Three leaders out of four, which still isn’t great for the respect for the institution. Thomas Mulcair led off by asking about a minister misleading the House, and whether it was an unacceptable practice. Harper responded first by congratulating Philippe Couillard for his victory and said that he looked forward to working with him. Mulcair got up and, after a screed about the Senate, pointed out the attacks that Pierre Poilievre made against the Chief Electoral Officer at the Senate committee. Harper again congratulated Couillard, this time in English. Instead of asking again, Mulcair stuck to his script and asked about voter fraud allegations that Poilievre made. Harper insisted that they were trying to ensure that voters had proper identification. Mulcair pressed, got the same answer, and moved onto the quotes of Sheila Fraser. Harper responded that elections shouldn’t be decided by people who can’t prove their identity. Scott Brison led off for the Liberals for a second day in a row, and again asked about the Building Canada Fund, the problems with which was impacting Nova Scotia municipalities. Harper responded, proclaiming ignorance of that issue, but touted their record investments. Brison pressed, to which Harper gave a staged plea for the Liberals to stop opposing infrastructure investments. Marc Garneau brought up the impacts to infrastructure programmes in Quebec, not that Harper was moved from his “disappointed” talking points.

Round two, and Mulcair was back up, asking about the “self-styled” election experts that the Prime Minister appointed (Harper: It’s important for voters to be identified), about the CARP poll of senior voters opposed to the bill (Harper: Look at the kinds of ID they can use), same again rounds with students, Firsta Nations, the visually impaired, (Harper: Look at these kinds of ID they can use), Preston Manning’s objections to the bill (Harper: We look forward to Canadians voting against the NDP), can you name a single witness who is not a present or past agent of the party who supports the bill (Harper: Our position is clear), and what about fraud investigations being affected by this bill (Harper: That statement is false and you have abused your parliamentary resources). Scott Simms asked about seniors affected by the elections changes (Poilievre: 39 acceptable forms of ID!), Joyce Murray asked about the coming loss of elections programmes for young voters (Poilievre: Obviously students to support the Conservative Party), and Kevin Lamoureux asked about Poilievre’s attacks on Mayrand (Poilievre: I stand by my Senate testimony). Ruth Ellen Brosseau and Malcolm Allen asked about the rail grain bill (Ritz: We have a balanced piece of legislation moving forward), and Hoang Mai asked about rail safety regulations not being published in the Canada Gazette beforehand (Raitt: We’re working in harmony with the States and streamlining the pre-publication period).

Round three saw questions on long-term care wait times, veterans challenging the government in the courts, the requests for provinces to have demographically-adjusted health transfers, the economics of policing, shrimp fishery quotas, whether Somali refugees will continue to be accepted, outsourcing airport authority food jobs, changes to Canada Post, and a person kidnapped in Cameroon.

Overall, we saw Thomas Mulcair trying to get back to the prosecutorial role, but it was clear that he was relying entirely on a script rather than trying to press the PM on answers not given. It makes for poor debate and poor accountability if you can’t actually ask the question again or get to a specific point after an evasion. Just moving onto the next question in your script doesn’t do the job.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Blake Richards for a dark grey suit with a light purple grid-patterned shirt and a dark purple tie, and to Marie-Claude Morin for a black top with a grey windowpane jacket with three-quarter sleeves. Style citations go out to Hedy Fry for a shapeless sand-and-brown dress in a vortex pattern, and to Jasbir Sandhu for a black suit with a faded fluorescent light blue shirt and a dark blue striped tie.