To beat the house, you've got to stack the deck.

In case you have yet to hear, the Upper House (Senate) is once again full. Full of senators that is. (I'm sure it's been full of certain other things fairly reliably since confederation.) Harper of course said he would not appoint senators, and he has now appointed a total of 20. (That is, 18 just now to make sure they go Conservative, 1 when elected to have a representative from Montreal (to pander), and one 'elected' from Alberta.) So I though I'd say a few words about senate reform.

There have been many attempts to and suggestions on Senate reform in this country. Under Trudeau (is there anything he didn't do?) there was a proposition to turn the Senate into a 'House of the Federation'. This would have been appointed half by the federal government, and half by the provincial governments. It would have increased the representation of BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Newfoundland. (The last three are questionable as all three provinces are already incredibly overrepresented compared to the 4 larger provinces.) This house would also have been given the power to veto legislation for 60 days, or permanently if it was of linguistic relevance and a majority of both English and French senators voted to veto. (What about people who speak both or neither at home?) At the time, many other groups came out with their own ideas. Most of which turned the Senate into a provincial hand in the federal affairs of the country where the members would be appointed by the provincial legislatures, and vote as a block. In the end nothing happened as Ottawa and the provinces could not agree, and there were more important things on the table.














How things are now.






Later, in and around the early 80s, Senate reform resurfaced, especially in Western Canada. Much of the problem was that BC and to a lesser extent Alberta were underrepresented compared to Quebec and to a lesser extent Ontario. (It should be noted that Quebec and even more so Ontario are just as underrepresented with respect to the 6 smaller provinces.) The battle cry was condensed around the three 'E's:

Equal: More equal distribution across provinces (here meaning each province gets the same, also know as less equal)

Elected: The Senate should be democratic (cause they don't cost enough as is)

Effective: The Senate should do more then it does (now that we have computers to do the spell checking)

limitEd: Senators should not be allowed to stay until age 75 (this isn't one of the three, but usually goes hand in hand)

This became the favoured model in the west, and a battle cry in Alberta. Alberta's specifically favoured plan (as of 1985 and 2003) involved every province having 6 seats (2 per territory) elected from each province/territory as a whole under a multiple-member system. This Senate would have a delay veto (as above, but longer), and the ability to ratify non-military international treaties. The senate would still not be able to topple to government.














The Three E Plan (Tall lines are bad.)







Under the Progressive Conservatives the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accords contained some Senate reform. Meech Lake would have forced the Senate appointees to come from lists put forward by the provinces. The Charlottetown Accords would have given each province 6 seats (1 per territory) to fill either by election or appointment, and also have given the Senate the language veto of Trudeau, the ability to delay money bills by 30 days, and force other bills into having to pass a vote in the combined houses. In the end, both accords dies for other reasons.

In the last few years Harper has latched onto the issue, specifically the democratic nature of the senate, and limited terms for its members. The big problem he doesn't talk about is that changing the Senate is for the most part a Constitutional thing, and thus requires consent from the House of Commons, the Senate, the GG, and two thirds of the provinces representing at least half of all Canadians. Harper likes to say that it has been the Senate that has so far stood in his way, but he has of course not had a majority in the House of Commons either, and the provinces have yet to agree to anything. In fact, Harper has tried to craft his Senate changes so as not to need provincial assent, but 4 of the provinces constituting 66% of Canadians (ON, QC, NB, and NL) have said that these changes must have provincial consent (meaning they likely don't agree with him, and in truth, the constitution agrees with the provinces on this one). This of course hasn't stopped him from tabling motions to limit terms to 8 years (was S-4, then C-19 this fall) and force provincial consultation on appointments (was C-43 then C-20 this fall). Neither had passed by this fall's election, and to my knowledge neither has been reincarnated since the economic crisis.














How I would do it. (Give 15 to ON, 7 to BC, 5 to AB, 2 to NL, MB, SK; new total: 138)



Personally, I agree that the Senate should be reformed somehow. That said the '3' 'E's are not the way to go. By giving each province an equal number of seats you severely disenfranchise the big provinces. I support the idea of it not being directly proportional so as to help the smaller provinces have their own voices, but Ontario and Quebec make up 61% of this country, and so they should get more seats than the west or the east. I also consider the idea to be a power grab on behalf of the Conservatives. If each province were given 6 seats, the Conservative friendly western provinces would lose no seats, while the more Conservative poor regions would loose 42 seats (taking into account a gain of 2 for PEI). Under this system there could be a Conservative Senate majority with just 33% of Canadians given a strong showing in the West. This is only intensified if the Senate becomes elected. At the moment, the Senate does little aside from minor amendments and thorough second readings of legislation (hence being called the body of "sober second thought"). If the senate were to become elected, I'm sure it would begin to wield its almost House of Commons like power. If this were to happen and the senate were not at least mostly proportional to population then we would no longer be even as democratic as we currently are. That said, if it were elected on a proportional basis, why bother having it, as it would just be a second House of Commons.

Why not limit their power (so that they can't impinge on the democratic House) throw a few extra seats at the 6 most western provinces, and then let the provinces decide for themselves how their seats are filled. In the end, they would likely end up elected anyway. The one problem with this is that in the even of provincial appointments, what party would the appointees represent federally? The provincial parties and federal parties in this country do not parallel well. The PQ and Bloc may agree, as likely do the Alberta PC's and the federal Conservatives, but the PEI PC party is nothing like the federal Conservatives, the Quebec Liberals do not necessarily get along with the federal Liberals (their leader was a PC), and the Saskatchewan Party has no federal analogue (the list continues, I do not).

In the end though, it seams Harper has decided that he wants what he wants, and he will violate his earlier principles to do it. While I don't fault the guy as a politician for doing it, doing it for reform is not really as necessary as it sounds. There was at least some senate support for the Murray-Austin amendment (fairly large reform proposal) in 2006, and in the 2004 election all 4 parties supported change to the Senate. I'm sure even today support could be found for a reasonable proposal amongst Ignatieff's Liberals. Besides, Harper himself said that if he could not get reform passed, he would like to see the Senate abolished, a position supported by both the NDP and the Bloc. So while the appointments can't hurt, I suspect this is more of a political smoke screen, hence the phrase: "If Senate vacancies are to be filled, however, they should be filled by the government that Canadians elected rather than by a coalition that no one voted for". (Which is of course politically charged and wrong, as the coalition is just as elected as they are.) It would have, of course, been political suicide to have let the appointments pass, risking more non-Conservative appointments. That said, Mr. Martin appointed at least two senators who identified as PC, not Liberal.

In the end this isn't so bad though.
If you don't trust him or his party, take heart that even after these 18 appointments the senate will be: 38 Conservative, 58 Liberal, 3 PC, 6 independent (or other). Even with 8 Liberal senators leaving in the next year, there will still be more Liberals than Conservatives.
If you do trust him, and were committed to reform, this is probably a good thing, so be happy. Besides, many of the appointments weren't so bad.
However, if you were hoping he would finally keep one of his silly promises long enough to be hung with it, be disappointed that once again he has chosen politics over ideology. Because in the end, that is how you beat the House.