Friday, October 19, 2007

Why The Political Party System Needs To Die

I have been closely following Canadian politics over the last few years, and things are getting much worse in the House of Commons and in provincial legislatures. For this article, I will be focusing on the Federal political scene. We have a few major political parties, and a few fringe parties. We have the Liberal Party of Canada, the Conservative Party of Canada, the New Democratic Party, the Green Party, some fringe parties, and those elected members who sit as independents. The current Conservative Party of Canada is made up of what was formerly the Progressive Conservative Party, the Reform Party, and the Canadian Alliance Party. Or, as I call them, the Conservative Reform Alliance Party, abbreviated as CRAP. Gee, with all these parties, it is no wonder most of them spend much of their time acting like drunken teenagers at a fraternity party on a Saturday night.

These days, the CPC is running the show in the Canadian Parliament. They have a minority government, and Prime Minister Stephen Harper is itching for a majority like a crack junkie itches for a fix. His reign as PM is noted by his leadership style, which is that of the schoolyard bully who forgot to take his daily dose of Prozac. He forbids his MPs from speaking to the press, they must toe the Party Line or get kicked out of the party, as was the case with Garth Turner and Bill Casey who stood up for their constituents against the wishes of the Prime Ministers Office, and must always remember that the party comes first and foremost, and the people come last. To me, this has gone on for far too long, and I don't see any way that the problem can be fixed under the current party system.

On the other hand, I do see a possible solution. This is likely not a new idea, but it is worth mentioning in case someone else hasn't heard of it or thought of it themselves. I would suggest that we should completely kill the current party system and start from scratch with a completely new system. I would propose that each voting district would have several people run to be the local representative, in an independent manner. Whomever gets the most votes goes to the House of Commons to represent the voters of that district. Once everyone who was elected arrives at the House of Commons, and Parliament is in session, the first order of business would be to have the MPs elect a Prime Minister from among their ranks, using a nomination and voting process to elect the Member with the most votes. If no Member has a clear majority, then those who got the lowest number of votes would be removed from consideration, and the process would continue until a majority is reached by a Member. Then, the newly elected PM would then start the process of deciding who would make up the Cabinet, with the assistance of the other MPs. As an elected PM, he could be removed from the role by a majority vote in the House of Commons if he or she became too controlling or was otherwise deemed to be incompetent in the role.

In this way, there really are no parties. Just people elected to represent the people, hopefully working together for the common good. No party allegiances, no Prime Ministerial browbeatings, etc. There are probably a hundred details, big and small, that need to be addressed, but we need to at least get the national conversations started, and the sooner, the better. The current system is devolving into a chaotic mess, with nothing being accomplished, and every move being aimed at improving the conditions and position of each Party, by the members of that Party, with little regard to doing what is best for Canada as a whole. The more people we have talking about the issues, and thinking about solutions, the sooner we'll be able to kill this wasteful system, and create a shiny new system that will actually make Parliament work once again. Call me a dreamer if you like, but I dream of a system that is better than the one we have now. A guy can dream, can't he?