Posted by Preston Manning on 6/9/2004, 7:25 pm, in reply to "Stop Christian-bashing" By PRESTON MANNING Recent polls tracking voter support show the new Conservatives catching the Liberals, NDP and Green Party support increasing, and the Bloc Québécois still strongly supported in Quebec. On the basis of these trends, many commentators are predicting a minority Parliament after June 28. This has led to growing speculation about the possible composition of a minority government, and concerns about the effectiveness and direction of such a Parliament and government. Will it be the Liberals forming a minority government propped up by the NDP? Could it be the new Conservatives forming a minority government in some kind of alliance with the Bloc? Are either of these combinations good for Canada? Are there any positive alternatives? Must we choose between electing a minority government based on unprincipled alliances of expediency, or electing a majority government simply out of fear of those alliances? First, we should get it through our heads that minority government is neither an aberration of the democratic process, nor a bad thing in and of itself. The election of a minority government can be a healthy corrective to majority government and an effective transition device. During my lifetime, we have elected minority federal governments in 1957, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1972, and 1979. In 1972, electing a minority government served to humble an arrogant majority government (the Trudeau Liberals) before giving it a working majority again in 1974. In 1957, John Diefenbaker and the Conservatives also formed a minority government and that election was just the first step in a two-stage movement toward electing a new majority Conservative government in 1958. Minority governments are usually more sensitive to public opinion than majority governments. They are also easier to hold accountable. Certainly a minority government is more democratically accountable than a majority government elected with only 35 per cent of the popular vote in an election with a 60-per-cent voter turnout. Under those circumstances, a government is given 100 per cent of the power for getting the support of only 21 per cent of the electorate -- hardly a desirable outcome from the standpoint of democratic legitimacy. Let us therefore not allow ourselves to be moved by last-minute pleadings in the final week of the campaign (as occurred in the elections of 1997 and 2000) to elect a majority government of dubious character or competence, simply to avoid a minority government situation. Secondly, there is a positive alternative to electing a minority government based on a formal alliance between the Liberals and NDP that will drive spending and taxes through the roof, or a formal but inherently contradictory alliance between the federalist Conservatives and the sovereigntist Bloc Québécois. That alternative rests on establishing genuine freedom of voting in the House of Commons and doing away with the so-called "confidence convention" -- the tradition that a government must resign if it loses any vote whatsoever in the House of Commons. To institute a genuine free-voting regime in our House does not require a constitutional amendment. It does not require a change to the Parliament of Canada Act. It doesn't even require a change in the Rules and Procedures of the House. All it requires is a prime minister who is a genuine democrat -- not an autocrat in democrat's clothing -- to stand in his place and read a 20-second statement. That statement must be a simple and clear declaration that members on all sides of the House are hereafter free to vote on all measures in accordance with their constituents' wishes, their own consciences, the direction of their parties, and the mandate they received via the election. As for the government, it will only resign if it loses an explicit motion of non-confidence, or if the motion proposing adoption of its Throne Speech or budget is defeated. If some important bill put forward by the government is defeated or substantially amended, the government itself should bring forward a motion of confidence. It should ask the House to make clear whether its intention was simply to defeat or amend the bill, or whether it actually wanted to defeat the government itself and precipitate an election. In all but the most exceptional cases, a majority of members may well vote to defeat or amend a government bill, but will then turn around and sustain the government on the confidence motion. If a government is to be defeated by a vote of the House of Commons, it should be a conscious and premeditated decision of the House for which all members can be held accountable, not an impulsive act committed in the heat of battle or an accident that occurred because some member missed the plane back from his or her constituency. This is not to say that there will be no need for arrangements and understandings between the parties or for coalition-building in the House to keep a minority government in office or to ensure the passage of important measures. But those arrangements, understandings, and coalitions should be temporary and fluid, responding to the circumstances of the day, including public opinion and expectations, rather than formal agreements binding one party to support another or a government measure, come hell or high water. If the election of a minority government on June 28 forces the next prime minister -- whoever that might be -- to make a deep and lasting commitment to democratizing the voting and operations of Parliament itself, that may well prove to be the most important and lasting result of the 2004 federal election.
Minorities are more sensitive to public opinion, says PRESTON MANNING, and easier to hold accountable
Tuesday, June 8, 2004 - Page A25
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