afransen
Senior Member
Letter to the Star: Canada's 11th province
While not politically realistic, divorcing Ontario by gaining provincial status could be very healthy for Toronto. It would be a fantastically wealthy province, at that.
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Canada's 11th province
Jul 19, 2007 04:30 AM
Council stalls, city stagnates
Editorial, July 18
So it's back to begging for Toronto. That's our creative plan for getting out of the financial mess we're in? Makes me wonder why I vote at all if that's the best our council and mayor can come up with.
Let's face it, Ottawa and the province will never return what they've taken away. The reason they haven't is obvious: There's just no political gain to be made by doing right by Toronto, or any other major urban centre. The big cities of this country are underrepresented on both the national and provincial stages. For a political party trying to get elected, it's far easier and cheaper to sway a few hundred voters in a rural riding than to convince several thousand in an urban one.
Urban Ontario is the favourite whipping boy of all federal and provincial political parties. The Tories recently said they'd add seats for both B.C. and Alberta to meet the needs of their growing population. Ontario – not so fast. While this province also deserves more seats, we're told we can't have them based on the lame excuse that the House of Commons isn't big enough to accommodate new Ontario members. Do we rise up in anger? Nope, there was barely a peep.
There's no way Toronto and, by extension, the urban corridor from Hamilton to Oshawa will ever get our due until we start making a real fuss. Not the bus-shelter-ad-begging-for-pennies kind of fuss. Not the diplomatic sort of fuss politicians and bureaucrats like to make. No, I'm talking about a serious fuss that both the federal and provincial governments can't ignore.
Urban Ontarians must demand provincial status. The province won't upload previously downloaded services? Who cares. As a province, we'd have the funds to pay for those services and to actually direct them to where they're needed because our provincial income and sales taxes and fees would remain here. Should we worry about Ottawa? Not a chance. We'd be one of the biggest, wealthiest and most powerful provinces in Confederation. We could demand and receive our fair share of federal transfer payments and development money, not to mention the obeisance of grovelling federal politicians looking to curry our favour.
How sweet would that be?
Chris Cook, Toronto
While not politically realistic, divorcing Ontario by gaining provincial status could be very healthy for Toronto. It would be a fantastically wealthy province, at that.
----------------------------
Canada's 11th province
Jul 19, 2007 04:30 AM
Council stalls, city stagnates
Editorial, July 18
So it's back to begging for Toronto. That's our creative plan for getting out of the financial mess we're in? Makes me wonder why I vote at all if that's the best our council and mayor can come up with.
Let's face it, Ottawa and the province will never return what they've taken away. The reason they haven't is obvious: There's just no political gain to be made by doing right by Toronto, or any other major urban centre. The big cities of this country are underrepresented on both the national and provincial stages. For a political party trying to get elected, it's far easier and cheaper to sway a few hundred voters in a rural riding than to convince several thousand in an urban one.
Urban Ontario is the favourite whipping boy of all federal and provincial political parties. The Tories recently said they'd add seats for both B.C. and Alberta to meet the needs of their growing population. Ontario – not so fast. While this province also deserves more seats, we're told we can't have them based on the lame excuse that the House of Commons isn't big enough to accommodate new Ontario members. Do we rise up in anger? Nope, there was barely a peep.
There's no way Toronto and, by extension, the urban corridor from Hamilton to Oshawa will ever get our due until we start making a real fuss. Not the bus-shelter-ad-begging-for-pennies kind of fuss. Not the diplomatic sort of fuss politicians and bureaucrats like to make. No, I'm talking about a serious fuss that both the federal and provincial governments can't ignore.
Urban Ontarians must demand provincial status. The province won't upload previously downloaded services? Who cares. As a province, we'd have the funds to pay for those services and to actually direct them to where they're needed because our provincial income and sales taxes and fees would remain here. Should we worry about Ottawa? Not a chance. We'd be one of the biggest, wealthiest and most powerful provinces in Confederation. We could demand and receive our fair share of federal transfer payments and development money, not to mention the obeisance of grovelling federal politicians looking to curry our favour.
How sweet would that be?
Chris Cook, Toronto
