As hard-working, self-reliant Albertans slip down an ever steeper economic slope, a bitter debate about help and fair treatment from Ottawa is the last thing anyone needs.
This country is nothing if not a place where people notice, care and act when folks in one region suddenly find themselves behind the economic eight ball.
And someday it will literally be nothing if Canadians can’t get past thinking in terms of obligations and balancing of accounts, and in terms of aggrieved regions rather than of ordinary individuals.
It is true that Alberta has been the key economic driver of this country for the last decade and more.
It is further true that our national future surely depends on the jobs and wealth that will come from finding ways to cleanly exploit our great resource wealth.
But what’s all that got to do with the needs of an individual Canadian living in this province who has just lost his or her job because of $30 oil?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
If the federal government has the power to help such individuals, and the communities they live in, it should do it because it is right – which it unquestionably is – and not because some debt for past services must be honoured.
http://edmontonjournal.com/opinion/editorials/editorial-ottawa-can-help-jobless-albertans
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