Despite the gloomy mood of many Canadians at present, things can change for the better with a new government. Pictured: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Photo Credit: Justin Trudeau/X.
This Canada Day, it seems a majority of Canadians have the blues. A number of different public opinion polls have been conducted to coincide with Canada Day, all of which concluded that most Canadians were not optimistic about Canada’s future. One Ipsos poll indicated that fully 70 per cent of Canadians believed that Canada was “broken.” Even worse, the numbers were higher for younger Canadians aged 18 to 34, of whom 78 per cent were not looking forward to the future with much hope.
There can be no doubt that there is much to be concerned about in our home and native land. Canadians are justifiably worried about taxation issues such as the recent hike in the capital gains tax (with zero consultation) and the fact that some recent studies show our lowest-tax jurisdiction, Alberta, still imposes a higher level of taxation than the highest-taxed jurisdiction in the US, California. Is it any surprise that Canadian businesses, highly skilled professionals and entrepreneurs are looking south of the border for better opportunities?
Concern is also growing about our out-of-control immigration mess, which is having clear and very negative impacts on our housing markets, inflation and overloading our already-struggling social services and health care systems, not to mention causing record-long backlogs in processing the various categories of immigrants. Despite their being more than enough existing challenges for Canadian business, our Liberal government recently found it necessary to introduce more federal legislation to penalize our valuable oil and gas sector in Bill C-59. Economic reports show a continuing decline in our standard of living, the dismal state of our paid-off media and international trade concerns that permit countries to unfairly gain access to the Canadian market without all the taxes and red tape facing our domestic businesses. Among other things.
Although provincial governments must bear some responsibility for Canada’s many challenges, most of the blame correctly falls at the feet of the federal Liberal government. Sometimes the Liberals’ incompetence has descended into farce, such as Liberal MP Yasir Naqvi’s attempt to send out to his constituents (on our dime of course) a map of Canada in celebration of Canada Day. The map was wildly inaccurate, totally omitting PEI and combining a few provinces together. A government that can’t even get Canada’s basic geography correct surely cannot be trusted with more complex matters.
Even beyond bad economic and social policy, some of the gloom surrounding this Canada Day is undoubtedly a result of a Prime Minister and federal government that continues to put down and diminish Canada at every opportunity. Trudeau has apologized for many historical events that no one living today had anything to do with, yet never seems to apologize for his own many obvious mistakes. He has changed our passport from something that represented many iconic moments in Canadian history to a milquetoast collection of pap. Permitting virtually anyone to enter Canada, even those with criminal records and dubious credentials, he has downgraded Canadian citizenship.
Trudeau has dishonestly portrayed Canada as a colonial and genocidal state, invented a narrative of secret burials of residential school students for which zero evidence has been found and flown our flag at half-mast for six months because of this fiction. Last Victoria Day, no one in the federal government even bothered to acknowledge this event – including the Governor General who is supposed to be the King’s representative in Canada. Trudeau tolerates statues of historic Canadians being torn down and Christian churches burnt down, with no repercussions for those who commit these crimes. Recent attacks on synagogues by pro-Hamas mobs rate barely a mention.
Very early in his tenure, Trudeau stated his belief that Canada was a nation with no core identity, no shared values and no mainstream. Balderdash. Most Canadians know that Canada has a proud history, albeit with some unfortunate passages as does every country. We surely do have a core identity of fundamental decency, freedom, and democracy. Perhaps the real issue is not that Canada is at all as Trudeau describes it, but that he does not like our basic principles as a nation that have prevailed since 1867 because he admires “basic dictatorships” and looks to restrict freedoms wherever he can. The bottom line is that Trudeau and his cronies have pursued a very un-Canadian path during their 9 years in government. They are the anomaly in Canada, not the rest of us.
Some Canadians – primarily the small minority who would still support this clearly incompetent and destructive federal Liberal government and others on the left – protest that life in Canada is still pretty good and we should stop our whining. It is true that we continue to have a comparatively attractive lifestyle and standard of living in Canada. But to those folks who imply we don’t need to worry about our major problems, I would ask “Should we wait until Canada resembles a third-world country before we start to try fixing our large and growing difficulties?” It’s going to take some time to turn around issues like our massive national debt (which many provinces contribute to as well), our mess of a health care system, out-of-control immigration, lagging productivity, rising crime rates, opioid addiction epidemic, economic uncompetitiveness and our declining standard of living.
Do we really want to wait until things are really desperate to try to reverse direction? Lots of Canadians already feel things are plenty bad enough, as people who have never before needed to seek public support line up at foodbanks, default on their mortgages, find they can’t pay their rent, have trouble finding decent employment and are innocent victims of crime. Our streets are full of terrorist supporters preaching hate and antisemitism, and most of our governments are tolerating that outrage. It’s pretty telling that a significant proportion of people who immigrated to Canada over the past few years are leaving, feeling they were sold a fake bill of goods by Justin Trudeau.
No – we need to act now so that we can begin to fix the many challenges we face. The good news is that Canada continues to have immense potential, great natural resources, a strong entrepreneurial sector and a highly skilled workforce. Many of our most valuable assets as a country have been ignored or mistreated by the current federal government. Some good economic and fiscal policies can start to turn things around fairly quickly with the right government. Another reason to act sooner rather than later is that many Canadian businesses and talented professionals are seriously considering whether they have a future in Canada or should leave for more business-friendly pastures. Many have already left. The businesses that remain in Canada, along with their many employees, the wealth they create and the billions of dollars of tax revenue they pay to governments, need hope to remain contributors to Canada instead of some other country. Despite the gloomy mood of many Canadians at present, things can change for the better with a new government so that our next Canada Day can be much more upbeat than this year’s. Let’s make that happen. Happy Canada Day!
She has published numerous articles in journals, magazines & other media on issues such as free trade, finance, entrepreneurship & women business owners. Ms. Swift is a past President of the Empire Club of Canada, a former Director of the CD Howe Institute, the Canadian Youth Business Foundation, SOS Children’s Villages, past President of the International Small Business Congress and current Director of the Fraser Institute. She was cited in 2003 & 2012 as one of the most powerful women in Canada by the Women’s Executive Network & is a recipient of the Queen’s Silver & Gold Jubilee medals.
