Move federal workers to rural areas...

[c_speed3108]

Move federal workers to rural areas, Senate report says
Government also urged to create department of rural affairs
David Akin, Canwest News Service
Published: Tuesday, June 17, 2008

OTTAWA - One in 10 federal government employees should be moved out of the country's largest cities and into rural areas, says a Senate committee studying rural poverty.

In a sweeping report with several dozen recommendations aimed to revitalizing rural Canada, senators also said a new department of rural affairs ought be created; that financial support for a host of rural programs should be increased; and that hedge funds and commodity traders be investigated to see what, if any, their role is in driving up fuel and energy prices.

"It is time to address rural-urban disparities," said Senator Joyce Fairbairn, the chair of the standing Senate committee on agriculture and forestry. Her committee spent two years looking at the issue of rural poverty and the price of farm inputs. The committee's final report was released Tuesday.

In their report, the senators note that, for the first time in Canada's history, fewer than 20 per cent of the country's population live in rural areas. The senators argue that rural Canada is becoming poorer and receiving a disproportionately small amount of federal government resources and attention.

"We've had so much political support for urban centres and very little political support for rural areas," said Senator Len Gustafson (Conservative-Saskatchewan). "Rural Canada has been forgotten. There's no question in my mind."

During its investigation, the committee heard from several witnesses who said swiftly rising fuel and fertilizer costs had combined with the effects of the high loonie, which makes Canadian exports less valuable, to create the perfect storm for many Canadian agricultural producers.

The senators say part of the plan to revitalize rural Canada should include re-locating one of every 10 federal government employees in smaller centres.

"Why would we have our civil servants housed in the most expensive cities in the country," said Senator Hugh Segal (Conservative-Ontario). Segal said that idea is one he believes would be taken up by a Conservative government. "We actually believe in decentralization."


© Canwest News Service 2008

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[Mille Sabords]

Oh, for Christ's sake. You gotta be joking. How can the Feds continue to be so clueless? Canada is an urban nation. Trying to artificially stop the depopulation of rural areas is wasteful and pointless.

[waterloowarrior]

plus rural areas already have a disproportional amount of political power

[Luker]

Guys, I think you forgot something here.. your using logic, something very hard to come by around parliment

[harls]

This relocation idea smells of pork. Whose rural ridings get first dibs?

[clynnog]

Originally Posted by harls

This relocation idea smells of pork. Whose rural ridings get first dibs?

Is Shawinigan Sud considered rural?

[citizen j]

I wonder if by "rural" they mean Vernon, Red Deer, and Barrie? Or if they've mined some heretofore unknown, genuinely rural enclave of bilingual underemployed graduate degree holders who'd be willing to throw together a federal department along with their buddies. Or do the feds think it'd be nice to export a bunch of city folks to the country to drive up business at the local Timmy's along with real estate prices and property taxes as part of an urban-rural exchange programme? Yeah, you're right, smells like pork to me.

[Kitchissippi]

And while we are at it, we should move the capital of Ontario from Toronto to Thunder Bay. I'm sure office space and housing are much cheaper there than in the Big Smoke

[adam-machiavelli]

I'll support increases in rural service provision when ruralites support fair parliamentary representation (as in ending the over-representation of rural areas in the house of commons).

[clynnog]

Originally Posted by citizen j

Or if they've mined some heretofore unknown, genuinely rural enclave of bilingual underemployed graduate degree holders who'd be willing to throw together a federal department along with their buddies. Or do the feds think it'd be nice to export a bunch of city folks to the country to drive up business at the local Timmy's along with real estate prices and property taxes as part of an urban-rural exchange programme? Yeah, you're right, smells like pork to me.

The image of the bilingual grad degree holders somewhere in the rural hinterlands (and somewhere w/o the seigneurial system intact) will be hard to find.

If we are talking rural Canada, I'm sure the local MP's have buddies in the real estate field whose scrub land would be a mighty fine place for some aluminum siding to sprout out of the ground.

[Acajack]

Not sure that this is such a good idea. People will point to modern means of communication (e-mail, videoconferences, etc.), but the reality is that people still do travel a heck of a lot on business, and this costs the government bundles of money. And it would cost even more to have these public servants travel to and from rural areas, where airfares (to name just one example) are many times more expensive than between the larger cities.

In any event, not all of the rural areas in the country are in the doldrums. Those within striking distance (say 100 or 200 km) of major cities are generally doing quite well and will likely be booming in the near future as many retirees move out of the city to a “place in the country” - but one that’s not too far from big city hospitals, shopping, museums, restaurants and entertainment. And of course, not too far from their grandkids, who are most likely to be growing up in or right next to the city because that’s where their parents work.

Although it pains me from a human and cultural perspective to see the rural areas from which my family originated in decline, from an environmental perspective it is not such a bad thing. It is much more ecological to have most of the population concentrated in cities, using up less land per person and also increasing opportunities for a larger share of the population to use sustainable transportation means.

As well, many depopulated rural areas that were once cleared for (what have since emerged as unviable) agricultural activities are now reverting back to their natural state. This explains why Canada’s forest cover is stable and even growing, in spite of all the logging that is taking place.

[Mille Sabords]

Not to mention the extra difficulty in getting qualified people to move to the boondocks for the sake of a job with the feds. Because the flip side is, how many qualified people would there be in these rural areas to get the jobs? I don't mean to disparage rural folks here but it's a valid question. It took Ottawa over a century to become something else than a penal colony for civil servants. And now that we're sort of a big city with sort of enough to make people feel comfortable and sort of entertain them, we're gonna ship'em all to the 'sticks?

Can't think of a better plan to kill off the federation.

[urbanfan89]

Oh great, we'll be like Japan where the government dumps truckloads of $ into the middle bumfuk nowhere for votes.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by urbanfan89

Oh great, we'll be like Japan where the government dumps truckloads of $ into the middle bumfuk nowhere for votes.

we'll? what about we are, highways to nowhere are frequent you know.

[bugsy]

Originally Posted by urbanfan89

Oh great, we'll be like Japan where the government dumps truckloads of $ into the middle bumfuk nowhere for votes.

Have you taken the Joetsu Shinkansen lately?