Winners and Losers
June 7, 2010 | 1 Comment
While visiting his British counterpart last week, the Prime Minister commented that “Losers don’t get to form coalitions. Winners are the ones who form governments”. If after the next election, whenever it may come, the Liberals and New Democrats (each with fewer seats than the Conservatives) attempted to form a coalition, it would be illegitimate. The Prime Minister was right, but only in part. Parties do not win and lose elections. Members of parliament do. There are no parliamentary political parties without members to belong to them and likewise no government without members to shape and vote for its policies.
This is a key part of our constitutional system which depends not on our party loyalties but on our parliamentary traditions. Stephen Harper has unfortunately shown little respect for the latter nor for his constitutional duties as Prime Minister which involve a responsibility towards Canadians not as voters but citizens. Much as the Prime Minister is the head of government in this country, he is also the guardian and steward of its democracy. This responsibility is all the more crucial because this area of the constitution is governed nearly entirely by convention.
Stephen Harper neglects that after last month’s general election in Britain, leaders among both the Conservatives and Labour met with Liberal Democrats to determine whether they might be able to form a coalition or reach some other kind of agreement for government. While some may have thought privately that a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition would be less legitimate than the Conservative-Liberal Democrat one which was eventually formed, they largely did not say so publicly. What all leaders and parties emphasized was the need for clarity and stability to tackle Britain’s pressing challenges. Some of that language may have been faux statesmanship, but at many points, it felt like the real thing.
I will not have been the first to correct the Prime Minister on this question, but what worries me most is not his mischaracterization both of what happened in Britain and what the constitutional rules are in Canada, but the attitude to which it attests. We should evaluate the Prime Minister here not on the basis of whether we agree with his political views or his policies, but on how this boorish and pugilistic constitutional politics affects the vitality of our democracy. We should not prohibit our leaders from exploring options for forming stable government and we should not led them prohibit themselves from doing so.
This kind of talk from the Prime Minister might lead some to think that we should codify the rules governing how we should determine who “won” a given election and how the transition between governments works. Such written rules already exist in internal Privy Council Office documents, but are not publicly available. Elections in this country were once administered according to partisan interests, but were gradually legislated into the impartial, well-respected ones which we now enjoy. Writing down these rules would be complicated and controversial. They would need to leave room for negotiation between parties.
Creating such laws would open post-election negotiations up to judicial review in a way that decisions made about conventions are exempt today. But without the intervention of the Supreme Court, several groups of Canadians would be excluded from elections today, including Canadians abroad. The challenge in this area of law would be that partisan interests would be very much tied up in the outcome of any given case. Moreover, the delay would lead to the kind of instability that these laws would be designed to avoid. The respect for the constitution which such a system would require is greater than that needed to replicate the frank and honest negotiations which lead to the current British coalition.
Developing the kind of constitutional maturity needed to do so will not be easy, but that does not make it any less necessary. The chief virtue of this area of our constitution is that it is both flexible and stable. It allows for Canada’s political leaders to find creative solutions for how to govern this country. This they cannot do without respect for their right and that of their colleagues to do so. They must moreover come to understand that it is their duty alone to do so. It should not be up to the Governor General or the Supreme Court to do so, unless we seek to radically alter the constitutional nature of those offices.
Losers and winners alike have an equal right to try to form a government. What they do not have however is a right to put the future of Canada in jeopardy to ensure their own political success. Indeed, if they would ever dare to do so, they do not deserve our votes, no matter our political opinions.
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One Response to “Winners and Losers”
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June 7th, 2010 @ 10:04 am
I would submit that parliamentary etiquette should dictate that when there is an early dissolution of parliament (as there was in the fall of 2008) and the opposition parties do not attempt to form a governing coalition to stave off an election, and during the ensuing campaign they swear up and down that they don’t want to be a part of a coalition, then they should not, upon losing collective ground in the election, attempt to then form a governing coalition.
That being said, we’re just about two years distanced from that election, so if the “losers” now attempt to take control, I won’t be too offended. I might wretch at the thought of a Prime Minister Ignatieff (right now – like Richard, I hold out hope that he will improve), but if he has the support of the House of Commons, sobeit.
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