When you think of a strong, committed, and radical separatist movement in
Canada what part of the country springs to mind? Northern Ontario, of course — that
snowy backwoods resembling iconic images of Canada better than any other part of
our country and where most Southern Ontarian suburbanites fear to tread. The home of
miners, loggers, outdoorsmen and First Nations. The Great White North has a complaint
with the way things are and there is a committed movement in Northern Ontario to break
away from Southern Ontario and become an independent province.

It is no secret that Queen’s Park is focused primarily on Southern Ontario’s
issues as this is where the ruling Liberals fight the hardest battle with the Progressive
Conservatives over seats. Northern Ontario, on the other hand, is filled with safe Liberal
and NDP ridings. Excluding the southernmost tip, Northern Ontario hasn’t elected a
PC since Bob Rae was premier. And so it follows that the political demands of Northern
Ontarians aren’t given much thought. Of course, the region is sparsely populated,
boasting just over 800,000 people in as many square kilometres. It is a paltry sum in
comparison to the 12 million residents of Southern Ontario, yet it is a population
larger than New Brunswick and greater than Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince
Edward Island and all of the territories combined. All these areas are self-governing
members of Confederation. Why then should Northern Ontario not be? Why should the
fate of Northern Ontario be decided by residents of Kitchener-Waterloo, Burlington, or
Etobicoke who may have never even set foot in the region?

Of course, this issue is not confined to Northern Ontario. Acadian portions of
New Brunswick, Cape Breton, English Quebec, and countless First Nations communities
across the country are stuck feeling that their concerns are unaddressed – even that the
rest of their province is hostile towards their interests. How then might we address their
concerns? One solution might be to consider separation with an open mind. Canada
would not be the first country to do so. The small European nation of Liechtenstein has
enshrined in its constitution the right of every municipality to secede if passed by local
referendum. Of course, for Canada such a proposal would not be intended to weaken
Confederation, but to strengthen it. A similar constitutional amendment could be adopted
that allowed for the creation of new provinces by a popular vote of the residents rather
than independence from Canada. It could be added that the areas concerned would have
to be geographically contiguous, or would have to have a population equal to the smallest
current jurisdiction in Canada – however, these would not be integral to such a system
functioning properly.

Some may be concerned that new provinces would not have the required tax base
to provide needed services and quality of life, but it should be noted that Liechtenstein,
with a population of only 35,000 has the highest per capita GDP in the world. Likewise,
the UN’s inequality-adjusted Human Development Index shows that a large population
does not equal a higher standard of living. Of the top ten countries on the Index, six
had populations under ten million and three of those had populations under five million
(Iceland being below even half-a-million). In addition, it has been argued by such
sociologists as Stockholm University’s Dr. Charlotta Stern, that smaller and more
homogeneous populations create a more effective and responsive bureaucracy because
there is a shared sense of identity and camaraderie that does not occur in larger, more
impersonal societies.

One obvious benefit of such a plan would be to keep politicians responsive to
the demands of all areas of their province – the threat of a loss of seats would hang like
the sword of Damocles over the heads of politicians. Likewise, if divisions did occur,
the new regions would be more effective in governing – if Northern Ontario or Toronto
became separate provinces, progressive reforms could easily be passed thanks to a lack of
sizeable opposition in their new legislatures.

Likewise, Southern Ontario would be freed from funding government projects
in these areas, as well as being able to pursue policies aligned with their core interests.
Such an arrangement would allow best practices to be identified. It would be easy to see
where certain policies failed and where others succeeded without imposing them on – and
perhaps endangering the well-being of – a large group of people. More provinces with
varying politics would make it easier to “vote with your feet” and move to a jurisdiction
where the government was more to your liking.

Normalizing the separation of regions would make the federal government less
inclined to bribe regions of the country into complacency. We would not be forced to
sink hundreds of millions of federal funds into quelling the complaints of regions that
are unhappy with the rest of Canada. Instead, if they were unhappy with the current
situation, they could be in charge of their own affairs. The clingy, unreasonable bickering
of Canadian nationalism would finally be replaced by an understanding of what political
jurisdictions ought rightfully to be: the union of peoples who share common concerns
and circumstances and, indeed, what confederation should be: a marriage that is only
justifiable if it serves the interests of all parties involved.