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‘Revolution between the ears’
By RYAN CLEARY
Saturday, May 03, 2008
I don’t want to seem ungrateful, but now that we’re rolling in the cash it may be time to consider breaking away from the country of Canada. If we’re teetering on the edge of economic independence anyway, why not go all the way and raise the Pink, White and Green outside Confederation Building? Maybe even fit John Cabot with a FREE NFLD. T-shirt, G-string and stocking cap.

Raise the separation point a few years ago and you would have been laughed off your downtown barstool and beaten over the head with a hockey stick, the symbol that unites this fair country as much as any Maple Leaf. People are more open to the idea today; it’s not sacrilegious to think outside the Canadian box, unless you’re a columnist with the Quebec-owned local print competition.

Would we be better off as an independent country? We tried our hand once at Responsible Government, but it didn’t exactly work out. Broke, half-starved and corrupt as all get out, we surrendered our democracy in 1933 in favour of a government by commission. We couldn’t handle our own affairs and signed over power of attorney to England for 15 years. Then, in 1949, we chose Confederation over going it alone again. Keep in mind that’s the Coles Notes version of what happened. I haven’t breathed a word about the manipulation, under-handedness and general skullduggery that went on. But I digress.

Newfoundland has had an inferiority complex for a dog’s age. Come-from-aways can always do it better, is how we saw it. Any industrialist with a Latvian accent or Sprung surname was better for us than a half-cocked Bayman or Townie any day.

It may be pie in the May sky, but I like to think that attitudes have changed since then.

So let’s move on, let bygones be bygones (just for the moment). Never mind questioning whether the whole world would have been our oyster (I prefer mussel) as a dominion or a nation.

Let’s say the whole world was never at our fingertips — until now.

Where to from here? We’ve got some cash in the bank and a fairly rosy future, at least in terms of energy. Do we maximize the potential within the federation or without? What would make better economic sense for us?

Newfoundland and Labrador may have earned a tidy surplus this fiscal year of $1.4 billion, but that’s still far less than the federal government’s take from our offshore. (My mistake, the Government of Canada’s offshore; see Supreme Court ruling of 1984.)

The oil and gas beneath the Grand Banks would be ours again if we went our own way. I imagine the extra cash would be at least equal what we get from EI every year, so we would be no worse off in that regard. How would independence impact the infamous upper Churchill contract? Would that still stand or would Quebec be forced to relinquish its plundered treasure. (Oops, I’m not supposed to use plundered, that’s one of the bygones I let be earlier on. Although countries have gone to war for a lot less.)

And what about the lower Churchill? Given all the debate about whether Quebec will allow us to transport Labrador electricity over its territory (without screwing us over again … my apologies again), maybe we should just keep all the electricity for ourselves and attract all the industry we’ve never had and always hoped for.

Then there’s the fish. We certainly couldn’t be any worse custodians than Canada (despite what John Crosbie says), which managed our fish to commercial extinction. You’re damn right times have changed. Our leading cod scientist, George Rose, dares to suggest trading off seals for fish, shutting down the seal hunt if foreign fleets agree not to trawl the Grand Banks.

Anything’s better than the federal government’s tack, which is to do nothing.

To rehash, an independent Newfoundland and Labrador could have all the oil and gas money for itself, plus a load more cash from the upper Churchill, and untold potential from the lower. Hell, we could even declare this place a tax-free zone like the Cayman Islands. We could do whatever the heck we want.

I raised the idea of an independent NL recently with a respected local commentator. He wasn’t so gung-ho, questioning how such a monumental shifting of Canada’s tectonic plates would impact the poor pensioner in Joe Batt’s Arm or the single mother on welfare in Flower’s Cove. Would the average person have the fortitude to make it through the hard times and uncertainty? The other question worth asking is how it would look if we leave Canada just as we’re becoming a have province and Ontario sinks into have-not status? Hasn’t central Canada spent the past 59 years keeping us afloat? I would argue just the opposite, and refer to The Independent’s 2004 cost-benefit analysis to back it up.

It’s ironic how only now — for the first time since Confederation — that mainland columnists are actually flirting with the idea that the next Supreme Court of Canada judge be a Newfoundlander or Labradorian. There’s a caveat, of course — only if Danny Williams “stays out of this one.”

To hell with that, I say. Don’t mind them, Danny. Speak your piece.

The days of us minding our place are done, at least as long as the good times roll.

We’ve got to make sure they do.

Surpluses like we see in this year’s budget may never be repeated unless more oil is discovered on the Grand Banks. There are no guarantees of that. The decisions we make now will position us for the future. Which is clearly ours.

Finance Minister Tom Marshall tells us to prepare for “a revolution between the ears.” About time, I say.



ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca
 
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