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New Democratic Party leaves out democratic reforms in federal election platform

Set out below is a letter-to-the-editor by Democracy Watch Coordinator Duff Conacher which was published in the May 9, 2011 issue of the Hill Times.
 
While the NDP's good government "Fix Ottawa" section of its platform sets out a few key measures such as voting system reform, restricting the PM's power to prorogue Parliament and to appoint party hacks to the Senate (and abolishing the Senate in the long term), and establishing a fair and transparent process for funding citizen groups, the platform does not contain the measure to fine MPs for not attending the House.

As a result, no one should believe that the NDP will actually push for this measure -- if the party was serious it would have put the promise in writing in its platform.

As well, this rather minor change will do nothing to fix the federal government's actual serious problems.  It is incredible to see that the NDP's platform makes no promises to close the loopholes that allow for:
  • dishonesty in politics;
  • secret, unethical lobbying;
  • secret donations to some political candidates (and secret trust funds by parties);
  • excessive secrecy overall;
  • patronage and cronyism by Cabinet in its appointments of more than 3,000 people;
  • the Prime Minister to call an unfair snap election;
  • party leaders to control MPs with their power to cancel an MP's nomination as a candidate in the next election, and power to appoint MPs to committees;
  • anyone to make a too high donation of up to $2,200 annually ($3,300 during election years) to each party and its riding associations;
  • Cabinet ministers, their staff, appointees and senior officials, and MPs and senators and their staff, to make decisions that affect their own financial interests
  • anyone to give a secret, unlimited loan to any of the people listed above;
  • government departments to hand out large contracts without public, competitive bidding process;
  • MPs to hide their spending from a regular, detailed and public audit by the Auditor General;
  • MPs and senators to accept the gift of unlimited travel each year from lobbyists, and;
  • MPs to switch parties after an election in return for a reward from their new party leader.
As well, the NDP platform says nothing:
  • about correcting the flaws that allow the Ethics Commissioner, Commissioner of Lobbying and Integrity Commissioner to fail to disclose details, nor about the fact that they and the Auditor General, Parliamentary Budget Officer and Information Commissioner and others to not have the powers needed, to effectively enforce good government rules and penalize violators;
  • nor about giving these and all good government watchdog agencies the power to release their reports whenever they complete them (even if Parliament is shut down)
Finally, the NDP platform says nothing about giving voters the right to vote "none of the above".

Not that the Liberal and Conservative party platforms are any better, but Canadians deserves better from all of them, especially from the party with the word "democratic" in its name.

For more details, go to Democracy Watch's Federal Election 2011 page