National Post Calls for the End of Equalization Payments

Three cheers for the National Post today who published an editorial calling for the end of the equalization payment scam:

That leaves Quebec, which will get $8-billion in equalization this year, almost 60% of the total. Though Quebec politicians would protest loudly at any threat to this jackpot, anyone visiting Quebec would be hard-pressed to find justification for the lavish outlay. Whether in terms of schools, universities, health care, social services, industry, culture or business, Quebec is as advanced and sophisticated a society as exists in Canada, having prospered mightily in recent years. Yet it continues to receive massive annual payments from other provinces, even as its noisy nationalists proclaim themselves a "nation," fully capable of handling their own affairs.

The situation no longer makes sense, and the longer it is allowed to drag on the more damaging and politically divisive it will become. Politically docile as they have been trained to be, Ontario residents are unlikely to quietly accept a continued annual outflow of billions of dollars to other provinces while their own services suffer and unemployment approaches double digits. Alberta, despite its image as the land of plenty, will struggle to meet its own needs until another oil boom comes along. Neither province should be expected to keep running deficits to finance programs in other provinces that long ago caught up to their own.

We need more of this kind of talk in Canada. Quebec lives off the fruits of the rest of Canada's labor, and feels entitled to it. To show their appreciation, they elect a separatist party to the majority of their federal seats in every election since 1993. People are finally starting to wake up to the scam. Desperate times do create opportunities. When money is tight, people start watching where their dollars go.

On that note, I hope the National Post survives as a newspaper. You'd never see this kind of idea in the Globe and Mail, and certainly not the Star.

Sending Equalization Payments to Ontario

Looks like Ontario joins the money draining provinces along with Quebec, Manitoba and the Maritimes. Ontario now on the dole

Ontario is now a province of haves and have-not.

As of today, the province is an official recipient of equalization payments for the first time in its history, joining other "have-not" provinces that receive monthly cheques from the federal government.

Yet just the day before, the province released its Sunshine List that shows 53,572 people who work in the Ontario public sector made more than $100,000 in 2008.

Overall, the list of publicly funded "haves" has once again grown much faster than Ontario's economy -- up 26% from last year. It's now almost double what it was in 2005 and includes 10% of the entire Ontario Public Service.

(...)

Ontario will also be the beneficiary of $347 million in equalization payments from the federal government this year to help the province offer public services that are comparable to other provinces in the federation.

No news yet if this has made a dent in province's "centre of the universe" smugness. Those hicks that they dismiss in the west are paying the bills.

Hat tip: Pat

Montcalm Loss: Quebec Gain?

In the Ottawa Citizen, John Robson asks is it really a bad thing for the Quebecois that Montcalm lost at the Plains of Abraham?

So what's the problem? Are the Montcalmites sorry they missed their date with Robespierre and Madame Guillotine? Do they wish they had stood with Napoléon at Waterloo, and Napoléon III at Sedan? Quebec nationalists didn't exactly rush to the colours when France was threatened in 1914 or needed rescuing after 1940. What's wrong with British self-government, suppression of the slave trade and defeat of Hitler that you'd rather be part of, say, Vichy France?

Not bad, but I would take that much further. For example, I doubt France would be shifting over billions in transfer payments to them all these years. I liken a Paris controlled Quebec to Newfoundland with the British. The Newfies had to beg Britain to take over full control of them in 1934, after they tried quasi-independence. (As Wikipedia humorously notes: one of the few countries that has ever voluntarily given up direct self-rule.) Shrewd Brits managed to fob them off onto Canada in 1949. (To my Newfoundlander friends, I apologize, I'm just trying to make a point.)

Quebec has had a sweet deal with Canada. They can be independent if they want. All they need is 50% + 1 of votes.

UPDATE: Here are my posts: Why Isn't Quebec an Independent Country? And this one recently: Quebecers Interested in Sovereignty but not Separation

Newfoundland Can't Be Weaned Off Welfare

Newfoundland, for the first time ever has been declared a "have" province thanks to oil revenue. But they're still whining for transfer payments:

Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams is calling on opposition parties to show Prime Minister Stephen Harper the door, following a federal budget he described as callous.

Williams said the fine print in changes to the federal equalization program, contained in the budget that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty delivered in Parliament Tuesday, have left him no choice but to rekindle his notorious battle with the governing Conservatives.

"It's a good indication of the punitive, vindictive, nasty side of this prime minister," Williams said. "The indication over the next three years is a pretty crippling effect."

Talk about entitlement. Since that province joined Confederation we've been shoveling them money hand over fist. So slow this down a little when they have a little of their own revenue, and they scream that we're taking away their money.

I throw my hands up in despair about this crazy country of ours.