Crown corporation

Crown corporations exist because it is felt their work should be kept at arms length from the government. A politician is forbiden from interfereing in the daily operations of a crown corporation. Thus a politician cannot tell the CBC to report a certain way and cannot tell VIA Rail[?] to start servicing their community.

The legislature only has the power to set the budget of the corporation and to appoint its chairperson. This gives a fair amount of control, but corporations have not been afraid to go agaisnt the government as can be seen in the CBC's frequent and wholehearted criticisms of the government.

There are two types of crown corporations the first like the CBC and the Canada Council exist to advance cultural goals that the private sector might not do adequatly on its own. The other type, such as VIA Rail of the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool[?] are natural monopolies that will not operate to the benefit of consumers in a free market. Many of these types of crown corporations were sold off by Brian Mulroney's government in the 1980s.

Canada has a number of corwn corporations. These include:

• the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
• VIA Rail[?]
• the Canada Council
• Canada Post
• Farm Credit Corporation
• Canada Land Corporation[?]

There are also a number of businesses which used to be crown corporations but are now privatized:

• Air Canada
• Petro Canada[?]
• Bell Canada

The provincial governments also have crwon corporations these include:

• Hydro Quebec[?]
• Saskatchewan Wheat Pool[?]
• SaskTel[?]
• TV Ontario[?]
• Insurance Corporation of British Columbia[?]