The Green Party presents some novel ideas, but when it talks about Atlantic Canada, it's woefully behind the times.

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Alec Bruce

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Elizabeth May, thy name is disappointment.

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How happy I once was to wander the wetlands of your website, to find it well-trodden by fellow travellers more interested in the details of democratic progress than in the crass maneuverings of political ambition.

How thrilled I was to read such sturdy, unapologetic declarations as: "We strive for stronger local economies with a small business focus, increased national and regional self-sufficiency, economic diversification, more 'fair' trade, more value-added manufacturing of resources, more green-certified production and a rapid shift to more renewable energy to create local economic opportunities."

Or this: "Canadians enjoy one of the highest qualities of life of any people in the world, now or in all of human history. However, we are not achieving our full potential. Unemployment is still unacceptably high "" not everywhere, but in significant and worrying regions of real economic stagnation. Too many small businesses go bankrupt, while major industrial sectors such as automotive and forestry shed jobs as they struggle to stay afloat. Employed Canadians are among the most overworked citizens in the industrialized world. The Green Party approach is to think holistically. How can we achieve the best possible economic result? What are the fiscal and regulatory impediments to economic sustainability?"

And this: "Our generation has the potential to capitalize on the single biggest business opportunity in human history "" the shift to a low-carbon economy. Whether this is driven by high energy prices, dwindling oil supplies, strategic geo-political threats to foreign oil, the climate crisis, or all of them combined, the country that mobilizes resources to develop and commercialize low carbon technologies (e.g. alternate fuels, renewable energy and energy efficiency) will survive the price shocks of fossil fuel's last gasps and emerge with a thriving economy. Canada should be that country."

But, then, I came upon this, and my heart sank: "Various regional development programmes (ACOA, Western Economic Diversification, Canadian Economic Development in Quebec) have funneled billions into failed enterprises. Since 1982, Industry Canada has made grants totalling more than $5.8 billion to some of Canada's largest corporations. Technology Partnerships Canada has swallowed up $2 billion and the accelerated capital cost allowance to the tar sands industries totals over $1.3 billion a year. Perverse subsidies distort the market and send mixed messages: reduce carbon/use more fossil fuels; create jobs/reorganize through lay-offs." Listen Liz, girlfriend, you come from this neck of the woods and you know as well as anybody that every politically contrived entity is subject to the abuse its evil masters deem appropriate. Have you checked the lines between your home province's Colchester, Cumberland and Antigonish counties lately? There's a reason why some roads are paved and twinned and other, more heavily travelled ones in Nova Scotia remain quaintly impassable even at the height of tourist season.

But to lay this sort of "distortion" at the feet of regional development agencies, especially the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, is patently unfair. Worse, it's factually wrong.

Since its inception, in 1987, ACOA has invested tens of millions of dollars not in large, soul-sucking enterprises like Stora and Michelin, but in thousands of small- and medium-sized enterprises whose owners and employees do most of the living, earning, tax-paying, and dying in this region. It has helped industrial workers "" devastated by the failure of their traditional livelihoods "" find new jobs and found new businesses. It has almost single-handedly financed the economic rejuvenation of Prince Edward Island with its massive investments in Slemon Park's aerospace cluster, bioscience, and Information Communications and Technology sector.

Over the past decade, ACOA's business funding in this region has generated 80,000 good, full-time jobs; a small business success rate that's the envy of the country; community economic development initiatives that would be unthinkable without its constant lobbying of Ottawa mandarins; and a tax ROI (return on investment) of more than two-to-one. What's not to like?

Is it simply that ACOA "" and any other development agency in the nation "" is a creature of so-called "established political parties", and is, therefore, suspicious for its provenance? If that is the case, then there's more distortion being retailed by a so-called "people's party" than by all the Harpers, Dions, and Laytons combined.

And, dear Liz, if that is the case, it's truly disappointing.

Alec Bruce is a Moncton-based writer. He may be reached via www.thebrucereport.com.