Opposition Plan "B"

Posted by Devin Johnston on January 5th, 2010

I will have a lot to say about the suspension of representative democracy shortly. Today, I want to talk about what happens when Parliament resumes. As I see it, the opposition parties have three options:

1. Bring down the government at the first opportunity.
2. Re-constitute the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan and stack it with opposition members.
3. Get down on all fours, jump onto Stephen Harper's lap, and act pathetically grateful for whatever scraps of respect the Prime Minister is willing to throw their way.

Option number 1 is self-explanatory. This government has shown time and time again that it is not interested in sitting as part of a democratically-elected legislature. If the Conservatives don't feel like showing up for work, it's worth questioning whether they should continue to have jobs. Unfortunately, all three opposition parties are needed in order to topple the Harper regime; at any given time, there is a high probability that at least one out of three will get cold feet due to short-sighted concerns about electoral losses.

Option number 2 requires more explanation. One of the major reasons for the prorogation was to avoid public scrutiny of the government's role in the Afghan detainee torture scandal. Harper locked the door on Parliament Hill just as the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan was probing allegations that Canadian Forces transferred Afghan detainees into the custody of local authorities, even though government officials had been made aware of the likelihood that those detainees would be abused or tortured. The Committee consists of 12 members: six government members and six opposition members. The Conservatives managed to stonewall the committee's activities for months through a series of obstructionist procedural stunts. As soon as the opposition members finally began to make some progress, the Conservatives boycotted the committee to prevent the committee from even holding a meeting.

The only reason the Conservatives were able to pull this stunt off is due to the composition of the committee. In order to have an offical meeting, a committee must have both: a) the Chair present; and b) a quorum of members. So, in order for the Committee to continue its work when Parliament resumes, its terms of reference must be amended in order to ensure that the opposition members alone control the Chair and hold a quorum of seats on the committee.

Although it is traditional for a government member to chair committees, it is not without precedent for the opposition to chair a committee. For example, there are four standing committees in which the chair is always an opposition member (Public Accounts; Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics; Government Operations and Estimates; and Status of Women). The opposition parties could, by way of a Standing Order of the House of Commons, reconstitute the committee in such a way as to give a majority of seats, and the chairpersonship, to the opposition.

Under normal circumstances, it would be inappropriate for the opposition parties to do this. The House of Commons has always rested on principles of comity and traditions of respect in order to avoid having one political party run roughshod over another. However, I believe that these are exceptional circumstances. At common law, there is a famous maxim which states that "one who seeks equity must do equity." In light of the fact that the Prime Minsiter has suspended our democratically-elected legislature in mid-session two years in a row; in light of the government's outright defiance of a binding order of the House of Commons to release certain documents pertaining to the Afghan detainee torture scandal; in light of the Conservatives' boycott of a Parliamentary committee; and in light of Mr. Harper's contempt for the House of Commons and, by extension, the Canadian citizens it represents; in light of all of this, Mr. Harper and his government deserve no respect from the opposition and are certainly disentitled to benefits of Parliamentary comity.

Option number 3 is to let the Prime Minister get away with all of this. This would set an extremely dangerous precedent, and legitimate the dramatic centralization of power in the Prime Minister's Office which has occurred under Mr. Harper's direction. To yield now would be to abandon the principle of responsible government.

I believe that Option number 1 is the best of the lot. I would settle for Option number 2. Option number 3 is the sort of thing that would potentially lead to me changing my party membership.

Spread the word and fan the winds of change: