Roundup: Debating useless rule changes

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Yesterday was “debate the House rules” day in the Commons, and lo, there was some talk about eliminating Friday sittings again, which the opposition parties tend to be against, but fear the government will try to ram through anyway. And yes, we all know that Fridays are not like any other day, particularly because MPs need to get back to their ridings, but there are still debate hours that happen, and eliminating them means either making up for them elsewhere, or losing them altogether, after we’ve lost plenty of debate hours in the past number of years, all to be more “family friendly” with spring breaks and so on. Kady O’Malley followed the debate (I would have more if I didn’t have other deadlines to file), and some of the best and worst are below.

Eliminating whip/House leader-provided speaking lists absolutely needs to happen. It removes agency from MPs and is part of what has debased QP into this scripted farce and turned debate on legislation into nothing of the sort. If you take away the lists – and then ban the scripts – it will help to make the debate free-flowing once again rather than just exercises in reading speeches into the void.

Oh, the irony. The bitter, bitter irony.

I am dubious, as we would have people tabling all manner of nonsense to “prove” whatever they were saying in QP, almost all of it irrelevant. (Also, look up the story about the tabled hamburger from the Alberta legislature that they ended up preserving).

No. We do not need to privilege private members’ business any more than we already do. Most of it is out of hand, with useless and costly Criminal Code piecemeal amendments, more national strategies than you can shake a proverbial stick at, and even more bills to declare national days for every issue under the sun. The proliferation of PMBs is already out of hand, we don’t need to make it that much worse.

So…turning the summer break from three months to four? No. But do feel free to sit more days in January regardless.

Not unless we start insisting that supply days start being about actually debating supply once again.

Because Parliament is just a debating chamber for hobbyhorses? Because there isn’t actual work that needs to get done?

Not unless parties start agreeing that second reading debates be severely curtailed, and that debate on government bills can collapse relatively quickly. But seriously, committee work already happens while debates are going on in the Chamber so I don’t see the point of this. At all.

Amen.

Seriously. I can’t believe that this actually needs to be pointed out.

Good reads:

  • The Commissioner of the RCMP apologised to female members for years of harassment and announced a compensation process under a former SCC justice.
  • Documents suggest that the government could have rolled out First Nations education money faster, but chose a slower roll-out.
  • The drama around the discovery of HMS Terror heats up as there looks to be an investigation over breaking Nunavut’s archaeological regulations.
  • There’s a leaked draft of an interpretive “declaration” of CETA to help assuage any fears around it, and it could help to finally get the agreement ratified.
  • Canada has signed onto the first airline climate plan.
  • Scott Brison says there is no conflict of interest in his husband taking over a corporate directorship position (and apparently the Ethics Commissioner agrees).
  • Here’s a look at the Library of Parliament analysis of the national security committee-of-parliamentarians-oversight bill.
  • It seems that the Cross-Cultural Roundtable on Security hasn’t met since 2014, and the government is still deciding what to do with its membership.
  • While Maxime Bernier released his tax policies, we are reminded that Bernier once compared progressive taxation to confiscating the wealth of Jews. Seriously.
  • The Canadian Press’ Baloney Meter™ weighs in on Brad Wall’s claim that a carbon tax will “siphon” $2.5 billion from their economy. (Spoiler: A lot of baloney).
  • Philippe Lagassé reminds us why accuracy matters when discussing how treaty ratification works in the media.
  • Economist Andrew Leach writes about the challenges the government will face on its carbon policy now that the minimum price has been set.

Odds and ends:

Parliament’s poet laureate is frustrated that no parliamentarian has asked him to pen any poems for official events since he’s been appointed.

The Canadian Disaster Assessment Team is headed to Haiti to assess what aid can be provided after Hurricane Matthew.