4 - Sunday, September 11, 1994 - North Shore News

Save dough: say bye-bye Quebec

Doug
Coilins

ON THE OTHER HAND

Ef it were done when ‘tis done,
‘twere well ie were done quickly. —
Banquo in shakespesre’s Macbeth.

OLD BANQUC knew a thing
or two and we should apply
his advice in the matter of
Quebec. We have been played
for dummies for too long.

There are concerns. What will
happen io the dollar if the crazies
take over? Will the country break up
into still smalter parts? Will we come
to rest on 2 bed of nails?

Who knows? All we know is that
the present bed of nails is no fun. But
if Quebec took a hike, French would
be gone from the cornflake boxes
and the Liberals would be safely
buried.

Isn’t that worth paying for?

If youask me, Wolfe made a imis-
take in trouncing Montealm on the
Plains of Abrabam.

He should have sated round to
the West Coast and set up camp here.
Many of our woes would then not
exist.

If we had any spine there would
be no problem, of course. We would
simply stage a retum engagentent on
the Plains and settle the thing once
and for all. Parizeau
could choose his
weilpons. °

Alas, that is out of
the question, Quebec
has too big a say with
the ated forces, such
as they are, And even
if it didn’t there are
loo many limp wrists
around, We'd rather
fornicate than fight.

Ottawa doesn’t even have the
nerve to say that Parizeau can hold as
many referendums as he likes but
that the only one that would count
would be a national referendum.

Instead, it hides under the blan-
ket. ,

Our approach to Quebec is the
kind of thing Neville Chamberlain
tried with Hitler. It's called appease-
ment. Well, it didn’t work then and it
won't work now.

The popular wisdom is that
Quebec will go PQ and that the
clever Quebecers will then say they
don’t want to separate, that they are
on to too much of a good thing.

So they are. But don’t count on
common sense winning the day.
Race and culture are more powerful
than dollars — except with English

Canada, which is willing to surrender
toanyeng, including a handful of
Sikhs.

The “good thing” for Quebee has
brought us nothing but slaps in the
face.

Conrad Black the media mogul
had it right. “Quit trying to buy
Quebee's affections,” he said a few
months ago.

Lord knows we've tied to buy

66 We'd rather fornicate

than fight, 99

them. Gny of the reasons we have
“equatization” payments was to bribe
Quebec. This year Quebce gets 47%
of the total —- nearly $4 billion.

That there was no need for them
is shown by Parizeau’s claim that
Quebec can easily go it alone. And
he laughs about how easy it has been
for Quebec to squeeze ever more
bucks out of Ottawa.

“Boy, did we know how to do
that,” he said on TV.

Studies by the ‘Tax Foundation of
Canada prove he was right. Between
1977 and 1992 Quebec got $95 bil-
lion more out of Ottawa than Ottawa
got out of Quebec. It's a bottomless
pit.

Alberta. in particular, has been

- royally dumped on. In that same

period it had to give Ottawa $32 bil-

aiICoAbER|

EE §8+PAGE CATALOGUE

fion, thanks to aif revenues and the
national energy policy.

Ottawa, whether Tory or Liberal,
has grovelled to Quebee in the
awarding of contracts, jobs, pen-
sions, kinguage and those jolly old
cornilake boxes.

The result is thar itis a republic
now in all but name, Itdoes what it
pleases. In France it has what
amounts to an embassy.

It's been vitsy, all
right. How could inet be
when Quebee has been
the guiding star around
which the rest of the
country has revolved"

For 35 of the past 46
years the prime ministers
have all been from
Quebec.

La belle Province was
a solid Bloc long before

the trtitorous Bloc Quebecois was
formed. :

We would save a Jot of dough if
Quebec took off into the night. The
dollar might even get a boost.

You miay ask, “What about the
Anglos in Quebec?” Well, let those
who vote for Parizeau stay where

(23 does not

inience

they are and let the rest head out,

At feast 150,000 have already
done just that. Ay Mordecai Richler
has stated, it’s a kind of ethnic
cleansing.

Another 16¢ say they will make
the trek, too, if Parizeau gets in. We
should give them a hand.

Charity should begin at home,
The rest of Canada should cut out all
foreign aid and all inmigration and
use the money thus saved to resettle
anyone who wants fo move,

As my man Banquo said, ‘twere
better it were done quickly,

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