15 Apr What kind of a province are we?

There’s a huge demonstration circling Province House this afternoon—the biggest* I’ve seen in 40 years of following politics here.

The McNeil Government, under pressure to reduce spending in the face of a big deficit, followed narrow-minded advice from Finance bureaucrats ideologically averse to targeted subsidies, and shockingly ignorant of digital industries.

The result—on display at Province House at this hour—is a cultural standoff between Old, Dying Nova Scotia and a youth-inspired creative industry that stands as one of the slender hopes for a future prosperity to be found here.

Some images from the standoff:

Guarding the Legislature from our children:

The face of government:

The corpse:

“My books are very few,” said Joseph Howe, “But then the world is before me – a library open to all – from which poverty of purse cannot exclude me – in which the meanest and most paltry volume is sure to furnish something to amuse, if not to instruct and improve.”

My Nova Scotia includes filmmakers.

The government refused to accept a petition of 30,000 signatures gathered by film industry supporters, because they were collected electronically—which neatly symbolizes the whole standoff.

To the McNeils and the Whelans of the world, if it ain’t a steel plant or a pulp mill; if it doesn’t pollute tidal waters, devastate forests, or wipe out fish stocks, it ain’t a real industry. And if it ain’t on paper, it ain’t a real petition.

The demo runs until 7 p.m. tonight. Hike on down to Province House between now and then, and sign an old school paper petition that even the dinosaurs who run that place can comprehend.

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* Longtime labour activist Jim Guild points out that the 1994 union protest against public service cuts by the Savage Government drew significantly more people.