Foreseeable dangers

Amazingly, it only took Murray Dobbin a month after highlighting the need for better-targeted progressive messaging to launch an explicit defence of red tape. But while the frame selection couldn't be much further off the mark, the spirit of the column is dead on:

A couple of stories in recent days have highlighted a trend that has been eroding the public interest and public safety for over a decade -- and all in the interests of the corporate bottom line.

Deregulation is one of neo-liberalism's five big initiatives (free trade, privatization, service cuts and tax cuts make up the rest). And it shows how successfully they have framed the issue.

Who in their right mind would want more red tape?

Well, for starters, pretty much anyone who flies in Canada, eats food, drives a car, uses prescription drugs or lives some place that could catch fire. That's just the short list.

All you really have to do is think about the profit motive and imagine that there were no regulations to moderate its impact. That's what regulations are mostly about -- attempting to manage the greed unleashed by capitalism. And neo-liberalism is all about undoing that management system and replacing it with corporate self-regulation. ("Self-regulation" being right up there on the list of modern oxymorons.)...

The deregulation madness eventually has consequences. Planes fall from the sky. Or, as is happening lately in the U.S., people get poisoned by bad food. In the past six months, hundreds of people have been made ill or dead by contaminated lettuce, spinach and, most recently, peanut butter...

(D)eregulation can go on even without legislation and with the public none the wiser. All you have to do is slash the number of inspectors and the law or regulation can be made all but useless. All of this is being done to enhance "competitiveness" -- except that there is no hard evidence that deregulation will have any impact other than to put Canadians at ever greater risk.

Dobbin notes the pattern of weaker regulations and enforcement over the past couple of decades - beginning with the Libs' budget cuts in the '90s, and progressing toward today's initiatives to try to not only cut regulations, but also tie the hands of governments who would otherwise want to implement more effective measures.

What makes that trend all the worse is that the deregulation hasn't happened for lack of incidents in the meantime which should have emphasized the need for effective government involvement. As a result, it seems entirely possible that it'll take a far more severe harm than the most recent examples such as Walkerton, Kashechewan or the U.S. food incidents for the general public to demand any substantial improvement in regulation and enforcement. But it's hopefully not too late to change direction before the worst materializes...if enough effort is put into showing Canadians just how much less safe they are as a result of the anti-state movement.