ABSTRACT
Many policies have significant interaction with planning, such as the extensive housing functions of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Urban policy would appear, at first sight, clearly to be a provincial rather than a federal responsibility. The Canada Water Act provides a framework for federal-provincial study and action by way of joint water quality management agencies. The federal position in relation to national parks is a happier and less convoluted one, though certainly not trouble free. Land management within national parks is directed towards maintaining the physical environment in as natural a state as possible. There is an abundance of writings on the fiscal problems of local government, but the essential points are simple. Local government reorganization in Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba was preceded by, and followed by, comprehensive studies. The problems facing local governments are thus administrative and political; and difficulties with the latter can preclude solutions to the former.
