There are days when the state of our parliament achieves the level of farce, and we appear to be having another of those moments. Minister Dominic LeBlanc sent a letter to opposition party leaders – which seems to be a more common occurrence the days – urging them to pass the bill that would allow for pandemic-related changes to the Canada Elections Act per the request of the Chief Electoral Officer. This bill was tabled back in December, and we have just exhausted the sitting weeks in March, and it still has not even made it to committee, in part because the Conservatives have spent weeks using procedural tactics to delay debate on most every piece of legislation on the Order Paper.
LeBlanc apparently mentioned the upcoming budget in the letter, because that is a confidence measure and this is a hung parliament, so it is possible that the government could face a non-confidence vote and trigger an election at pretty much any point. And so during what debate there has been on this bill, the opposition MPs keep saying that there’s no imminent election unless the Liberals plan on calling one, and the NDP are going so far as to say that they simply need to work together to avoid one. Essentially, they get to accuse the government of opportunism for trying to do their due diligence at the request of the Chief Electoral Officer, which is cute for everyone involved.
But here’s the real kicker that makes this all a farce – the bill has an implementation period of 90 days after royal assent. The House isn’t sitting for the next two weeks, and even if they managed to have a Second Reading vote, speed it through committee and rush it to the Senate, I don’t image that it could be passed both chambers before the 23rd of April at the earliest, and only then would that 90-day clock start. That means that the changes couldn’t be fully implemented until the very end of July, meaning that even if the budget were the crux by which the government could fall (those votes would likely happen sometime in early May), there is no way that these changes could pass before a spring election could be called (considering the usual writ period of about six weeks). Any party pushing for an election without these changes would be suicidal. The government really has no interest in calling an election (seriously, and I’ve spoken to ministers who lament the number of items they have on the Order Paper that they need to see passed), especially because we are now into a Third Wave of this pandemic and there is no possible way we can vaccinate our way out of it without a time machine, so all of this chest-thumping by parties (and pleading by bored pundits) is for naught. This is all a bunch of Kabuki theatre for the sake of scoring points. We are not a serious country.
Good reads:
- As COVID variants spread in communities, Canada is set to record its one millionth positive test result next week. Doing such a good job, guys!
- Anita Anand says the 1.5 million AstraZeneca doses the Americans are “loaning” us will arrive Tuesday.
- A senior official in PCO gave her recounting of how she dealt with the allegations against General Vance that were forwarded to her, and how she couldn’t proceed.
- The gun control group PolySeSouvient is calling on MPs to vote down the government’s gun control bill, calling it too weak to be salvageable.
- Facebook says they are willing to offer $8 million in commercial agreements to support news publishing in Canada – but they won’t pay for links posted.
- The UN Secretary General says it’s “absolutely imperative” that Canada retrieve its citizens from prison camps in Syria, which Canada has steadfastly refused to do.
- The Commons’ Canada-China committee wants to look into debunked conspiracy theories about two fired scientists, so that’s going well.
- Mumilaaq Qaqqaq released a report on the state of housing in Nunavut that she witnessed touring some of the communities there.
- Jason Kenney says he didn’t prepare for the eventuality that the Supreme Court would uphold the federal carbon price, because he was sure he was going to win.
- Andrew Leach walks through Thursday’s Supreme Court of Canada decision on carbon pricing, and looks to what fights are likely to happen next.
- My weekend column looks at the notion of ministerial accountability as opposition parties demand that senior staffers be summoned to committees.
Odds and ends:
https://twitter.com/Catelli2Oh/status/1375472315299987458
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It sounds cynical but I can’t see an election happening until the “class of 2015” collect their six-year pensions anyway. I seriously don’t think this obstructionist stonewalling can last the full four years, however. 2022 *maybe*, and I think even that’s a stretch.
Agree about the bored media, though. There are actual scandals that they could get plenty of meat from if they’re tired of pandemic coverage, but they choose not to because they don’t involve Liberals or Trudeau. Zero percent chance the media will investigate themselves, having been implicated in an arguably more serious CoI at Queen’s Park.
So it’s back to election speculation, Trudeau’s socks, and Poilievre throwing papers at the Kielburgers like a juvenile delinquent in high school detention. Must-see TV.
Dale,
“But here’s the real kicker that makes this all a farce – the bill has an implementation period of 90 days after royal assent. The House isn’t sitting for the next two weeks, and even if they managed to have a Second Reading vote, speed it through committee and rush it to the Senate, I don’t image that it could be passed both chambers before the 23rd of April at the earliest, and only then would that 90-day clock start.”
What happened to the Third Reading vote? It is the Third Reading vote that the House of Commons grants consent to the Bill.
Ronald A. McCallum
I left it out for the sake of brevity. It obviously would need to happen before it gets sent to the Senate, but I didn’t think I needed to spell out every stage.