Stumbling Across The Starting Line

It was the session that wasn’t.  It was the dumbest of times; it was the cruelest of times.  There had been hope, back in September, that the Prime Minister’s own words about being more cooperative might signal an end to the bleeding that’s been going on here in Ottawa for a few years now.  It was not to be; in fact, it appears as though by government design it was never meant to be.Last Thursday night I received an email from a sincere Conservative, asking if I would be willing to join him and some other MPs from other parties for a late drink.  “No, I replied.  “I’m tired of the partisanship and I just don’t want to fake any good will.”His response was effective: “But Glen, we have to start somewhere.”  I typed back that the issue wasn’t really “starting” something, but “stopping it.”  When I added that we lacked two clear characteristics as MPs in all parties – a lack of courage to confront our leaders as to the lack of respectability in the House, and the obvious shortage of humility in confronting our individual and collective failures – he never responded.But I wanted to go.  Seen as the non-partisan guy, why shouldn’t I attend a session where MPs were attempting to make things better?  And then I realized it: there’s only one place we can correct our ways: not in a bar but in the House – the scene of our daily failures.Don’t be fooled folks; this Parliament never left the starting blocks.  Joan Bryden did a great job in the Globe and Mail today chronicling the virtually empty playlist the government has put forward.  We were told Parliament had to be prorogued last winter so that the government could prepare for its robust agenda in the spring.  It never arrived.  Parliamentary expert Ned Franks couldn’t recall any other session that amounted to so little.  “There might have been, but I have no record of it,” he concluded.Let’s face it, this Parliament is sick, likely diseased.  We have opposition parties chasing after every Guergis story they can find because in many ways the Harper government has left them little else to do; they can't affect change in such a climate.  We were never informed of the sheer magnitude of the “fake lake” costs (over $1 billion), and now that we’re trying to correct it the government is saying it won’t defer.  It is fully honest, right and legal that political staffers responsible for assisting ministers in the workings of government should appear before committee when requested.  The government says no.  The opposition then threatens to take legal action to make them appear, and the government says: “Go ahead; make my day.”  Committees are stymied at many turns, to which the government replies: “It’s not our fault.”The greatest danger of all plays out in the next 24 hours.  Raising its fist to the Speaker by refusing his ruling that Parliament is the ultimate master in this country, the Harper government has said, “no, we won’t turn over the documents, even though you said it would put us in contempt of Parliament if we didn’t.” The sheer gall of that defiance!This list goes on, leaving opposition parties looking amateurish in the face of a government that defies Parliament and its people.  This Parliament is sick and there really is only one route to potential healing: an election.  Its timing and verdict are in many ways up to you.  But naturally the Conservatives know that while Canadians bemoan our behaviour in Parliament, they don’t want to be bothered with going to the polls.  Well, it’s perhaps time to get agitated.  This is your Parliament and it’s busted.  If the Harper government refuses any form of correction, even from the Speaker, then it stands to reason the institution can’t rise to your defence when you need it.  After 10 months we never left the starting line.  And we never will until either the government atones for its mistakes, or the good people of Canada say “enough.”