I am against the federal government proposal to change the formula of seat allocation for the House of Commons. Sadly the proposal short-changes Ontario. I feel it is better to stick to the current formula. Dalton McGuinty and federal Tory House Leader Peter Van Loan have had a surprisingly partisan exchange over this issue – along party lines. I think you can guess which one of the two I agree with – Dalton! If the choice is between further shortchanging Ontario with the seat plan or keeping the status quo’s shortcomings, I’d stick with the status quo. I am hoping the federal Liberals join with the provincial Liberals in fighting against this bill so that Ontario does not get shortchanged more than it already is. This particular bill should not be a matter of confidence because it was not mentioned in the Throne Speech.
I also think it has become clear that as long as the McGuinty government is in power and as long as the Harper government is in power, n’er the twain shall get along. This is also true of PST harmonization. Harmonizing Ontario’s PST to the federal GST would be detrimental to Ontario consumers. It is for this reason that McGuinty is only willing to harmonize the PST on his terms. Without numerous exemptions on various items in a harmonization agreement, McGuinty has said he is not interested. And those exemptions would make it so that it is not harmonization at all. It is for this reason that PST harmonization is unlikely to occur under McGuinty. Also, I know this was four years ago, but I recall that the Eves Tories also did not believe in PST harmonization.
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Its about the population silly . . . the west is growing . . . the east is shrinking. Remember TO is no longer the centre of the universe . . . Calgary is taking over . . . head offices are leaving Ontario for the tax haven of Alberta. So my advice to you is just get used to it . . . maybe in a 100 years or so the balance will change again . . lol...
I agree it is better to stick with the old system. Ontario's fractional representation is the same in either the new or old (since we will get 4 new seats out of a total of 7 in the old system) but it has the advantage in that no one is claiming it solves the problem of representation by population. So, I feel it will give a better chance of leading to a sensible change down the road. Meanwhile, it would leave BC, Alberta and Ontario all with similar underrepresentation, so we would all be motivated to find a solution.
“Its about the population silly . . . the west is growing . . . the east is shrinking. Remember TO is no longer the centre of the universe”
Trust old tool to get everything hopelessly wrong. This is the guy who claimed that Toronto with a murder rate of 1.5 was becoming another Detroit; Detroit has a murder rate of 48. The East shrinking now that is some good humour.
Yes Alberta’s population increased at fastest rate than anywhere else. However, the population of Ontario increased by more than in absolute numbers. Between 2001 and 2006 Ontario grew by 600,000. No other province came anywhere close in terms of absolute numbers. The next closest was, drum role please, Quebec.
By the way, two provinces showed a net decrease between 2001 and 2006, Sask and NFLD. One is a “western” province” and the other a “Maritime” province.
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