Dear Mr. Klassen:
Thank you for your message about the timing of the next election.
I fully understand the angst about another campaign. The timing issue arises from Mr. Harper's decision, almost exactly one year ago, to break his own "fixed election date" law and force a snap vote one year early.
That was the campaign that was totally out-of-order and unnecessary, but its consequences linger on.
Attached are a couple of recent commentaries which I have published about this issue. The position of the Liberal Official Opposition is both clear and appropriate. The onus has now shifted to the Conservatives and the NDP. The timing issue is in their hands.
Yours sincerely,
Ralph Goodale, MP
Wascana
(I've included his attached commentaries in the comments section to this post)
3 comments:
RALPH GOODALE’S REPORT
A weekly commentary by the Member of Parliament for Wascana
goodale@sasktel.net
For the week beginning September 7th, 2009
MR. HARPER CHOSE OCTOBER OF 2009
Stephen Harper says he doesn’t want an election this October!
That’s odd? Wasn’t it Stephen Harper himself who picked October of this year for a federal election?
Yes, it was! Remember his “Fixed Election Date” law? He pushed it through Parliament about two years ago. He ordered Canadians to the polls in October of 2009. That timing was Mr. Harper’s idea.
But somewhere along the line, something happened. For his own convenience, he pulled the plug early. He violated the law – his law – by calling an unscheduled and unnecessary election a year early, in October of 2008.
No one forced him. He was never defeated on a “confidence vote” in the House of Commons. He just wanted to have an election. Why? Because he knew a nasty recession was coming, and he knew he had already put the country into a damaging deficit long before that recession ever began.
Mr. Harper’s premature 2008 campaign was his way of trying to “beat the rap” for squandering Canada’s hard-earned financial strength.
Another point to bear in mind is this -- instead of governing, the Harper Conservatives have been electioneering for many months now.
Mr. Harper is the one who has saturated the television networks with bitter “attack-ads”. He’s the one who has stuffed mail-boxes across the country with nasty pamphlets. And all of this is subsidized by taxpayers – millions of your dollars wasted on self-serving, misleading Conservative propaganda!
So Mr. Harper picked the original timing for a vote and started campaigning. It’s a bit hypocritical for him to complain about it now.
But hypocrisy has become his trade-mark. Beyond “Fixed Election Dates”, remember all those other broken promises about equalization, income trusts, no deficits, no appointed Senators – the list goes on.
If an election comes this fall, Stephen Harper must shoulder the responsibility!
RALPH GOODALE’S REPORT
A weekly commentary by the Member of Parliament for Wascana
For the week beginning September 14th, 2009
YOU HAVE TO SAY “NO” TO A BULLY!
Everybody understands public weariness with election campaigns.
There’s no “good time” to ask people to vote. It will always be inconvenient, especially during an unstable minority Parliament when the interval between elections is shorter.
But at some point – when a government is blatantly incompetent and dishonest – a line must be drawn. Confronted with unrepentant government misbehavior, the Official Opposition cannot just “look the other way”.
After giving the Harper regime nearly a year to show some good intentions, the Liberals have made it clear that their patience is exhausted. (The onus has shifted to the NDP or the Bloc Quebecois to sustain the Conservatives.)
A pattern of unacceptable government dishonesty began accumulating long ago.
The first example was probably that $800 million falsehood told to Saskatchewan about equalization, followed by a $25 billion falsehood told to two million innocent investors about Income Trusts.
Add to that, the dishonesty about fixed election dates, Senate appointments, floor-crossers, the threat of a recession and deficits!
Add to that, the loss of nearly 500,000 full-time jobs, an infrastructure program that has an 80% failure rate, the squandering of Canada’s financial strength BEFORE there was any recession, ballooning debt of more than $160 billion over six years (instead of four more surplus budgets), and the bungling of public health issues around H1N1 flu, listeriosis and medical isotopes.
Add to that, the failure to deliver for Saskatchewan – no help for our livestock and forestry sectors, unfulfilled promises about cellulose ethanol plants and a police research centre, no secure funding for the RCMP Heritage Centre, the attack on PFRA and the Grain Commission, and the elimination of the Prairie Grain Roads Program.
Add to that, months of bitter Conservative attack-ads and hate-mail.
The Harper regime represents what’s wrong with politics in Canada. This country can surely do better!
We probably could do better, but I don't see anyone in any party that I can imagine would.
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