It’s time we saved Canada’s institutions
The following is an excerpt from the David Peterson Leadership Lecture given at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto, by Donald J. Savoie, holder of the Canada Research Chair in public administration and governance at Université de Moncton.
Canadians are witnessing the slow disintegration of their institutions. Let’s start at the top. Parliament is today in a state of disrepair. We have numerous reports, books and speeches produced by recently retired MPs and others calling for reform. We know that fewer and fewer Canadians now turn to their Member of Parliament to voice their opinions or concerns.
What about Parliament’s role in holding the government to account for its spending? Thousands of pages are tabled every year in Parliament for MPs to review, but little ever comes out of this process. Lowell Murray’s observation rings true: “Parliament — specifically the House of Commons — over a period of more than 40 years, has allowed its most vital power, the power of the purse, to become a dead letter, their Supply and Estimates process an empty ritual.”
Political parties in Canada have lost their brand to their leaders. The Trudeau and O’Toole brands are now what count at election time. Sophisticated political expertise are required to develop political brands. A well-known Liberal party pollster explains: “Parties don’t run on what their members think and can’t if they want to be successful. They run on what will get them the most votes. It is a strategic marketing exercise rather than a genuine contest of ideas.”
Why then would Canadians want to join a political party? Political parties have become little more than electionday organizations, fundraising machines and a convenient venue to select candidates to help them win elections.
I invite those who believe Canada still has cabinet government to ponder this point: “Two key decisions regarding Canada’s deployment in Afghanistan — one by a Liberal government, one by a Conservative government — were made in the Prime Minister’s Office with the help of a handful of political advisers and civilian and military officials. The relevant ministers — of National Defence and Foreign Affairs — were not even in the room.” Cabinet was later informed. This is hardly an isolated case.
Justin Trudeau declared on the day his government was sworn into office in 2015 that “government by cabinet is back,” in effect acknowledging that Canada no longer had cabinet government. However, government by cabinet is not back.
Ottawa has had powerful ministers through the ages. Today, only one brand is tolerated — the PM’s brand. Leaving aside the minister of finance, who always plays an important role in government, I challenge anyone to identify a minister who is known for something other than being in cabinet.
Recent surveys show the federal public service is demoralized. There’s also evidence that it has lost standing with Canadians in recent years. If history has taught us a lesson, it is that countries cannot succeed and their economies cannot grow in the absence of a public service that can offer objective advice to their political masters, establish and enforce rules, collect revenue and provide public services.
We have made it exceedingly difficult to let federal executives and managers manage. One ought not to be surprised then, as one former senior public servant observed, that if the public service was asked to ice a hockey team, it would go with six goalies. We have established the circumstances to ice six goalies. We now have far too many officers of Parliament looking over the shoulders of government managers, always at the ready to fuel the blame game.
Representative democracy requires informed citizens, and informed citizens require media to supply factual information and knowledge. We are witnessing a shift from the traditional media to the new media that has given rise to a post-truth world. Facts give way to the saying, “Oh, I heard it from someone or somewhere.” Social media do not lend themselves to in-depth studies and editorial control, and as a result they become vulnerable to fake news. Unlike the traditional media, social media will all too often focus on individuals, not institutions.
Where does all this take us? Canadians can take some degree of satisfaction that we have not maligned our institutions to the extent that some other countries have. But Canadians need to guard against our institutions losing legitimacy. When this happens, talented people no longer go to work for them or run for elected office. We are seeing signs of this.