Prorogation — Before You Accuse Harper Of Playing Politics...

...You may want to check the historical data - and you'll find that proroguing the Parliament is by no means an extraordinary action. In fact, in some of the earlier Parliaments, prorogation could occur twice in the same year - and nobody regarded that as an affront to democracy.

Sure, those were the days of yore, the days of a small government, when elected representatives simply didn't have that much work as they have nowadays. Still, prorogation remained a routine procedure, that kept occurring every year or so, up until the end of the 30^th Parliament. And even if we check later Parliaments (35^th, 36^th, 37^th, all of them - majority Parliaments) - we'll still find that some of the sessions only lasted a year or so. Moreover, judging from the prorogation dates, as well as the dates that marked the beginning of the new sessions, the technique to extend a summer (or a winter) recess by a month or so by proroguing the Parliament, was invented long before Harper. In other words - that too is (and was) a common practice.

Let's take the 37^th Parliament as an example. It lasted 1210 days - slightly less than 3 years and 4 months. (A majority Parliament!) About half of that time (595 days) was the first session; the beginning of Jean Chretien's third mandate. In mid-2002, Chretien announced his upcoming retirement and the Parliament was prorogued, so that he could start building his "legusee" with a fresh legislative session. In November of 2003, the Parliament was prorogued again - just before the Liberal party convention on which Paul Martin was elected leader. When the Parliament resumed - it was already a new session with a new Prime Minister and a new legislative agenda.

So, is anyone eager to accuse Chretien of undermining the role of elected representatives, because his decision to prorogue the Parliament back in 2002, resulted in the summer recess being extended by 2 weeks, shortening the fall sitting accordingly? Or how about the next prorogation, which extended the Christmas break of 2003 by more than a month? How come it's ok for the Liberals to shut the Parliament down for an extra month so they could have a convention, but when Harper postpones the reopening of the Parliament until after the Olympics - that's playing politics and undermining the role of elected representatives?

To summarize - prorogation is nothing but a routine procedure that can mark a new direction, but that can also mean merely a break and a fresh start. In this current Parliament, the first prorogation marked an abrupt end of Harper's attempt to govern as if he had had a majority, while the recent prorogation marks the change of the balance of power in the Senate and, hopefully - the change of course in the House of Commons. (Yes, it's rumored that this time, Stephen Harper is determined to put forward a Conservative agenda, for a change.) All private member bills will survive the prorogation and will be automatically reinstated at their previous stage, once the Parliament resumes. As for the key government bills which have died on the order paper - if the opposition is serious about making the Parliament work - they'll vote with the government to get them fast-tracked to where they were prior to the prorogation.

And another thing: if the Liberals do decide to defy the prorogation and show up at the locked gates of the House of Commons on January 25^th, (although, due to the lack of global warming, the Conservative-bashing gathering is likely to take place in a nearby Timmy's,) then maybe someone from the Conservative caucus should show up as well and ask Mr. Speaker (or whoever is going to play his role,) whether the Liberal party is going to be held accountable for violating the maximum contribution limits under the guise of campaign loans. That's just something else to think about.