Under Justin Trudeau, Parliament has become utterly irrelevant. Some might argue that Parliament has been irrelevant to most Canadians for years but right now, it could shut down and no one would notice.
Effectively, the House of Commons has been shut down for the month of October with no government business taking place.
Since Oct. 2, MPs have been debating the government’s refusal to hand over documents in what all the opposition parties have dubbed the Green Slush Fund. Despite a vote by the majority of MPs and a ruling by Speaker Greg Fergus, the Trudeau government has refused to hand over documents related to what was officially known as Sustainable Development Technology Canada.
SDTC was the subject of a scathing audit which found executives and board members violated conflict of interest guidelines 90 times when awarding funding. Projects with close ties to those running SDTC were awarded taxpayer money despite not meeting eligibility criteria and $40 million was misspent during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a whistleblower.
The fund was shut down and its remaining funds and responsibilities transferred to the National Research Council.
Yet, despite acknowledging the damning audit and that things were so bad that SDTC had to be shut down, the Trudeau government has been stonewalling MPs trying to learn more. At first, they stonewalled at committee, then they refused to abide by a vote of MPs in the Commons calling for documents related to the fund to be handed over, and they ignored the ruling of the speaker.
The rules of the House of Commons state that no government business can occur while MPs deal with this issue. Committees still meet, Question Period still happens but the government can’t move legislation and can’t pass anything through the Commons.
How bad are the revelations in those documents that Trudeau would rather shut down Parliament than follow their legal and binding order to hand over what the government has?
The news that the Bloc Quebecois is ready to consider toppling this government after the Liberals refused to meet Bloc demands is quaint. There is no way for a vote to happen to topple the government while MPs debate what appears to be the government’s corruption in this matter.
Has anyone noticed that the Commons is effectively useless at the moment?
We still have the theatre of Question Period where parties try to outdo each other in generating clips for TV and sharing on social media, but that isn’t the business of government. Justin Trudeau has survived two confidence votes and a palace coup with MPs in his own party trying to force him out last week, but he has no control of the Commons.
This is a government and a Commons that is at a standstill, unable to do anything for Canadians and yet Trudeau limps along.
Trudeau is now facing calls for a secret ballot vote on the question of his leadership of the Liberal Party. Seems most Liberal MPs still don’t have the courage of their convictions to deliver the message voters have been sending, wanting the man gone.
Meanwhile, reports indicate that the Liberals are finally ready to start running attack ads against Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre. Those ads, which a smart party would have started running the day after Poilievre became leader in September 2022, likely have come too late.
Based on the weak content the Liberals have produced against Poilievre over the past several months, we shouldn’t expect the ads to be all that effective. Especially not up against the multi-million-dollar campaign Poilievre is currently running featuring a combination of positive ads highlighting his polices and attack ads aimed at Trudeau.
While Parliament isn’t functioning, the party machinery is gearing up. What we have entered is the unofficial election campaign.
When the official campaign begins remains anyone’s guess.