Last week I decided that I would change my commitment so I no longer guarantee an op ed every weekend. If I publish a deep dig---like the one below---I'm going to avoid the op ed for that week. That's why last week I didn't publish one.
&&&&
In my last installment Michael Chong and I discussed more theoretical Parliamentary issues and compared how our democracy works as compared to both the USA and UK. In this final one we discuss Chong's work in the last two Parliaments to reform the system in Canada's house of commons.
 |
| Michael Chong in his Fergus constituency office. Original photo by Tim Allman. |
Chong: By the way, you mentioned something interesting. One of the arguments against getting rid of the party leader's veto over party candidates is that if the leader doesn't have this power we're going to get all these crazy and extreme candidates in our system. But then people in the same breath people often say "like this candidate in this riding---in the last election!"
[Chong laughs out loud]
I thought that the party leader veto was supposed to prevent that! Right? So my argument in favour of getting rid of the veto and letting the CA have the final decision is that we already do get crazy and extreme candidates in all parties during every election---so why not get rid of the party leader veto and at least strengthen local democracy? And make the party leader accountable to the local MPs?
Hulet: One of the things I've tried fruitlessly to remind people to think about is the opportunity cost of a certain rule.
Chong: Exactly! Exactly!
The opportunity cost here is the loss of democracy. People say to me "we had a candidate that smuggled booze across the BC boarder and was charged and convicted for that". The NDP had a candidate that was smoking weed while he was videotaping himself driving in Vancouver and then posted it to You Tube during the election. The Liberals had a white supremacist running for them in the 2011 election---a full-blown white supremacist. His name was Andre Forbes, his name was on the ballot. He was a declared white supremacist. So you know every party gets this. People say if we don't have the party leader's veto maybe we'll get a white supremacist. But we already do!
[Chong laughs out loud.]
Look at what you're giving up when you give party leaders that kind of power.
Hulet: I've read C-559 (the original bill), which was very different from what eventually passed, C-586. I can just imagine all the sweating that went into trying to squeeze that through the bottle-neck.
Chong: Yeah!
Hulet: So it basically changed from "you will" to "you can if you want to".
Chong: On one half of the bill, and the other half of the bill is completely gutted. The original bill had two parts. One concerns the accountability and structure of party caucuses in the house of commons. And the other part of the bill concerns local Constituency Associations and the nomination of local party candidates. That second part of the bill was completely removed. And the first part of the bill was essentially amended from "you will" to "you can". So that's what happened. The reasons for those changes was that it became clear to me after the introduction of the original bill that while all the party leaders were saying that they were supportive of the bill, there was no way that this bill was ever going to pass the house of commons and the Senate and that they would find a way to kill it clandestinely.
So I decided that I was going to play hardball with them and say "OK if you are truly serious about supporting this bill and you say you thought that there are some minor issues, then I am willing to play ball and address those minor issues". So I decided that it was better to get something passed than nothing. Because we did have an opportunity to get something passed. I decided that "the perfect is the enemy of the good" and it was better to get something done. So that was why I agreed to these changes. And they certainly weakened the bill. But we got something passed and it moved the pendulum a little back in the right direction. So my view is that it wasn't a huge improvement, but a step in the right direction that hopefully lays the foundation for future reform.
Hulet: What actually happened at the beginning of this Parliament? [Remember, readers, I am referring to the beginning of the Parliament that preceded the last election---not the current one.]
Chong: Quite simply, there were three recognized parties in the house of commons: the Liberals, Conservatives and New Democrats. The law said that at their first meetings all of three of these party caucuses had to go through a series of votes---four votes each, to determine the powers of the party leaders and the power of the elected members of parliament. Two of the three caucuses broke the law. They violated the law that had been created by the reform act. Only the Conservatives followed the law.
 |
| Jane Philpott, photo by Dave Kalmbach, c/o Wiki Commons. |
 |
| Jody Wilson-Raybould, photo by Erich Saide, c/o Wiki Commons. |
Hulet: What did the Speaker say about this?
Chong: I appealed it to the speaker but he washed his hands of it and refused to get involved. Which I thought was a sad reflection on the state of our Parliament. But because this law concerns the internal affairs of the house of commons and its caucuses, there is no recourse to the court system. The only appeal is to the house of commons, its committees, or, the Speaker.
The house of commons and its committees are under the control of the Prime Minister, so that wasn't a practical avenue to seek justice and see the law was followed. So an appeal to the speaker was made and he washed his hands of it. And we have no recourse in the law. So we have a situation where a law was broken and there were no consequences. I actually wrote a piece about this in Policy Options if you want to read it.
The fact that two caucuses---2/3s of the House of Commons---broke the law as one of their first official acts after the general election tells you everything you need to know about the state of our parliamentary democracy. The fact that this happened---and that's pretty upsetting in itself---was that the rule of law was not upheld. They deliberately did this, they knew exactly what the law said. The Reform Act, as you know, was well publicized before the last election. It received tons of ink. And before those caucuses met for the first time---when they were supposed to fulfill their responsibilities under the act---backgrounders went out to all elected members of Parliament. They described in great detail their legal obligations under the Act. But despite the reminders being sent to them, 2/3's of the officially-recognized parties in Parliament chose to ignore the law. But what's even more concerning is the fact that there were no consequences for that violation. There were no committee hearings, no vote, or debate on the floor of the house of commons. The law was broken and in the Canadian system that's OK. I think that's a sad reflection on the state of our institutions.
Hulet: I had no idea of all this, and I tend to be pretty up-to-date about this sort of thing. So I imagine the general public has no idea that any of this happened.
Chong: No. And neither should they, right? These are the detailed, day-to-day functions of the House of Commons and it's up to elected member to keep addressed. We don't have direct democracy in this country. People elect us to act on their behalf and they expect us to hold the highest standards of integrity and accountability. It's up to us to do that. Not up to the average voter to wade through the standing orders and other statutes that cover the house of commons to decide who's right and who's wrong. That's up to us in the Parliament and the fact is that that didn't happen.
Hulet: It's also a sad reflection on journalists. So we're sitting here and you're doing your job and hopefully I'll do my job, and, perhaps voters will pay attention.
Chong: You know it's interesting. Without betraying confidences, a number of members of the national press gallery came up to me during the controversy about the removals of MPs Wilson-Raybould and Philpott this last Spring and said that they did not do their job when the Reform Act wasn't followed. One of the members said to me "the national press gallery" really fell down. I'm paraphrasing, but he said something to the effect of "the national press gallery really didn't do it's job and cover this properly, because now I realize how important an issue this is". So it was disheartening to hear that.
In their defense, they're stretched for resources too. There have been a lot of lay offs in the mainstream big media outlets.
Hulet: It's almost impossible to make enough to support yourself in journalism. The large companies are all losing money, and the indies like me are mostly subsidizing their work. I couldn't do this interview if I didn't have a pension.
&&&&
This, of course, is a natural segue into my suggestion that people purchase a subscription. It's easy with Pay Pal and Patreon. Even a little bit a month helps.
&&&&
Okay, the Conservative caucus did vote. How many votes did they have?
Chong: Good question. We had four votes. As the law requires. The first vote was on the expulsion and readmittance of caucus members. So we voted to adopt that rule---taking away the ability of the party leader to expel an MP from caucus. In this last parliament Andrew Scheer and before him Rona Ambrose did not have the power to expel a member from caucus. That's a decision of caucus done through a secret ballot vote. We've had several members who have left the caucus but they did so voluntarily by resigning. The second rule concerned the election and potential removal of the caucus chair. Up to 2015 caucus chairs had been appointed by the party leader. So we voted in that rule, taking away the power of the leader to appoint the caucus chair and instead giving elected conservative MPs the power to elect the caucus chair.
Hulet: So who was elected caucus chair?
Chong: We had several candidates who ran and David Sweet the MP for the rural part of Hamilton was elected caucus chair for the first time in decades. Then we had the third vote which concerned the review and removal of the party leader by MPs. And that rule got defeated. Then we had a vote on the fourth rule, which was the election of an interim leader by Conservative MPs. Up to that point, the interim leader was always appointed by the out-going leader. The way it used to work was that the leader said that "I'm resigning, and I'm appointing so-and-so to be the interim leader". So what happened with that fourth rule was that it was defeated but because some MPs wanted Senators to also vote for the interim leader. So immediately after that fourth vote we had another vote to enact a similar but modified version of the rule that allowed not just MPs but MPs and Senators to vote for the election of an interim leader. That rule was adopted.
Hulet: Adopted by the caucus or the parliament?
Chong: It was adopted by Conservative MPs. All these votes I'm referring to happen within caucus.
Hulet: So there's no reason why you couldn't extend the votes to the Conservative Senators too.
Chong: That's right. The first rule was adopted. We decided that the leader doesn't have the power to expel members---that comes from caucus using a secret ballot vote. The second rule we adopted was to elect the caucus chair---instead of being appointed by the leader. The third rule was defeated, but a modified form was adopted. That is that MPs and Senators in the Conservative Party get to elect the interim leader and the out-going leader doesn't get appoint the interim leader. We then went to two more votes. The first one was an election for the caucus chair, which was David Sweet, as I mentioned. Then we went to the election of an interim leader. We had 7 or 8 candidates run for that position and Rona Ambrose was elected as the interim leader. And that's how she came to be the leader. So that's how she ended up the leader.
Hulet: Oh! You see that is news to me. This is the sort of thing I want to tease out.
Chong: To clarify, there were seven votes at the first caucus meeting. The first five were about process---whether or not we will be voting for specific positions, and, how that voting will take place (ie: including Senators for the leadership vote.) The last two were actual elections to fill two positions: caucus chair and the interim leader. And that set up the structure for this current parliament. That structure expires at the general election because the law requires of us that when we meet for the first time after the election to go through that process again. As does every other party in the house of commons.
Hulet: So the Conservative party---by doing this---is serving the useful function of holding the other parties' feet to the fire. The rule is not becoming moribund because nobody follows it.
Chong: Right. But it's also self-serving for us because it created a better structure for us in the past Parliament. It made clear what the rules were for expulsion. It made clear the rules were for the election of the caucus chair. And it made clear the rules of the election of the interim leader. What it did in all three cases was establish democratic credibility.
The caucus chair---being elected---had a great deal of credibility because the members thought that this guy had democratic legitimacy. When caucus chairs are appointed by the leader there's always this grumbling that they are just doing what the leader wants and not what the caucus wants. And there's always grumbling that they don't really listen to caucus members and that they are just there as an extension of the leader's office.
This didn't happen in this Parliament because the caucus chair was elected and knew that theoretically he could be removed by caucus at any moment in time. When we had members who got into trouble there was always a clear process to consider their expulsion. It was a different rules-based environment and there was no ambiguity about who had the right to expel and any questions about a member being removed from caucus was clearly laid out in writing.
So that created a very stable environment. And then the third rule about the election of the interim leader gave Rona a great deal of legitimacy as the leader during that period. In fact, she was so good that a lot of members thought that she should be allowed to run for the permanent leader of the party. And I think that came in part because she was elected by caucus. Previously, when you were appointed by the out-going leader there was always the idea that you are just a "care-taker" and you don't have the legitimacy. She didn't face that challenge because she was elected by caucus, and they had confidence in her leadership until a new leader was elected by the party-at-large. So self-interest also was a big part of the result. The Reform Act actually showed our caucus how beneficial these structures can be. So it wasn't just about holding the other parties accountable. It also created a structure that created order and created democratic legitimacy.
&&&&
Chong was speaking about the past Parliament. I tried to contact all the Caucus Chairs in this session and found that there seems to have been a greater degree of compliance with the law this time around. None of the Chairs responded to my email, however. When I called their offices I was able to talk to actual people in both the NDP and Bloc Quebecois (I had to leave recorded messages at the others' offices).
The woman working for Brian Masse, the NDP Caucus Chair, knew what I was talking about, said the vote had been taken but that she didn't know if she should tell me the specifics and would look into it. If Masse decides the outcome of the vote isn't a state secret, she said she'll send me the info by email.
The secretary for Louis Plamondon---the Bloc Chair---didn't seem to know what I was asking about, but she put me onto the party Press Officer, Joanie Riopel. Her response was cryptic and not terribly informative: "In regard to your present request, the Bloc Québécois caucus had voted unanimously that this does not apply to us." (To be fair, I asked the same question of Lloyd Longfield about the last Parliament, and he said something very similar.) I don't know if that means that they didn't have the vote at all---thereby breaking the law---or that they did and decided to leave all the power with their party leader.
I asked our local Guelph MP at an event shortly after the first meeting of the Caucus and Mr. Longfield told me that they had had the meeting and the votes required by law. According to a Canada Press article in the Vancouver Courier, the Liberals MPs decided to leave all their power to get rid of the leader, put in a replacement, and, kick members out of the Caucus in the hands of the party leader. They did elect their Caucus chair---which the Liberals said they'd already done for years---but the article didn't say whether or not the election was done with a secret ballot and multiple candidates, or not.
I haven't heard back from the Conservative Caucus Chair, but Micheal Chong did reply and gave me some of the info above. He didn't mention whether they had had their vote and what the decision was, but I think it's safe to say that they did follow the rules that they put in place. (If I get more info from the parties after publication, I'll add that into the text.)
The takeaway I get from this is that Chong's reforms have had some impact on the culture of Parliament and as long as the party Caucuses are forced to "go through the motions" of empowering the back bench MPs there is always the chance that some of them might start actually giving themselves real power again. And if one party does that, maybe pressure will build to the point where all of them start doing it.
As to why the MPs aren't voting to give themselves a greater role in Parliament, I suspect that the reasons are several and sadly understandable. I spent several years in the Green Parties of Ontario and Canada trying to reform their decision-making structures in an attempt to increase democratic accountability and often found myself stymied in my attempts by people of good will who simply couldn't understand what I was talking about.
The first thing to remember about politicians is that getting elected to an office is a totally different skill set from that of governing an institution. If you want to win that election you have to put in a huge number of hours glad-handing voters, going to events so you can be seen there, meeting with important party members to build a web of connections, helping individuals with their problems to build personal loyalty to you, working with the media, etc. All of this gets in the way of gaining a detailed understanding of how various issues---like democratic accountability---actually works. As a result, the vast majority of politicians don't seem to have anything more than a very vague understanding of how important the mechanisms of democracy are to its substance. Moreover, they usually believe that when someone tries to talk about these sorts of things, they perceive it as a waste of their extremely precious time.
The second thing to remember is that people get involved in parties because they are concerned about policy more than process. In my experience with the Greens the overwhelming majority of members wanted to talk about environmental issues rather than democratic structures. They had joined because they'd read Silent Spring, not Robert's Rules of Order. Mainstream parties are different from "up and comers", but they have the same sort of dynamic. If you join the Liberals or Conservatives in order to have a "career" in "the public service", you tend to be the sort of person who "gets ahead by getting along". People like this look at a system in order to find out the best way to adapt to and succeed in it---not how to change it.
Finally, a lot of the old structures---the ones that made backbench MPs "loose fish" instead of "trained seals"---were done away using language that sounded like the new ways are better. For example, if you ask most people I suspect they would say that directly electing the party leader by the rank-and-file members is much better than letting experienced party delegates do it at a leadership convention. That's because they simply don't understand that once the leader gets directly elected, it strips away all the power that other party officers---like the Constituency Association and Party President---used to hold. It also ignores the point that experienced delegates usually have a much better understanding of the personalities and issues than ordinary members---many of whom just recently joined in order to support one particular candidate. I recently heard these same old arguments from at least one candidate for the Ontario provincial Liberal leadership race. (Luckily, IMHO, the party was wise enough to stick to the old convention/delegate model.)
I mentioned the substance of this story to my significant other and she said that once she understood it she realized how important it is. But she also said that you simply cannot expect ordinary people---who mostly have busy lives---to put the necessary effort into learning the important details. (Chong made much the same point.) I don't know how many people will bother wading through this article, but at least it's on the web now, and maybe some voters (or students doing term papers) will read it. Perhaps one of them will eventually become someone who actually is in a position to make a difference, and it will help them understand the problems that Chong has outlined.
One last point that I learned from my experience in politics is that leaders will almost never voluntarily give up power once they have it. The sorts of people who end up in positions of authority are almost never idealists. And pragmatists who put enormous amounts of effort into amassing the power to run a party will never give it up without a fight. Even idealists have a tremendous temptation to hold onto power so it will allow them to "do some good", which makes them forget that their successors will also have the same power to do what they conceive of as being "ill". Moreover, the well-understood problem of confirmation bias affects many leaders, which means that they probably won't understand why what their opposition to reform is self-serving. A huge number of people simply lack the self-awareness necessary to look at the unfairness of the present system from the point-of-view of someone who isn't a member of the "inner circle".
&&&&
Hulet: One last question as we are running out of time. There's this idea known as "the wisdom of crowds". That's the notion that if you get more people involved in making a decision you often get different viewpoints and you get better solutions to a given problem. Something I tend to believe in. Is the extreme centralization of power in the leader's office "dumbing down" Parliament's ability to deal with complex questions? I mean just because you have fewer people with different points of view working on issues?
Chong: I think the concentration of power in a leader's office---especially the Prime Minister's---has significantly reduced the accountability of the Prime Minister to Parliament. And as a consequence has significantly decreased our democracy's ability to deliver results.
When I look at three big international commitments that this country has made in recent decades, we've failed to uphold any of the them. Despite the fact that most of our allies have upheld two, if not all three. These are:
- our NATO commitment to deliver 2% of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on defense spending
- the commitment to spend 0.7% of our GDP on overseas development assistance
- our commitment to reduce emissions and meet our greenhouse gas reduction goals.
I think that those three terrible outcomes for our defense, for helping some of the world's most vulnerable, and, for our environment, are the result of a Parliament that is unable to hold the Prime Minister and the government to account.
I think one of the consequences of this system we have is something of a paradox. On one the one hand it's an incredibly efficient decision-making system from the point of view of the Leader. What the Prime Minister wants, the Prime Minister gets. As I said earlier, no Prime Minister with a majority government in has lost a vote in the Canadian house of commons in decades. Governments and Prime Ministers can make decisions and put them into effect very easily without a lot of resistance.
But the paradox of highly efficient decision-making systems is that in the long run they lead to terrible outcomes from the point of view of the country. The corollary to that paradox is that, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, "Democracy where power is not concentrated in any one office but dispersed in Parliament is a terrible form of government---but it's better than all the rest".Reforming out system so that we de-concentrate power away from the Prime Minister's and other party leader's offices and diffuse it back into Parliament-as-a-whole is going to lead to a more inefficient decision-making system from the point of view of the Prime Minister's Office. It would be more difficult for governments to get their way, it means that they won't win all the votes on the floor of the house of commons like they currently do. But history shows that those sorts of diffuse, collective decision-making systems produce the best outcomes. The best environmental outcomes, the best military and defense outcomes, the best foreign aid outcomes, the best economic outcomes, and, so on and so forth. And we know that from the broad sweep of history. The societies that have prospered and delivered the most fair, the most just outcomes for their citizens have all been democracies with significant checks and balances on power and where power isn't concentrated in one place. We may have struggled in a recent decade or so with the rise of totalitarian states like China and Russia, but I'm confident in the long run we will prevail. But we will only prevail if we continue to renew these democratic institutions by ensuring that we don't concentrate power in just one place.
&&&&
Furthermore I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
No comments:
Post a Comment