North American Integration Getting Closer but no Thanks

am writing this mere hours after
| returning from a weeklong stint in

Ottawa, as a participant in the
Triumvirat project; the first ever North
American Model Parliament. There have
been model versions of the UN, the
Canadian Parliament, the US Congress,
and countless“others. The forum I partic-
ipated in was unique in that it was one of
the first times a group had established a
model government program that was not
designed to be a mock-up of any current-
ly existing body, but rather a fantasy vision
of something that could potentially exist
in the near future.

The program was the brainchild of a
Montreal-based North American think-
tank known as FINA, or the Forum on
North American Integration. The FINA
people have long advocated that our con-
tinent take a more European approach to
decision-making, and eventually organize
into some sort of EU-like supranational
federation. Canada’s former ambassador
to the United States, Raymond Chretien,
has been one of the more prominent
members of FINA as a follow-up to his
time in office, during which he often
made headlines as an outspoken advocate
of EU-style arrangements for North
America. In recognition, FINA made

Chretien President of the Triumvirat
forum, with the hopes that if young peo-
ple could successfully manage a mock
North American parliament, it might
attract sufficient attention within academ-
ic and political circles, and thus help
solicit support for the creation of a real
one.

Chretien submitted calls for delegates
at a few select schools in North America,
Canada, and the US. I have no idea on
what basis the schools were chosen. In the
end, the delegation of approximately 70
ended up being fairly lopsided, with the
majority of students being Mexicans, fol-
lowed by French Canadians, about a
dozen English Canadians, and only one or
two token Americans. After applying in
March, I was eventually accepted as one
of six members of the BC delegation.

This was my first mock anything, so I
attended the Triumvirat project with an
open, albeit still somewhat skeptical,
mind. Playing the role of a lawmaker for a
week sounded like it could be an interest-
ing experience, though it would likely also
be mind-numbingly dull at times. And,
though I personally had applied for the
role because I was generally interested in
the topic of North American integration,
I worried the other delegates would sim-

ply be a gang of overly ambitious try-
hards who were attending this conference
simply because it had caught their eye as
an impressive-sounding event that would
look good on their résumé. While I was
mostly right in both cases, the Triumvirat
adventure still proved to be a great expe-
rience,

Perhaps the greatest insights came as a
result from my “insider” view of the law-
making process. Our mission as members
of the North American parliament was to
pass four bills that would help integrate
the continent’s laws in regards to trade,
energy, and immigration. I was on the
immigration committee, which ended up
being the most controversial of the three.

The committee process of lawmaking
always had seemed sort of mysterious and
obscure to me, but having sat in several, I
now realize it is one of the most vital (and
soul-crushing) stages of the entire legisla-
tive process. For several days my
committee sat in a small room across the
street from the Parliament buildings and
attempted to hammer out a North
American visa policy that could appease
both the Mexicans, who seemed to feel it
was their birthright that the United States
provide them with free jobs and health-
care, and the Americans, who felt

 

Editorial Cartoon

 

If textbooks

were

Senators are appointed by the
prime Minister's flunkies in secre
smoke-filled backroom meeting:
The purpose of :

the Senate is tg

give pensions tg

party whores who

are blindly loya]

too useless to get
made, real jobs.

 

honest...

 

 

june 8/2005

Right Hook

J.J. McCullough, OP Columnist

 

 

determined to stem the already chaotic
tide of illegal migrants. During the first
session it took us a full two hours just to
come up with the name of our draft reso-
lution. Needless to say, I felt a huge sense
of relief when the thing finally passed a
vote in the parliament on Friday morning.

Our mock parliament was hosted in
the Senate Chamber of the parliament
building, which was very cool. Getting to
sit in that famous chamber that I had seen
so many times during CBC coverage of
the annual “Speech from the Throne”
ceremony was a very surreal experience at
times, as was rising to address “Mr.
Speaker,” and listening to instant transla-
tions of the Quebec delegates through
those famous wires you always see dan-
gling from the politicians’ ears. The
senate chamber was very large, and sur-
ptisingly poorly lit, though still quite
impressive. If not for the nagging knowl-
edge that the room is usually used to
house barely awake, un-elected party
hacks voting themselves pay raises, I
might even have found it inspiring.

Committee work and parliamentary
antics aside, I would say overall I learned
the most about North America from
chatting with my fellow delegates. This
was the first time I ever had a serious
chance to converse with politically mind-
ed Mexicans and French Canadians, and I
took advantage of the opportunities as
much as possible. Both experiences
proved very eye-opening.

For their part, the Mexican students I
spoke to were all very eager to dispel
whatever myths and stereotypes I held
about their country. When I told my
Mexican roommates that I had always
been raised to believe that Mexican water
was among the most poisonous, undrink-
able substances on the planet, they all
broke into screaming laughter, as if I had
said the most hilariously ignorant thing in
the world. Today’s Mexico, they said, was
very modernized and trendy and deeply

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