It’s time for the silent majority to be heard
Activist minorities are overruling will of the masses, writes Roger More.
An enduring feature of Canada’s democratic and free society has been majority rule.
It is simple in concept: in political decisions and situations that affect a majority of Canadian citizens, the choice will be the decision the majority supports. It is far from perfect or clear in many situations.
Sadly, majority rule has collapsed in some recent critical political choices. In many cases, these decisions, with huge economic impacts on the vast majority of Canadians, have degenerated into the rule of small, powerful, activist and ideologically driven minorities with wildly disproportionate power in the situation, combined with no real political majority checks and balances.
The most egregious current example is the Canadian oil and gas situation, at both the federal and provincial government levels. In British Columbia, in the recent provincial election, a tiny minority of Green party MLAs (three seats) held the balance of power in the legislature. The NDP cynically embraced a Green coalition government to seize power over the Liberals.
Prior to this, the majority provincial Liberals had supported both the Trans Mountain oil pipeline expansion and major LNG projects. Both these energy projects represented multibillion-dollar investments and huge job creation that would financially benefit not just B.C., but the majority of Canadians.
The federal government, which by definition represents the majority of Canadians, supported both projects.
The minute the socialist NDP took power in B.C., they abruptly stopped or stalled both projects. Why? Clearly, it was implicitly the price of Green party support.
The Green party represents a narrow, single-issue (environment), ideology-driven anti-oil-and-gas political perspective. As a result, we have the worst example of a tiny minority of three activist Greens in one province literally defeating a majority project decision that would hugely benefit millions of Canadians.
To make matters more difficult, they have the support of another powerful minority group, the Indigenous community.
In response, the federal government has caved in, and apparently will allow them to get away with it.
Moving to Quebec, we have a parallel example of minority power. The mayor of Montreal, with the implicit support of the Quebec government, is blocking the cross-Canada Energy East pipeline project, again involving billions of dollars in investment and thousands of jobs.
In total, all of these politicians represent a small minority of Canadian taxpayers.
We need to challenge the fundamental political processes and locus of power for major oil and gas and other major projects that cut across provincial boundaries and profoundly affect the financial welfare of all Canadians. The Canadian political majority, as represented by the federal government, must have the ultimate decision on these projects.
This raises the thorny issue of provincial powers and federal-provincial relationships. In this critical national resources area, we have ceded far too much power to the provincial governments, which clearly empowers and sustains the power of activist minorities to overwhelm majority rule.
It will be difficult to change, but will be critical for Canada to move back to true majority rule, real democracy and a strong economy for all taxpayers in the future.