For starters, I’d like to apologise for trying to invent the word “proroguement.” Perhaps I was trying to blaze a trail. Perhaps I know as little about it as most Canadians.
In the seventh episode of my podcast, Jeff Wilson reminds me that prorogation has been used over a hundred times in our nation’s history. It’s true. This stat is probably ubiquitous enough by now that it’s meaningless again. In pointing this out, however, we get some insight into just how little we know about our own Parliament.
While Harper deserves all the licks he’s getting for shutting down Parliament for, let’s be honest, most of February, this tactic is right out of the Jean Chretien playbook. You may remember that Chretien used prorogation to avoid Auditor General Sheila Fraser’s report on the sponsorship scandal. Not much outcry then.
He also used prorogation to dodge the heat of the Somali affair. Not sure if you remember that one. It was similar to the Afghan detainee thing, except it involved actual Canadian soldiers actually killing somebody. Not much outcry then.
Chretien’s abuse (today’s definition) of prorogation was every bit as egregious as Harper’s is today. Yet, the public outcry isn’t nearly as loud. Perhaps we could spend some time thinking about this and asking ourselves some hard Canadian questions. At the very least, we could pretend we care all the time, not just some of the time.
In closing, I’d like to thank Mr. Harper for restoring an element of competition to Canadian politics that was absent for some time. It clearly has a positive effect on the population, albeit a somewhat baffling one.
Jeff
on Jan 28th, 2010
@ 11:02 am:
Well said Roger.
I would like to offer another fact regarding prorogation as there has been much misinformation out there lately.
We are hearing a lot of noise about how there are 36 bills that died on the floor when Harper prorogued.
However, it is not unprecidented for any or all bills that did die due to a PM asking for parliament to be prorogued be reinstated during the next session at the same point they were at when the session was prorogued. All it takes is a majority vote and these bills are right back where they were in December, leaving only the committees that need to be restruck.
Any of the opposition parties could use an opposition day to make a motion for this to happen, and with their majority pass this quite easily.
However, me thinks that it would serve them better in the polls to continue berating Harper for killing the democratic process in Canada than it would to reinstate the bills they have been so concerned about over the past four weeks and therefore we will not see this happen.