Conservatives Obstructing Parliament
Early 2007, the public learned about the 200 page book the conservatives harboured, on obstructing commons committees. That elected officials spent their time preventing their peers from making government work for the citizens who not only voted (hopefully) but also maintain these elected officials via tax payments, hasn’t been viewed as one of the ultimate betrayals and surefire reason to remove the Conservatives from office, I cannot understand.
Had this issue been consistently present in new reports just before 2008′s sham dissolution of parliament and during the election, would it have influenced the results more?
Quote from the Toronto Star1 article (18 May 2007).
OTTAWA – The Harper government is being accused of a Machiavellian plot to wreak parliamentary havoc after a secret Tory handbook on obstructing and manipulating Commons committees was leaked to the press.
Opposition parties pounced on news reports Friday about the 200-page handbook as proof that the Conservatives are to blame for the toxic atmosphere that has paralyzed Parliament this week.
“The government’s deliberate plan is to cause a dysfunctional, chaotic Parliament,” Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale told the House of Commons.
New Democrat Libby Davies said the manual explodes the Tories’ contention that opposition parties are to blame for the parliamentary constipation.
“So much for blaming the opposition for the obstruction of Parliament,” she said.
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The Globe and Mail2 (15 August 2008) also reminded us of the situation when a year later, the Conservatives tried to scam us into believing the opposition parties were the ones obstructing parliament.
“Last year, the governing Conservatives prepared a secret handbook on how to disrupt parliamentary committees and create chaos. No mere pamphlet, the book ran to 200 pages.
It instructed committee chairmen to select blatantly biased witnesses and tutor them in advance. It gave the chairmen pointers on how to obstruct parliamentary business, to storm out of meetings if necessary. . . .
All along, Team Harper has been quite faithful to its manipulation manual. We recall, among the many examples, the tricks they pulled to avoid being called to account on the censorship of documents regarding the Afghan detainees file. We recall Auditor-General Sheila Fraser saying they were out to gag officers of Parliament.”
It’s hard to understand how the Conservatives could still be respected by Canadians after this blatant puncture through the proper workings of our democracy.
