Article content continued

A status quo that has a clearly negative impact on Canadian consumers will be allowed to stand.

Trans Mountain is clearly a political issue, and requires a political response. No one is seriously questioning this, and Trudeau appears to be working to find a solution. It is not so clear that inter-provincial trade has struck the same level of political attention.

Until Thursday, it appeared that the federal government was content to allow the inter-provincial trade issue to remain an issue of legal interpretation. But now it seems that the government will either need to ignore the problem the court has caused, or develop a solution.

The question to ask here seems as obvious now as it has ever been: Are we a nation, or are we a collection of self-serving political and politicized entities? As The Economist has drily noted, Canada’s provinces “see themselves as quasi-countries. They set standards and write laws with little regard for what their neighbours are doing.”

There is no doubt that addressing this problem will take years, and will require extensive legal adjustments and inter-provincial negotiating. Unfortunately, now that the Supreme Court has abdicated any responsibility for helping fix the problem, it is unclear if anyone is truly willing to show leadership on an issue of such critical importance to the economic future of our nation.

Canadian politicians of all stripes have long referred to our country as a “trading nation.” Now if only they could make good on that claim inside our borders.

Mischa Kaplan is an Ottawa writer, economic development advocate, and chair of the West Ottawa Board of Trade.