The federal government often makes decisions that negatively affect the well-being of Albertans. Since the Liberals’ election in 2015, many of these decisions have been harmful to Alberta by design. The Liberals want to fight climate change, and they think Alberta’s oil and gas industry is the main contributor. Therefore, imposing heavy-handed policies to restrict Alberta’s major source of wealth will achieve their goals.It should not be lost on Albertans that the politicians imposing these harmful policies were not elected here. They were elected in places like Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal. Politicians elected in other parts of Canada impose policies on Alberta that lead to economic hardships and job losses. Since they are elected elsewhere, they don’t pay any political price for the negative impacts of those policies.Because of Canada’s political system, there’s nothing Albertans can do about this. Central Canada contains the majority of Canadians, so it elects the majority of federal MPs. In other words, they get to decide who forms the government. Generally speaking, at the federal level, Alberta is not governed by Albertans.Who really governs us, then? Basically, it’s the Laurentian elites.Who are the Laurentian elites? This is one of the topics covered by Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson in their 2013 book, The Big Shift: The Seismic Change in Canadian Politics, Business, and Culture and What It Means for Our Future. As they write, the Laurentian elites are “the political, academic, cultural, media, and business elites in the communities along the watershed of the St. Lawrence River.”.To a large degree, this would refer to people in places like Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal, although Vancouver can now be added to this mix due to its ideological affinity to the Laurentian perspective.For much of Canada’s history, the Laurentian elites could operate through either of the two major federal parties. However, after the collapse of the federal Progressive Conservative Party in 1993, the Laurentian elites became completely identified with the Liberal Party.There are important policy consequences to being ruled by the Laurentian elites. One of the most harmful is the Laurentian disposition to favour massive government spending. As Bricker and Ibbitson note, balanced budgets are not a priority for the Laurentians. Instead, from the Laurentian perspective, “deficits were necessary to finance the pan-national programs—healthcare, welfare, housing subsidies, and later child care — by which Central Canadian elites hoped to cobble the nation together through shared values.” This helps to explain Canada’s huge — and growing — government debt, a massive burden for future generations.Furthermore, using the power of the federal government, “the Laurentian elites sought to craft a set of national myths, built around the Liberal-created Maple Leaf flag, the Liberal-created social safety net, the Liberal-inspired policies of bilingualism and multiculturalism.”Then, beginning with former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, Quebec’s influence became especially powerful within the federal government. “Canada evolved profoundly under Trudeau’s Quebec influence. Social programs expanded, and the state along with it. The British connection was all but entirely severed. Bilingualism, the Constitution, asymmetrical federalism ... all dominated a capital obsessed over Quebec questions and dedicated to accommodating, even if they could never be satisfied, Quebec’s demands.”.Besides complete control of the federal government, the Laurentian elites dominate the national media. Perhaps not surprisingly, Bricker and Ibbitson write that the “Laurentian mindset is most pervasive at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. For all its claims of balance,” they add, “the CBC is genetically incapable of expressing any vision of the country other than the Laurentian.”Due to the Laurentian domination of the national media, many journalists believe “the federal government has the right and the obligation to strengthen the union by promoting ‘national’ (read federal) standards and programs. In their eyes, provincial governments are, in every sense of the word, inferior; their concerns parochial and selfish; their bureaucracies second-tier. Ottawa must lead the way, especially in social policy, and if the Constitution insists social policy is the purview of the provinces, then the Constitution must be gotten around.”In short, the federal government and national media are dominated by elites that disparage provincial interests and support increasing federal power. You can see how Conservative-voting Alberta would be considered an obstacle to their goals.At the federal level, Alberta is largely governed by politicians who are members of the Laurentian elites. They are not elected by Albertans. In this sense, they can be seen as foreigners governing in the interests of a different region of Canada.The only way to escape their clutch is for Alberta to become independent. As our own country, we could elect politicians who would represent us, rather than the powerful elites of central Canada. This is the only real path to freedom and prosperity for Alberta.
