Prorogation in the real world

In the flurry of news stories about prorogation, a word you may not have even heard of until events began to unfold over the last two weeks, there is one central fact of the Harper government that has become clear: they have lost touch with what matters to hard working Canadians who live in the real world and not the Ottawa bubble.

For those who may still be unclear about what prorogation means, it is essentially the executive decision to shut down all the business of parliament, including the legislative agenda and the work of committees, to start with a clean slate.

Parliamentary tradition dictates that it is a decision made with a strong consensus from all parties that the parliamentary agenda has, for the most part, run its course.

At least, that is how it used to work, by and large. Until Stephen Harper. He has decided - based on the cynical calculations derived from a poll before Christmas - that you would not care about how or when he would prorogue. After all, you live in the real world, and he clearly thinks you don’t expect the work of government to be accountable to you.

In the real world you don’t show up to work two months late and say that you have been “recalibrating” your agenda for the next year.

In the real world you don’t explain to your boss that it is important that you take time off to celebrate the Olympics while everybody else has to show up to work. And for those who do get the time off to see an Olympic event, in the real world you have to pay - and dearly - for a ticket.

In the real world you don’t just cancel all the projects you have been working on and all the meetings you have scheduled and explain to your boss it was just too difficult to work with your colleagues. Especially when there is absolutely no evidence of this. And you certainly can’t go to the boss and say you’re going to hand pick say, five new senior managers on the strength of this baseless argument.

What has emerged from this cynical decision to prorogue is yet another glimpse at the real Stephen Harper, a man who, curiously enough, has never really had to work in your world, who has been an academic, head mouthpiece for a special interest group and professional politician for all of his working life.

In other words, he has never really had to be accountable to anyone but those who make up the political class in the Conservative Party of Ottawa - woops - of Canada.

Well perhaps now that may change. We all deserve better.

PS For those on Facebook, please join over 110,000 of your fellow citizens in the group “Canadians Against Proroging Parliament” to show your support for getting Parliament back to work.

The numbers on prorogation

Number of government bills killed: 37
Share of government bills killed: more than half
Number of crime bills killed: 11
Months without accountability to Parliament: 3
Order paper questions from MP to Ministers killed: hundreds
Total days prorogued: 63
Total days prorogued in the 4 years Stephen Harper has been Prime Minister: 148
Total days prorogued during the 10 years Jean Chretien was Prime Minister: 145
Parliaments that continued passing sitting right up to or during Olympic Games: Italy (Turin 2006), US (Salt Lake City 2002), Australia (Sydney, 2000), Japan (Nagano 1998), US (Atlanta 1996), Canada (Calgary 1988)

In his own words: Stephen Harper on prorogation

Then:
“When a government starts trying to cancel dissent or avoid dissent is frankly when it’s rapidly losing its moral authority to govern.” (Stephen Harper, Canadian Press, April 18, 2005)

Now:
“A decision to prorogue when the government has the confidence of the house is a routine constitutional matter.” (Stephen Harper, CBC’s The National, January 5, 2010)