The Canadian Campaign Speech I’d Like to Hear

 

The Canadian Campaign Speech I’d Like to Hear

                                                                    

(I wrote this in the context of the Canada's 2019 federal election and published it then on Linked-In, but it still seems kind of relevant. Consider it a message in a bottle from a utopian Canada in an alternative universe where the politicians and the voters are actually willing to discuss and engage with the most important issues.)

My colleague Elizabeth May has described this as the most historic Canadian election ever. That may sound like political hyperbole, but I agree with Ms. May – at least on that particular description.

There are two reasons I agree.

The first is the one alluded to by Ms. May. Climate change is now more than a “clear and present danger.” It’s an established fact and an actual crisis.

Weather data has shown temperatures increasing relentlessly on a global basis. Scientific evidence of rapidly melting polar ice caps and other phenomena caused by global warming is inundating us. Destructive storms, floods and wildfires are happening more frequently than the past - and the damage claims associated them have skyrocketed.

Our efforts to address the accelerating crisis, both in Canada and around the world, seem scattered and ad-hoc. At times, it seems most of us are “fiddling while the world burns,” even though some isolated, individual efforts may be commendable.

It’s important to understand the magnitude of the crisis, and all the aspects of our lives it involves. It’s not simply a matter of addressing the changes to our climate and the consequences for the ecosystem, including the movement of invasive and dangerous species from the tropics north to our latitudes.

It’s also a matter of coming to grips with the implications for our political and economic order – including a massive increase in the number of refugees seeking shelter from the storm in our safe and prosperous country.

Climate change is a global crisis in both senses of the world global. It encompasses all aspects of our life, as well as all regions of the world.

To me this election is also historic for another reason – although it’s one that's closely linked to the first.

The second reason it’s historic is because Canada is at an economic crossroads.

Over the first 150 years of our existence, we’ve taken a widely dispersed group of small colonial outposts into one of the most prosperous and desirable places to live in the entire world.

But the economy that enabled us to build our prosperous and advanced nation is giving way to a new economic order.

The center of economic life is moving from the production and distribution of goods such as automobiles, oil and wheat that have been the mainstays of our exports, to the production and use of knowledge, information and data.

The economy was once defined and dominated by corporations such as General Motors, Exon, and Cargill. They've now been replaced by companies like Facebook, Google, and Amazon.

And Canada must make the transition to the new economic game if we are to remain prosperous.

The early innings have not been encouraging.

Canada is lagging in the transition to the knowledge-based economy. We haven’t found the key to applying new ideas and technologies to our existing industries, and thus boost our sluggish productivity growth.

And we haven’t succeeded in building any world-beating players in the tech world. Or rather we have created some champions, but for various reasons their reign at the top was short-lived.

These might sound like issues for academics and policy wonks - remote from the everyday concerns of Canadians just trying to get survive from paycheck to paycheck.

But if we don’t update and renew our economy, if we don’t revive productivity growth, and if we don’t bolster our ability to compete globally and diversify our export markets, that everyday struggle to get by will become harder and harder over the next few years.

The only way to make more wealth available to Canadians is to create more wealth. The gist of that work will fall to the private sector, but the public sector also has a key role in developing policies that will foster the creation of new ideas and technologies and make sure they make it into production.

I have complete confidence that we will be able to succeed. Our public education system is one of the best in the world, our universities number among the finest, our work force is well trained, hard-working, and highly adaptable, and our culture is diverse, sophisticated, and open-minded.

Let’s not forget it wasn’t just basketball and Superman that were invented by Canadians. Insulin, the medication used to treat diabetes around the world, was developed by researchers at the University of Toronto, to name just one of our singular contributions to civilization.

What we need are the policies and legislation and institutions that will allow us to translate the brilliant and creative ideas Canadians develop into companies and products that create new and better jobs for Canadians.

And while we’re doing that, we must ensure the wealth we generate is equitably distributed and its benefits flow to all Canadians – most importantly, the Indigenous nations whose land we are all graced to live and work upon.

The last few years have proven that wealth creation that leaves some segments of the population is an open invitation to instability. It’s our responsibility to build the best and most competitive economy in the world, and the fairest and most equitable and sustainable.

We have a particular responsibility to those who lose their livelihoods during the transition, to provide them the training and support they need to find a productive new niche.

And we must extend the objectives of equity and sustainability beyond the economy and into the ecosystem itself - because those two things are not really distinct at all.

The economies built by human beings are an integral part of the ecosystems that sustain us, not an artificial world set apart from the realm of Nature. 

We must align our economies with the planetary ecosystem - otherwise, we threaten the very existence of our economies, the broader ecosystem and the other species that inhabit our planet.

That’s the connection between the two issues that make this election so pivotal – the climate change crisis and Canada’s economic challenge.

In a way we’re fortunate we’re encountering these two challenges at the same time. It gives us the opportunity to rebuild our economy in alignment with the needs of the planet, as well as the needs of Canadians in mind - the opportunity to create an economy that’s creative, productive, equitable and fair – fair to future generations as well as ourselves, and fair to all our fellow species and the environment we share.

A Canadian politician once infamously said that an election is no time to discuss serious issues.

I couldn’t disagree more.

An election is exactly the time to talk about the serious issues confronting the country we all love so dearly. And that conversation shouldn’t be from the top down. Politicians will be using the campaign and the polling data to get a sense of what’s important to Canadians. If these core issues are important to you, let me and my opponents know – and please let’s us know your ideas about how to solve them.

Canadians have the right to the highest standards of ethics and behavior from their politicians, but I’d like to suggest devoting the next three weeks to a discussion of the ill-considered remarks or questionable behavior of candidates in the past may not be the most effective way of spending these precious days.

Over the next few days, my party will be rolling out a series of policy proposals that include input from a broad range of independent thinkers from the fields of economics, environmental science, engineering, urban planning and other fields.

I’m really looking forward to hearing your responses to our ideas – and to hearing the positions advanced on these key issues by our opponents.

Most of all, I’m looking to engaging in a thorough and constructive conversations with Canadians of all persuasions about how to build a country that will prevail in the face of these great challenges. And one that will prevail in the same creative, courageous, and compassionate way we have triumphed over our challenges in the past.

Now I have time for a few questions from the media.