The Liberals are missing the point

I am astonished at the bronze face the Liberals hold when proposing the anti-prorogation measure. Their leader-in-waiting Bob Rae is the prorogation guru (as brought out by many bloggers and the CBC itself), and they are the same party who, while advocating democracy and people power last year were ready to get in bed with a separatist party. What a bunch of pillocks!

Prorogation should be a tool that allows the Government to announce a massive new legislative drive needing immediate attention. The current prorogation is way too long, despite there being reasons for having such a long break. I would limit the prorogation term to 14 days, enough for the Government to draft a new Throne Speech and have the urgent bills ready for introduction. In the meantime Committees should be given the possibility to finish up their business, or at least put their current work in writing so they can come back to it. No, business should not be wiped completely clean, it's a waste of work. The scope of prorogation should be softened and made to resemble the normal evolution from one session to the next. Parliamentary business preceding prorogation must remain on the agenda, albeit on the back burner.

Additionally, for Chrissakes, allow Committees to be reset without resorting to a prorogation.

Yet the Liberal proposal stinks to high heaven. Having the House vote on a prorogation is a rubbish concept: a majority government would have an obvious outcome, a minority government would be held hostage by the opposition. 10 days notice? Fair enough, if we really have to. Allowing committees to continue working while prorogued? That's fine too.

Spare me the confidence rubbish though. Limit the prorogation time and vote down the government on the Throne Speech, if you have the guts to.

Thought so!

Save your anger til March, just don't count on the Grits

Demos! Can't live with them, can't live without 'em. Today a number of Canadians came out on the streets to protest the prorogation of Parliament, and the CBC gleefully reports their heroic fight against the cold, as well as the heckling of any Harper supporters in range.

The Prime Minister was caught between a rock and a hard place. The opposition could always have defeated the Government on the eve of the Olympics (making the host of the games a lame duck), derailing the appointment of the remaining Senators that would give the government a majority in the red house. Bend it as you wish, the torture inquiry was way outside the PM's radar range when making the prorogation decision. It's all about timing.

Harper didn't want to be held hostage by an opposition ready to ruin a once-in-a-lifetime event with petty politicking. And as the adage goes, no freedom is safe while the legislature is in session. So, dear anti-prorogation Canadians, be grateful your Parliament can't make bad laws and fill the news with useless bickering rubbish. There is no business that can't be taken care of in March instead of today, except the Olympics. As a matter of fact the Games do not need Michael Ignatieff's grandstanding or the Tory side's snidery to be a success. Now isn't that a refreshing thought!

Keep the Lords CLEAN

The House of Commons has expressed a preference for more elected peers in the Lords, marking what I deem to be the beginning of the end of parliamentary sovereignty in Britain. Until today the Lords have acted as a check on the Government excesses that the Commons have to bow to, as the voting records can show easily. A nearly powerless but wise House, with an over-riding clause should the Commons wish to impose their will was the best arrangement for a country such as Britain. Citizens could look at Westminster knowing that in that building there were two powerful forces keeping each other in balance: the Commons, expression of people's wants, passions, desires, excesses and the Lords, who were not as accountable to their constituents but had to justify such an anachronism by applying their wisdom rather than manifesting party loyalties.

I recently attended a very informative, albeit uncontroversial panel discussion regarding a written British Constitution. Leaving aside the rest of the discussion, a point was raised about the Lords having more legitimacy in the people's eyes if the House was more elected than appointed or wholly elected.

But this is not merely a question of democracy, as the Commons is already the most powerful House and can impose its will if necessary. It is a question of class and, let me say it, British style. The Houses aren't named randomly. The Commons is what its name says: the House representing the will of all us commoners, from the benefit fraud underclass to the rich businessmen, from the apathetic and lazy to the activists and lobbyists. It has a legitimate right to be the most powerful House because ultimately the State has to do the people's bidding.

The Lords is the house of the enlightened aristocracy. We can argue at will about the need for a House of Lords or for any aristocratic representation at all, but the fact remains that currently the Lords do not have to face party candidate selections, do not have to follow the whims of the majority in their constituencies and can calmly sit and do what they like, trying to keep up the good name of the House by being wise and voting accordingly.

What we have in proposition is now the reduction of the Lords to an even greater resemblance of what the Commons are, including all the political squabbling, favours and brown-nosing that mar any democracy. A Commoner can rebel and is stigmatised for it. At the next party candidate selection he might be pushed to a side in his seat in favour of a more loyal careerist youngster junked up on party ideology and the leader's personality cult. Is this what we want to see in the red House?

I say now and forever NO to a majority of elected Lords or anywhere close to that level of elected influence. Every citizen who disagreed with the Government's manias could look up to the Lords and know they would stand up for common sense because they didn't have to fear for their seat. Now the citizen will be left at the mercy of party politicking, whips and technocracy.

The Government doesn't know the ground it is venturing into is unsafe. If the Lords are subject to electorate and party influence there will be nothing left to act as a check on the Government, be it Labour or Conservative. If fighting citizen disillusionment with politics is the aim, this Lords reform achieves all but that.