Voice of Region: The Long Journey to Senate Reform in Canada

Paul G. Thomas is a professor of Political Studies at the University of
Manitoba.

Readers should not be misled by this book’s title. It is not a dry
discussion of that much-maligned institution, the Canadian Senate.
Rather, it is a somewhat idiosyncratic interpretation of Canadian
history through the lens of regionalism, which emphasizes the failure by
national political institutions to respond adequately to regional needs
and demands. The historical account is tilted towards the regionalism of
Western Canada, where concern for Senate reform is the greatest. White
identifies Ontario as the principal audience for his message: greater
provincial equality in an elected Senate is necessary as an act of
nation building.

Writing before the demise of the Meech Lake Accord, he sees accepting a
“triple-E” Senate as the quid pro quo for recognizing Quebec as a
distinct society. Plans for a new Senate must also make what he
describes as “a modest bow” to Canada’s aboriginal peoples.
Finally, White connects—not entirely persuasively—action on Senate
reform to the Free Trade Agreement, which has the potential to increase
regional tensions.

The bulk of the book deals with the changing nature of Canadian
regionalism. This account, while interesting and readable, is not linked
sufficiently to the long-standing debate on the Senate’s future. Like
other critics, White sees the present Canadian Senate as “lame and
ineffectual.” Yet he also quotes a study that describes the Senate as
a powerful “lobby from within” on behalf of corporate Canada.

There is some good material on various schemes to reform the Senate,
but the book glosses over some practical difficulties of various
proposals. While White did not set out to write a history of the
Senate’s evolution, he too-readily accepts others’ glib judgment
that the present Senate is a “political nullity” without any
redeeming qualities. Like nearly all the critics, White reaches this
conclusion despite paying scarcely any attention to what the Senate has
done in the past, or what it does today, to reflect the regional
diversity that is the most salient feature of Canadian society.