John Robson: Parliament Should Use Its Power to Rein In the Government’s Feckless Spending

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh meets with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Nov. 14, 2019. The Canadian Press/Sean Kilpatrick

Commentary

When I read that “Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says pharmacare will not jeopardize Canada’s fiscal standing as the federal government intends to abide by the spending rules it pledged in the fall” I did three things at once: laughed hysterically, wept uncontrollably, and reached for our constitutional separation of powers.

No, really. Somehow it passes for wisdom in Canada to mock American political institutions, which admittedly aren’t working well today. But our Constitution modelled on Britain’s clearly provides for the same separation America’s Founders also borrowed while seeking to make it more durable. And unlike theirs, ours has withered to the point that our real problem isn’t who we invest with executive authority, it’s the unchecked nature of that authority.

Take the Liberals’ fiscal policy... please. They’re not the only villains. But from Justin Trudeau’s glib 2014 “the budget will balance itself” to his few modest deficits before balance in 2019 to Freeland’s 2020 word salad about “guardrails on the road … physical and anchored to something” prior to sending us over Borrowing Cliff into Debt Abyss, they spend with careless arrogance because we let them.

The PBO says we might see a balanced budget in 2035… if everything breaks our way. But the point here isn’t that people with unlimited authority to raise money and hurl it about tend to do so irresponsibly. At least I hope not. Surely we grasp that pattern after millennia of autocratic fiscal shipwrecks. As surely we grasp that these incumbents aren’t to be trusted with it either. The point is that our institutions, as currently malfunctioning, implicitly trust them anyway by placing minimal restraints on their folly, malice, or indifference.

If I kept listing examples of their fiscal fecklessness, like cutting another $1 billion from defence while throwing $2 billion into Vancouver housing, I’d risk exhausting my column space while leaving you curled up whimpering on the floor. But we must note how unchecked their authority is.

For instance, Freeland writing herself a note raising the borrowing authority of C. Freeland from $444 billion to $571 billion by April 1 without explanation. Or Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault suddenly terminating federal subsidies for roads, before denying he’d said it then denying he’d meant it because the boss balked. But if the PM had backed him, who could stop him? When Trudeau suddenly did say no more gasoline cars by 2035, who could stop him?

In theory, the Crown. But no British monarch has vetoed a bill since Queen Anne, a reference whose very obscurity proves my point. And with good reason; our system focuses symbolic authority on the monarch not because we believe in autocracy but because we don’t, and separate the pomp and circumstance of head of state from the partisanship and cunning of head of government.

So in practice it’s Parliament that should check the executive. As the only people in government we the people elect, legislators are meant to see themselves as our servants in restraining the arrogance of ministers and, if it comes to it, of judges, not as members of the red, blue or orange team, willing to trample principle in a desperate lunge for power most of them won’t even share.

True, with a minority of MPs in their caucus, the Liberals need the support of “the NDP.” But in practice it only means Jagmeet Singh. No NDP MP will vote nay on a Liberal confidence measure if Singh says aye (while denouncing the Liberals as plutocratic puppet partners of Poilievre). And no Liberal will say I share my party’s progressive goals but can’t support this reckless approach to fiscal sustainability.

By contrast, even in these troubled times the U.S. Congress consists of a host of independent actors in two independent Houses not bound to support or oppose the president by electoral success, party discipline, ideology, or anything else. Instead, the more a president seems out of touch with the public, the more congresspersons distance themselves from his program. Not least because he doesn’t sign their nomination papers, as our party leaders have since 1972 in a significant deformation of our system.

It’s not just me. When she wrote herself her latest blank cheque, Freeland told the Commons finance committee, “The increase in the borrowing authority is in no way a blank cheque. Every single expenditure by the government needs to be authorized by Parliament.” Which for once is both true and profound.

Parliament’s main job is to check the executive by yanking on the purse strings. It says so right in our Constitution, formalizing a British rule dating back to 1407, because MPs represent those who will have to pay.

You couldn’t ask for a clearer or sounder constitutional doctrine. Now all we need is MPs who care about it, because they are elected by voters who do.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.