Sure because we really want to align ourselves more closely with those other hotbeds of economic activity and democracy North Korea and Cuba.
The public sector does not contribute to the economy. It siphons money out of the real economy and redirects it to places with the least cost benefit ratio.
We should align ourselves with the National Policies that built Canada from the time of Confederation when John A. MacDonald removed the country from the British Imperial Free Trade pact.. and later rejected 'Reciprocity' that Wilfrid Laurier would have imposed on us which would have fatally undermined our sovereignty and independence from the U.S.
Protectionism does not mean isolation, it means dirigiste economics that promote a national integrated industrial economy.. it means encouraging internal competition and research spending.. it means policies that are governed by goals of full, fairly payed employment.. it means a sovereign currency with agreed upon long term exchange rates that are dictated by the public interest... not Wall Street profits.
It is what we had prior to the onset of the Global Free Market hegemony that began with avengeance in the 1970s and has impoverished us.. opened us to the ravages of a riotous, unregulated world economic system... has polarized wealth and left millions of young Canadians with little prospects of employment that will allow them to comfortably and predictably pay for an education, start a family, buy a house, and plan for a secure retirement.
It's outrageous. NONE of the promises of Free Trade and Free Markets have been realized.. yet we tranquilly accept that the (nonexistent) Invisible Hand of the Free Market will ensure our future. Nothing of the sort is happening. We are being duped by a parasitic class of profiteers... and scumbag, incompetent politicians like Mulroney, Chretien, Harper and now, inevitably, Justin Trudeau.