What do the Fathers of Confederation have in common with a beer enthusiast from New Brunswick? Both appreciate the need for the free flow of commerce between the country’s provinces.
The beer enthusiast played the lead role in “New Brunswick court decision could help expand market for B.C. wines” (www.biv.com).
As the Business in Vancouver story reported, an April 29 decision from a New Brunswick provincial court judge could remove some interprovincial impediments to that free flow, especially in the chronically controversial liquor trade.
Judge Ronald LeBlanc’s judgment sided with a New Brunswick resident’s constitutional challenge of a penalty levied against him for bringing 15 cases of beer and three bottles of liquor bought in Quebec across provincial borders into his home province.
With the Constitution Act’s Section 121, the Fathers of Confederation, he concluded, intended to eliminate business barriers and promote free trade between Canada’s provinces.
While the judge’s decision applies only to New Brunswick, it carries a precedent that promises to redraft antiquated interprovincial wine and beer trade rules across all provinces. As LeBlanc pointed out in his ruling, interpreting Section 121 “as permitting the free movement of goods among the provinces without barriers, tariff or non-tariff will have a resounding impact.”
Free trade advocates can only hope that’s the case.
While production from B.C. wineries is raising the industry’s profile in markets in other countries, it continues to face obstacles in its own country when it comes to lucrative domestic markets like Ontario.
Whether the Fathers of Confederation were beer and wine fans, too, is uncertain. What is certain, however, is that they accurately envisaged that Canada, being a huge country geographically with a relatively small population, needs to leverage its business and trade strengths as a united entity rather than as a disparate collection of provincial self-interests if it is to grow and prosper as a nation.
