Dear Editor:
Nothing is more appropriate on, or about, Queen Victoria’s birthday, then to bring in that Canada, as a nation, is a “constitutional Monarchy.”
Queen Victoria was the sovereign who made Confederation possible, under her government in 1867. One could conclude that it was Queen Victoria who began the journey of this great nation and yet she would have been decidedly concerned that democracy, one of hallmarks of our constitution, is well and truly under attack.
From the inquiry on interference in our government institutions: “Public trust in democratic government institutions is important in a democratic country like Canada. Trust leads to greater acceptance of public policies, nurtures political participation, strengthens social cohesion and builds institutional legitimacy.”
Democracy is something that, for centuries, has had to be hard fought for. Now, with a simple stroke of a pen, the province of Ontario, has violated a fundamental trust by removing democracy from our municipal “institutions.”
The constitution allows the province to create these institutions (historically at the petition of the people); it allows the province to create legislation to restrict these municipal institutions; it allows the province to explain the role of Councils; it allows these institutions to have “the capacity, rights, powers and privileges of a natural person”; it allows the province to restrict financial obligations; it allows the province to support a process that only democracy can bring.
But our constitution does not allow the province to remove those hard-fought-for rights delineated through democracy. This provincial government has done just that by implementing “strong mayor powers.”
This stroke of the pen can be placed on the same footing as the scourge that has invaded our electoral system and undermined our democratic institutions.
Never again will there be trust in these government institutions; never again will there be avenues for residents to bring forward substantiated information to their elected representatives; and never again can anyone in Ontario trust this government.
Next election will be something, because the only thing people will remember about this sitting provincial government will be how it removed every citizens’ rights to democracy and destroyed their trust in our democratic institutions – something the people have relied on since this nation’s creation.
Happy Birthday, Queen Victoria. Your representative, the Lieutenant Governor and the premier have failed you and your people.
Elizabeth Marshall,
Director of research, Ontario Landowners Association