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Just Trust Us
J. Patrick Boyer draws together new patterns that help explain why Canadians who care deeply about our country nevertheless feel perplexed, angered, and even embarrassed by the way we now govern ourselves. Since the late 1700s "representative government" has been part of our Canadian birthright, and since the 1800s "responsible government" has additionally been a constitutional foundation of our country. That the forms of both endure, but not their substance, is the thesis of Boyer’s book. The result? An absence of accountability in Canadian government. Most of our country’s pressing concerns and complex problems - from regional economic disparities to the Quebec and Western Canadian separatist movements, from tax evasion to voter apathy - can be traced back to this fundamental lack of accountability. A citizen who understands this absence sees that it makes sense to step back from a dysfunctional system. Making this accountability connection is critical, Boyer concludes, because only when we clearly understand the root cause of the problems we face as a nation can we begin to develop workable, long-term solutions.
Days of Reckoning
In the mid-1990s, a team of young researchers, fresh out of university, embarked on a cross-country journey that would profoundly alter their understanding of Canada and Canadian government. The focus of their investigation was the massive national debt, which at the time had ballooned to $580 million. How, they wondered, had a country that was once so prosperous and full of promise managed to accrue such a crippling financial burden? The researchers travelled from province to province in search of answers. Along the way they spoke to a diverse cross-section of Canadians, from politicians and bureaucrats, to academics and policy experts, to cattle ranchers, farmers and small-business owners. Everywhere the researchers went they found evidence of government policies and programs that were plagued by chronic mis-management, overspending, unaccountable practices and a lack of long-term vision. Gradually they began to realize that the national debt is just one of many crises facing the nation today. Moreover, it is their generation, the young people of Canada, who will have to pay the price for the mistakes made by those who came before them.
Secrets in High Places
Researchers pit themselves against government bureaucracy when they try to determine the nature of government spending.
The Chatter Box
"Parliament, where the potential to defend ourselves ought to be debated and ultimately decided, has become irrelevant talk-shop ... The Chatter Box is essential reading." - Peter C. Newman, author and columnist
The Chance of War
In the past ten years, thousands of Canadian "peacekeepers" have served in the former Yugoslavia. The soldiers who appear in this book all served in the first three years of the conflict. Ten were there as a part of Canada's contribution to the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR), Operation Harmony. The other, Lewis MacKenzie, was the Chief of Staff for UNPROFOR at the beginning of the UN mission. The stories they tell about their training, their experiences overseas, and finally their homecoming reveal that no matter how benign the government judges a situation to be when they deploy our troops, soldiers are always faced with the reality and the chance of war.
The Chatter Box
"Parliament, where the potential to defend ourselves ought to be debated and ultimately decided, has become irrelevant talk-shop ... The Chatter Box is essential reading." - Peter C. Newman, author and columnist
A Call to Account
"What happens when Parliament fails to hold the government to account? What happens when the very institution that is supposed to represent us becomes dysfunctional?" These are the central questions posed in A Call to Account, a compilation of interviews conducted between November 2000 and July 2001 for a series of Stornoway Productions television documentaries on Canadian government. The interviews contain the reflections, observations, and analyses of those most familiar with the inner workings of Canada's political system - from government and opposition backbench MPs, to Cabinet ministers and party insiders, to civil servants, academics, historians and the media. The picture of Parliamen...
Guardians on Trial
Governments in Canada today are facing a fiscal crisis. In recent years both Ottawa and many of the provinces have undertaken cost-cutting measures, such as reducing program spending and streamlining the public service, in an attempt to get their fiscal houses in order. Yet these efforts have barely even begun to address the problem. Governments still find themselves strapped for cash, struggling to find enough money to keep our most cherished social programs afloat while continuing to make payments on the billions of dollars in debt they owe to the rest of the world. How did we get to this point? The answer is that for more than thirty years the people we elected to office, and the public s...
Reinventing Canadian Defence Procurement
In a comprehensive study of the defence-procurement environment and the legislative and regulatory framework that governs the process, Alan Williams argues that an inoperable procurement process has led to the near disarmament of the Canadian Forces, the collapse of national defence policy, and a system compromised by bureaucracy and conflicting interests. The only way to fix these problems, says Williams, is to completely reinvent the system of defence procurement, from the roles of various people and organizations to the process itself. Williams also examines questions surrounding efficiency, accountability, and the motivations of politicians and bureaucrats in defence spending. He provides an exhaustive examination of a complex and vital process - a virtual roadmap for a reconstruction that would allow Canada's defence spending to support national security and the Canadian Forces.
