Victoria Standard, July 18th, 2007:

What if….CBI was a Province?

by Jim Morrow

That Cape Breton Island is a province unto itself is a proposition that has been around longer than the province to which it is presently a part. There are those who are very seriously, looking at re-achieving the Island’s province-hood which they maintain was taken away and never rightfully returned.

Mark MacNeil Chairman, CBI Province-hood Campaign, can provide chapter and verse on how the Island lost its legally granted autonomy dating back to 1713 and the Treaty of Utrecht.

The legal and constitutional issues of that argument could fill volumes. As an exercise, however hypothetical it may or may not be, to wrap one’s mind around the idea of Cape Breton Island being an entity with full provincial powers is intriguing.

The idea of province-hood raises any number of questions on governance. In this regard the question, “as a province do you see the Island being governed as other provinces?” was posed to Mr. MacNeil.

His reply was, “Essentially the legislative model we would follow would be similar to other provinces with some adaptations to suit the representative needs of our island. For instance, we are looking closely at the PEI legislature which has 27 riding’s in a province with a population comparable to our own and expect we would organize a Cape Breton Island Assembly with 25 to 29 riding’s. However, we would vary the PEI model a little as we are looking at the possibility of guaranteeing representation in our Assembly for our Mi’kmaq communities e.g. native communities of Membertou, Wagmatcook, Whycogomagh, Chapel Island & Eskasoni may be combined as one common electoral district, which with a population of 5000 people would represent one seat in the new legislature.

It should be noted that the average population per riding is expected to be approximately 5000 to 6000 people. At this point we will look to existing municipal council riding’s and NS provincial boundaries on our island to craft a distribution of seats across the island on an equitable and representative basis. “Other novel features of the prospective CBI Assembly is that we expect that in addition to a majority vote being required to pass legislation we may also require the vote to provide a majority from within the seated Assembly representation of the islands participant municipalities to support legislation prior to final passing i.e. for instance as well as passing a majority of votes in the Assembly, representatives from within the vote would also have to comprise at least 3 of 5 of Victoria, Richmond, Inverness, CBRM & Port Hawkesbury supporting the legislation . The purpose of this requirement would be to ensure that CBRM which has a population of 105,000 of 145,000 on our island, would not unduly dominate decision making on the island, with a view that legislation to be passed should reflect the best interests of the entire island as a priority.

“Another feature which is being considered is a model of governance which would see the provincial ministries decentralized with parity to each of the four counties on CBI. For instance if their were 12 or 16 ministries then each county would be ensured to host 3 or 4 ministry administrations. Because of the decentralized model we envision the choice of a capital location becomes less significant as essentially the capital would host primarily only the House of Assembly, executive support and ministerial satellite sub-offices.

“We have also looked at the notion of using a non-partisan system (i.e. a non-political party structure), but at this stage all constitutional features are open for discussion and we plan on hosting a Constitutional Convention in the Fall of 2007 to establish the guidelines for the voluntary shadow government which we intend to elect in the Fall of 2008 as a citizens assembly to follow NS and Canadian policy effects on CBI and Atlantic Canada on an interim basis until province hood is achieved. We envision four year fixed terms and hope that province hood will be achieved prior to 2020 - the 200 year anniversary of the illegal annexation of CBI by NS.”

For more info readers can contact Mr. McNeil:
RR4 Mabou
NS B0E 1X0

or visit www.provinceofcapebreton.org