Monday, October 28, 2002
When Canadians defied themselves - THE COMMENTARY
By Joseph Planta
VANCOUVER – This past Saturday, the 26th of October, was the 10th anniversary of the referendum on the Charlottetown Accord. The Accord was the second attempt of then prime minister Brian Mulroney to amend the constitution. His first attempt was the Meech Lake Accord, where in 1987 Mulroney and the other first ministers hammered out a deal whereby Quebec would sign the constitution that it hadn't when Pierre Elliott Trudeau patriated it in 1982. Meech Lake failed when some of the provinces were unable to ratify the deal in their respective legislatures. Seen as ‘the Quebec round,' it was rather unpopular in that it did not deal with minorities such as aboriginals or women. Mulroney, wanting to try again, charged his senior minister and former prime minister Joe Clark to hammer out a new deal. It was the Charlottetown Accord. This time, not only ensuring Quebec its "distinct" place in the Canadian family, it proposed changes to the Senate, the House of Commons, the Supreme Court; as well as greater power for the provinces, including a change in federal spending power, an appreciation of the inherent right of aboriginal self-government, and an amending formula for future constitutional change. It was a grab bag and instead of the elites approving the deal (as Meech), Mulroney heeded that the people should have a say in a national referendum.
Peter C. Newman, the chronicler of the Canadian establishment, wrote a book on Canadian political life from 1985 to 1995. He entitled his tome, The Canadian Revolution: From Deference to Defiance. Clearly, Canadians did revert from deference to defy their political masters. For 125 years prior to the Charlottetown Accord, Canadians generally took everything the elites and the establishment doled them without question. The Charlottetown Accord was supported by the governing Tories, the opposition Liberals and the NDP. Nearly every member of the establishment, people like Newman, June Callwood, Pierre Berton and others spoke out in favour of the deal. Media companies like Maclean Hunter, even registered their support for the accord formally. Nearly every newspaper in the country editorially supported the accord. People that didn't – British Columbians like Gordon Gibson, Gordon Wilson (then BC Liberal leader), Mel Smith and Rafe Mair – were castigated as enemies of Canada. Mair himself, was threatened by Mulroney with a tax audit and called a "traitor."
The Charlottetown Accord also saw the rise of the Reform Party. Preston Manning, the bookish and professorial Albertan, began to emerge as a political player with his campaign against the accord directed mainly at disenchanted Canadians west of the Lakehead. The Accord, Reform claimed was not in the best interests of Western Canada. How could an accord that gave Quebec more and more, serve Western Canadians getting less and less? To wit, 25% of the seats in the House of Commons to the province of Quebec, regardless of its declining population? The House itself (not to mention the Senate) was (and is) severely skewed already. Westerns took to Manning's reforming approach, and the party that was barely a decade old, cut its teeth during the campaign on Charlottetown. The next year, a general election ensued and the Reform Party was ready, sweeping Western Canada, helping to defeat the Conservatives.
Mulroney's desire for constitutional reform was rooted in the fact that Quebeckers through the 1980s and early 1990s were dissatisfied with the status quo. Quebeckers naturally wanted more; thus Mulroney felt it necessary to give more, lest they want to separate. Oddly enough Charlottetown, considered a solution to Quebec discontent, was rejected in Quebec come voting day. Sure enough, separatism was on the rise in that province, as in 1994 the federalist Liberals were thrown out and the soverigntist Parti Quebecois formed the government.
British Columbia was the province that rejected the accord at the highest percentage. Nearly 69% of British Columbians voted against the accord, in spite of the federal and provincial governments and the entire media's support for the deal. Rafe Mair, vociferously criticising the accord on the radio, notes that many grassroots people studied the complex jumble of legalese and voted their conscience without any coercion.
Brian Mulroney's popularity had been on the wane already, as he had by this time engaged in implementing the GST, and made an orgy of patronage appointments. When the Tories sought a third mandate from Canadians, they were rejected. They were reduced to two seats. They have yet to recover. Joe Clark is the leader of the Tories now, and on Friday he spoke on the 10th anniversary of Charlottetown saying that the Liberal government of Jean Chrétien has reverted to a form of "combative federalism." Though, I totally disagree with Joe Clark and Brian Mulroney's view of federalism as articulated through the Charlottetown Accord, I agree with Clark's remarks that Jean Chrétien's government has done very little in the field of constitutional activism. I admire Clark and Mulorney for having had the intestinal fortitude in actually suggesting changes to the status quo. Prime Minister Chrétien, elected with a majority in 1993, has squandered his opportunity at creating a lasting Canada in the area of constitutional reform. This reliance on the status quo, in the propagation of the Liberals' own power, will in due course, be seen as the beginning of the end for Canada as a country. Jean Chrétien may be credited (and wrongly I might add) for slaying the spectre of separatism in Quebec; however at the end of the day we may see the threat of separatism from parts outside of Quebec, namely Western Canada.
The Charlottetown Accord debate showed the uniqueness of the Canadian way. It took 115 years to bring the constitution home to Canada, and at that, imperfectly without the signature of Quebec. Changing the way it is certainly is difficult. Charlottetown failed, not because the constitution is unalterable. Rather it failed because the proposition was flawed and unpopular to the Canadian people themselves. As it should be, because it is our constitution in the first place.
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An archive of Joseph Planta's previous columns can be found by clicking HERE .