I'm going to read you an excerpt from the article by Claude Castonguay:
Prime Minister Harper has declared that there will be no solution to the problem of fiscal imbalance until there is a consensus among the provinces. He might as well have said he was indefinitely postponing a solution to the question. The provinces have differing views depending whether they have more than the average national wealth, like Ontario and Alberta, or less, like Quebec. The richer provinces, whose per capita spending is less than that of Quebec, don't accept the fact that the government takes into account the more costly choices of Quebeckers.
The need for a consensus among the provinces seems like a red herring because the issue, the importance and complexity of which is exaggerated, is far from insoluble. What is the exact nature of the problem? According to a recent study conducted jointly by the Mouvement Desjardins and Cirano, the fiscal imbalance is attributable to the federal government, whose tax revenues are too high relative to its responsibilities. Two options are available to the federal government to resolve the issue. It must either increase transfer payments to the provinces or cut direct and indirect taxes.
The transfer option means increasing federal spending in areas of provincial jurisdiction such as health, education and infrastructure. It requires that agreements be signed inevitably limiting the provinces' freedom of choice regarding their priorities. In addition, the negotiations that it inevitably requires, as is currently the case, cause needless tensions between the two orders of government.
Ottawa's second option, cutting direct and indirect taxes, does not require the provinces' consent or new agreements. It reduces the amount of begging by the provinces and dependence on the federal government. It leaves the provinces free to make choices based on their priorities. The provinces are entirely at liberty to occupy all or part of the tax room left by the federal government. Lastly, something very healthy, it makes the provinces accountable by requiring to set their tax levels based on spending levels.
In addition to its obvious advantages, the tax reduction option is much easier to implement. It avoids the lengthy negotiations and confrontation from which each party claims to emerge the winner. The Harper government went this route in cutting the GST by one percentage point, thus freeing up, according to 2005 data, tax room in the order of some $1.3 billion a year. It also made a commitment to make another 1% cut, thus vacating total tax room in the order of $2.6 billion a year for Quebec [...]
I knew Gilles Loiselle well at the time. He said that the GST was something that shouldn't be around for long.