Monday, March 22, 2010

OTTAWA - Today, Democracy Watch applauded the actions of the three federal opposition parties in the House of Commons in the past week to move forward on disclosure to Parliament of the Afghan detainee documents, restrict the Prime Minister's powers to prorogue Parliament, and restrict mailings of 10-percenters by MPs.

However,  Democracy Watch called on all the federal parties to work together to take further, more effective steps to solve the systemic problems revealed by these three situations.

"To ensure resolution of key systemic problems in Parliament, federal parties should refer the document disclosure issue to the Supreme Court of Canada for a non-partisan ruling, pass a law that restricts the Prime Minister's power to prorogue Parliament, and restrict MP mailings to voters to four information pamphlets each year," said Duff Conacher, Coordinator of Democracy Watch.

ON THE AFGHAN DETAINEE DOCUMENT DISCLOSURE
While Speaker of the House of Commons Peter Milliken will take his duty of ruling on the question of Parliamentary privilege seriously, he is a Liberal MP, and the issue would then be referred to a committee made up of a majority of opposition party MPs.  A referral of the issue to the Supreme Court of Canada would instead result in a clearly non-partisan ruling that would set a clear, strong precedent for future similar document disclosure situations.  To see details, click here.

ON PROROGATION
In addition to the resolution introduced by the NDP and passed last Wednesday, a bill that changes the Parliament of Canada Act should be passed to restrict the Prime Minister's power to prorogue Parliament, in the same way that a bill was passed changing the Canada Elections Act to fix federal election dates and restrict the Prime Minister's power to call snap elections.  To see details of a court case about the fixed-election-date, click here.

ON MAILINGS BY MPs
Beyond the motion introduced by the Liberals and passed last Tuesday directing the Board of Internal Economy (BOIE) of the House of Commons to limit mailings by MPs to their own ridings, the mailings should be limited to maximum four information pamphlets each year (including an annual calendar) and the Speaker of the House of Commons should be given the power to reject any mailing if it is partisan or inaccurate.  As well, all BOIE meetings should be held in public and on the record.  To see details, click here.