The Fall of the Ministry of State and Urban Affairs
“Nearly everything that municipalities do, and practically every place-based policy enacted by any level of government in Canada, depends in some way on successful intergovernmental activity” — Lucas and Smith (forthcoming, p. 8).
As we discussed in class this week, there are multiple reasons behind the federal and provincial government’s interest in cities. And as mentioned in the quote above, “nearly everything municipalities do depends in some way on successful intergovernmental activity” (Lucas and Smith, forthcoming, p.8). Although the provincial government has a department responsible for working with local governments and partners across Canada (known as the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing), no similar department or Ministry exists on the federal level. Canada is actually one of the few countries with no national urban policy (Bradford, 2018). But this raises the question, is there a need for a federal-level Ministry to oversee urban affairs in Canada?
What’s interesting to note is that there was such a Ministry. In the 1970s, former Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau created the Ministry of State and Urban Affairs after recognizing the fact that urban issues were a national problem. Although the Ministry provided an outlet/space for Canadian city problems, it was disbanded in 1979 due to conflicts with provinces (Herbert, 2015). This wasn’t the only attempt by the federal government to be involved in urban affairs. There was the “New Deal for Cities and Communities” that took place in the early 2000s as well as former Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin’s creation of a Minister of State for Infrastructure and Communities (Spicer, 2015).
However, many local-level issues such as housing, transit, and infrastructure influence Canada’s growth. Housing for example, as mentioned in our field trip to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing this week, has tentacles everywhere. It has connections to health policy, social policy, economic policy, and the list goes on. This highlights, at least to me, that there is a need for a national vision when it comes to urban policy and the issues urban cities face. Maybe it’s finally time to create a new and hopefully permanent federal department to oversee such issues.
Sources:
Bradford, Neil. 2018. A National Urban Policy for Canada? The Implicit Federal Agenda. IRPP Insight 24. Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy. Retrieved from https://irpp.org/research-studies/national-urban-policy-canada-implicit-federal-agenda/.
Herbert, John. 2015. Canada needs a federal ministry of urban affairs. Ottawa Sun. Retrieved from https://ottawasun.com/2015/12/04/canada-needs-a-federal-ministry-of-urban-affairs/wcm/b4538ec2-2146-40bd-8666-b58001a6a052.
Spicer, Zac. 2015. What will Trudeau’s urban agenda look like? Policy Options. Retrieved from https://policyoptions.irpp.org/2015/10/30/will-trudeaus-urban-agenda-look-like/.
