By Angelo Persichilli

Yes, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister John Manley will be a candidate for the Liberal leadership if the money is right and the support is there. But he only wants to run if he knows he will win. In an interview with The Hill Times, Mr. Manley (Ottawa South, Ont.) talked about his political future, the Canadian economy and, always controversial, the future of the monarchy in Canada. He proclaimed himself a "moderate" republican and said he doesn¹t mind having Queen Elizabeth as queen of Canada, as long as Canadians start talking about changes for the future. Declared Mr. Manley: "We can look at adopting a practice already in place in many other countries where there is a non-executive Head Governor General was elected by Parliament. In the meantime, he says, Canada should change the way it appoints the Governor General." Mr. Manley, who will deliver is economic update on Wednesday, Oct. 30, in Halifax, N.S., also talked about another hot topic these days ‹ Parliamentary reforms.

Mr. Manley, are you running for the leadership of the Liberal Party? It¹s still too early for me to say anything totally definitive. My expectation is that my name will be on the ballot. There are people who, for some reason, want me to run and I have authorized them to do some of the things that are necessary like raising the money and putting an organization together so that, at the proper time, I can make a judgment on it. I am not 100 per cent committed, but certainly interested.

Which are the elements that will play a role in making your decision? Some are personal: it will affect your family and you have to take it into consideration.

And the others?

I do not have an interest to run in order to hopefully be in a position of influence in the next government, unless I am the Prime Minister. I will run because I believe that I can win. I want to make that assessment and in part that depends on the availability of money; the cost of the campaign is above my credit card limit and the existence of enough support through the country to be able to build an organization.

Ministers of Finance have a limit on their credit cards too? There is even a limit on the Government of Canada credit card, but that¹s not the one I can use for this.

Whoever talks about the Canadian economy these days, expresses optimism, but at the end of their presentations there are always Œifs¹ and Œbuts.¹ Can you elaborate on them?

There are really factors of uncertainty that make it difficult to be definitive. You will never know how reliable an economic forecast is because there is always a possibility that there will be a shock of some sort.

Where does this shock come from?

There are some weaknesses and challenges that are foreseeable. The most obvious one is the possibility of war in Iraq and that is compounded by the fact that the recovery in the U.S. is very slow, the investments in the United States have not been returning as strongly as they hoped. Furthermore, we have got other areas with real economic turbulence in the world, particularly in Latin America.

In a nutshell if we are going to have problems they are not ŒMade in Canada.¹

That is right. Although, as you know, so much of our economy depends on the United States and that means that those global events can have a real effect on us if they affect demands for our export to the United States.

Many people talk about needing Parliamentary reforms. Do we really need them?

I think that there have been frustrations on the part of many Members on Parliament; the adequacy of the role they play and I think that we can and we should do things to enhance that. That¹s an important element for the ministers and for the government to consider. There has to be involvement for the MPs not just in the passage of the legislation but in the development of the policy and reviewing them. They represent voters and they should play an enhanced role. That being said, I strongly resist a step that will adopt an American Congressional style of governance in Canada. We have a different model, we have the British Parliament model, I think it served us well, forces us to build a consensus that is broadly-based, that¹s how you form a government in Canada and Members of Parliament are elected on the basis of a party platform that has sought that broad consensus. We don¹t have the kind of trade-off between a district and another that you see often in the U.S. Congress. I consider ours superior and I do not want to see it compromised.

So, you believe that the Parliament rules should be better used than changed.

I think that¹s correct. And we should be careful in uprooting a system that is working by and large quite well for us. If you look at the ability that we have had for the last number of years to take very difficult decisions, I am not sure that that could have been done in a system in which the administration or the executive is separate from the legislators. One of the challenges that we all have in dealing with the United States is that we can make an agreement with the administration and find out that they can¹t have the approval by the Congress. I think this is an advantage for us, the government can make a decision. There is an important balance there that needs to be struck, but I wouldn¹t undermine the strength that I see in our Parliamentary system.

Now that the Queen is not in Canada any longer, I assume we can talk about it.

I would have hoped that in a mature country we could talk about it whenever, anyway, it seems to get some people very upset.

When is it going to be the right time to start talking about having a different institution? When I opened the debate about five or six years ago, it was because I believed it was the time. I am a pretty moderate republican; I believe that we should let Queen Elizabeth finish her reign. That might be 20 years. If she lives to the age of her mother it¹s a long time. So we have the opportunity now to begin to consider an act of succession. In the meantime, I would like to take a look at the process by which we select the Governor General. We can look at adopting a practice already in place in many other countries where there is a non-executive Head of State, where the Governor General was elected by Parliament.

Kyoto: it seems that there is going be money in the February budget. I think that Kyoto is one of the things we are going to deal with in the process of preparing the budget. However it’s still too soon for me to forecast what things will be in the budget. Clearly, we are going to have the Kirby-Romanow report between now and then, the First Ministers¹ meeting on the health care early in the new year and many other requests and items people want us to look at. Too soon to forecast what might end up in it. Next week in Halifax I¹ll give the annual fiscal economic update and that will provide some idea of what money is available for planning purposes.

Do you think that the relationship between Canada and the U.S. is better or worse after Sept. 11? I think it¹s better. I believe that we have been able to open a dialogue, particularly on issues pertaining to the border that we had difficulty engaging in before. We have made significant progress.