Changes to NCC, CIDA for the best, Baird says

Former Liberal minister Axworthy supports integrated aid approach

Ottawa residents who go to Winterlude or Canada Day on Parliament Hill won’t notice much of a difference after the NCC hands over responsibility for celebrations to the Department of Canadian Heritage, Ottawa West-Nepean MP John Baird told supporters on Saturday.

“Canada Day is half run by Canadian Heritage and half by the NCC,” he told about 300 people at a breakfast for constituents.

“We’ve decided to consolidate the works on those kinds of festivities. If you go to Canada Day, you won’t notice much of a difference.”

In a speech that skipped over the main elements of the federal budget, Baird, who is also Foreign Affairs minister, touched on one other budget measure that has attracted criticism — rolling the Canadian International Development Agency in with Canada’s diplomatic and trade services to form a new Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development.

Baird said this was for the best. “It will make our aid more effective,” he said.

With the role of promoting the capital going to Canadian Heritage, the NCC is left with a reduced roster of responsibilities. Some critics say the NCC is withering, while others argue it was already bloated and needed pruning.

Meanwhile, observers in the aid community have also been ambivalent about rolling CIDA in with diplomatic and trade services.

Baird has argued the merger will give development the full strength of Canada’s presence abroad, and others have noted that the presence of business gives real muscle to improving lives in the developing world. Critics have wondered if some of the world’s most vulnerable people will lose out to the interests of diplomacy and business.

Baird told the constituents he was surprised at the support for the changes he has received from unexpected sources. One of these was Lloyd Axworthy, who was a Liberal foreign affairs minister from 1996 to 2000.

In an article in the Globe and Mail, Axworthy said he believed an integrated approach was needed “that would enable the government to use the various tools of diplomacy, trade and development to achieve its goals.”