Liberals seek to change party constitution
Move comes after Trudeau announced he was cutting loose those in upper chamber
“I think this shows that the Liberal leader drew this up on the back
of a napkin.”
NATHAN CULLEN, NDP
DEPUTY LEADER
OTTAWA — Liberal members of Parliament are seeking to formally sever ties with the scandal-plagued Senate by having all references to senators removed from the party’s constitution.
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau announced this week he was dumping 32 senators from the party caucus in an effort to eliminate partisanship and patronage, and return the upper chamber to its original purpose as a place of sober second thought.
But the Liberal Party constitution still lists senators as members of caucus, as well as automatic delegates at party conventions. It also says there is always supposed to be at least one senator sitting on a powerful internal committee that helps develop Liberal election platforms, though the party said there hasn’t been an active senator on the committee in some time.
Deputy Liberal leader Ralph Goodale said removing all mention of senators from the constitution is an administrative step needed to fulfil Trudeau’s vision of a less partisan Senate.
“A number of things will have to be adjusted to implement the new reality,” Goodale said.
To formalize the move, Goodale, national caucus chair Francis Scarpaleggia, House leader Dominic Leblanc and House whip Judy Foote have written Liberal president Mike Crawley asking the party’s national board of directors to work on amending the constitution.
“The constitution does identify clear roles and responsibilities for caucus which need to be adjusted to reflect our new caucus reality,” reads the letter, which was obtained from Trudeau’s office. “We urge the National Board to develop a process for amending the (Liberal party) constitution to remove reference to senators and to operate immediately in a manner that is consistent with only elected members of Parliament being part of the LPC national caucus.”
The NDP accused Trudeau on Friday of breaking his party’s own rules by unilaterally excluding senators from caucus without getting the Liberal constitution changed first.
Any constitutional amendment requires support from two-thirds of delegates at a national convention.
“I think this shows that the Liberal leader drew this up on the back of a napkin,” NDP deputy leader Nathan Cullen said. “What he suggested on Wednesday was illegal in his constitution. God help us if he ever has to interpret the Canadian Constitution.”
But Liberals rushed to Trudeau’s defence, insisting the Liberal leader does have the power to decide who is part of caucus. “The constitution is clear in terms of the leader is the one that determines who is in caucus,” Crawley said. “It’s the leader’s purview to determine what comprises caucus.”
Either way, it could be several years before the change is formalized.
While a convention will be held in Montreal in three weeks, the deadline for submitting proposed constitutional amendments has passed.
Crawley said the board of directors will meet next week to discuss proposed amendments, and there are mechanisms in place to hold an emergency convention and amend the constitution, as happened following the 2011 federal election when the party agreed to put off the leadership race by two years.
But he didn’t believe there was a sense of urgency, and that the party could wait for the next Liberal convention in 2016.
“Can the party in practice operate in a way that’s aligned with the decision that has been made, and constitutionalize those changes at the next convention?” he said.
“My sense going in is that we will be able to do that, but we need to confirm that.”
Senate reform has been talked about on and off for decades, but until this week’s bold stroke by Justin Trudeau banishing Liberal senators from his party’s parliamentary caucus, precious little had ever been done.
It is not so much for lack of ideas, but more for a lack of possibilities for substantial reform.
The sticking point has always been the fact that the Senate has always been a fundamental aspect of the Confederation bargain, and so major changes to it would require a constitutional amendment that is beyond the power of Parliament alone to enact.
Before Trudeau’s move this week, both the Conservatives and the New Democratic Party had long-standing Senate-reform proposals on the table. But even apart from their respective pros and cons, both were unrealistic on constitutional grounds, in that there is scant to zero chance that they would get the necessary approval required under the current amending formula.
The NDP has, from its inception, been for Senate abolition, an idea that is not without its merits. Having unelected senators with the power to override legislation voted by elected parliamentarians goes against the democratic grain, even though they conventionally don’t invoke it. And Canadians would be grateful for the tax-dollar saving abolition would entail.
But it is more than likely that the Supreme Court, to which the question of what can be done with the Senate has been put, will shortly rule that abolition would require unanimous consent of the federal and all 10 provin- cial governments.
Given Canada’s recent history of constitutional wrangling, the prospect of achieving such an agreement on the Senate is practically unimaginable.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper would like to see an elected Senate, but that would also be unlikely to pass muster with the required number of provinces. Yes, it would be more democratic to have senators elected, but it would inevitably lead to the gridlock that too often plagues the United States Congress, with its two elected bodies.
Harper’s idea that he could circumvent the constitutional requirement by having provinces run Senate elections, with the winners then being appointed by the government, is also unlikely to pass Supreme Court muster.
Trudeau’s proposal to transform the Senate into a non-partisan chamber by excluding senators from House of Commons party caucuses and partisan activities, and having them selected by a non-partisan panel of experts, has been mocked as worse than the present system, in that in addition to being unelected, Senators would be selected by unelected people.
On the other hand, it offers the prospect that those selected will be of a better calibre than the current political appointees who include an inordinate number of party organizers, bagmen, failed candidates and former prime ministerial dogsbodies.
There is furthermore a precedent for such a selection process at the mother of Parliaments in London, where a non-partisan committee makes some selections for Britain’s House of Lords.
The idea certainly needs elaboration, and while it is only half-baked at present, it is at least more doable than anything else advanced so far.