A statue of Sir John A. Macdonald, Canada's first prime minister, on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
The very essence of Canada is a big idea: a country forged out of three British colonies that would grow to span a continent. And like most big ideas, success was anything but guaranteed.
The Maritime colonies had been eyeing their own union plan, which likely would have meant the end to the ambition of a wider confederation. There were squabbles between those (like Sir John A. Macdonald) who preferred a dominant central government and those advocating for the looser federalism model that eventually won out (and won over Macdonald).
And who could have predicted that the Canada of 2026 would come to be? That Manitoba, then British Columbia, then Prince Edward Island, would choose to become part of the new nation in British North America? That a transcontinental railway would bind that nation together? That 159 years of history would bear out the big idea of Canada.
Macdonald had an inkling, more than an inkling. Speaking in February, 1865, the future first prime minister of Canada made the case for the yet-to-be-born country. “...if we wish to be a great people; if we wish to form – using the expression which was sneered at the other evening – a great nationality, commanding the respect of the world, able to hold our own against all opponents, and to defend those institutions we prize... we wish to be able to afford to each other the means of mutual defence and support against aggression and attack – this can only be obtained by a union of some kind between the scattered and weak boundaries composing the British North American Provinces.”
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In the next two years, the momentum toward Confederation would grow, spurred in part by the growing threat to sovereignty from the United States, most notably in the cancellation of a wide-ranging trade agreement, the Reciprocity Treaty.
Macdonald would have his country and eventually, his great nationality. That aspiration, as Macdonald noted, drew scorn in some quarters 161 years ago. It still does today, the idea that Canada, that Canadians, should aspire to greatness. That boldness seems an ill-fitting suit to the habitual posture of this country.
The parallels with Macdonald’s day are striking. Today, just as then, the U.S. republic covets Canada. Today, just as then, a relationship of trust built on trade has been upended. And just as then, there are petty squabbles over narrow prerogatives.
And today, just as then, we need big ideas. The first is: Finish the work of Macdonald and the other architects of Confederation. The vision of a unified (but not unitary) country remains unfulfilled. There is not one Canada today, but a baker’s dozen of fiefdoms. A true economic union is 159 years overdue.
Last year, the federal government set the goal of eliminating its own internal trade barriers by July 1, 2025. That was far too modest an ambition, leaving intact the provinces’ own thickets of rules, regulations and preferences. Ottawa should set a new goal: by July 1, 2027 it will have cajoled – bribed if necessary – the provinces into doing the right thing, and creating a single economic space.
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Prime Minister Mark Carney has set the goal for Canada to be the fastest-growing economy in the G7. He should be bolder, and aim to make this country the most prosperous in the world, full stop.
That is a years-long project, but it can start now, with a break with the mediocrity-inducing policies of the past decade, an embrace of free trade over meek protectionism and a deliberate step away from the economic shadow of the United States.
Speaking of shadows, let’s end the fascination with, and fear of, the United States and its stultifying effect on political debate in this country. It should not be enough that our tax rates are not terribly higher than those of the U.S. It should not be enough that our health care system is not quite as bad. It should not be enough that our education system is marginally better.
Canada should have world class universities, plural. Aiming for the top 30 is aiming too low. Canada should have world-beating companies, plural. Aiming to sell off startups rather than build enduring success is aiming too low.
Those are big ambitions. Success is unlikely, the naysayers are many. Macdonald would approve.