The Other Macdonald Report: The Consensus on Canada's Future that the Macdonald Commission Left Out

Lovell Clark was Professor of History at the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg.

In a hard-hitting introduction, the editors argue that the Macdonald Commission “failed the people of Canada” by reflecting only the views of the business sector. They dispute the underlying theme of the business briefs that “private enterprise alone produces the country’s wealth,” and attack in convincing fashion the views of businessmen regarding productivity and competitiveness, free trade with the United States, and the alleged health of the U.S. economy.

The editors contend that the academic consultants chosen by the Commission held views similar to those of the establishment, and that only a handful of academic dissidents were asked to do studies. Most importantly, they claim that in the public hearings conducted by the Commission the views of the “popular sector” were largely ignored.

It is this other Macdonald Report that the editors seek to present. From scores of briefs they have selected twenty presentations from churches, trade unions, women’s groups, native organizations, farmers, and social agencies. Of particular interest are the excerpts from briefs by: the Social Planning Council of Toronto; the United Auto Workers; the National Action Committee on the Status of Women; the Canadian Union of Public Employees; the United Church of Canada; and the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.

These and other briefs not only criticize what they regard as the unimaginative, outdated, and destructive proposals of the business sector, but present an alternative vision of society based upon social and ethical values that are not dictated by corporate balance sheets.

The editors perhaps exaggerate the degree of consensus held by the popular sector, just as they exaggerate the unanimity of the Commissioners.

(The dissenting and supplementary comments by some of the Commissioners deserve attention.) Nonetheless, Drache and Cameron have performed a service by highlighting the views of the less favoured segments of society in the present hard times. In the process they raise serious doubts about the Commission’s panacea of free trade with the United States, which they say is “continental integration, the preferred solution of most of Canada’s economic elite.”