Iggy has gone back and forth on question of limiting prorogation, from trust me to endorsing formal limits and now back to trust me (@ 3:57). Meanwhile, in latest Macleans, Geddes has Goodale & the Liberal caucus considering three ways to formally limit the PM's hitherto unfettered privilege to prorogue, with Goodale & caucus, in my reading, leaning towards the kind of compromise I've gathered & advanced.
At least one of the same characters who was intellectually & morally cowardly re. the 2008-2009 prorogation (creating the climate in which Harper naturally assumed such conduct was acceptable, given some supposed elite opinion last time) is again misleading Canadians by portraying prorogation as some divine power with which only PMs & GGs are endowed. But this is nonsense. In Parliament Will Fight, Derek Lee evoked a possibility that was picked up by Coyne in The Short Parliament, namely The Act against Dissolving the Long Parliament without its own Consent. The crux : "And be it declared and enacted by the King, our Sovereign Lord, with the assent of the Lords and Commons in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that this present Parliament now assembled shall not be dissolved unless it be by Act of Parliament to be passed for that purpose; nor shall be, at any time or times, during the continuance thereof prorogued or adjourned, unless it be by Act of Parliament to be likewise passed for that purpose"
This battle has been fought and won, in 1641 or 1649, as preferred. The how? is not complicated.
1) House resolves that it and future Houses will not agree to be prorogued for longer than, say, 14 days, without a vote of the House.
2) This resolution is adopted as part of the Orders of the House. The Crown (GG & Queen) is notified of this resolution.
3) The House amends the Orders of the House such that they cannot be further amended without 2/3 approval of the House & the approval of the Leader of the Official Opposition, pace Quebec precedents (search for "deux tiers" & then "chef de l'opposition) and in same spirit, Mulcair's Bill 190). NB. QC is not adequately respecting its constitutional requirement for legislative information on both languages. The online English version of the Orders is not up to date.
Remember, Canada is neither a monarchy nor a republic, but a constitutional monarchy. Some seem to forget that it is the monarchy that derives its legitimacy from observance of the constitutional limits placed upon it, that is from parliament and democracy, and not the reverse. The Crown, informed of Parliament's conditions for agreeing to prorogation, in both the current and future parliaments, could not order a prorogation of parliament that ran counter, on the sole advice of the PM, any PM, sole recognised constitutional advisor that he/she is, without delegitimising the Crown itself.
We see once again either the knavery or the foolishness of the "input-output" perverts, whose 2008-2009 view was really "the ends justify the means". These supposed elites, mostly English Canadian elites, and I use the term "elites" very loosely, were so undone by the thought of Bloc support for a left-leaning coalition that they abandoned every democratic, parliamentary, principle they had ever claimed to cherish, and waffled into approving anti-democratic, unconstitutional subversion. They placed perceived raison d'État over claimed respect for parliamentary democracy. It is striking to reflect that they behaved, the supposed Anglo elites, in exactly in the manner they continually & furiously decry in Quebec elites: they placed nationalism over liberalism. For make no mistake, the coalition was legitimate according to every precept of parliamentary democracy, the PM had less than no grounds for asking for a prorogation, and the Crown/GG, as Parliament's designated guarantor of our constitution, should absolutely have refused such an outrageous request. It might not have suited the Anglo elites nationalist agenda (note the unconscious nationalism that justifies illiberal anti-democratic behaviour, exactly what anglos criticise in QC) had she done so, but that is not an argument, and barely an excuse, weak and incoherent.
It is easy to claim to believe in one's ideals when the institutions derived thereof produce personally acceptable results. It is when respect for those ideals would produce personally reviled results that one learns just how real those beliefs are. I always remember Bonhoeffer: “Christians in Germany will face the terrible alternative of either willing the defeat of their nation in order that Christian civilization may survive, or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying our civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose; but I cannot make that choice in security.” I have said I am a Canadian before I am a large-L Liberal, but I should have added, though I think it is clear from this blog, that I am some sort of small-l liberal (commu-socia-libera-tory?) before I'm a Canadian. I don't believe in Canada, right or wrong, I believe in Canada right, and criticise it when it is, or we are, wrong. Same goes for LPC. This is exactly my problem with QC elites, and now we see, with far too many hypocritical anglo elites.
The ends do not justify the means. Not just as simple moral precept, but also, as observed repeatedly throughout history, by acting in such a manner, the ends themselves are degraded and lost. In 2008-2009 crisis, "in & out" perverts placed what they considered national considerations, that is nationalism, over parliamentary democracy, that is liberalism. They promoted arbitrary executive power, degraded legitimate parliamentary democracy, and subverted the Crown as guarantor of our democracy, since it is only there on the whim and forbearance of the Commons. (I am a fervent monarchist precisely because I understand its subservient role.) This dynamic of placing nationalist considerations over liberalism such that the executive is unchecked always ends badly. There are innumerable examples, but the Bush years are an obvious recent example. Counterproductive even, or esp., in stated aims. Gandhi wasn't just an idealist, he was a canny political leader and he knew: "as the means, so the end."
It's good, I suppose, that the previous anti-democratic perverts are now trying to compensate for their betrayal of claimed principles by concentrating on Harper's latest authoritarianism. Better late than never. But we might not be here if they hadn't cheerleaded and justified when he did it the last time. They should have stuck to their principles. Who is to know what the upshot of the coalition would have been? We will never know. Today's assumptions are tomorrow's garbage. Humility would dictate that one is best off sticking to one's democratic principles and hoping for the best, without clairvoyance of the future, rather than betraying oneself and democracy on shaky assumptions. If it was a choice between two evils, then the choice was between the known certainty of the undermining of Canadian democracy and the unknown supposition of the harm the federation might suffer otherwise. One was known. The other unknown. One spoke to the subversion of the very underpinnings of Western civilisation. The other to possible political troubles within a federation. I don't value Canada over democracy. And no sort of liberal, in the broadest sense, should, or can, without disqualifying themselves as liberals and democrats. (Trudeau said a thing or two about this re. poss of QC separation - (his) Canada is not the kind of country that would keep QC by force).
The question for me, as always, is whether such people are knaves or fools? It is so very hard to tell. To pretend Parliament is incapable of placing limits on the power of prorogation, when it has before, and also does so now in other jurisdictions, is silly. But given the supposed education & knowledge of some who say such things, one wonders, are they really so dim or are they acting to advance some narrow, partisan political aim? What is clear is such foolishness must be nipped in the bud. Goodale & caucus have evoked some useful reforms. I've offered a good one. Don't let Iggy waste this moment and mess up his answer to an obvious question with "trust me". Parliament & the citizens it represents deserve better.
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