Title: City and Provincial Political Parties Post by: editor on April 10, 2006, 03:15:05 pm City and Provincial Political Parties A dangerous roller coaster, when city leaders cast their public support for a provincial party. The fundamental principal of elected city representation is and stand without party platforms. The consent of City election is based on electing a Mayor that has a vision for the whole City, Councilors that represent the need of their distinguished wards. This concept embeds individual fundamental principal of accountability in that each Councilor is accountable to every member of their ward. Second, the Mayor function is to attempt to balance these issues to serve the population to which he/she was elected. The roller coaster of funding begins when Cities display partisan political party support for a particular provincial party, rather than focusing on City issues and needs. In doing so Cities run the risk, as provincial parties are unseated, of losing and or being ignored. It could be said, even penalized by Provincial Parties who failed to gain City support. Dalton McGuinty’s plan to modify City elections to a four year term is a dangerous one, it that this would encourage and exasperate a local politicians into further alignment with political provincial parties. This concept would further erode the separation between City and provincial needs. Some would argue that this would facilitate city’s to fulfill their intended mandate to their constituency, but in fact this may contribute to a greater roller coaster between the city and province. The only benefit here is that individual City elected will be in a better position to play their cards to gain a better foot hold toward aspired dreams, of increasing their chances of securing support to advance their career in provincial politics, while defraying city responsibility. Moreover, if the City elected have demonstrated that in three years that they have earned the respect from their wards they will be re-elected. Others, will argue that the cost of elections every three years, but I would suggest that the cost is well worth the alternative. What do you think....? ham_editor@yahoo.ca |