A preliminary report is by definition an unsatisfying document, though it may be an exciting one. The Gordon Commission's Preliminary Report qualifies for the former description, without quite coming up to the latter; for while the prospects of economic growth which it holds out are gratifying in the extreme, its discussion of policy problems is narrowly empirical and pragmatic, uninspired by any consistent philosophy of resource-orientated growth or even of economic policy, and interesting mainly as a reflection of trends in Canadian political opinion and the balance of pressure groups at the end of the second Liberal era.