We have too many layers of government, and a system in need of
change. The party system does not work effectively to
represent the interests and needs of constituents.
Power is concentrated in the hands of the Premier at the Provincial
level, and in the hands of the Prime Minister at the Federal level,
leaving the MLAs and MPs virtually powerless. The
general public has no direct say in choosing the Premier or Prime
Minister.
My suggestion is as follows:
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Do away with electing MLAs and instead have the Mayors and
Reeves act as the MLAs for their municipalities.
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Separately elect a Premier for the province.
Candidates for Premier must have previously been elected to a
public position, and cannot serve more than two terms as Premier
(fixed four year terms).
-
Do not appoint Ministers for each Ministry. Instead
have the Ministries report directly to the Legislative Assembly
through their Deputy Ministers. This does away with
Cabinet and puts the Legislative Assembly and its members in
control, as it should be. (As an aside, a careful
analysis of the value of each of the current 19 Ministries would in
my view eliminate at least eight of them, having worked in both the
public sector and private sector).
I believe that this approach would have a number of important
benefits:
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Make municipal officials more important.
-
Provide better representation of municipal and regional
interests at the provincial level. It would also give
the municipal officials a better understanding of provincial
issues.
-
Give the general public the opportunity to choose the
Premier.
-
Reduce empire building within the provincial bureaucracy.
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Give greater control to the general public.
-
Reduce the overall cost of government significantly.
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Provide a much more responsive and democratic process of
government.
There would definitely be a learning curve involved on the part
of everyone, and a need to put aside party ideology and parochial
interests. This approach would also represent a
significant change to our current system and would be challenging
to implement.
In my view, tinkering with the current system will not provide
any real benefits. It is time to reform the system to
make it more responsive and democratic.
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