Many folks like to harp against the evils of big government and how all it does is create a stumbling block for industrious private business with endless reams of red tape, taxes and laws. In some regards, these complaints are entirely valid. But government organizations play a crucial role in our society. They exist to ensure the protection and best interest of the public, both physically and financially.

This necessity exists for a simple reason- someone's gotta be the traffic cop and private industry is too busy doing it's thing to worry about regulating itself. Most private businesses actually are very conscientious corporate citizens... they do indeed care about the big picture and the good of the nation. This mirrors private life- most citizens are good people who just want a good life for themselves and their loved ones. Just as police are necessary for general law and order in public, so too are they necessary in the corporate world. This is so for a couple reasons-

1) You will always have bad apples in any crowd. Basic human nature. Take a group of 100 people at random, most will be good but there will be a couple out there who, if given the chance or the knowledge that they would get away with it, would screw you over in a heartbeat for their own personal gain (many would argue that most lawyers and politicians fall into this class) In the business world when you have people breaking the rules it can oftentimes be significantly magnified by the vast sums of money involved- ie; Enron, their criminal actions in California and the thousands of employees and investors they knowingly lied to and mis-lead. The impact of hanky panky in a private company can have drastic negative consequences for the public sphere.

2) Quite often we can get so wrapped up in what we are doing that we don't notice the wider impact it's having. I like to think of this as the clueless driver who realizes they took the wrong exit and suddenly slows to a crawl on a freeway as they're trying to figure out where they are. It's not that they want to break the law, they're just so consumed with what they are trying to accomplish that they don't notice they are endangering the public. In this case enforcement isn't there to punish the clueless ones, but to hopefully educate them and most importantly to protect the public. Quite often this is a discovery process, as new technologies and techniques rolled out in the private sector can have unforeseen consequences.

Theory's all fine and well. Blah blah, lots of words. Let's see how it plays out in the real world. This week in Canada there were two instances that illustrate both points for the necessity of government regulation.

The 'bad apple' example occurred off the coast of Newfoundland, and the perpetrator was an international shipping company. A cargo hauler was found to be dumping their bilge oil directly in the ocean right off the coast. This is a bad thing because it screws up the marine ecology, kills birds and pollutes the shore line. When the vessel was boarded, a special pipe was found to have been installed that bypassed the bilge tank to dump directly in the ocean. A little explanation is in order- quite often, most developing nations will purchase bilge oil from tankers and use it for fuel. Here in Canada, it's too dirty for lawful use as a fuel so the ship has to pay a charge to have their bilge oil disposed of safely.

Rather than obey the law and pay a fee for waste disposal, they knowingly harmed the environment and dumped their sludge near the coast. This is an example of a guy who will screw you over if he can get away with it, and is why we need things like the coast guard and monitoring agencies to ensure the public is being protected from private interests that are only concerned with profits, all else be damned.

The other example occurred in Alberta's oilsands. This week hundreds of ducks and other birds have been found dead- after landing in tailings ponds from oil operations that lie along their migratory path. This isn't just affecting birds but other wildlife as well and there is always concern about things like water table contamination. These are tailings ponds for the effluent from Syncrude facilities, a major oil company that has invested billions in the oilsands project. Syncrude didn't create these ponds knowing that it would impact the local ecology this way (if they did, then that is a different story) and they are working in tandem with environmental agencies for a solution. This was a case in which Syncrude was busy doing what they do best, producing barrels of oil. In their drive to expand, there wasn't very detailed consideration given to the location and nature of the placement of these tailing ponds, and so now there is a negative impact on the public sphere. This further reinforces the need for impartial government monitoring and oversight- a private company may think it's operations are running just fine with no consideration for how they are affecting the bigger picture.

Does this kind of regulation apply across the board? No. Every industry is different, but still requires a third party to keep an eye on it!