Even cursory readers of this platform will know that I’m short-tempered about the normally superficial state of debate in our political scene.
Too much of our national conversation is taken up with trivia about who was at Hy’s and somebody’s slip of the tongue. It always seems to be about “us,” the political class, and not “them,” the people.
This gulf leaves most Canadians out of the conversation about their government, because we rarely talk about what matters to Canadians: jobs, security, affordable and accessible health care, clean air and water, and a better tomorrow for our children.
The last eight months have been an especially bad example.
Ideas are in short-supply from all four parties, as the struggle for short-term advantage overtakes all other considerations in this most wobbly of Parliaments.
Rhetoric is over-heated, with Denis Coderre’s “people will starve” claim only the latest in a long line of “tar baby” and “socialist-separatist coalition.”
The low-point was Ian Brodie’s proud admission that: “We resolved that the term 'competitiveness,’ the term 'productivity’ and the term 'innovation’ was never going to appear in anything we said or did in the 2005-2006 election campaign.” Nothing like purposely out-stupiding your opponents to really make your heart swell.
The blame for the conduct of all Parliaments falls on its first minister, as they typically reflect his personality. Just as in St. Laurent’s era the Commons was sleep and business-oriented, or in Diefenbaker’s it was mercurial and increasingly unstable, Harper’s Parliaments are growing increasingly obsessed with tactical advantage with no regard to long-term outcome.
So it is a blessed relief to have something productive and positive emerge that demonstrates there is still an ability to come down off the Parliament Hill pedestals and move files forward in a thoughtful way.
Thanks to yesterday’s compromise decision by Michael Ignatieff and Mr. Harper some positive results will emerge for Canadians.
First, no summer election. While I would be happy to clean the Augustan stables that Parliament now resembles with the cleansing waters of a writ, precious few others were crying to go to the hustings during our short summer season.
The compromise sets the table for a fall writ, and leaves the trigger in Mr. Ignatieff’s hand, a curious decision by the so-called Super Genius to hand his principle opponent the trigger to the next election. If Mr. Igntatieff chooses, he will be able to drop the writ at a moment of weakness for the Conservatives: too early for an economic update or budget to control the agenda, too early for any recovery to impact Canadian psychology, but far off enough to give the Liberals enough time to organize their campaign.
Second, real EI reform could actually emerge from this process.
The Liberal decision to promote employment insurance reform as their principle economic plank this spring was earnest and honest, but reflects the over-weighting of the Atlantic caucus in the calculations of that party in Parliament. EI reform is hardly a hot button in Ontario, let alone the West, despite the second-class status of the unemployed in those regions.
By the fall, the Liberals, along with the NDP and probably the Bloc, will have developed more extensive economic platforms to tackle the recession and the endless deficits that now threaten to engulf us.
But this committee could help lock reforming the compromised EI process – 58 administrative regions with their own unique rules and all – by either the successor Harper or Ignatieff regimes. For those who think employment insurance should be an employment program not a social program, this is a faint sign of hope.
Third, and perhaps most importantly, something was decided through private negotiation rather than public chest-beating.
We are in an era of minority government, one that can’t end soon enough but which will probably take a few more years to work through.
It is positive that after five years of this slippery environment the party leaders are finally beginning to talk to each other about what they want to accomplish in a calm and rational manner.
If they continue to eat a little humble pie and agree that compromise is not akin to treason, we might actually see some of the productivity of Harper’s first term come back. (Don’t tell Ian Brodie I just said productivity.)
But Harper and Ignatieff weren’t the only grown-ups taking themselves off the pedestals yesterday.
Dalton McGuinty, dubbed Premier Dad, held a press conference yesterday to assume full responsibility for the problems at eHealth Ontario.
In full Harry Truman-mode, McGuinty stated that “the buck stops with me.”
McGuinty rightly realized there was a problem, and moved to fix it. He owned up to it and asked to be held personally accountable. Critically, he changed the rules for procurement in government and its agencies so that value for money was the test, and nothing else.
Every now and then a little humble pie is nutritious for politicians.
McGuinty got a good helping, but hopefully both Ignatieff and Harper also developed a taste for it.
