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It’s back because Albertans are fed up with Quebec, the grand leech of Confederation. CAQ Premier Francois Legault lit the match when he killed the idea of restarting Energy East and declared there was no social acceptability for oil in Quebec. Well, guess what? There’s no social acceptability in Alberta for sending Quebec any more of our money.

One has to wonder if the tables were turned, what would Quebec do? What would Quebec do if Canada refused to approve the construction of transmission lines across provincial and international borders? What would Quebec do if the federal government announced that its goal was to phase out its high carbon dioxide emitting industries like the aerospace industry, cement, aluminum and steel?

What would Quebec do if their taxpayers paid $5,265 more per person in federal taxes than they got back in federal spending? (For Alberta, that’s a $21.8-billion net transfer; if Quebec paid the equivalent to us, it would be a net transfer to Canada of $44.2 billion.)

I think we know the answer. They would have been gone ages ago.

This is the fundamental dysfunctionality of Canada. There should be no earthly reason why the second-most populous province in the country receives equalization at all. By virtue of being big, neither Quebec nor Ontario should ever receive transfers from smaller provinces. It’s like the bully in school who steals the smaller kids’ lunch money. Ontario has finally weaned itself of equalization again this year, but Quebec never will.