On the Election of New Speaker of the House of Commons
Factional Fighting in the Parliament Underscores Need for Democratic Renewal of Political Process
On October 3 Hull-Aylmer Liberal MP Greg Fergus was elected the new speaker of the House of Commons. A new speaker became necessary after the resignation of the former speaker Anthony Rota who was thrown under the bus as being solely responsible for the two standing ovations the entire House of Commons gave to a former member of the Ukrainian WWII Nazi SS Galizien on September 22. Much has been made of the fact that Fergus is the first Black Canadian to serve as Speaker of the House which the Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada concurs is indeed significant.[1] But what received scant attention was what Fergus said when elected. In fact, all those vying for the position spoke in the same vein.[2]
Like many speakers before him, in his bid to be elected, Fergus promised to end the rancour among MPs and dysfunctional proceedings of the House. "As your Speaker, I would restore, and quickly bring back, honour to the chamber," Fergus told MP's. "... there is respect for each other, in the way we treat each other and the way we talk to Canadians. In other words, this is all about decorum," he said.
In his acceptance speech he reiterated his wish for decorum, stating, "I am going to be working hard on this, and I need all of your help to make this happen, because this is the place where hard debates will happen."
But it is not about decorum. It is about the inability of parliament today to reestablish an equilibrium needed to say the decisions taken by government represent "the national will," and are good for "the nation." It is about the urgent need to renew the political process to eliminate positions of power and privilege and empower Canadians. It is about changing the direction of the economy so that it is not the bloody profits of the narrow private interests and oligopolies which are put at the centre of government concerns but the well-being of the people. Once the people are forgotten, abused and silenced, illusion-mongering that Members of Parliament represent their "constituents" or that Canada's institutions are "democratic" without permitting discussion of what that even means, are another block to solving problems and finding a way forward which favours the interests of the people.
Today, the vicious factional fighting between narrow private interests which call themselves political parties is directed by marketing companies hired by these cartel parties to defame, discredit, attack, misrepresent, disinform and do whatever it takes to lie, cheat and worm their way into positions of power and privilege. To say the problem is the decorum in the House of Commons is part of everyday chitter-chatter to make sure there is no discussion of substance on all the matters which profoundly concern Canadians including not only domestic affairs but also Canada's role in the world.
When asked by CBC if Fergus could achieve his aim of re-establishing decorum in the House of Commons, one expert answered with a simple "No." "Parliament has always been contentious, it's always been rowdy. There's never been a quiet moment really," he said. Tari Ajadi, assistant professor of political science at McGill, answered the question in a similar fashion, noting that there has been a long steady decline in parliament. "As for the actual, meaningful impact on policy," he told CBC, "I think there's nil. As for a meaningful impact on the decorum of the House of Commons, I think that that will also be nil. I don't think that this appointment is going to shift that in a meaningful way."
Finally, when asked, Fergus himself said he did not think whatever he did would have any impact whatsoever.
While it is clear that attempts by the speaker to re-establish decorum will go unheeded, such answers reveal a typical refusal to go to the heart of the matter which is that today political parties have no standing whatsoever in the parliament and they are no longer primary organizations which link the citizens of the country to government policy and decision-making. If they have members, these members play no role in discussing policy or setting the direction of the country. MPs are merely tools for carrying out whatever they are told to do and say and even government ministers, beginning with the Prime Minister are merely tools of what narrow private interests which have taken over the functions of the public sector decide. Today, it is mainly the U.S. war machine, including the U.S. and Canadian intelligence agencies which set policy by declaring what constitutes matters of national security, the security of the economy, and everything that determines matters pertaining to crime and punishment, war and peace.
Since the 1993 federal election which brought the Liberals to power, the House of Commons lost its equilibrium and a cartel system of party government set in. The Liberals' desperation for money to pay for elections led to the sponsorship scandal which showed that corruption had become a main feature of party rule. Far from eliminating it by renewing the political process as Canadians were demanding, one government after another, with the full cooperation of all the cartel parties with seats in the House of Commons, changed electoral laws so as to strengthen their positions of privilege and power and exclude Canadians from having any say whatsoever over the decisions which affect their lives and society itself. Also excluded are political parties without seats in the House of Commons and organizations of workers, women, youth and others. Added to this, since 9/11, besides the narrow private interests organized as oligopolies which operate as cartels and coalitions, Canadian and foreign intelligence agencies have overtly taken over telling government what policies it must dictate when it comes to the fundamental issues pertaining to defining crime and punishment as well as problems of war and peace.
The violation of
people's conscience and depriving them of the right to free
speech and
to organize -- in the name of national security and anti-hate
legislation and anti-terror laws -- has become commonplace. The
only
"right" of Canadians is to submit to the views, policies and
values
espoused by the state or lose their jobs, careers and
reputations to
campaigns which smear and defame them. Initially, the idea of
enshrining the rights to speak, organize and to conscience in
constitutions was to protect those who do not think the same as
the
state or believe in the same causes or share the same
aspirations.
Today, because the views of the state are so self-serving and
unconscionable, its only recourse is to criminalize people, jail
them,
fine them and deprive them of the rights which each human person
is
entitled to.
The lack of equilibrium in Parliament is a serious problem for Canadians because governments of police powers push extremist positions in the name of defending democracy against authoritarianism. Only by engaging in the work of renewing the democratic process can Canadians establish a form of rule which upholds the rights of all by virtue of being human. The problem of decorum will not exist.
Notes
1. As part of its on-going series entitled Being Black in Canada, CBC News interviewed leading Black Canadians about the significance of the election of Greg Fergus to the position of Speaker of the House of Commons.
George Elliot Clarke, English professor at the University of Toronto and Parliament's former poet laureate, told CBC that the election of a Black Speaker is historic. "[It] is, of course, a major event in terms of Black Canadian History, African-Canadian history and also this history of this country," Clarke said. CBC summed up his view by stating Clark believes "it challenges a Western racial hierarchy that sees white people at the top."
Debra Thompson, Canada Research Chair in Racial Inequality in Democratic Societies at McGill told CBC, that Fergus' election "is quite significant." "It's not often we see Black folks in the upper echelons of power in this country. Representation is definitely not everything, but it's something," she said. "When you grow up Black in this country ... and you walk through the world and nobody in a position of authority looks like you, that's limiting to how you imagine your life progressing and what you think you can achieve as a person."
Velma Morgan of Operation Black Vote Canada, echoed this sentiment. "For our community, we are able to see someone that looks like us," she said. "And for everybody else, it says that we matter and we've contributed to our society and we continue to contribute to our society."
2. An extract of an October 2 article by Alex Ballingall, Ottawa based reporter covering federal politics for the Toronto Star, aptly describes what MPs have to say about the level of discourse in the House of Commons
[...] Not only will the person they choose have to steer the institution away from the ignominy of the Nazi controversy, but some of those vying for the job say there is a profound and pressing need to repair political discourse in the House, which was unacceptable even before parliamentarians applauded someone who fought for Hitler's Third Reich.
"Awful" – that's the word longtime Liberal MP Sean Casey, who is running to replace Rota as Speaker, used to sum up the state of decorum in the current House of Commons.
"Being in an environment where people are intimidated and bullied on a regular basis during question period is not OK. Being in an environment where we have people screaming at the Speaker is not OK. That's where we are now" Casey said.
For New Democrat MP Carol Hughes, one of two assistant deputy Speakers who are now both vying for the top job, the tone of debate has become "unacceptable" and needs to change. Her colleague as assistant deputy, Liberal MP Alexandra Mendès, believes discussions in the House have grown "out of control."
"If we want to continue to interest Canadians in what happens in the House of Commons, we have to show them that what we debate and what we exchange on is done in a respectful and mature manner, and we're not just throwing insults at one another," said Mendès.
Conservative MP Chris d'Entremont is the current deputy Speaker, and also running for Rota's vacant job. He attributed much of the "sharper" tone in Parliament to the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced MPs to participate in Commons debates virtually for long stretches of time.
"Members of Parliament really didn't get to know each other at all, so there's no friendships being made here, there's no understanding what the position of other members are," he told the Star.
Yet regardless of where it comes from, those vying for the Speaker's chair appear to agree something needs to change in how debates are refereed in the House of Commons.
According to Mendès, it can be as simple as more rigorously applying the rules that already exist to enforce decorum. For example, she said the House has grown too lenient in allowing MPs to point out when somebody isn't present in the chamber – something that is explicitly forbidden but frequently happens without consequence.
Both Hughes and Casey also stressed that the next Speaker needs to be stricter, noting how some MPs have grown too comfortable challenging decisions about how to manage debate and what types of statements are acceptable.
"We have now in the House experienced members who openly defy the chair and repeatedly receive a slap on the wrist," Casey said, calling for more "tough love" from the next Speaker. "Ground rules need to be laid early and observed."
Elizabeth May, the Green Party leader in Parliament and a British Columbia MP, said she is putting her name in the race for Speaker but not actively campaigning for the position. For her, the need to enforce the rules has existed for many years, including a convention that prohibited MPs from reading from written speeches that has been largely abandoned.
"The debates we have in the House are essentially an exercise in bad high school theatre," May said. "It's not edifying."
May also bemoaned how in recent decades successive Speakers have agreed to use lists provided by the whips from each party to decide whom to call on during debates in question period. For May, that means MPs have a greater incentive to please their own partisan bosses than they do to follow the Speaker's strictures about how to behave in the House of Commons.
"The more that backroom party operatives have anything to do with what happens on the floor of Parliament is contributing to the loss of respectful discourse," May said.
To steer debate in the Commons, Rota often paused discussions to ask MPs to stop shouting over each other. More rarely, he would publicly name an MP who was misbehaving, or shift around the order in which they were called upon to ask questions. Further action was even rarer still – and perhaps wasn't that effective.
Last year, for instance, Rota ejected Conservative MP Raquel Dancho from the Commons after she refused to apologize for accusing a Liberal MP of lying during a debate over gun control. In the days to follow, Dancho claimed she was being punished for "speaking the truth," while the Conservatives cited the incident in a drive for fresh donations from their supporters.
Situations like that suggest that the next Speaker should refrain from ejecting MPs, and instead refuse to recognize them during debates if they use language or behave in ways deemed to be "unparliamentary," Casey said.
To d'Entremont, it's sometimes better to try to find a middle ground, especially when MPs from both sides of the House are locked in a heated argument. Such an example occurred after the Nazi incident, when Conservative MP Melissa Lantsman called Liberal House leader Karina Gould a "disgrace." With Liberals demanding Lantsman apologize for using unparliamentary language, and d'Entremont overseeing debate after Rota's resignation, he took a day to consider what happened. The following day, he ruled Lantsman's words weren't "unparliamentary," even if they failed to support the "essential civility and respect" parliamentarians should show to each other. He decided not to take any action over the incident, other than to encourage MPs to use nicer language.
The ruling sparked criticism from Liberal MP Chris Bittle, who said it showed d'Entremont shouldn't be the next Speaker. But d'Entremont said he felt he struck the right balance, especially given that "more was being said" during the debate on both sides.
"In a lot of situations like this, when everybody's upset, then you're probably in the right place," he said.
In his view, the next Speaker will still have to be stricter, in the sense of being quicker to tamp down tensions when tempers rise in the House.
"Whoever the next Speaker is going to be has to be more judicious and quick in their decision-making, rather than just sort of letting things flow a little too far," he said.
Along with the responsibility of the job, the Speaker gets a $92,800 salary bump on top of the $194,600 base annual salary for all MPs. The Speaker also gets the keys to an official residence called "The Farm," a 19th-century estate in the Gatineau hills that Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King bequeathed to the federal government when he died there in 1950.
Perks aside, however, the role is essential to Canadian democracy, and now comes with the added responsibility of helping the House recover from the blunder of its recognition of a man who fought with a Nazi unit in the Second World War, said May.
"I am fond of Anthony (Rota) as a person, but I could kill him because this was just so unnecessary It wasn't embarrassing. It was mortifying. You feel physically ill from the fact that it happened," she said. "And it's certainly horrific, just the aftermath and the way in which, of course, everyone's going to play partisan games with it.
"Oh, man – the next Speaker has quite a challenge."
(Toronto Star, October 2, 2023)
This article was published in
Volume 53 Number 10 - October 2023
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/Tmlm2023/Articles/M530107.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca