Michael Harris: The Big 10 A must read for all who fear for our democracy, Michael Harris has done all Canadians a favour by spelling out ten questions he wants answered, along with some supporting facts that are background to each question he has posed. The inaction or lack of
Continue readingTag: Democratic Deficit
CuriosityCat: The Trans-Pacific Partnership trade treaty: Evil fruit from Secret talks
It is worth reading the article by Joseph Stiglitz on the problems posed by the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade treaty. Our government is one of those negotiating in confidence a treaty that will substantially effect the livelihood of all Canadians. Stiglitz highlights the problems posed for democracies by the one-sided secrecy
Continue readingCuriosityCat: A Liberal Party Mess in the Making
A man of principle This is a mess. Justin Trudeau and his advisors had better get on to this debacle post haste, reveal all the facts and communications, and make sure the principle of open nominations is adhered to. If we start retreating from opennes and transparency before the election
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Canada: A Simple Election Law (“SEL”)
At the Montreal convention, the Liberal Party overwhelmingly agreed to Priority Resolution 31, Restoring Trust in Canada’s Democracy. An important part of that resolution is this: AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED THAT immediately after the next election, an all-Party process be instituted, involving expert assistance and citizen participation, to report
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Liberal Party Convention: The Most Important Policy Resolution
In my view, the single most important policy resolution at this week’s convention in Montreal is the prioritized number 31, which should significantly reduce our democratic deficits. That resolutionreads: 31. Priority Resolution: Restoring Trust in Canada’s Democracy* BE IT RESOLVED THAT the Liberal Party pursue political reforms which promote: Open,
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Ontario Byelections: The change that really counts
It seems that the leaders of all three poltical parties in the province of Ontario sense that voters want change. Premier Wynne, leading a minority Liberal government, was rejected by voters in the two byelections, but says change is wanted: Real Change Wynne? After writing off the byelections as “skirmishes”
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Brian Rice: The right person for President of the Liberal Party of Canada
Brian Rice – Political reformer par excellence For many reasons, I believe that Liberals should elect Brian Rice as the next President of the Liberal Party. He is a mover and shaker, a man of ideas, an adept politician in his own right, and a very hard worker. One very
Continue readingcalgaryliberal.com: 1 out of 100 Calgary Co-op members vote.
It’s election season for Calgary Co-op. For the month of February if you’re a member-owner of Calgary Co-op you can select three of their nine-member board. Most people don’t know they can help select representatives on that board. Out of some 440,000 members the Calgary Co-op cooperative only nets a little
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Senate expenses scandal: Snippets from the Mounties
They’re are the march … to protect our democracy A bombshell burst in Ottawa today when the Mounties filed a request for a search warrant dealing with the Duffy expenses scandal. Reading that request is interesting. I include a few snippets that caught my eye. Overall, my impression from the
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Robocalls: Who is blocking Elections Canada?
Our new flag? If thisis true, then we live in a banana republic: Elections Canada has heard complaints of dirty tricks in the 2011 election from over 200 ridings. Many of the grievances don’t amount to much, sources say, but a substantial number are thought to be of a serious
Continue readingCuriosityCat: The Senate Scandal: How to hold the Prime Minister to account in Question Period
Thomas Mulcair in Question Period The leader of the NDP has done Canadians, and Canadian democracy, a service through his dogged, skillful, meticulous and highly professional questions posed to the Prime Minister during Question Period. Mulcair has clearly spent a great deal of time researching the facts of the Sentate
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: NAFTA, “Free Trade” and the TPP: Fast-Track To Full Corporate Rule
“Twenty years ago, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed into law. At the time, advocates painted a rosy picture of booming U.S. exports creating hundreds of thousands of new jobs, and economic development in Mexico, which would bring the struggling country in line with its wealthier northern
Continue readingCuriosityCat: 2015: The ballot question in Canada’s next election?
Methinks John Ivison has hit the nail right on its head with this: If the Auditor-General’s report does suggest a systemic problem of corruption and abuse, who would bet against the Conservatives using the Senate as a classic wedge issue, pointing out that the Liberals are in favour of preserving
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Don’t Say This Question Hasn’t Crossed Your Mind
Is our system of government incapable of meeting the challenges we face? A very simple question raising a point that has been addressed here at length several times. It gets into issues of what it means when we vest such enormous powers in our elected apparatus, in our
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: US government shutdown, and other fairy tales and political theatre
I’m not sure what to make of the hoopla going on in the US right now. I’m inclined to think it’s all just political theatre, as Gerald Celente calls it, designed to distract the people from the real issues – the central one being, who controls the government and the
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The deeper reasons for the “war on drugs”
There is a deeper reason for the war on drugs, which is the central reason for the policy, even outweighing profits from private prisons and seizure of property by law enforcement officers, both of which no doubt are also significant and strong motivations for keeping the “war on drugs” going.
Continue readingImpolitical: Prorogation, obviously
The big news on an August Monday: Prime Minister Stephen Harper has confirmed he will ask the Governor General to prorogue Parliament until October, when his Conservative government will introduce the next speech from the throne. “There will be a new throne speech in the fall, obviously the House will
Continue readingImpolitical: Prorogation, obviously
The big news on an August Monday:
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has confirmed he will ask the Governor General to prorogue Parliament until October, when his Conservative government will introduce the next speech from the throne.
“There will be a new throne speech in the fall, obviously the House will be prorogued in anticipation of that. We will come back — in October is our tentative timing,” Harper told reporters in Whitehorse Monday. Harper is in the Yukon on the second day of his annual summer tour of the North.
A few thoughts to add to the online maelstrom.
I am quite meh over this one. It’s mid-August and the House of Commons will be back in just over a month and a half? That’s not tooo bad in terms of an extension beyond a return that was expected on September 16th.
The news coverage on the Senate scandals, for example, is likely to continue through this period. They won’t be escaping damage from it.
Also, whenever Harper interferes with his own government’s ability to legislate, that’s not so bad. Less is definitely more for some of us when it comes to their legislative output record.
Harper, though, just can’t prorogue and avoid critical comment. He has baggage, to say the least.
He is the lone Prime Minister, of any Westminster democracy, to have faced a confidence vote and deployed prorogation to avoid his minority government’s fate. Totally unprecedented in Canadian history and so he just can’t shake that shadow. He would have been defeated in late 2008-early 2009 by the opposition parties but for his proroguing of Parliament. The Harper majority era might totally have been avoided had he not done so. All of today’s present Conservative party edifice is built on that shaky foundation. Which is partly why the power to prorogue is still in need of reform. There is less malevolent political calculation at play in today’s prorogation. But nevertheless, it doesn’t take away the need to fix, at some point, the unrestrained ability of a PM to prorogue without limitation.
A law that would restrain the power of the Prime Minister to prorogue could be passed and a PM would ignore it at their political peril. Whatever that judgment by voters might be. Could be nil, could be more, depending on how prorogation occurred. (Similar laws could be passed provincially as well.)
Today’s prorogation is also another reminder that it is just plain old anachronistic that a Prime Minister retains such power to unilaterally dictate the government’s sitting. In this modern era of a 24 hour news cycle, ever enhanced technologies and where Canadians’ work is increasingly stretched beyond 9-5, it is a strange holdover that a Prime Minister can still set their own government’s clock and work agenda, largely for political convenience. It just doesn’t fit in this era. It’s a reminder that there is a larger democratic deficit that needs to be cured in Canada. It’s not all about the Senate sideshow. Harper has educated us well about a PM having too much power and our way of governing being in need of an update.
Beyond all that, politically, today’s prorogation seems to continue the end of summer roll-out of the newish Harper majority looking toward 2015. New websites here and there with partisan purpose (Consumers First, the new Harper blog), election style speech and talk, etc. Now prorogation. The reboot is on and he’s looking to win again in 2015. Obviously.
Continue readingImpolitical: Prorogation, obviously
The big news on an August Monday: Prime Minister Stephen Harper has confirmed he will ask the Governor General to prorogue Parliament until October, when his Conservative government will introduce the next speech from the throne. “There will be a new throne speech in the fall, obviously the House will
Continue readingCuriosityCat: Justin Trudeau raises the bar for MPs and Senators
A breath of fresh air in Ottawa In a move that is refreshing, because it shows an MP who is willing to listen to criticism, and to rethink matters in the light of such criticism, Justin Trudeau has announced that he will work with charities to reach some solution satisfactory
Continue reading