If you were PM, what would you do?

[Moonlight Graham]

And not necessarily for the current CPC party (so as to not make this thread too partisan), just with a party of your choosing (or making) or whatever you wish.

So what would you do with your newly found power? What reforms, legislation, foreign policy etc. would you try to push through? I'll post mine later.

[Bryan]

• Open up our healthcare to allow more two-tier medical services.

• Tear up the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

• Give Quebec a one time take it or leave it offer to either join confederation as a full and equal partner, or to fully succeed with no more money or services from Ottawa.

• Give First nations the same offer. Either you're fully equal Canadians, or the reserves are your own independent nations and you're on your own.

• Get both softer and harsher on drugs at the same time: no penalties at all for simple possession or personal use (especially soft drugs like pot), but life in prison for trafficking hard drugs.

[g_bambino]

Give Quebec a one time take it or leave it offer to either join confederation as a full and equal partner...

Already done, in 1867.

[eyeball]

1. 
   • Close healthcare to two-tier medical services.
   • Sew the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms back together again.
   • Begin discussions with Canada's bio-regions regarding the dissolution of the provinces and how to rationalize and share responsibilities for governance between federal and bio-regional jurisdictions.
   • A lot of First Nations traditional territories are usually defined along bio-regional lines so I'd expect Canadians within these would have the choice to be governed according to whoever's territory they were in or move.
   • Legalize all drugs and turn all responsibility for public education, regulating it's use, treatment for abuse etc over to the health department. The locations for production, distribution, retailing, hours of operation etc would be determined by local authorities.
   • Raise taxes on the wealthy and reduce their access to power - either or, the result should be the same. Place the income gap near the top of the list of things used to determine our fiscal policy.
   • Require any and all lobbying of politicians and or senior government servants to be conducted in public.
   • Link all trade to our own human, labour and environmental standards.
   • Require national referendum with a super-majority of 75% before sending any troops into any foreign conflict.
   • Did I say tax the rich?
   

[CPCFTW]

• Open up our healthcare to allow more two-tier medical services.

• Tear up the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

• Give Quebec a one time take it or leave it offer to either join confederation as a full and equal partner, or to fully succeed with no more money or services from Ottawa.

• Give First nations the same offer. Either you're fully equal Canadians, or the reserves are your own independent nations and you're on your own.

• Get both softer and harsher on drugs at the same time: no penalties at all for simple possession or personal use (especially soft drugs like pot), but life in prison for trafficking hard drugs.

I love most of it.

I'll add:

- Once budget is balanced, continue to reduce corporate and personal income taxes.

- Start issuing T-Bills for investment purposes instead of for spending. Borrow at 1%, invest in a diversified portfolio of assets yielding 5-10% for Canadians. Send Canadians over 16 y/o dividend cheques from this portfolio every month so that Canadians can start to appreciate the benefits of investment before they become NDP voters. When you reach 65 or leave the country, some sustainable percentage of your share of the accumulated capital gains on the portfolio will be paid out (to RIF if retired, via cheque and pro-rated if leaving Canada).

- Implement RHSP (registered health savings plan) with tax deductions similar to RRSP.

- Abolish welfare for non-disabled/insane/single parent of children under school age.

- Make minimum wages illegal.

- Banish public sector unions. Make all public pensions DC instead of DB with 1:1 matching only.

- Create Department of Public Sector Compensation which will find comparables (in terms of duties, education/skills, hours worked, job security, etc.) between public sector vs private sector jobs. Public sector compensation and benefits will be rolled back to 105% of private sector comparables if public sector is compensated > 110% of private sector comparables.

- Finally, implement "minimum income" program whereby the government makes up any shortfall in income paid by the company.

Eg. Car parts manufacturer makes a plant in Canada and hires full time workers for $5/hr. Government has $20,000 minimum full-time income law. Employee only makes $5 x 40hr x 50wks = $10,000 through the manufacturer, the government pays the worker another $10,000 in "welfare" to meet the $20,000 minimum income level.

This program will be paid for by eliminating welfare, heavily reducing unemployment (more tax revenue, less social costs), reducing public sector labour costs, and through taxation of the new manufacturing industry.

The effect of all this will be to reduce prices (much lower labour costs) for better quality of life, increase employment, and increase disposable income (less taxes).

Edited January 14, 2012 by CPCFTW

[eyeball]

I guess I'd probably also round up all the right wingers, take a page out the movie Wild In The Streets, and force them to all take LSD.

Maybe that would help.

[jacee]

I love most of it.

I'll add:

- Once budget is balanced, continue to reduce corporate and personal income taxes.

- Start issuing T-Bills for investment purposes instead of for spending. Borrow at 1%, invest in a diversified portfolio of assets yielding 5-10% for Canadians. Send Canadians over 16 y/o dividend cheques from this portfolio every month so that Canadians can start to appreciate the benefits of investment before they become NDP voters. When you reach 65 or leave the country, some sustainable percentage of your share of the accumulated capital gains on the portfolio will be paid out (to RIF if retired, via cheque and pro-rated if leaving Canada).

- Implement RHSP (registered health savings plan) with tax deductions similar to RRSP.

- Abolish welfare for non-disabled/insane/single parent of children under school age.

- Make minimum wages illegal.

- Banish public sector unions. Make all public pensions DC instead of DB with 1:1 matching only.

- Create Department of Public Sector Compensation which will find comparables (in terms of duties, education/skills, hours worked, job security, etc.) between public sector vs private sector jobs. Public sector compensation and benefits will be rolled back to 105% of private sector comparables if public sector is compensated > 110% of private sector comparables.

That'll take a decade or more and cost billions.

- Finally, implement "minimum income" program whereby the government makes up any shortfall in income paid by the company.

Eg. Car parts manufacturer makes a plant in Canada and hires full time workers for $5/hr. Government has $20,000 minimum full-time income law. Employee only makes $5 x 40hr x 50wks = $10,000 through the manufacturer, the government pays the worker another $10,000 in "welfare" to meet the $20,000 minimum income level.

This program will be paid for by eliminating welfare, heavily reducing unemployment (more tax revenue, less social costs), reducing public sector labour costs, and through taxation of the new manufacturing industry.

The effect of all this will be to reduce prices (much lower labour costs) for better quality of life, increase employment, and increase disposable income (less taxes).

No employer will want to miss out on that deal, so suddenly everyone earns only $20,000 ... and nobody's paying taxes or buying products.

This is how the race to the bottom ends.

[CPCFTW]

That'll take a decade or more and cost billions.

Abolishing welfare, banishing public sector unions, and slashing public sector compensation will cost billions?

No employer will want to miss out on that deal, so suddenly everyone earns only $20,000 ... and nobody's paying taxes or buying products.

This is how the race to the bottom ends.

You are so far removed from reality. You must not have been very educated/skilled if you have such little confidence in your abilities that you think a company would only pay you 20k in this scenario. Companies will continue to pay top dollar for people with unique skillsets, or they won't be able to hire anyone because everyone with employable skills will move to the US.

There will also be much more entrepreneurship and competition for labour as hiring employees and creating jobs will be much more affordable. I could start an online business that manufactures, sells, and delivers couches in the Toronto area. I'd pay the builders and drivers/deliverers $5/hr. My couches might not be the best, but I'll sell a ton of them if they cost $50 each. When my profits are high enough I hire a CEO and relax while collecting my cheques. He starts exporting my couches to a billion Chinese people and we're paying taxes on all the corporate profits.

Could I do the same for an operating system to compete with Windows, or a portfolio management company that put 100% of client assets in RIM because they liked Blackberries, or a hospital that will do open heart surgery for $100, or a university for $100/semester but all the professors flunked out of high school? No because people demand skilled labour in these occupations.

But yes, everyone flipping burgers, serving coffee, and mopping floors will get 20k.

Furthermore, reduced wages leads to reduced prices. So people will actually buy more.

I might also suggest that any company using this strategy would have to open an RESP in the employee's name and contribute $2500/yr to it. After 5 years of labour, interest, and government CESG grants, the employee would have around $20,000 to train for a better career. Finding a part-time job during school to help pay living expenses would not be hard. This would keep our labour force as skilled as possible.

Edited January 14, 2012 by CPCFTW

[TimG]

But yes, everyone flipping burgers, serving coffee, and mopping floors will get 20k.

Paid for by the people making more that 20K. GAI programs never see the light of day because they are prohibitively expensive and the taxes required to support them are too high.

And that does not even take into account unintended consequences. In this case, an employer that pays 25K gets no subsidy but an employer that pays 10K gets half of their wage bill paid for. This will create an economic incentive to build low wage/low skill businesses which is exactly the opposite of what we need.

[TimG]

So what would you do with your newly found power? What reforms, legislation, foreign policy etc. would you try to push through? I'll post mine later.

It seems that many of the posters think that the PM is a absolute monarch and not contrained by the law, the bureacracy and the politics. The fact is PMs have very little power to effect real change and the most they can do introduce incremental changes to the status quo. The real power rests with people that can articulate a vision and get masses of people to buy into it. You dont have to hold a political office to do this.

[WWWTT]

It seems that many of the posters think that the PM is a absolute monarch and not contrained by the law,

Yes its actually funny.

Really the thread would be more appropriately titled "If you had absolute,unquestioned total control over every juridiction and aspect of Canada and definition of.Regardless of concern from its citizens/voters,etc,etc well you get the idea.

If anyone had this kind of power the corruption would leed to unimanginable devastation!

WWWTT

[Michael Hardner]

I would try to improve the public understanding of government - by educating and better publicizing government operations, by creating new public forums for debate, by simplifying and flattening government operations.

I would look for ways to better separate the political side of government from services, perhaps through outsourcing or consolidation.

I would look for ways to make the public service more dynamic and more closely tied to private business.

I would look to streamline government, and use the savings to invest in people.

[Michael Hardner]

• Tear up the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

• Give Quebec a one time take it or leave it offer to either join confederation as a full and equal partner, or to fully succeed with no more money or services from Ottawa.

• Give First nations the same offer. Either you're fully equal Canadians, or the reserves are your own independent nations and you're on your own.

These 3 are fairly outrageous. We have relative quiet on these items after decades of strife and you would poke at these hornet's nests... why ?

[Michael Hardner]

I guess I'd probably also round up all the right wingers, take a page out the movie Wild In The Streets, and force them to all take LSD.

Maybe that would help.

Your suggestion seems to me to be as legal as some of them... 'tear up the constitution'...

If they decide to abolish all laws, we can take advantage of the anarchy and drive to Alberta together to force rural Tories to take ecstasy at gunpoint.

[prairiechickin]

If they decide to abolish all laws, we can take advantage of the anarchy and drive to Alberta together to force rural Tories to take ecstasy at gunpoint.

Careful there, redneck love is a dangerous thing when unleashed.

[Michael Hardner]

Careful there, redneck love is a dangerous thing when unleashed.

I don't like the term 'redneck' ... and I don't think such people exist anyway.

I grew up in a rural area and the countryfolk were as politically diverse as the townies.

[cybercoma]

• Give Quebec a one time take it or leave it offer to either join confederation as a full and equal partner, or to fully succeed with no more money or services from Ottawa.

Perhaps before you issue any ultimatums, you should learn that the term is secede.

[prairiechickin]

I don't like the term 'redneck' ... and I don't think such people exist anyway.

I do, and they do. I'm purebred, cowboys on my Father's side, dirt farmers on my Mother's.

[Michael Hardner]

I do, and they do. I'm purebred, cowboys on my Father's side, dirt farmers on my Mother's.

It's not that it's offensive (maybe it is) but that it's a caricature. In any case, this all started as a joke so I'll lighten up now.

[Guest Manny]

Hang the rich

[Wild Bill]

1. 
   • Require national referendum with a super-majority of 75% before sending any troops into any foreign conflict.
   • Did I say tax the rich?
   

I dunno, Eyeball. I actually agree with you on a couple of your points. Still, I have a problem about national referendums on military matters. You see, I believe that if that were the case sooner or later we'd all be dead or enslaved!

Look at the example of Neville Chamberlain. It's easy to brand him as gullible with the hindsight of history. He kept appeasing Hitler until Hitler was strong enough to begin a world war. He must have been the equivalent of a granola crunching idiot, most say today!

What we forget is that he was a political leader. He got to be Prime Minister of Britain because more Britons WANTED him to take that approach than didn't! If he hadn't have appeased Hitler he would likely have lost the next election, assuming of course that war didn't break out, which it unfortunately did.

It's human nature to want to avoid conflict. War is distasteful, to say the least. It's also easy to think that because it's quiet outside there's no wolves gathering on the other side of the hill, where we can't see them. The more power you give to a people to tie the hands of their leaders the more they will exercise it.

As far as keeping leaders from meddling and instigating conflicts this would be a good thing. Where it fails is with situations where a clear and present danger is born and is growing. How many lives would have been saved if nations had stood up to Hitler at the beginning of his rise to power?

Leaders like Churchill saw the danger and did what they could to prepare their nation but until the balloon went up there was not a lot he could do. Of course, when war broke out all of a sudden the people WANTED a leader like Churchill, recognizing that someone like him was more likely to save their asses than ol' Neville.

However, when WWII broke out it was very nearly too late for Britain to ramp up and compete militarily with Germany. She very, very nearly was conquered at the time of the Battle of Britain.

Today, we have even less time to catch up. Today's wars are "come as you are" wars. You fight with what you have on hand and by the time you could even begin to start ramping up your military assets it would be over. If you lose, too bad and so sad.

I think it unlikely that we would ever actually be invaded and conquered but I could see the day when some brutal thug grew powerful enough to seriously hurt our economy, causing much hunger, hardship and suffering. Not to mention hurting or killing large numbers of our allies. With the traditional high immigrant percentage of our population I'm sure significant numbers of Canadians have no desire to stand by and watch their relatives get bombed or even nuked!

So if we had your super majority, I think it would mean that we would NEVER handle a problem while it was small! We would ALWAYS wait until it became large and very, very bloody!

That's where we expect our leaders to have some foresight and give them the power to use it. Your system would tie their hands. As I said, this might be a good thing if they were instigators but as far as making sure we have what we need to defend ourselves it would be very bad indeed.

Maybe if as a people we were so stupid we would deserve such a fate! A bloody Darwin Award, as it were. In an academic sense I could agree with that. Certainly it would tend to kill off the short sighted.

Still, it would be a much higher price than I would care to see paid.

Edited January 14, 2012 by Wild Bill

[eyeball]

If anyone had this kind of power the corruption would leed to unimanginable devastation!

Did you miss this?

Require any and all lobbying of politicians and or senior government servants to be conducted in public.

[eyeball]

That's where we expect our leaders to have some foresight and give them the power to use it. Your system would tie their hands. As I said, this might be a good thing if they were instigators but as far as making sure we have what we need to defend ourselves it would be very bad indeed.

What would really tie their hands is opening up all lobbying to public scrutiny. I'm betting that alone would prevent most wars.

As for basing your arguments about why we should go to war on the ghost of Hitler, I'd counter that Hitler likely never would have arisen if Europe had been left to the Europeans back in WW1 and they'd paid better attention to the way it was concluded. I suspect the intense feverish lobbying that must have been going on in secret during the Versailles Treaty negotiations is what really cocked things up.

To paraphrase you...Maybe as a people they were so stupid they deserved such a fate.

The path to enlightenment is always painful.

Edited January 14, 2012 by eyeball

[Scotty]

Prime minster with an absolute majority in both houses? Ok.

I'd throw out the Canada Health Act, and adopt the Swedish health care system, with elements of France and Germany.

Cut immigration by 50% and refocus it on Europe.

Work with the provinces to bring in a new level of trade/apprenticeship colleges/programs like the Germans have.

Create a civilian 'army' by drafting all able bodied men and women without kids to look after who receive government assistance. This 'army' for want of another name, would receive physical training, be taught discipline, and be used in a variety of jobs from clearing snow to weeding and cutting grass in parks, cleaning up garbage, paving roads, harvesting crops or whatever else the government has use for. And I don't care if the unions and civil libertarians howl. If you don't want to be drafted, you simply pay your own way in life.

All prisoners, except those who are too dangerous would likewise be doing work or learning a trade. No more warehousing.

Fraud laws would be made stricter, and fines replaced with jail time. That means those guys who pave your driveway, which cracks and falls apart three months later, the roofer who does a miserable, crappy job with sub-standard material, or never even finishes it, the auto mechanic who lies about what was wrong with your car so he can triple the bill, the plumber who pretends you need to get your lawn dug up at enormous cost to replace your sewer pipe, the sports shop owner who sells cut rate 'official' jerseys which he knew were forgeries, those guys would all go to prison. Over-billing would likewise be cause for prison time. Companies which sell you products or services which are not as claimed, or which fall apart quickly, would be put out of business, even if their name is Ford or Chrysler.

All products originating in China would be subjected to full inspections at the borders, and the cost passed on to China through a special tariff.

No foreign state, including any state-owned enterprises would be permitted to invest in Canada, or purchase any Canadian company or corporation.

Any politician who fails to try to the best of his or her ability to fulfill the promises in his election platform would be forbidden from running a second time. Any politician caught lying would be fired, fined, and banned from ever running in an election again.

All new buildings would be required to adopt much stricter energy and water efficiency systems, including gray water recycling and top end insulation, and, wherever practical, be required to be equipped with geothermal heating.

Not a well thought out platform but just off the top of my head.

[Michael Hardner]

Not a well thought out platform but just off the top of my head.

I agree.