Edmonton Real Estate Weekly by David Rogers
James Rajotte is the MP for Edmonton-Leduc.
I have to confess up front that James Rajotte is one of my favourite interviews. The Conservative Member of Parliament for Edmonton – Leduc is gracious and well spoken but it is his education in Political Theory that I find interesting. After all, Dead White Guys are kind of out of fashion these days so I don’t get to talk to people who appreciate them the way I do very often. And it is just my humble opinion - but it is my opinion - that an education starting with Plato and taking you to Nietzsche is the best education a person in politics can have.
You have now had a year to watch federal politics from the government side. What has been the most surprising part of that experience?
Well, the best part of being in government is that you have more influence. You can make things happen right from a policy idea to an implementation. But the most surprising thing is how hard and difficult that process is to get it from a concept or an idea to implementation. Even on the government side there are just a lot of steps to go through in order to implement it.
You have to convince your colleagues in Parliament, you have to convince any Ministers relevant, you have to convince people in the Prime Minister’s office and then the big, big challenge is convincing people in the bureaucracy that it is a good idea and that they should be working on it and implementing it.
You Chair the Committee on Industry, Science and Technology. What is the highest item on the committee’s agenda at the moment?
At the moment we are studying the Telecommunications sector because the Industry Minister has proposed some deregulation of that sector. So the Committee is studying his proposed changes and deregulation as well as some questions like foreign ownership, wholesale rates and issues like that that are specific to that sector.
Our main item this past year was studying of the manufacturing sector which was released in February of this year.
And what was the issue there?
The issue there was looking at the challenges facing the sector and we identified five primary challenges and then looked at some of the solutions. We came up with twenty-two recommendations in all areas. But the main challenges were obviously the rapid rise of the Canadian dollar, especially with respect to the American dollar. The rise of countries as manufacturing powerhouses such as China, the role that energy plays in the manufacturing sector particularly as a cost of production, the issue of regulation, the sector being regulated too much as some would argue. And then the fifth issue was the availability of skilled labour. That is certainly an issue here in Alberta but it is right across the country in that sector. And it was a unanimous report which is quite rare to get.
That is quite impressive.
Yeah, in a minority parliament it was quite something.
Much was made of the friction between the Prime Minister and the national media assigned to cover Parliament but it seems to have settled down. Has a truce been struck or is it more that the media felt they weren’t winning the war of popular opinion on this and decided to sulk in silence?
Well, I think you are correct that there seemed to be a lot of tension in the beginning. I think you are correct as well that it has calmed down. I think there has been a détente or rapprochement. I think there are two things. I think the media has realized that at the beginning they were spinning that the Prime Minister was controlling everything. That wasn’t true. But he was trying to impress upon Cabinet Ministers that anything they said was, in effect, government policy.
You have seen the Prime Minister – certainly towards the end of last year – and other Cabinet Ministers, be quite available to the media which has helped the situation. But just as well I think you have seen some of the more senior members of the Press Gallery, perhaps, take a little more control and realize that they need to have a more professional working relationship rather than engage in a constant battle. So I think it has been a calming down rather than that one side or the other has won. It is more just a matter that both sides have recognized that they need each other in a professional way and so that is how they should act.
You had a town hall meeting last weekend for your constituents. What were the primary issues that came up during the course of that?
Well, justice issues are at the top here in Edmonton because the last number of years the number of murders and violent crimes that we have had in the city. So that would be the top issue. The issue of the environment and climate change was certainly a topical issue. There is obviously support for action but there are some concerns as to what government may or may not do on that issue. There were a lot of specific issues raised. People raised the Maher Arar settlement.
But I would say that it was primarily on justice and the climate change issue. Although the question that was most asked was when the next election will be and I obviously don’t have an answer to that.
Well that is a perfect segue for my next question. There is a lot of chatter in the media that we are getting close to an election. Do you think you are ready to make your pitch to the electorate that you deserve a majority this time? In other words, do you think you have had enough time to show the electorate what a majority Conservative government would look like?
I think my preference and the Prime Minister’s preference would be to govern longer. I think Canadians have a very good idea of what we are like in government and what we will do and not do. They have a good sense of that. And I think a lot of the criticism of the last couple of elections that tried to portray us in a certain way won’t work this time because people have seen us in government. They have seen what we have done. So in that sense I think we are ready for an election. I think we have adequately defined ourselves as to what we do in government.
But obviously I would prefer a longer time in this government to work and the Prime Minister would as well. And I think most Canadians are saying that for a minority this government has accomplished a fair bit and seem to be happy with the way things are going for now so we don’t see a need for an election. Obviously the Opposition could force it and there have been a few issues and there will be a few more issues this spring - whether it is the Budget or the Private Member’s Bill on Kyoto - that could force an election.
The last time we spoke you told me you hoped to have your M.A. in Political Theory finished within the year. Have you been successful in that?
(Laughs). Well, I can report that I am on my last course. It is on Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics and The Politics. I take the course every Friday night so I should finish that by mid April and then I’ll write the final paper right after that.
I am very impressed.
So six more months I guess I would ask for.
