On the need for politics #nlpoli

Politics [is] the art of pursuing common interests through... active listening, advocacy, public persuasion, compromise and negotiation.

Bob Rae

William Ford Coaker,
the father of the Commission

The people from Newfoundland and Labrador quoted in the Globe and Mail on Friday described the problem facing the province today.

We are not talking about chronic overspending, an aging population that will need more health care, or the impact of Muskrat Falls.

The problem is the shared attitude among the province’s opinion leaders  - the ones quoted by the Globe and many more besides - that *any* solutions to the province's financial problems are bleak and politically unacceptable.

Here are the bits from the Globe and Mail piece, ironically by some guy named Greg Mercer, a name he shares with the current Premier’s chief of staff:

• Political science professor Amanda Bittner: “You’re going to be making some tough choices that nobody is going to be happy with, and it’s probably going to be miserable.”
• Lawyer and cable television show host Melissa Royle Critch described the problems as “daunting” and said the debt problem was “insurmountable.”
• Progressive Conservative leader Ches Crosbie: “We are in a death spiral.”
• Outgoing Premier Dwight Ball said that borrowing to cover continued deficits will be the major challenge facing his successor.
• Economics professor Scott Lynch said,” [Dealing with the financial problem is] going to be a nasty situation. These cuts will be extremely painful.”

We can add to that finance minister Tom Osborne who recently dismissed out of hand a proposal to put the government’s liquor corporation in the private sector, like Alberta did more than 20 years ago.  The result would create jobs,  preserve provincial tax revenues, and bring in a couple of billion dollars in the sale.

But Osborne, like all the others leading the province will brook no change in anything.

They simply want someone else to pay the bills.

The importance of what we care about #nlpoli

When we do not talk about the most vulnerable people in our society – sex workers and people in homeless shelters to name just two groups – we tell the world that our community does not care about them.  Last week’s spectacle in the House of Assembly showed the world that the 40 people who Newfoundlanders and Labradorians elected to represent them and run the province do not care about very much at all.

Alison Coffin and Ches Crosbie
talk to reporters on Friday about Gerry Byrne.
(Not exactly as illustrated)

A 23-year-old man lay on the pavement in downtown St. John’s last Tuesday night, the life running out of the bullet hole in him and mingling with the rain on the cold pavement, trickling along the gutter and into the sewer.

He died outside a shelter for homeless people. The community learned very quickly that it was a shelter, that it was a rental property, and that police frequently visited the place to deal with disturbances among the people who came and went from the house with great frequency.

We learned that information because neighbours put it on social media, where the local conventional media – newspaper, television, and radio - picked it up and repeated it.  Before anyone knew who the young man was, or what had gone on, they had decided what the issues were in the story.

That morning, in the House of Assembly,  the opposition parties asked for the Premier’s opinion on the fact that provinces in Canada received transfer payments from the federal government because they  - unlike Newfoundland and Labrador – didn’t make enough money on their own to meet the national minimum government income standard.  There were questions about flooding in a district on the west coast, a couple of questions about specific constituents who needed government money, and about the deaths of a couple of million salmon in a fish farm a couple of months before.

There was only one question thread - about ferry service to northern Labrador - that stood out for its consistency and seriousness - and the only question about homelessness was about people with high paying jobs in western Labrador who had to couch surf.

The morning after the death,  the few questions related to the murder were generic:  “’What plan does the government have’  to deal with crime and homeless in St. John’s?” opposition leader Ches Crosbie led with.  His second question was about a growth in payments to temporary shelters run by landlords, not not-for-profits.  That story had been in the local media before and brought back because of the assumed connection in media reports between the for-profit shelters and the murder.

Attention then turned to a general discussion of health care.  By the time the official opposition was done, the New Democrat leader Alison Coffin’s question about homelessness was also generic: 

“APEC reports that despite growth in the oil industry, our province is struggling. Homelessness, addictions, cost of living, bankruptcies, gangs, unemployment, electricity rates, out-migration are all on the rise.

“I ask the Premier: Will Advance 2030 address these pressing issues, or will we continue to stumble forward?”

That was the lone NDP question before her colleague got back to the dead salmon.

Where do elections come from? #nlpoli

From fixed election dates to the number of candidates that run in an election,  what Newfoundlanders and Labradorians believe about one of the basic institutions of their democracy is as much myth and rumour as reality. 

Here are some facts to help you navigate the world of post-Confederation elections in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The Crown Prerogative, exercised with the advice of the Premier

Newfoundland and Labrador does not have a fixed election date.

The changes to the House of Assembly Act in 2004 that supposedly set the election date for a day in October every four years starts with a simple clause that supersedes the fixed date bit:

3. (1) Notwithstanding another provision of this section, the Lieutenant-Governor may, by proclamation in Her Majesty's name, prorogue or dissolve the House of Assembly when the Lieutenant-Governor sees fit.

To understand how that works, we need to recall some basic constitutional points first.  Except in some very rare – but important – instances, the Lieutenant-Governor may only act with the advice of the Executive Council.

Campaign Finance Reform: shifting attention #nlpoli

Until 1996,  there were no campaign finance laws in Newfoundland and Labrador at all.

In 2003,  the Conservatives promised to make dramatic changes to the laws governing how parties financed election campaigns.

They delivered none of it.

In 2015,  the Liberals promised changes to campaign finance laws and one year into their new mandate, the Liberals are looking at appointing some experts to make recommendations on changes to elections laws.

In the weekend Telegram,  James McLeod described this lack of action one year into a new mandate as "massive delays" on democratic reform but starts out his story by talking about something else entirely.

That's your first clue something is out of focus.

What's wrong #nlpoli

As with a lot of things in local politics,  the most interesting thing wasn't the fact that Steve Marshall barred Roger Grimes from a hockey rink Marshall owns.

What was fascinating was the response of plenty of folks in the province.  Some just blew it off as childish or small.  And at least one even tried the old game of blaming "both sides" for being a good example of what's wrong with local politics.

And in the process, they all approved of the behaviour.

Strategically Unwise and other political own-goals #nlpoli

Depending on which interview you listened to on Tuesday,  Tom Marshall would be hanging around as Premier until the end of the summer.

At least.

That’s the VOCM story.

Marshall will run the place for two full months after the Conservative convention in early July while Coleman runs around the province attending all sorts of summer festivals.

Meanwhile, on CBC,  Peter Cowan said in his report on Tuesday evening that Marshall expects to hand over the Premier’s job shortly after the Conservative party meeting in early July.

Which is it?

That’s a good question, but there’s no clear answer.

Bravery and Democracy #nlpoli

“It is easy to be an armchair critic, tweeted natural resources minister Jerome Kennedy before Christmas, “but It takes real courage to stand for election.”

In another context, John Steele offered this opinion about your humble e-scribbler.:

“One thing that I respect about Ed is, he’s got balls enough to put his name to stuff. He’s not anonymous, so I respect that.”

The word “democracy” derives from the Greek words for people and power.  Democracy is a form of government in which everyone may participate equally and fully in making decisions that will affect them.
 

Another sign of the democratic deficit #nlpoli

If you have a few minutes to spare, flip through the provincial government’s 2012 budget.

Look for the work “donation”.

You won’t find it.  Nor will you find any amount of money set aside in the health department budget that would cover a donation by the provincial government to health care foundations operated in some communities on the west coast earlier this year.

Suppressing Dissent #nlpoli

One of the hallmarks of the Conservative political method since 2003 has been the suppression of public dissent.

Anyone who wants to raise a problem for public discussion is attacked for being “negative.”  It is part of the aggressive campaign the Tories have waged to eliminate political opposition and stifle anything that was not approved by the Premier’s Office.

No surprise, then, that Bonavista mayor Betty Fitzgerald went to her local MHA to get a letter she could sign attacking one of her councillors who had violated the iron Conservative law against dissent.

Collins beats Kazakhstan #nlpoli

From a second rebuttal to justice minister Felix Collins, right (not exactly as illustrated) from the Center for Law and Democracy:

In a speech to the House of Assembly on 14 June 2012, Collins used derogatory terms to refer to CLD, and claimed we had financial motives in publicising our research. CLD is no stranger to working in difficult political environments. Over the past year, we have conducted projects in Kazakhstan, Myanmar, Somalia and many other countries that are known for being particularly hostile to democratising forces. However, this is the first time that the integrity and professionalism of our organisation have ever been directly attacked by a political leader. [Emphasis added]

 

-srbp-

When rights are annoying #nlpoli

There’s something about this frivolous and vexatious thing that caught people’s attention right from the start.

Under the provincial Conservatives’ new secrecy laws, a cabinet minister can refuse to disclose information if he or she thinks the request is “frivolous or vexatious”. (sec. 43.1)

Leave aside the idea that a politician gets to decide on who gets information and who doesn’t.  As we learned from the Cameron Inquiry, Danny Williams and his political staff vetted access to information requests and blocked stuff they didn’t want to hand over or blocked people they didn’t want to give stuff to.  The law didn’t matter.  They refused.  They stonewalled.  They used every other trick in the book.

But that’s a whole other issue.

Let’s just look at this curious choice of words and see what they reveal.

More oil, less democracy #nlpoli

“Oil and democracy do not easily mix,” wrote political scientist Michael Ross in The Oil Curse: How Petroleum Wealth Shapes the Development of Nations, his 2012 study of the impact that income from oil development has on governments around the world.

Regular readers will recall this idea from an earlier post.

Countries that are rich in petroleum generally have lower economic growth and less democracy that countries that don’t have oil revenues. Ross puts this down, in part, to a relationship that citizens see between government revenue and government spending. 

Citizens in oil-producing countries, though, cannot directly observe how much their government collects in oil revenues.  They must rely on the government and the media for their information.  If they live in a democracy, the information is probably available. 

Probably available.

That assumes, of course, that the media in those democracies can find out the information and publish it.

The Stacked House Filibuster #nlpoli

Democracy is a beautiful thing. 

The people of Newfoundland and Labrador are witnessing its full beauty in the filibuster against the Conservative government’s latest assault on openness, transparency and accountability. 

Our failed state #nlpoli

The always sharp labradore has posted links to a report by the Foundation for Democratic Advancement on election finance laws across Canada.

You can find the full report here.  The Newfoundland and Labrador section starts on page 34.

The analysis (p. 38) reads, in part:

Based on the FDA scoring scale (see Conclusion section), Newfoundland and Labrador received an unsatisfactory score of 51.3 percent. This score means that Newfoundland and Labrador has numerous deficiencies in its electoral finance legislation and borders on a failed democratic state. The FDA believes that this legislation is not working in the interests of the majority in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Borders on a failed democratic state.

Doesn’t get much plainer than that.

-srbp-

The question of democracy in Newfoundland and Labrador #cdnpoli #nlpoli

“A democracy only works really well,” according to Kathy Dunderdale, “when people are asking questions.”

Opposition Leader Dwight Ball told a Western Star interviewer that “my job is to ask questions with substance…”.

Not to be outdone in the spate of year-end interviews, New Democratic Party leader Lorraine Michael tied the health of democracy to asking questions:

If our natural resources standing committee ... were operating like a House of Commons committee or like the committees in Nova Scotia, we’d have a fully open discussion on Muskrat Falls.

Not surprisingly, all three party leaders in Newfoundland and Labrador agree on what constitutes democracy in the province.  They lead parties that agree on everything but the fine details. 

Not surprisingly, the three leaders discuss democracy solely in terms of what happens in the provincial legislature.  The only disagreement they have, such as it is, centres on the questions the opposition parties ask.  The NDP want more time to ask questions.  The Liberals want to ask better questions and the Conservatives claim variously that there is enough time for questions as things stand or that the quality of them is low anyway so more time wouldn’t make things better.

In one sense, democracy is about questions.

It is about people who want power – like Kathy Dunderdale, Lorraine Michael and Dwight Ball – asking the rest of us in the community to support them at election time.  We support them with the one thing that we all have in common:  our individual vote. Everyone in the community has exactly the same kind of vote. And it is our individual vote that is the foundation of everything else that happens in our democracy.

In between elections, democracy is about those people who get enough support to form a government asking “May I” when they want to do something. That’s essentially what they do in the House of Assembly.

They pose the question to the other members of the House, whether from their own party or the other parties and individuals who won enough votes to sit in the legislature. 

You’ll find that quite literally in the procedure.  The Speaker will “put the question” on a motion, a resolution or a bill to the House and ask the members to vote.

Ask a question. 

Vote on an answer.

Decision made.

All starting from the fundamental question put to individual voters at an election to chose individuals who will represent those voters in the legislature.

Things weren’t always that way.  But starting almost 800 years ago, in those countries that follow the British parliamentary tradition, people started to place limits on what the government could do without the agreement of the people ruled by the government.

The 1689 Bill of Rights brought together many of the features of our modern democracy that we often assume have always been around and that people have always accepted.  Freedom of speech,  freedom to stand for and to vote in elections to the legislature and the need for the legislature to meet regularly are all contained in the 1689 Bill of Rights. They survive today: some changed, some the same.

At the core of the whole thing is choice.  People chose their representatives to sit in the legislature.  We select those representatives to stand in for each of us every day between elections.

We do not elect a government.  We elect people to the legislature, to the House of Assembly.  Out of those people, we get a group to run the government.  And those people running the government must come back to our direct representatives for approval for what they want to do, especially when it comes to spending public money.

There are two other ideas that go along with choice and who gets to chose.  One of these is that choices must be based on information.  The legislature’s day-to-day business is built around debate and the exchange of information. 

The other idea is that the information and choice must be in public.  The legislature has space for people to sit and watch what happens.  News media and others can report on what happens.  The legislature keeps an official record – Hansard – that people can read.

Seen from that perspective, those political comments about questions and the legislature don’t look all that good or convincing.  Looking at some recent history, one can find a host of examples  – from the spending scandal to the Abitibi expropriation fiasco  - that show the bad things that happen when politicians operate in secret. 

You can also see that the Premier’s excuses for keeping the legislature closed simply don’t make sense.  If she feels that her current job is a “rare privilege”, then Kathy Dunderdale needn’t remind herself of that fact every day, in secret, in her office. 

She can show up in the legislature and demonstrate that she gets the point:  if you want power in this province, the you have to stand up in the legislature and ask “May I?”

The purpose of the House is to subject those with power to public examination and to the test of debate, discussion and disclosure.  The Premier and her colleagues should want the legislature to be open as much as possible.  They should want to tell us about their plans, present their case and convince us all that they have good ideas.

How very odd it is, then, that the Premier admitted at the end of last year that she and her colleagues don’t have any thing ready to present to the House.  This is the case despite the fact they’ve been in office since 2003 and the Premier herself has held her job for more than a year.

At other times, Dunderdale has said that she kept the legislature closed because the House was dysfunctional.  The opposition parties were weak. Who will hold them accountable for what they say, she wondered. 

The answer is simple:  the ordinary people of Newfoundland and Labrador will.  If the opposition political parties are as weak as Dunderdale claims, then they won’t be able to hide away from public scrutiny either.  Exposing yourself to examination works both for those with power and those who want it.

The fact that the Premier and her colleagues avoid the House as they do and denigrate the legislature as the Premier does, she demonstrates nothing less than contempt for the people of the province.

To be fair, though, none of the parties in the House can really escape blame on this point.  All parties have  helped to create the current climate. Dunderdale controls how often the House sits.  But the other parties went along unquestioningly with the special ballot laws that undermine the right of individuals to stand for election.  Some even openly suggested making this a one party state.  Perhaps that explains why they slipped things through the House with a nod and a wink and stood idly by as their colleagues abused the fundamental rights we have enjoyed. Now they may not see it that way. They may believe that what they have done is absolutely right in every respect.

But they were not right.

It is not okay.

The attitude and actions of politicians in the province in recent decades are why the state of democracy in our province is, itself, in question.

- srbp -