Wannabe MPs must get serious
During the October 1993 federal election campaign, many Canadians got angry at Kim Campbell, then the prime minister, when she suggested that election campaigns are poor occasions for the discussion of serious issues.
But this year, the candidates running in the federal riding of Nunavut have so far said little to prove her wrong, especially on the crucial issues of poverty, economic development, wealth creation and wealth distribution.
Yes, we’ve all heard the usual mouthing of phrases like “housing,” “food prices” and “infrastructure.” These represent crucial issues for many Nunavut voters.
But in their discusson of these issues, candidates have offered, not a debate, but a prelude to a debate.
Here’s the biggest disappointment: the absence of any substantive discussion on how the federal government ought to help Nunavut prepare for what promises to become the greatest transformative event in the region’s history since the 1960s.
That would be the arrival of four or five wealth-producing mines, with more to follow in later years. Over the next five years, companies propose the construction of new mines at Doris North, Meliadine, and Mary River, as well as a revival of the bankrupt diamond mine at Jericho.
In its 2010 economic outlook, the Nunavut Economic Forum expects this to produce growth rates of at least five per cent a year over the next five years in Nunavut. For Nunavut, that represents unprecedented opportunities for new wealth creation within families and communities.
For regular people, it means new opportunities to get better paying jobs or to start new businesses. Most of all, it represents a chance for people to earn higher incomes in a territory where incomes, especially outside Iqaluit, are far too low in relation to the cost of living.
But at the same time, the economic forum reports, Nunavut’s not doing enough to prepare. “Nunavut must address its issues of poor labour mobility and skills mismatch, and resolve the issue of a welfare trap,” the economic forum report says
What have candidates had to say about this? Not much.
Here’s just one example, related to employment training. In the Kivalliq region, an organization called the Kivalliq Mine Training Society has offered job training to more than 500 Inuit in the region.
But the federal government program that pays for most of it, the Aboriginal Skills and Employment Partnership, is set to expire next March. The organization has been told to wind down its operations as of that date, a development that makes no sense whatsoever.
And yet not a single Nunavut candidate has raised this issue, nor has any opposition party candidate posed questions on it to Conservative incumbent Leona Aglukkaq.
It’s true that two of the candidates, Liberal Paul Okalik and New Democrat Jack Hicks, have thrown rhetorical stink bombs at Aglukkaq over Nutrition North Canada and the need for more subsidized social housing.
These are legitimate poverty issues. But those problems are rooted in low income, not supply shortages or price gouging.
Take retail food prices, which have been mitigated slightly by Nutrition North Canada in recent weeks, but have become a major obsession for some people who want the government to tinker even more with price reduction.
High prices are more than just an annoyance. They represent a legitimate moral challenge. But they are not the root problem. Today’s retail food prices accurately reflect the energy and labour that’s required to bring goods to Nunavut, store them and then offer them for sale. Price is not the problem.
Nunavut’s root problem is income, not prices. That’s the essence of poverty. When you don’t have enough money to pay for what you need, you’re poor.
Given that median incomes in have-not communities outside Iqaluit fall as low as $14,000 a year, it’s clear that Nunavut’s biggest economic problem is low income, not high prices. Too few people earn enough money to pay the high cost of living in Nunavut.
The same holds true for the housing shortage: too many people in Nunavut can’t afford to pay the true cost of buying or renting their own accommodation. This is why more than 50 per cent of families in Nunavut need the government to build housing for them and then pay the lion’s share of the maintenance cost.
For humanitarian reasons, the federal government, must of course, build many more subsidised social housing units in Nunavut. But we should not delude ourselves into believing that this constitutes a long-term solution.
For governments, at all levels, a long-term fix for poverty in Nunavut means two things. First, they must transfer substantially more money into the pockets of people who can’t earn enough to get by, through the tax system and through direct transfers.
The other is for governments to do much more to prepare Nunavut residents for higher-income jobs. The impending mining boom offers a splendid opportunity to do this. Unfortunately, too few people seem to recognize this.
Combatting poverty means two things: the creation of new wealth and the equitable distribution of new wealth. Nothing else has ever worked, anywhere.
So whether you look inside or outside the federal election campaign, it’s a shame that hardly anyone in Nunavut wants to talk about this. JB
(0) Comments