The Gomery CommissionThe Gomery Commission was established on February 19, 2004 by the Liberal Cabinet led by the Prime Minister of the day, Paul Martin. The scope of the inquiry was set as follows: a) to investigate and report on questions raised, directly or indirectly...in the November 2003 Report of the Auditor General of Canada... with regard to the sponsorship program and advertising activities of the Government of Canada, including: i) the creation of the sponsorship program; Speaking to the illusion making about the Gomery Inquiry, the Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada (MLPC) wrote: "... there is one key issue at the root of the sponsorship scandal -- the party dominated system of representative democracy, the electoral laws designed to elect a political party and to disempower the people and their fanatic need for money to make it happen. Why a political party in Canada was allegedly involved in stealing funds from the public purse and funnelling them into its election campaign coffers is going to be completely detached from the issue of the political system in which masses of people are treated as mere voting-cattle. The issue is not going to be touched upon at all by the Gomery Inquiry or by the Public Accounts committee looking into the same scandal."[1] The developments reveal that this central issue to the sponsorship scandal was indeed completely overlooked/disregarded by the Gomery Commission of Inquiry and the government. In fact, neither the Gomery Inquiry nor the Harper government took up the issue of political accountability. The Gomery Inquiry identified the problem of accountability in administration generally (defining responsibilities) and more specifically partisan interference in terms of the administration of programs by the public service and, to an extent, in the ability of Parliamentary Committees to hold government accountable. The problem of political interference/partisanship was attributed to certain individuals whose conduct was wrong. On this and the other issues identified, administrative measures were proposed to deal with the problem. The assumption was that, if implemented, they would restore accountability of government to parliament and parliament to society. In the preamble to Restoring Accountability, Justice Gomery sketches the framework of accountability that the parliamentary system brings to the Canadian democracy.[2] It goes like this: The principle of the supremacy of Parliament establishes Parliament as the body that creates the laws that give powers to Ministers and the rest of the executive, and the body to which the executive must be accountable. Parliament through statutes and budgetary processes, assigns powers and resources to the Government. The government administers these powers and resources, while Parliament holds Government accountable for its stewardship. Ministers and the Public Service form the executive branch of government. The executive branch derives its powers and its authority from Parliament and, in turn, is accountable to Parliament and, through Parliament, to the people of Canada. The principle of ministerial responsibility identifies the members of Cabinet, collectively and individually, as the persons at the head of the executive branch who hold broad responsibility and exercise the power to govern. The principle of rule of law provides an overarching framework that both enables and limits the actions of the Government. Gomery says: "Parliament is the central forum in which the Government is held directly to account for both policy and administration. Ministers are accountable collectively to Parliament for policy and for the Government's actions or failures to act, and they are ultimately accountable to the people of Canada through general elections. "Parliament holds Government accountable in two ways. First it holds the Cabinet collectively accountable for its policies, for its responses to the challenges facing the nation and its stewardship of the public sector and the business of governing the nation. Second it holds the Government accountable for the way it has used the powers and resources that Parliament has granted it. This accountability applies to administration, not policy, and it must be directed to those who hold responsibility for administration."
Position of the MLPC
The MLPC wrote: "A fundamental problem with this rendering is that the conception of accountability is detached from where the sovereign power is vested and whose interests it protects. So long as the historic need to vest the sovereign power in the citizenry is not addressed, the problem of accountability cannot be sorted out." In A Power to Share, published in 1993, the MLPC's then National Leader Hardial Bains discussed among other things, how the problem of accountability poses itself within the Canadian system of government. "... the problem is that under the circumstances in which people are deprived of sovereign power and of a mechanism through which to exercise it, they are not able to freely choose who governs on their behalf. Political parties have virtually exclusive jurisdiction over this matter. [...] "In fact, there is no mechanism to make the elected representatives or the government accountable to the electorate. The only recourse provided to the citizenry is to vote an unpopular government out of office at the next election. It is interesting that both transparency and accountability serve their purpose when they divert attention from the fact that it is in all cases the government which commands the process. They are merely part of the tinsel and tassels with which the executive power wraps itself to cover up the fact that it is the sole decision-making power. "All of these means are used to ensure that the electorate is deprived of its right to participate in governing society. [...] "These jurisdictions are getting increasingly transformed into absolute powers through the reforms which are being enacted. Those with access to political power still need a method to sort out the contradictions in their own ranks and keep the people out of government. The word democracy has come to mean using democratic forms to achieve what are actually undemocratic ends. The democratic form is becoming a mere remnant of democracy, and it is increasingly becoming synonymous with the set of laws which sanction the rule of political elites. This is justified by evoking various terms, including precedent, traditions, evolving institutions, democracy as we know it and various others. "The character of supreme power and its origins is not separate from the character of the government and the interests it serves. The two are inter-related. The political process or political system facilitates the wishes of the supreme power. If the political process remains the same and if the only changes concern the extension of the franchise, the manner of counting votes and the reform of parliamentary procedures, supreme power will continue to remain alienated from the citizenry."[3] On the basis of this analysis, the MLPC adopted the slogan For Us, Accountability Begins at Home. At its centre is the recognition that when society is being held back and every avenue to solving its problems is obstructed, the working class and people take up their own social responsibility to change the situation. The MLPC wrote: "Today, as the anti-social offensive and the drive to embroil Canada in the aggressive wars led by U.S. imperialism are stepped up, the problem that the people cannot hold the government to account becomes increasingly evident and urgent. So long as Canadians do not participate in setting government agendas and are, on the contrary, at the mercy of whatever self-serving agendas the government, political parties and the media set, the problem of accountability will continue to plague the polity. Thus, the most important question which has emerged is who wields political power -- where the decision-making power is vested. While the question of power involves a myriad of elements, the cutting edge of the people's struggle for empowerment is to build the organizations through which they can put themselves into positions of influence by taking stands that defend the rights of the people and, on this basis, open society's door to progress and advance the cause of peace and human rights. This is the only way people can avert the dangers which those in power today are preparing. The program of the MLPC is to bring forward worker politicians and people's representatives to elect and be elected to form a Workers' Opposition in the Parliament. A Workers' Opposition can then go further and create an anti-war government which responds to the needs of the people at home and abroad."
Notes1. "Illusion Making About the Gomery Inquiry," Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada, August 16, 2005. 2. Gomery Commission of Inquiry into the Sponsorship Program and Advertising Activities, Part II: Restoring Accountability: Recommendations, 2006. 3. Bains, Hardial, A Power to Share: A Modern Definition of the Political Process and a Case for Its Democratic Renewal, (1993), pp. 32-34.
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