Diminished Favour(itism)

There will doubtless be much gnashing of teeth at the perceived slight when Quebecers come to the realization that finally they do not represent the most entitled segment among Canadian society, that their province does not quite qualify for the largess formerly unhesitatingly - actually deliberately and with votes-aforethought - allocated to the province in commemorating their fetes nationale.

A province where Canada Day celebrations are not thought of as being exceptional, since so many French Canadians would far prefer to celebrate Jean Baptiste Day, and feel nonetheless that funds doled out parsimoniously to the rest of Canada and generously to that singular province simply recognize the premier importance of Quebec within the Canadian confederation.

However, the regional imbalance is now set to become a dim memory of Liberal favouritism excesses. In the interests of party politics and reaping Quebec votes.

Since, in fact, the program doling out taxpayer funds for various such celebrations, inclusive of National Aboriginal Day, Canadian Multiculturalism Day and Canada Day - oh yes, of course, Quebec's Fete nationale holiday, (June 21; 27; July 1, and June 24, respectively) dated from the era that saw the Liberals' discredited "Sponsorgate" program erupt on the national scene.

It's taken this long for the current government to put a rein on the inequities of sharing out available funds as it had little option but to honour the existing funding agreements until expiration. Which has now occurred. A new formula is set for introduction that would finally permit each of the provinces and territories to receive funding based on population size.

The Quebec organizing committee that had formerly received a whopping $3.2-million out of $3.8-million in available funding in 2008 for organizational purposes will be dissolved. As representing unnecessary costs in maintaining the committee's structures and travel costs, now viewed as redundant. All regional committees will be affected.

According to the announcement by Canadian Heritage Minister, James Moore there were no abuse of funds, merely unnecessary costs. Now, funding for country-wide celebrations of Canada Day will be available to municipalities and community groups who wish to make application for those non-commercial grants.

Dispensing with the regional committees which had used roughly half of the entire $6.7-million Celebrate Canada program. "We're frankly cleaning up a program that was badly structured and badly created by the Liberals back when they were in government" said Mr. Moore.

"...this is our first opportunity to change this and we're changing it in a way that will respect taxpayers [and] make sure that Canada Day is not being used for political purposes and is rather celebrated properly with government funding in a way that is proportionate across the country."

Tickety-boo!

In the 2009 fiscal year the program's funding had been increased to $9.6-million to reflect increased support for other provinces. Despite which, Quebec with less than 24% of the Canadian population, still managed to scoop 40% of total funding.