Who says Canadian Politics is boring?

[maycm]

Here in Canada we are in the midst of constitutional and political mayhem

The ruling minority Conservative party, fresh from an election victory seven weeks ago, made a damp squib of an economic announcement last week in the midst of the turmoil the whole world is going through (of which Canada has been affected, though not as much as some),

Part of the announcement included an anticipated removal of tax payer funding of political parties. The parties on both sides of the house get $2 for every vote they received in the election, to be used to help fund their operations. We are talking about a relatively small amount of money here - around $25 million, but it was enough to enrage the opposition parties enough that they have banded together to force an interesting situation. The Conservatives have back peddled and reversed the decsion but it's too late.

Faced with a no-confidence vote, the Conservatives are stalling like mad and amazingly the opposition parties have formed a coalition pact to 'seize' power. This includes the support of the so called seperatist party of the Bloc-Quebec, who's stated aim is to separate from the rest of Canada. The basis of their coalition is that the economic statement included no 'stimulus' package, and thus they state that the ruling party is out of touch with the needs of the country and should be removed.

The situation we are in today is that the Prime Minister has gone to the Queen's representative in Canada, the Governor General, who has to make a decsion to either adjourn parliament for a few weeks, thus giving the Conservatives time to work on a budget that may placate the opposition, or to deny this, which would grant the opposition their wish to form a coalition, which could lead to a government or possibly trigger another election if the PM resigns along with the rest of his party.

Suddenly this 'commemmorative' position holds the nations future in a very real way….

Watch this space….

*Edit* the Governor General has granted the Prime Minister a 6 week suspension of Parliament before which he has to put anything to a vote.

Merry Christmas Mr Harper.

We are now in a state of suspension when they should be debating and decision making.

Talk about fiddling while Rome burns...

[eefanincan]

I think we're in big trouble here no matter what happens with the Governor General's decision.

To leave Parliament as is does nothing......
To allow the coalition in is allowing in something we didn't vote for........ if this leads to another election, it's another 33 million dollars spent to most likely elect another minority government and face the same thing all over again.

My guess is that if an election is called we will likely see a vastly decreased voter turnout and that the results will likely be the same as 7 weeks ago.

But at least we still have the right to vote.

[faceless]

It seems a strange system of funding the parties - designed to benefit the larger parties as it seems to be.

I like the idea of minority governments though, as they tend to create more inclusion.

[maycm]

Not an exclusive way of funding of course - but a nice little earner that they didn't want to give up.

[faceless]

I see that they've suspended the parliament - Gord bless the Queenage and her right responsible guvnor for saving those Canadians from democracy!

[maycm]

The interesting thing thats developing here is considerable numbers of people rallying to support one side or the other.

Many unions are obviously vocalising support for the coalition to take power and take immediate action, but there seem to be larger numbers phtsically going out and staging protests at events and in the street with the message being "you were not voted into power by the masses so you cannot take power in this way"

I'm inclined to agree with them on that point, and in fact the leader of the Liberals, who was widely panned for his performance in the election and previously already said he would step down when a new leader could be selected, is now being criticized within the coalition and is a target for this because he would become PM should the coalition take power.

Some are even saying the scenario could have been predicted within the Conservatives as being a way to further damage the reputation of the liberals ahead of any new election.

Meanwhile, first order of business when the come back to parliament will be a 'stimulus' budget (which they should have done in the first place) and if the coalition votes against it then an election will ensue.

[faceless]

Does Canada have some form of P.R. or is it simply first-past-the-post?

I'd say the people protesting on the streets are just scared that they'd lose power, but if they haven't achieved a true mandate from the country then it's always going to be tough luck. Scotland has a minority coalition government and Labour hates it - but you won't find many people complaining in reality, mostly because of Alex Salmond who does have the confidence of the people.

[maycm]

Canada is pretty much identical to the UK in terms of the way elections are run.

Nothing like the US for example.

The big message from the conservatives is around how the coalition is supported by the Quebec "seperatists" and the fact that their stated aim is to break away from the rest of Canada.