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; nyone else getting the feeling of déja
vu?
Stephen Harper is proroguing

Parliament—again. That means he’s going to
suspend Parliament, stop MPs of all parties
from getting anything done, and any progress
made by committees that hasn’t been voted
into law is gone for good.

Yay.

I guess I should be surprised that Stephen
Harper is proroguing Parliament a second
time. I should be shocked by his violation of
democratic principles, his aversion towards
accepting responsibility for the Afghan
detainee affair and his unwillingness to simply
call an election and let the people judge his
actions.

But I’m not. Can you tell?

After all, he’s done this before when
things weren’t going his way. With last year’s
prorogation in mind, it’s fast becoming a

_ winter tradition to see Stephen Harper take

a dump on Canadian democracy. Whenever
things don’t go Harper’s way he uses the

_ biggest, fattest loophole the Canadian legal

system allows to get himself out of trouble. It
makes me wonder what kind of father Stephen
Harper is. When his children won’t go to bed
does he simply prorogue dessert?

Crappy jokes aside, it’s shocking that
such a mechanic exists for a prime minister
to escape criticism from Parliament. Wasn’t
this the sort of thing that the straight-shootin’
Stephen Harper got elected-to oppose?
Wasn’t he supposed to usher in a new era
of an elected senate, more accountability,
less all-encompassing power from the
Prime Minister’s Office? This arrogance
he’s showing is something I’d have trouble
imagining even the Chretien Liberals trying
to pull.

It’s just the latest in a series of dirty
tricks that Harper has used to stay in power.
Remember the guide that was distributed
to Conservative MPs on how to disrupt
committees so they wouldn’t be able to
complete work contrary to the Conservatives’
agenda? Remember how his MPs repeatedly
ducked out of committee meetings so that the
proceedings could not continue? How about
calling an unnecessary early election in 2008 °
which went against his promise of four-year
terms for Parliament? And how about... well
about his the damn prorogation thing? Nixon

would be proud.

The worst thing about this is that there’s
no recourse for it. Opposition members can’t
do anything except complain in the media
about the suspension, and all the work they’ve
tried to do in spite of the Conservatives’
antics is all for naught. It’s so frustrating to go
through this time and again.

Fun fact: one of the earliest examples of
prorogation was done by Charles I of England
in 1628 when Parliament wouldn’t act his way
over a taxation issue. Charles I suspended
Parliament for over 10 years, and a year after
it reconvened, the English-Civil War started.
After the war, Charles I was beheaded for
treason.

I’m not saying that Harper is a dictator
or deserves beheading (that would be illegal,
dear reader!), but if you ask me, whenever
a prime minister does something so against
the spirit of democracy like proroguing
parliament, he shouldn’t think of it as a matter
of course. It should be something he dreads
doing; something he’s absolutely terrified of
doing.

After all, it could cost his government its
head.

Your friend in high fidelity,
Liam Britten

Editor in chief

The Other Press

 

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