Friday, April 3, 2009 2:23 AM
Ed Schreyer, Superstar!
Douglas Bell
At first glance last evening's joint meeting of UT's Hart House Debates Club and the Churchill Society for the Advancement of Parliamentary Democracy, featuring the Right Honourable Edward Schreyer speaking on the subject of prorogation, might not strike the average Joe as the sort of thing that would rock their world. But, buddy, I'm here to tell you that they'd have been wrong.
In the words of the mighty Randy Jackson, “Dude was the bomb.” Following a sparky back and forth among a gaggle of debate geeks and comments from the floor, Ed rose and, for forty or so electrifying minutes (without notes), blew the roof off the dump.
In short order he put paid to the Tory argument that the coalition was somehow antidemocratic, pointing to the 2004 letter to Adrienne Clarkson suggesting exactly the same arrangement in an effort to dump Paul Martin et al. “If that was acceptable then who are they to impugn the patriotism of those who suggest it now. I suppose it depends on whose ox is being gored.”
He went on to assert that when a Prime Minister loses the confidence of the house the PM's communication to the GG transforms from “advice' into mere “suggestion”. And so long as it is a question of process the GG is under no obligation to accept that suggestion and moreover, should the PM persist, perfectly within his or her rights to “tell him to get lost.”
Schreyer went on to discuss among other things the nature of his relationship with Pierre Trudeau – “no one understood the proprieties better than him” – and the wise counsel he received from constitutional scholar Eugene Forsey – “a crippling personality, but his research was always immaculate.” In the end Schreyer condemned the seven-week Harper prorogation as an obvious and naked scheme to avoid the will of Parliament.
With that he took his leave, accompanied by a thunderous standing ovation. And it wasn't like he was preaching to the choir. There were plenty of head-wagging skeptics on both sides of the issue and Schreyer brought even those who disagreed with him to their feet. I'm thinking a media pilgrimage to Winnipeg might well be in order.
