JaredMilne 
Forum Elite
Posts: 1465
Posted: Thu Jun 18, 2015 4:36 pm
(Like an idiot, I jumped the gun on this thread by only responding to the tagline without reading the article itself. So I'll try this again...)
Justin Trudeau's covering a lot of ground in this speech. Let's see exactly what he's promising...
An End To First Past The Post: Like I said in my previous post, this system doesn't really fit Canada well, since it was designed for a time when Canada was much smaller. The UK has twice the MPs, and yet that country is about the size of the Maritimes, as opposed to Canada, which has a very large size and a very uneven population dispute. It also makes us look more polarized than we really are, given that it makes some regions look like they exclusively support certain political parties when local voting patterns are actually much more nuanced.
Any proposal to make every vote count would be terrific...provided that you get the details right. The Constitution still requires every province to have a minimum amount of representation, and we'd need to determine exactly how to ensure that constituents still know which MP to contact if they need to. Local representation still counts for a lot when Canadians need their MP's help with something.
Mandatory And Online Voting: I'm lukewarm to the first and opposed to the second. Mandatory voting would be difficult to enforce, while online voting offers way too many ways to be rigged. You can't really hack a paper ballot or a physical ballot box the way you would an electronic one.
A Clearer Definition Of "Political Activity" By Charities: I love this one. The current rules are far too vague on what constitutes political activity by charities, make it easy for governing parties to use the CRA to crack down on charities whose messages disagree with the government's, while conveniently leaving aside charities whose political activity largely agrees with the governing party's agenda (coughFraserInstitutecough).
A Proactive CRA: This one sounds good on paper-having CRA agents tell Canadians when they qualify for certain tax credits. However, there are indications that CRA staff are already overworked as it is, and they've been criticized for giving inaccurate information plenty of times already, so this one could end up turning into a gong show if staff end up wasting people's time and getting their hopes up for no reason. Besides, this is going to require more staff in general.
Filing Taxes For Canadians Who Have Not Had Substantial Income Changes From The Previous Tax Year: Again, this sounds good on paper, but I'd prefer to make it an opt-in program, particularly given that some people might not like the CRA mucking with their tax forms without giving them a chance to review it first.
Reviving The Long Form Census, Reducing Access To Information Fees And Banning Wasteful Partisan Ads: I love the first two, but the third one's pretty iffy in my view. Like political activity by charities, the exact definition of "wasteful" partisan ads could be pretty vague. What one person thinks is legitimately informing Canadians of government services and benefits could be someone else's partisan hackery. I'd want more details on that.
But otherwise, two out of three ain't bad!
The Verdict: Trudeau's laid out some good ideas, although some of them seem to me like they look better on paper than in practice. The devil's going to be in the details for a lot of them-reforming FPTP, especially, could turn into a gong show, while I'd want to hear the details on defining "partisan" ads and the CRA filing tax forms for Canadians.
The real problem I have, though, is not so much the ideas but the fact that the Liberals were making similar game-changing promises over 20 years ago in the Red Book. After all, they broke what would have been some of the most beneficial promises, including a promise to review NAFTA before signing it with the possibility of backing out, of increasing the power of individual MPs, and moving towards Aboriginal self-government. I'm sure a lot of people are just as suspicious that Justin doesn't mean any of this stuff, and that he's just like the same politicians he criticizes, despite his image of youth and change.
To be fair, the Liberals did keep some substantial promises, such as their support for EI reform, gun control and balancing the budget. However, that brings us to the other problem...
...namely, that Justin Trudeau isn't exactly his father's son in terms of brains.
I overstated my case when I said that Justin may possibly the policy smarts of a tree stump, but for all his screw-ups Pierre also had some very impressive successes too. Even if Justin does try and implement his platform, I can see a lot of things going pear-shaped simply because the policies are poorly implemented. I suppose it might depend on how much Justin would delegate to smarter Cabinet ministers like Stéphane Dion (who, despite his lack of political skill, was a damn good Intergovernmental Affairs Minister), but that's all speculation at this point.
