I’ve been reading and thinking for a few days about the prorogation of Parliament, an occurrence for the second year in a row, and what it all means. It’s true that there has been general outrage from those who identify themselves as opposition voters. And the media has been in a frenzy of hyperbolic ravings and outlandish characterizations. There’s certainly nothing “despotic” or undemocratic about what the Prime Minister has done, no matter how unseemly it may appear to people. It would be dishonest to both ridicule people one year ago for calling the proposed coalition government last year a “coup”, and in the same breath be able to call prorogation an “insult to democracy”.
But that’s precisely the language being used in column’s like Heather Mallick [who goes overseas to condemn Canada again], the title of her column including the word “shafting”. Ms.Mallick believes the prorogation was “to smother a scandal, to halt a highly embarrassing and public inquiry into the Canadian military.”
Don Newman uses similar language in his CBC column saying that prorogation is a small price to pay “for silencing embarrassing questions on Afghanistan.” Meanwhile, Elizabeth May is using this moment to advocate Canadians “kick and scream” about the move. And by kick and scream she really means log on to Facebook and sign a petition. I’m certain that will be highly effective in shaming the Prime Minister for his decision.
John Ivison probably penned the most calming response to the “crisis”, debunking the idea that it was done to avoid “embarrassment”. As he writes, although the government could do without the endless detainee talk in the House of Commons, this had nothing to do with the prorogation strategy. For one, the government was ignoring the entire affair, and for another, polls suggest Canadians either don’t know or don’t care about it.
No, prorogation was about reconstituting the Senate committees to keep the Liberals from stalling bills which had already been unanimously passed in the Lower House. Further to the point, it gives Stephen Harper control in the Senate for the first time since he became Prime Minister in 2006. Rather than continue to berate the man for stacking the Senate, I’m more particularly interested to see how this fits into his proposed claims to want to reform the Senate.
It’s true that Canadians aren’t entirely up to speed on the definition of “prorogue”, but as Tim Powers pointed out, it isn’t exactly a rare occurrence. Parliament has been prorogued 105 times in its history. But you can’t exactly, as Mr.Powers did, average it out to once every 1.3 years.
Historically speaking, prorogation was more common before 1983, since the process of proroguing the Canadian Parliament usually involved the Governor General reading a speech in the Senate recounting the accomplishments of the parliamentary session. But not all prorogation were length affairs; on the contrary, some lasted only a few hours.
What’s most interesting is that there is some historical precedent involving the Conservative Party and a meddling Liberal Party with prorogation. In 1988, Brian Mulroney’s Free Trade Agreement was endlessly being stalled in Parliament by the Liberals who wanted an election to be held on the issue. Mr.Mulroney asked the Governor General to dissolve Parliament and won a majority in the November election. He then caused Parliament to be convened on December 12, 1988, for the sole purpose of passing legislation related to the Free Trade agreement, and then adjourned until late February. But the Conservatives didn’t think this was long enough to organize, so Mr.Mulroney asked the Governor General to prorogue Parliament for a month longer until he and his government were ready.
Besides all this talk about democracy and despotism, John Ivison points out the obvious: that the opposition can always vent their outrage in March by defeating the government budget and going to the polls. Norman Spector certainly thinks it’s going to happen. And if the Liberals don’t defeat the government at that time, it’s only going to make all their moaning and complaining now look all the more ridiculous.
One is reminded of the cartoon where the snarling and vicious dog who has been barking at a stranger finally breaks free of his leash. Realizing he is no longer restrained, he turns to his owner and asks that his leash be reattached so that he may continue snarling and barking and looking vicious. The phrase it coined sums up the Liberal Party: “all bark and no bite.”
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