Crossing the floor: To whom are legislators responsible?
Posted on Wed, Feb 8, 2012, 5:01 am by Paul Rowe
In reaching his recommendation to stand-down for consent of the governed after Floorcrossing Mr Rowe expresses the widely-held, although, sadly-incorrect view of our hierarchical power-sharing arrangement. The fundamental question remains - Accountability & Responsibility to who/what? If the elected Assembly (House of Commons)was the pinnacle of power in the BNA/Constitution Acts, I might agree with (hard to find and contact author) Mr Paul Rowe.
If the phrase "Supremacy of Parliament", as Prime Ministers, Cabinets and many pundits use it ie the elected Assembly is the highest and final authority, then I might agree.
And if we had a Constitutionally "informed electorate" and similarly informed cohort of candidates/MP's, then I submit no one would agree with the view expressed in Mr Rowe's piece, because the elected Assembly would be the place for all voices and on any given issue everyone of them could be a Loose Fish (a MacDonald-ism re: independent MP's who voted in the House "inpredictably").
Mr Rowe's 3 categories "delegate", "trustee", "party disciple" do not allow for the 'loose fish' scenario because our elected assemblies are filled to the gunwales with party-disciples.
Since only party-nominated candidates get any votes at elections (the uniformed voter saves electoral-energy by voting by "colour" ie party colours) the trick to getting elected is to be nominated by a big party, pay the price of admission (voting loyalty in all but the rarest of times), learn the script (talking points and policy book) and generally be a team-player (unthinking, unblinking-in-the TV-lights loyalty to Boss aka a toady, a trained seal, a 50ft [from Parl't Hill-P.E.T] nobody etc).
Enough of that for now -you may wish to look over a few other of the commonly-held, albeit wholly inaccurate opinions about Canadian governace via this link or read the Annotated, Plain Language Version of the BNA.Constitution 1867 to test the veracity of my opinion.
The Essence of the Dominion of Canada
All and everything thing about Canada is owned or Accountable or Responsible to the Crown (except some time-limited copyrights & trademarks).
Look at a Abstract of the Deed to your real property (land) -in Ontario it's easy - all computerized and on a standard form. Direct your attention to the middle-top of the standard form. What does "Subject to the Reservations in Crown Grant" mean?
If means (in the common law provinces, with civil law equivalent I'm sure) that you hold a Fee Simple "interest" in the land with a "bundle of rights" accepted at law -to use, to lease, to mortgage, to will, to sell and to give away.
This 'bundle' covers most of the day-to-day stuff and so Fee Simple (aka Free and Common Socage) is the "highest title" you can hold .... but it's only AN INTEREST in the land ... like a super-powerful, commercial lease-from-the-Crown.
Some lawyer's going to dispute this and say the Crown's position is tantamount to "eminent domain" in other countries ... but is "eminent domain" written on the top of the abstract in those countries?
So forget the fine points and the blah blah, just find out the difference between allodial title and fee simple title. If you discover there is a difference .... which one would you prefer to hold?
The "interest in land" that is NOT the Fee simple .... is the Crown's interest. It is the root of title (see below)and forms the basis for the ultimate "grant" of use to you.
So the Crown owns all the Crown land, and holds a huge "interest" in the 15% of Canada that is Fee Simple plus all the animal (non-human), mineral and vegetable matter above and below ground.
NB there is debate about whether the Crown negotiated the beds of the rivers and lakes and, that discussion, ie the "stupidly hubristic Crown-Agent dealings with local folks" leads to the ramifications and unintended consequences of making poor, bad, blatantly-unfair-in 20th century Treaties with the Autochthonous peoples AND the consequences of "stupid Crown-Agents" not-bothering to establish Treaties on great swaths of now-Canada.
If the Crown owns all of Canada, it would be helpful to know:
1) who/what IS the Crown in Canada these days?
2) what exactly are the Crown's holdings, interests, assets and liabilities?
3) if it's 'our' country', does some non-Canadian "entity" own all that stuff? or is it a Canadian entity?
4) regardless of who/what owns it, are these assets "on the books" (Sttmnt of Assets/Liabilities)?
4) who/what is watching over the administration of all that stuff on behalf of /"in trust for" the Crown?
5) who/what has 'hands on'" responsiblility for Stewarding, Husbanding, Preserving, Protecting, Conserving & Enhancing the value and worth of these 'Crown' assets?
6) if we know the value of the assets - are the Stewards getting a good return on the value of those assets?
7) If these assets are on Canadian soil and HRH (the Office/Person) doesn't seem to care about who/how they are administerted and seems not to care why, or if, these assets are being wisely managed, wouldn't it be wise to transfer the "ownership" of these assets to someone/something that would pay more attention to a) the assets and b) the stewardship?
Perhaps we'll ask silver-jubilee HRH to proclaim a "deemed disposition" to the citizens of Canada (I had the speech ready for the golden-jubilee visit)
So there is the Essence. The Office of Monarch. The Queen in Right for Canada.
Everything legally done, or authorized or decided in Canada, is done in the Name of the Crown and everybody who works for government, the country etc have sworn allegiance, or loyalty, or responsibility, or duty, or accountability to the Crown.
Sadly, when these (generations of) Stewards came to realise that no "Crown" is supervising them ... human nature created the opportunity for more "stupidly hubristic Crown-Agent dealings with local folks".
But no one spends too much time thinking about queries 1-6 above - that's my purpose - getting you to think about the answers to questions 1-6 (acknowledging a) that nobody but me is thinking #7 and b) no one else has written a take-off of the Quebec Act 1774 to express the answer).
I just hope that once you delve into 1-6 .... you'll accept that there IS a problem of responsibility/accountability in Canada and be prompted to think about a solution.
A solution with minimal dislocation, intrusion AND CERTAINLY NOT requiring a 7/50% or 100% Constitutional amendment.
So ..... back to Mr Rowe's floor-crossing.
Delegate, trustee or party-disciple - 'tis moot.
The elected assemblies of Canada are shams. Question Period? -televised hootenannies of CPAC tid-bits for the folks back home to ooh and ahh about. Zingerland for the national and local news.
AND everybody "reads" in the House these days ... can nobody think on their feet anymore?
Worse still, Elections are expensive games about fooling enough of the too-busy-to-pay-much-attention-day-to-day public to place first in our 'best-of-a-bad-bunch' voting system. Campaigns try to keep the fundamental issues OFF the agenda in favour of poll-tested platform planks and bold promises of voter-segment-targeted fiscal treats or regional grants/subsidies/entitlements.
The congregated MP's, MPP's, MLA's (& MNA's for pete's sake) ARE party-disciples. Dependent on their party's will for nomination, advertising & policy coat-tail jumping, fancier offices& positions AND re-election - the public be damned (after all we're ONLY accountable to them -in any way -at elections)
Shall we continue sanctioning this sham? or do we just not know anything other than "stupidly hubristic Crown-Agent dealings with local folks"?
I say:
Until the elected assembly is the Public Forum for the free expression of all ideas, not just the place for televised "reading" of prepared drivel espousing the party-machine's spin;
Until the Canada Election Act and Electoral Finances Act are re-written to exclude the bias, special subsidies, allowances, tax-treatment status for the privileged-few, private-entities in the election-business (written by and for those entities);
Until Elections Canada removes it's bias, special subsidies, allowances, tax-treatment status for the privileged-few, private-entities in the election-business (ditto);
Until the Senate is restored to it's elevated Upper place as House of Taxpayers by adjusting-for-inflation the 1867 qualification/disqualifications (why have we never adjusted s23 & 31? $4,000 net worth and $4,000 net-equity in property just ain't the same criteria);
Until the Privy Council is restored to the Executive Power (s9-13) as independent, advisors-for-life of His/Her Excellency and institutional memory on behalf of the rest of us;
Until the Governor General(& Lt Gov's) has a citizen-acknowledged mandate to use His/Her powers of Reservation, Disallowance and Withholding of Royal Assent;
Until we select our recommendation for GovGen to the Monarch by election at large;
AND more importantly until the Canadian people accept THEIR responsibility to be in charge of their own lives, their future, their country by demanding that their elected and appointed officials be accountable to the "governed" .... it doesn't really matter.
Be it Harper, or Chretien, or Mulroney, or the Late Messrs Trudeau, Pearson, Diefenbaker, St Laurent or King ... a 50%+1 Prime Minister is almost unstoppable ... certainly not stoppable by voters continuing to select party-disciples as elected representatives.
If we don't change the reasons we select MP's (et al) we'll just get more "stupidly hubristic Crown-Agent dealings with local folks".
a la prochaine
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