Nicole McMahon, University of Calgary
The relationship between local governments and the federal and provincial governments in Canada has been described as imbalanced (Hachard, 2020). Constitutionally, local governments are considered “creatures of the provinces,” meaning their powers and responsibilities are defined by the province. Over time, the federal-municipal and provincial-municipal relationship has seen changes, despite municipalities still being viewed as the “little siblings in Canadian federalism” (Hachard, 2020). Provinces continue to make decisions that deeply impact local government operations, while also expanding the authority and autonomy of local governments (Taylor and Dobson, 2020).
This dynamic can sometimes lead to tensions between all three levels of government and presents an opportunity to better understand intergovernmental relationships in Canada. Using data from the Canadian Municipal Barometer, we are able to evaluate how local politicians perceive their municipality’s relationship with the provincial and federal governments.
To understand the perceptions of local politicians regarding their relationships with the federal and provincial governments, I use data from the Canadian Municipal Barometer (CMB) between 2020 and 2023. Local politicians were asked the following questions:
For both questions, respondents could select Excellent, Good, Fair, Poor, or Don’t Know. Table 1 and Table 2 present the percentages of respondents who selected each option by province and year for question 1 (provincial relationship) and question 2 (federal relationship), respectively.
The tables also include the average percentage of respondents who selected each ranking across all years for the province. For example, the average percentage of respondents in Alberta who evaluated the relationship between their provincial government and their municipality as “Excellent” is 8. This information can be found using Table 1 to filter the province to “AB” and the rating to “Excellent.”
The data from Table 1 and Table 2 are visualized in Figure 1, which can be filtered by province and year using the dropdown menus. Figure 1 illustrates how respondents evaluated their municipality’s relationship with the provincial government (blue bar) and federal government (black bar). It shows the percentage of respondents who selected each rating level (Excellent, Good, Fair, Poor, or Don’t Know).
Evaluations of the provincial-municipal relationship are presented in Table 1 and visualized with the blue bars in Figure 1. Generally, local politicians evaluate their municipality’s relationship with the provincial government as “Good.” It is consistently selected by the greatest number of respondents across most provinces. On average, 25% to 50% of respondents evaluate their municipality’s relationship with the provincial government as “Good.” For instance, in Alberta, “Good” ratings hover around 33% each year.
The second most common evaluation is “Fair” which tends to be between 24% to 39% of respondents. In British Columbia, the relationship is evaluated as “Fair” by 25% to 33% of respondents.
“Excellent” and “Poor” ratings are less common and show some variability. In Manitoba, “Excellent” ratings increased from 8% of respondents in 2020 to 19% of respondents in 2023. On the other hand, “Excellent” evaluations in BC dropped from 22% of respondents in 2020 to 6% of respondents in 2023.
“Poor” evaluations are similarly variable. For example, in Newfoundland, “Poor” evaluations increased from 18% of respondents in 2020 to 50% of respondents in 2023. By comparison, respondents from Quebec were fairly consistent in their “Poor” evaluations only increasing from 5% in 2020 to 8% in 2023.
Evaluations of the federal-municipal relationship are presented in Table 2 and visualized with the black bars in Figure 1. Similar to the evaluations of provincial-municipal relationships, the federal-municipal relationships are generally evaluated at “Good.” In most provinces, “Good” is selected by the highest percentage of respondents. For example, an average of 35% of respondents in British Columbia and 42% of respondents from Nova Scotia evaluated their municipality’s relationship with the federal government as “Good.”
“Fair” evaluations tended to be the second most common rating, such as in Ontario, where 27% to 36% of respondents selected “Fair” to describe their municipality’s relationship with the federal government. Similarly, 19% to 45% of respondents in Saskatchewan evaluated their municipality’s relationship with the federal government as “Fair.”
“Excellent” ratings are generally low across all provinces, often below 10% with a few exceptions. For example, “Excellent” ratings in New Brunswick increased from 7% of respondents in 2020 to 27% of respondents in 2023.
Comparing the evaluations of local politicians regarding their municipality’s relationship with the provincial and federal governments from 2020 to 2023 highlights interesting trends and differences. For both levels of government, the relationships are consistently evaluated as “Good” or “Fair.” When evaluating the provincial-municipal relationship, more respondents tend to select “Good,” whereas when evaluating the federal-municipal relationship, more respondents tend to select “Fair.”
Respondents were less likely to select “Excellent” or “Poor” to describe provincial-municipal or federal-municipal relationships. When these categories were selected, “Excellent” was more often used to describe the provincial-municipal relationship and “Poor” was more often used to describe the federal-municipal relationship.
It is also worth mentioning that the 2020 CMB survey was fielded in January/February 2020, right before the COVID-19 pandemic started. As a result, I briefly compared responses from Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec in 2020 with responses from 2021-2023.
In 2020, an evaluation of “Excellent” from respondents in all three provinces for both the provincial-municipal and federal-municipal relationships was more likely compared to other years. “Good” ratings were generally higher in 2020 when evaluating the provincial-municipal relationship, but there were mixed results for federal-municipal relationship evaluations. Finally, “Poor” ratings were lower in 2020 for the provincial-municipal and federal-municipal relationships. Although the data is somewhat mixed, these differences highlight the possibility that the COVID-19 pandemic may have impacted how local politicians evaluate their municipality’s relationship with the provincial and federal governments.
References
Hachard, Tomas 2020. “Federal-provincial-municipal powers need to be rebalanced.” CBC News Opinion. (November 24, 2020). https://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/opinion-federal-provincial-municipal-powers-1.5813461
Taylor, Zack, & Alex Dobson. (2020). “Power and Purpose: Canadian Municipal Law in Transition.” IMFG Papers on Municipal Finance and Governance. https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/99216
