Atlantic Party of Canada

[robbie25]

Not sure how many Atlantic Canadians are in this forum, but I'm posting here to raise awareness for a grassroots political movement coming out of the East. Our basic premise is that none of the national parties have any incentive to truly represent us in Ottawa due to their need to be popular across the whole country. Basic Canadian demography will tell you that the interests of Atlantic Canada will always take a backseat to the more populous areas of the country. If you'd like to read our mission statement, please go to our facebook group at:

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Even if you don't support us, you may be interested anyways. If there are any posters here who don't have a facebook account and would like to read about the ACP, just mention it on this thread and I'll post the mission statement here.

Comments are welcome, regardless of your opinion on the topic.

 

[darkbeaver]

"Comments are welcome, regardless of your opinion on the topic."

I doubt the sincerity of that statement and will test it right here right now. You represent atlantic money and you hope to carve a piece of the great pie off for yourselves at the expence of the downtrodden electorate as is usual in these common instances of faux political reform. I have read your platform and find absolutely nothing fresh new or benevolent for the common man. Banker.

 

[robbie25]

I appreciate the reply.

First of all, you're right, there is likely nothing new or fresh in my platform, nor do I claim there is. People who feel they have no voice in their affairs have been espousing similar sentiments since government began. But their lack of originality does not make them any less valid.

As for your comment that we "hope to carve off a great piece of the pie for ourselves" you're absolutely correct, and in my opinion, that is what every govermnet should strive to do. I'm new to this forum, but if the tag by your name means that you are a Bloc supporter (and likely a Quebecer) then I would merely point out that what we are trying to do is only what the Bloc has been doing for 19 years since the Bloc was formed.

And Quebec has written the book on trying to grab the largest piece of the pie that it possibly can at the expense of the rest of the country. And rightly so, in my opinion. Any governement worth it's salt should attempt to do the same. There is no shame in driving the hardest bargain that it can for it's constituents. We feel that the national parties are unwilling and unable to represent us (in Atlantic Canada) in that way, and we are better served by a regionally based party that will.

Unlike many others, I don't blame Quebec for it's preferential treatment in Canadian politics. If anything, I blame the rest of Canada for their policy of appeasement. It is not Quebec's fault that the ruling parties are weak.

 

[TenPenny]

A party that focuses on Atlantic Canada will be completely pointless.

The future of the Maritimes (not Atlantic Canada) needs to be unification of NB/NS/PEI, with a reduction by 75% in elected officials and civil servants. We waste too much money on government, and it's disgusting. Put all of the Maritimes together, and we have the population of a big city.

We can't afford the ridiculous amount of government that we have.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

Regional parties are fine, it is part of democracy. As long as the Atlantic Party runs candidates in more than one province, I support it.

In our FEDERALIST system, the Bloc Quebecois runs candidates in only one province, this violates the principles of our FEDERALIST system. The BQ would have their message diluted if they had to run candidates outside Quebec, it might fade away.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

Our basic premise is that none of the national parties have any incentive to truly represent us in Ottawa due to their need to be popular across the whole country.

You're wrong before you start. A party needs to be popular only in the areas of greatest population density to form a government, and that's roughly between Quebec City and Hamilton. If you can take the seats in urban southern Quebec and Ontario, and a scattering of others, you win. Liberals did that for most of the 20th century and paid almost no attention to the Maritimes or the West.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

You're wrong before you start. A party needs to be popular only in the areas of greatest population density to form a government, and that's roughly between Quebec City and Hamilton. If you can take the seats in urban southern Quebec and Ontario, and a scattering of others, you win. Liberals did that for most of the 20th century and paid almost no attention to the Maritimes or the West.

That''s still democracy, the Libs got the votes fair and square.

Now if every vote was equal, we would have even more democracy. Rural votes are worth more than urban votes. That is not democracy.

 

[damngrumpy]

I say here we go again, another regional party so called grass roots with those special interests
posing as populists. We have Wild Rose in Alberta, the Saskatchewan Party, in government that
is really the disguised disgraced conservative/liberal coalition that made a come back under a
different name. In BC we have the so called Liberal Party, not Liberal at all. It is a reworked old
Social Credit Party that was a you guessed it, a Coalition Party on the right.
These parties come from frustration with the alternatives and they last for a short period of time
and we go through it all again.
The real reason is, we don't take an active party in the politics of the day, during times that are
fairly good. When things go wrong we blame everyone but ourselves. Its not governments who
are asleep at the switch it is you and I who don't keep up with what our politicians are up to.
Then there are those who believe we should have a vote on everything, every issue, of the day.
Does anyone know what that would cost? In addition they shout this is not democratic, we didn't
vote for that. Wanna Bet? People don't listen, these politicians on the left, right and center tell
you what their policy is on various subjects and they are telling you in the event of the unknown
here is the direction we would take. Situations develop during the years in office that become
issues that no one knew were coming, we elect people to make decisions that is what you are
voting for.
If we can't be bothered to monitor the people we have in power right now, what difference does it
make that we have a new party? Like New Years Resolutions, we will ignore the new boys in the
first year they come to power and the situation will repeat itself.
Here is something to think about, instead of the expense of starting over, and it is costly why don't
we all participate in the current party system. Conservative, Liberal, New Democrat, Green what
ever, actually join the party of our beliefs and be active. You would get change, because you would
have the numbers and voices to demand change.
Instead we behave like the legal system, we insist of making a whole lot of new laws, that we can't
enforce, to combat crime. What we should be demanding is that the legal system enforce the
present laws to the max, and set out maximum instead of minimum sentences.
The politicians love to see new parties, they join them and carry on business as usual until the public
catches on. Voters in this country are their own worst enemy. I have participated in elections in the
past, I even ran Federally once many years ago. I no longer support any party. What we suffer in
Canada is a lack of meaningful leadership. All our leaders are pandering to someone and no one is
brave enough to tell us how it really is, and we as voters collectively don't want to hear bad news
or we are totally gullible and believe what we are told, by people we know are not telling the truth.
Pardon the rant, but every time I see this course of action, I think, yup politicians are fooling some of
the people some of the time. The problem is now politicians are for the most part fooling all of the
people all of the time.

 

[robbie25]

Tenpenny - I agree with you that Atlantic Canadian unification is a concept worth exploring. While that is not a stated goal of our platform, one would think that a strong regionally-based national party with the support of the majority of Atlantic Canadians would be a natural precursor to serious dialogue about that topic. We are not suggesting making government bigger here. Those 32 parliamentary seats are going to be filled by somebody. We just want them filled by a party that will advance Atlantic Canadian interests.

dumpthemonarchy - Our long term goal is nothing short of holding all 32 seats allocated to Atlantic Canada. Whther that's possible or not is another thing, but if we don't succeed it certainly won't be for lack of trying. So to answer your question, yes, we plan on running candidates in more then one province.

Dexter Sinister - I think we are both saying the same thing, perhaps I phrased it wrong in my post. You said this:

"You're wrong before you start. A party needs to be popular only in the areas of greatest population density to form a government, and that's roughly between Quebec City and Hamilton. If you can take the seats in urban southern Quebec and Ontario, and a scattering of others, you win. Liberals did that for most of the 20th century and paid almost no attention to the Maritimes or the West."

Which I completely agree with, and is a basis for out platform. It is politically convienent to put the interest of the population centres around the country ahead of Atlantic Canadians, and so this has been the norm, really, since confederation. Ignoring Atlantic Canada carries no political risk, and in fact, being seen as FAVOURING Atlantic Canada would likely be political folly in the areas where parties NEED to be popular to win elections. The current system essentailly guarantees that Atlantic Canada will always be an afterthought, and this is why we cannot trust our political voice to ANY national party. Imagine, however, a bloc of 20 or so votes in the house of commons held by the Atlantic Party of Canada. That is large enough to be relevent for everything from national policy, to passing important legistlation, to passing a budget. All of a sudden, ignoring Atlantic Canada is no longer politically convienent, and in fact, could become political dangerous. Only then will we see the imporvements in our region that will bring us up to the standard of the rest of the country.

damngrumpy - I understand your opinion, but, with all due respect, this platform is not designed to appeal to you. In fact, if a regionally based party is popular OUTSIDE of the region in which it represents, then it is likely doing something wrong. We are not trying to fix the whole country. We are trying to fix ourselves.

 

[darkbeaver]

I appreciate the reply.

First of all, you're right, there is likely nothing new or fresh in my platform, nor do I claim there is. People who feel they have no voice in their affairs have been espousing similar sentiments since government began. But their lack of originality does not make them any less valid.

As for your comment that we "hope to carve off a great piece of the pie for ourselves" you're absolutely correct, and in my opinion, that is what every govermnet should strive to do. I'm new to this forum, but if the tag by your name means that you are a Bloc supporter (and likely a Quebecer) then I would merely point out that what we are trying to do is only what the Bloc has been doing for 19 years since the Bloc was formed.

And Quebec has written the book on trying to grab the largest piece of the pie that it possibly can at the expense of the rest of the country. And rightly so, in my opinion. Any governement worth it's salt should attempt to do the same. There is no shame in driving the hardest bargain that it can for it's constituents. We feel that the national parties are unwilling and unable to represent us (in Atlantic Canada) in that way, and we are better served by a regionally based party that will.

Unlike many others, I don't blame Quebec for it's preferential treatment in Canadian politics. If anything, I blame the rest of Canada for their policy of appeasement. It is not Quebec's fault that the ruling parties are weak.

I am Nova Scotian I am not of the Bloc, that is just an old pun in my avatar. You want regional power, so do I, what I don't want is to share it with the bankers nor thier acolytes adherants and slaves. Untill you have that kind of power nothing will change no matter how often we are fooled by the smoke and mirrors of pretty new slices of a pie we cannot see and do not control. Democracy has been studied to death in our times, literally. Private money is free all else is subject and consumable. So, at this time, early in the twenty-first, I wonder how you would avoid the banker operated filters in the selection of canditates. Nationalism is still very desireable, wheather it's on a grand scale such as the former pre Zionist Canada or smaller like an Atlantic region the exact same problems of public misuse by the private sector will continue and the only possible difference will be of scale. I honestly can't see it any other way. Follow the money. So while I'm sure your regional approach makes very good sense it cannot possibly be constructed by wage slaves working the same rusty old system.

They won't even let us keep the lumber or the blueberries or the lobster and they have foiled every attempt to market and consume the best of our production, we don't make our own food, shoes, furniture houses cars, you name it we are made to import it by the same people who shipped our jobs to the other side of the world. If we don't begin to take back the responsibility and rewards in these areas we are in for multiple decades of Atlantic depression and war. The basic building blocks of sound regional economies have been stolen and sold out from under us. While Wal-Mart and the like rules our Atlantic retail world there will be no renewed prosperity. Convention centers will do nothing to address these issues. That construction deal best illustrates the massive disconnect between the electorate and the elected. Factor in the recent Cancun agreements and you will quickly see that there is in fact no functioning Canadian government as in the commonly thought of sense, the World Secritariet is contained in the carbon taxes and those who collect them would rule the world. So you see taking a bigger slice from Ottawa, while tough enough, is now many times more dangerous because of the new owners of that tasty pie. It's not the people that must be convinced, it is the bankers alone and no one else.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

dumpthemonarchy - Our long term goal is nothing short of holding all 32 seats allocated to Atlantic Canada. Whther that's possible or not is another thing, but if we don't succeed it certainly won't be for lack of trying. So to answer your question, yes, we plan on running candidates in more then one province.

Good. Then you can mock the BQ for running candidates in only one province in a FEDERAL state. But that's central Canada (Ont + Que), they have a unitary mindset along with regional lackeys. They each think they are Canada and other "regions" just don't compute in their universe.

 

[Trotz]

I would vote Bloc Quebecois if they ran a candinate in my area; but it will never happen, as FPTP ensures that the options are limited to Liberal and Conservative (there are even areas of British Columbia that don't have a Federal NDP Candidate).

Nevertheless, the Bloc Quebecois has potential to export their party to the rural ridings in Western Canada and even win a few ridings, providing the rhetoric is less Quebec and more against the greviances that Canadians have against Ottawa and the Federal Government.

Federally wise, the conservative party was a "Western Canadian" Party but Steven Harper hasn't proven to be any different from his liberal counterparts, hence the irony in that Bloc Quebecois is the only party left for Western Canadian regionalists (after all if Quebec seperated there would be seperations here or we'ld renegoitate our confederation)

 

[FiveParadox]

The Atlantic provinces already have a good deal in influence in the affairs of government. The Atlantic provinces already have representation in the House of Commons well above the seat calculation formula, due to special clauses in our constitutional texts that artificially add seats to smaller provinces (until their populations sufficiently increase); and moreover, the representation of the Atlantic provinces in the Honourable the Senate of Canada is really fantastic--there's nothing for Atlantic Canadians to argue about there.

 

[Tonington]

A party that focuses on Atlantic Canada will be completely pointless.

The future of the Maritimes (not Atlantic Canada) needs to be unification of NB/NS/PEI, with a reduction by 75% in elected officials and civil servants. We waste too much money on government, and it's disgusting. Put all of the Maritimes together, and we have the population of a big city.

We can't afford the ridiculous amount of government that we have.

I'd vote for that.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

A party that focuses on Atlantic Canada will be completely pointless.

The future of the Maritimes (not Atlantic Canada) needs to be unification of NB/NS/PEI, with a reduction by 75% in elected officials and civil servants. We waste too much money on government, and it's disgusting. Put all of the Maritimes together, and we have the population of a big city.

We can't afford the ridiculous amount of government that we have.

Oh yeah, I totally agree with that, make one big province of the three. Make Halifax the capital and the bigger city could easily get NHL and CFL franchises. Excessive govt in the Maritimes helps ensure that Canadians are overgoverned along with mediocre govt.

 

[robbie25]

The Atlantic provinces already have a good deal in influence in the affairs of government. The Atlantic provinces already have representation in the House of Commons well above the seat calculation formula, due to special clauses in our constitutional texts that artificially add seats to smaller provinces (until their populations sufficiently increase); and moreover, the representation of the Atlantic provinces in the Honourable the Senate of Canada is really fantastic--there's nothing for Atlantic Canadians to argue about there.

Please don't confuse the seats allocated to Atlantic Canada to seats that represent Atlantic Canada. The two may sound the same, but they are not. The way things work now is, MP's are party member firsts, and local representatives second. It doesn't matter how many seats AC has....as long as they are held by members of the Liberals, Conservatives, or the NDP, they will never truly represent Atlantic Canadian interests.

For example, here's an article I just found doing a quick Google search about last years budget.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/581557

An excerpt:

"Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff is letting his MPs from Newfoundland and Labrador break with his party and vote against the federal budget in a key vote tonight.
Ignatieff said this morning that he is allowing the MPs a "one-time" vote of protest to "display their anger and indignation" at the budget, which they charge shortchanges the Atlantic province by more than $1 billion."

and at the end....

"The decision is not expected to impact the budget vote, which is expected to pass easily shortly after 6:30 p.m., thanks to the support of other Liberal MPs"

So, the province with among the smallest GDP in the nation is short changed by $1 billion, and how deomcratic of Mr. Ignatieef to "allow" the NFLD MP's to vote against the budget (remember, however, this is only a "one time" exception). But of course, the budget is easily passed regardless.

Is that what you call true influence? And what if those MP's votes WERE the deciding ones to pass the budget? Do you think for a second that they would have been allowed to vote against it? The answer is no.

So the political masters will allow the illusion of Atlantic MP's truly reprsenting their areas as long as it doesn't affect anything....but is that leadership? Is that what we call representation?

 

[FiveParadox]

A regional party is not the answer to your concerns, then, Robbie25; the answer should, instead, be a campaign to reform how members of the House of Commons vote on matters before them.

We cannot abandon the principle of party discipline when it comes to budgets, of course--as this would bring about the possibility of government changing hands every few months, and would have the nation stuck in a state of constant election-readiness. That would most certainly act to disengage voters faster than any other factor. It would be reasonable though, on some other matters before the House, to have members vote by their conscience more frequently; we would need to more clearly define, though, which matters would then be issues of confidence.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

Iggy's populairty is going nowhere because he is pretty much more of the same. To me, it's a matter of giving MPs some real power. There's always a sense of disloyalty by going against central Canada, they have the plan, and everyone else is just on for the ride.

New parties shake things up and they can make a difference. We would not have referendum and recall in BC provincial politics were it not for the newly constituted Liberal party. Business hates ref and recall, but it was the price Campbell had to pay to get his party. All the eastern minded media in BC think, "Oh this is so populist, what the riff raff want, so American." Well, it;s not, and its good, and Campbell is finding out with his lying of the HST that newly created parties are more democratic and can oust bad leaders.

 

[robbie25]

A regional party is not the answer to your concerns, then, Robbie25; the answer should, instead, be a campaign to reform how members of the House of Commons vote on matters before them.

We cannot abandon the principle of party discipline when it comes to budgets, of course--as this would bring about the possibility of government changing hands every few months, and would have the nation stuck in a state of constant election-readiness. That would most certainly act to disengage voters faster than any other factor. It would be reasonable though, on some other matters before the House, to have members vote by their conscience more frequently; we would need to more clearly define, though, which matters would then be issues of confidence.

The example I used, FiveParadox, was just an example I got from aquick Google search. I'm using that one example, but the probelm is really systemic. But to use that example again....... Let us assume that a regionally based party focused on Atlantic Canada was in place, and they held, say, 25 seats. They would not have been able to shootdown that particular budget, as it passed by a wide margin....but,the fact is, with 25 seats held by an Atlantic bloc, it is very unlikely that $1 billion shortchanging would have even been there in the first place.

But again, I see your from BC, and I must reiterate, respectfully, that the Atlantic Party is not for you. I'm not really here to debate the merits, merely to gain awareness for it. I don't expect anybody from outside of Atlantic Canada to agree with or support anything I'm saying here.

The old way isn't working, for us, at least, so it's on us to create a new way.

 

[dumpthemonarchy]

A regional party is not the answer to your concerns, then, Robbie25; the answer should, instead, be a campaign to reform how members of the House of Commons vote on matters before them.

We cannot abandon the principle of party discipline when it comes to budgets, of course--as this would bring about the possibility of government changing hands every few months, and would have the nation stuck in a state of constant election-readiness. That would most certainly act to disengage voters faster than any other factor. It would be reasonable though, on some other matters before the House, to have members vote by their conscience more frequently; we would need to more clearly define, though, which matters would then be issues of confidence.

Such a traditionalist! Time to kick down the old rotten structure and build anew. That's what great about Canada and we don't have a bloody revolution when it happens. You join the Lib/Cons/NDP party and you must conform to what the old guard wants or get out. The AC would have plenty of party discipline, it would just be used for AC and not for the big old rotten parties.