I've heard that rural Canada is notoriously full of bullshit, but jeez...
It's why the Conservatives are actively trying to drum up opposition to Elections Canada's (a non-partisan agency) proposed redistricting plan for Saskatchewan's federal ridings: it would change those for Regina and Saskatoon from being 4 each, partly urban and rural, to 3 mostly urban for Regina and 2 mostly urban for Saskatoon, reducing their chances in those new ridings and increasing the NDP's. Normally riding boundary changes are basically pro forma votes in Parliament and the only things debated are the names.
This also doesn't address the issue of most provinces being guaranteed a disproportionately large number of seats in the House.
It's interesting to compare the actual number of seats each province gets with the number they'd get if seats were allocated as per the formula used to allocate seats in the US House of Representatives.
Running the numbers (using the 338-seat House proposed for the next election and provincial populations from the 2011 census):
Province | Computed seat count | Actual seat count |
Alberta | 37 | 34 |
British Columbia | 44 | 42 |
Manitoba | 12 | 14 |
New Brunswick | 8 | 10 |
Newfoundland and Labrador | 5 | 7 |
Northwest Territories | 1 | 1 |
Nova Scotia | 9 | 11 |
Nunavut | 1 | 1 |
Ontario | 129 | 121 |
Prince Edward Island | 1 | 4 |
Quebec | 80 | 78 |
Saskatchewan | 10 | 14 |
Yukon | 1 | 1 |
And this doesn't even scratch the surface of all that is wrong with the Senate.