PARLIAMENT HILL, Ottawa—“Parliament is sick.”
That is the diagnosis of Dr. Keith Martin, Liberal MP for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca who sat for the Reform and Canadian Alliance parties before crossing the floor to join the Liberals.
He’s not the first to come down hard on the behaviour of MPs representing Canadians in the House of Commons—and he likely won’t be the last if nothing changes. As it is now, Parliament’s most popular hour, question period (QP), looks like a schoolyard shouting match where there is as much insult as debate.
It’s a level of decorum far below that of any comparable Legislature and an embarrassment to all Canadians, Martin says.
“It desperately needs to be changed because if it doesn’t, serious problems in our country will not be dealt with,” Martin told the Epoch Times on Tuesday.
The Hansard, the written record of the debates, captures the subtle insults and slippery answers common in QP, but it doesn’t record the shouting, finger pointing, jeers or heckles that frequently erupt.
Martin says ongoing decline in decorum dumbs down the level of debate and makes running for public office less appealing for Canada’s brightest minds—the people who come up with the best ideas to address problems facing the country who are often ignored in Parliament now.
“If they are ignored, they will leave and not run and all you have is a group of people fighting with each other where politics trumps public policy.”
Martin might be one of the most outspoken on the topic, describing some MPs as “petulant pre-pubescent children,” but others have also raised the issue. One of the most informed on the issue is NDP MP Joe Comartin.
Comartin says question period has been particularly bad for about 20 or 30 years with successive governments doing a great deal more obfuscating than answering.
“Here, the standard joke is it is question period, not answer period.”
He says the decorum in Canada is a far below that in England, Australia, and New Zealand, our closest political cousins, which have a very similar parliamentary system but vastly different political cultures.
“In those three legislatures, they actually do get answers,” he says.
Television helped shape up those parliaments, Comartin explains, because they added rules to curb the worst behaviour of MPs. Unfortunately, despite a special committee that made similar recommendations here in the 80s, nothing was changed.
“It was always bad, as it was in those other legislatures. But when they knew TV was coming in, they changed their rules so their populace wouldn’t see them misbehaving, and it worked.”
“We just never passed the same kind of legislation that I think would have had the same effect here.”
In those parliaments, MPs actually seem to respect each other, he says.
“The exchanges that go on there are one professional person to another.”
Another marked difference is that while MPs in Canada may shout insults and allegations during an opposing member’s comments, in those parliaments such conduct is dressed down by the Speaker of the House, who acts as a referee for debates. Canada’s Speakers typically take a hands-off approach, a problem Comartin campaigned on when he challenged current Speaker Peter Milliken for the position.
While the Conservatives have taken a lot of heat for partisanship in the House, Comartin says the Liberals were just as bad when they were in power.
But while Milliken may take a hands-off approach, Comartin says the Speaker has also urged the committee responsible for setting the rules of Parliament to work on stronger regulations to guide his hand in debates.
“He has urged us to do it and we have not picked up on those urgings,” says Comartin.
But Martin doesn’t quite agree with his NDP colleague. He believes a large part of the problem has to do with the way the media focus on the clash of the day rather than the substantive matters that are the real work of Parliament.
He believes if the media focused more on the MPs proposing good ideas and ignored the attack dogs that grab headlines, such behaviour would begin to fade away.
“Our public is not being served well by Parliament and this spiral of negativity continues to descend.”
He noted a visit by a British Parliamentarian to Canada who was appalled by what he saw in our Parliament.
Martin says MPs need to put more effort into finding ways to work with each other, coming up with good ideas to address the country’s ills and less effort into attacking each other and finding ways to bring the other side down.
Without that, he says, debate will continue to spiral downward and fewer of Canada’s brightest minds will be willing to enter public office. And without those bright minds and constructive debate, fewer and fewer Canadians will turn out to exercise their right to vote—a right Canadians have given their lives to defend.
“That is the big tragedy.”
And with all that negativity, Martin says people with ideas don’t get the attention they deserve—either from the media or their own party. Rather than rewarding the politicians with the good ideas, party leaders are often more inclined to reward those that toe the party line and lead the attack against their opposing politicians.
“We support and reward bad behaviour,” he says.
That is the diagnosis of Dr. Keith Martin, Liberal MP for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca who sat for the Reform and Canadian Alliance parties before crossing the floor to join the Liberals.
He’s not the first to come down hard on the behaviour of MPs representing Canadians in the House of Commons—and he likely won’t be the last if nothing changes. As it is now, Parliament’s most popular hour, question period (QP), looks like a schoolyard shouting match where there is as much insult as debate.
It’s a level of decorum far below that of any comparable Legislature and an embarrassment to all Canadians, Martin says.
“It desperately needs to be changed because if it doesn’t, serious problems in our country will not be dealt with,” Martin told the Epoch Times on Tuesday.
The Hansard, the written record of the debates, captures the subtle insults and slippery answers common in QP, but it doesn’t record the shouting, finger pointing, jeers or heckles that frequently erupt.
Martin says ongoing decline in decorum dumbs down the level of debate and makes running for public office less appealing for Canada’s brightest minds—the people who come up with the best ideas to address problems facing the country who are often ignored in Parliament now.
“If they are ignored, they will leave and not run and all you have is a group of people fighting with each other where politics trumps public policy.”
Martin might be one of the most outspoken on the topic, describing some MPs as “petulant pre-pubescent children,” but others have also raised the issue. One of the most informed on the issue is NDP MP Joe Comartin.
Comartin says question period has been particularly bad for about 20 or 30 years with successive governments doing a great deal more obfuscating than answering.
“Here, the standard joke is it is question period, not answer period.”
He says the decorum in Canada is a far below that in England, Australia, and New Zealand, our closest political cousins, which have a very similar parliamentary system but vastly different political cultures.
“In those three legislatures, they actually do get answers,” he says.
Television helped shape up those parliaments, Comartin explains, because they added rules to curb the worst behaviour of MPs. Unfortunately, despite a special committee that made similar recommendations here in the 80s, nothing was changed.
“It was always bad, as it was in those other legislatures. But when they knew TV was coming in, they changed their rules so their populace wouldn’t see them misbehaving, and it worked.”
“We just never passed the same kind of legislation that I think would have had the same effect here.”
In those parliaments, MPs actually seem to respect each other, he says.
“The exchanges that go on there are one professional person to another.”
Another marked difference is that while MPs in Canada may shout insults and allegations during an opposing member’s comments, in those parliaments such conduct is dressed down by the Speaker of the House, who acts as a referee for debates. Canada’s Speakers typically take a hands-off approach, a problem Comartin campaigned on when he challenged current Speaker Peter Milliken for the position.
While the Conservatives have taken a lot of heat for partisanship in the House, Comartin says the Liberals were just as bad when they were in power.
But while Milliken may take a hands-off approach, Comartin says the Speaker has also urged the committee responsible for setting the rules of Parliament to work on stronger regulations to guide his hand in debates.
“He has urged us to do it and we have not picked up on those urgings,” says Comartin.
But Martin doesn’t quite agree with his NDP colleague. He believes a large part of the problem has to do with the way the media focus on the clash of the day rather than the substantive matters that are the real work of Parliament.
He believes if the media focused more on the MPs proposing good ideas and ignored the attack dogs that grab headlines, such behaviour would begin to fade away.
“Our public is not being served well by Parliament and this spiral of negativity continues to descend.”
He noted a visit by a British Parliamentarian to Canada who was appalled by what he saw in our Parliament.
Martin says MPs need to put more effort into finding ways to work with each other, coming up with good ideas to address the country’s ills and less effort into attacking each other and finding ways to bring the other side down.
Without that, he says, debate will continue to spiral downward and fewer of Canada’s brightest minds will be willing to enter public office. And without those bright minds and constructive debate, fewer and fewer Canadians will turn out to exercise their right to vote—a right Canadians have given their lives to defend.
“That is the big tragedy.”
And with all that negativity, Martin says people with ideas don’t get the attention they deserve—either from the media or their own party. Rather than rewarding the politicians with the good ideas, party leaders are often more inclined to reward those that toe the party line and lead the attack against their opposing politicians.
“We support and reward bad behaviour,” he says.
