A recent Ottawa Citizen piece gave voice to a familiar critic’s assertion that Bill C-20 would not afford protection to Gatineau Park.
I heard a radio clip of Paul Martin saying that one can’t always consider success against what might be perfect, but instead against what might have been. In the case of Gatineau Park legislation the amendments to to the original legislation now provide that for the first time the NCC are legally required to undertake regional and national consultation in producing a Gatineau Park Masterplan every ten years. The original legislation did not require this.
Nor did the original legislation require that the House of Commons and the Senate see the new Masterplan before it is approved. This at least lets a little daylight in on the process.
Of course evil-doers can game the system. Consultations could be perfunctory; Parliament and the media might be distracted by some other issue and a Masterplan be slid through. Of course the universe could be better than what’s proposed.
But that doesn’t mean what’s proposed isn’t better than what we’ve had so far.
See also here.
