asset divestitures, constitutional limits on how much our politicians can spend, and be buttressed by a legislated schedule of debt reduction. Second, articulation of a two-track trade policy is essential. The escalation of trade wars (read: Ottawa vs. Brazil) does not serve our long-term economic interests. Government subsidies should not be seen as a source of competitive advantage, no matter how specific or short-term we are told they will be. Taxpayers in Canada and Brazil are both held hostage in this scenario. Canada should adopt a more aggressive policy stance in future trade negotiations that aim to level the international playing field for all. As well, corporate subsidy rent-seekers (even political donors) should be shown the door. The government should turn off both faucets of the subsidy tap: direct grants and loans as well as targeted tax credits. Nationally, a plan to reduce inter-provincial trade barriers is needed. The 1994 Agreement on Internal Trade (AIT) is similar to a book with chapter titles, but no text. Labour mobility under the agreement is still restricted for many professions and political will to adhere to the AIT timetable is non-existent. Ottawa has a responsibility to make the economic union work. To ignore this problem while embracing international agreements and promoting multilateral trading frameworks, as the Liberals are doing, is sheer hypocrisy. Third, we cannot continue to ignore our number one economic generator: Canada’s cities. In 1867, one out of five Canadians lived in urban centres; now, it’s 82%. Cities fuel our gross domestic product, yet they cannot continue to deliver public transportation, infrastructure, and myriad social services on the current property tax base. Subsidiarity should be a pre-eminent principle of organizing government. To this end, Ottawa must facilitate — not lead — constitutional discussions to ultimately change the relationship between the three orders of government to cede more power to the provinces and cities. Moving to institutional issues, governance is key. Taxpayers are demanding concrete performance results as the best measure of the value for their tax dollars. The practice of government spin-doctors or the Prime Minister deflecting criticism with shallow analyses of how much is spent on various programs is useless. Tangible measures that focus on outputs, not inputs, must become the benchmark for evaluating government program effectiveness. As for Parliament, solutions such as free votes and committees actually empowered to improve legislation have been crying to be adopted for several years. Outside Parliament, voting reform and reflective democracy measures must form the bedrock of any governance reform initiative. Our first-past-the-post, winner-take-all voting system is obsolete and ill-suited for a post-industrial democracy such as Canada. A national referendum on ditching this system with a follow-up vote to adopt a more proportional system is long overdue. Finally, serious issues of cross-generational fairness in social policy including health-care reform, public pensions and aboriginal policy must be tackled. The Canada Health Act must be modernized. The current principles of universality, accessibility, comprehensiveness and portability, can all be rolled into universality as public opinion polls clearly show that Canadians believe them to be one in the same. Public administration should give way to public governance: a truer reflection of the health system’s current and likely future organization. New principles of choice, accountability, quality and sustainability should be added. Apart from historic tax cuts, the Bush presidency is poised for partial privatization of the social security system. This should reinvigorate our dormant public pension debate. While government actuaries tell us the CPP is stable, reports indicate that between 66%-75% of Canadians disagree. Today, CPP premiums stand at 7.8%. They’re on track to hit 9.9% by 2003. Back in 1966 — when the CPP was instituted — premiums were pegged to never rise above 5.25%. Indeed, we were told they would only reach 5.1% in the year 2025. To compensate, Ottawa has set up the CPP Investment Board to invest a portion of CPP funds in market instruments. It’s time to let Canadians invest this money for themselves in their own retirement vehicles. The issue of cross-generational fairness also has specific relevance for Canada’s aboriginal peoples. Almost two-thirds of our native population is under the age of 35: their baby boom is happening now. Implementing a series of reforms in concert with aboriginal leaders including individual property rights, transparent and accountable band governance and abolition of the Indian Act (Canada’s version of institutionalized apartheid) would all be steps in the right direction. Canada’s political parties -- especially it’s so-called small “c” conservative ones -- must seize upon these ideas. One-party rule is a dangerous and debilitating democratic illness; an antidote of policy is the first step towards a cure. |