OTTAWA — It happens like clockwork. The kids just get settled into their work, when the ice cream truck shows up on the lawn of Parliament Hill. Everyone instantly drops what they are doing and runs off, pushing and shouting, to the nearest microphone.
This week it is robocalls. Last week it was Vikileaks. Not long ago, it was federal public servants “faking the oath” at a simulated citizenship ceremony. Before that, we had a Conservative backbencher’s schoolboy crush on a Chinese reporter and NDP showboat Pat Martin’s salty tweets.
There was the Conservative senator who wanted to provide convicted serial killers with do-it-yourself nooses. There was an extended furore over a mysterious “not” included in a cabinet minister’s decree. The longer list of trivial pursuits includes Bruce Carson’s bankruptcies, Maxime Bernier’s missing briefs, Helena Guergis and the “busty hookers,” Peter MacKay’s helicopter ride, and Justin Trudeau’s supposed separatist sympathies.
Increasingly, federal politics looks more like a sit-com than ground zero for the sober pursuit of the nation’s business. Entertaining, but deeply unsatisfying.
Gossip is deplorable and irresistible — particularly when it involves pious hypocrites who delight in scolding. And tales of personal foibles, small deceptions, embarrassing liaisons, even (rarely) of private virtue, add juice, even humanity, to a dry business. No wonder we look.
Further, some of these recurrent “scandals” are potentially serious and worthy of attention. If robocalls, the attempt to misdirect voters to the wrong polling stations, is linked to senior Conservatives, the endless media hypothesizing and the opposition’s moralistic venting will be vindicated. But we are still in the world of “if.”
Meanwhile, a greater danger to the functioning of our democracy was laid out at a committee meeting this week by Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page, far from the bright lights. He reported that MPs are “starved of information” necessary to effectively review $250-billion of annual spending. That, arguably, is their most important job.
A perfect example of how disconnected from reality financial accounting has become: the government estimates for 2012-’13, released this week, do not reflect cuts expected in the March 29 budget. In other words, the estimates are already outdated. Why would MPs waste their time studying them?
Page reported, as well, that annual departmental reports have become “communications tools” rather than a scrupulous accounting of future plans and that “only a handful of people know how the whole system hangs together.”
Instead of breaking down spending by program — the child care bonus, the Afghan war, border infrastructure — the government offers MPs global figures, which obscure more than illuminate.
Ordinary members don’t have the time, resources, expertise, or co-operation from finance officials, to uncover the real cost of various initiatives. By some estimates, they spend an hour considering every $1 billion in spending. There is more consideration given to the average city budget.
That is a scandal and a costly one. But, because we are dealing with columns of numbers, not disposable cellphones, there haven’t been many national TV call-ins, or screaming headlines, over this insidious trend.
And, while governments of all stripes manipulate the numbers, few have been as brazen as the Harper Conservatives. They were found in contempt of Parliament last March for withholding the costs of their justice agenda. They don’t appear to have learned their lesson: this week Page (him again) suggested the government didn’t even do basic costing on their omnibus crime bill — and still hasn’t offered a credible estimate.
As for those F-35s, Peter MacKay insists the government is sticking to its original budget — $9 billion for 65 jets over 20 years, and $7 billion for maintenance. But with the cost-per-plane escalating rapidly, Canada could end up with 30 very expensive aircraft. Maybe someone should acknowledge that.
The government is similarly opaque on the question of job cuts in the pending budget — cuts that will hurt real people and could imperil the fragile recovery. Jim Flaherty says they will be moderate; John Baird says they will be “nothing”; critics fear a significant downsizing, but extended over time to dilute political reaction.
These issues — including questionable changes to the Old Age Security — do occasionally interrupt the obsessive search for smoking guns, ticking time bombs and rogue operators that dominates news coverage. But they are rarely pursued with the full-throated vigour devoted to more colourful, less urgent, matters. Maybe if Page changed his name to Pierre Poutine?
Meanwhile, MPs turned up the heat in question period on Thursday. Prime Minister Harper is now claiming the Liberals made those misleading calls! Smears all round.
In a few weeks, this controversy will fade as everyone prepares for a much-delayed, much-anticipated budget. That and the next ice cream truck.
Original Article
Source: ottawa citizen
Author:Susan Riley
This week it is robocalls. Last week it was Vikileaks. Not long ago, it was federal public servants “faking the oath” at a simulated citizenship ceremony. Before that, we had a Conservative backbencher’s schoolboy crush on a Chinese reporter and NDP showboat Pat Martin’s salty tweets.
There was the Conservative senator who wanted to provide convicted serial killers with do-it-yourself nooses. There was an extended furore over a mysterious “not” included in a cabinet minister’s decree. The longer list of trivial pursuits includes Bruce Carson’s bankruptcies, Maxime Bernier’s missing briefs, Helena Guergis and the “busty hookers,” Peter MacKay’s helicopter ride, and Justin Trudeau’s supposed separatist sympathies.
Increasingly, federal politics looks more like a sit-com than ground zero for the sober pursuit of the nation’s business. Entertaining, but deeply unsatisfying.
Gossip is deplorable and irresistible — particularly when it involves pious hypocrites who delight in scolding. And tales of personal foibles, small deceptions, embarrassing liaisons, even (rarely) of private virtue, add juice, even humanity, to a dry business. No wonder we look.
Further, some of these recurrent “scandals” are potentially serious and worthy of attention. If robocalls, the attempt to misdirect voters to the wrong polling stations, is linked to senior Conservatives, the endless media hypothesizing and the opposition’s moralistic venting will be vindicated. But we are still in the world of “if.”
Meanwhile, a greater danger to the functioning of our democracy was laid out at a committee meeting this week by Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page, far from the bright lights. He reported that MPs are “starved of information” necessary to effectively review $250-billion of annual spending. That, arguably, is their most important job.
A perfect example of how disconnected from reality financial accounting has become: the government estimates for 2012-’13, released this week, do not reflect cuts expected in the March 29 budget. In other words, the estimates are already outdated. Why would MPs waste their time studying them?
Page reported, as well, that annual departmental reports have become “communications tools” rather than a scrupulous accounting of future plans and that “only a handful of people know how the whole system hangs together.”
Instead of breaking down spending by program — the child care bonus, the Afghan war, border infrastructure — the government offers MPs global figures, which obscure more than illuminate.
Ordinary members don’t have the time, resources, expertise, or co-operation from finance officials, to uncover the real cost of various initiatives. By some estimates, they spend an hour considering every $1 billion in spending. There is more consideration given to the average city budget.
That is a scandal and a costly one. But, because we are dealing with columns of numbers, not disposable cellphones, there haven’t been many national TV call-ins, or screaming headlines, over this insidious trend.
And, while governments of all stripes manipulate the numbers, few have been as brazen as the Harper Conservatives. They were found in contempt of Parliament last March for withholding the costs of their justice agenda. They don’t appear to have learned their lesson: this week Page (him again) suggested the government didn’t even do basic costing on their omnibus crime bill — and still hasn’t offered a credible estimate.
As for those F-35s, Peter MacKay insists the government is sticking to its original budget — $9 billion for 65 jets over 20 years, and $7 billion for maintenance. But with the cost-per-plane escalating rapidly, Canada could end up with 30 very expensive aircraft. Maybe someone should acknowledge that.
The government is similarly opaque on the question of job cuts in the pending budget — cuts that will hurt real people and could imperil the fragile recovery. Jim Flaherty says they will be moderate; John Baird says they will be “nothing”; critics fear a significant downsizing, but extended over time to dilute political reaction.
These issues — including questionable changes to the Old Age Security — do occasionally interrupt the obsessive search for smoking guns, ticking time bombs and rogue operators that dominates news coverage. But they are rarely pursued with the full-throated vigour devoted to more colourful, less urgent, matters. Maybe if Page changed his name to Pierre Poutine?
Meanwhile, MPs turned up the heat in question period on Thursday. Prime Minister Harper is now claiming the Liberals made those misleading calls! Smears all round.
In a few weeks, this controversy will fade as everyone prepares for a much-delayed, much-anticipated budget. That and the next ice cream truck.
Original Article
Source: ottawa citizen
Author:Susan Riley
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