PUBLICATION:
Edmonton Journal
DATE:
2003.03.21
EDITION:
Final
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE:
A18
COLUMN:
Lorne Gunter
BYLINE:
Lorne Gunter
SOURCE:
The Edmonton Journal
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Big
man! He made a woman cry: Chretien browbeats caucus into adding to gun-registry
absurdities
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The
spectre of Prime Minister Jean Chretien reducing a female MP to tears at the
regular Wednesday meeting of his Liberal caucus, over her misgivings about
voting new millions for the federal gun registry, is still further proof that
being Liberal means never having to admit you're wrong, much less say you're
sorry -- even when presiding over the most dishonest public policy in a
generation.
Rose-Marie
Ur represents the rural Ontario riding of Lambton-Kent-Middlesex, which forms a
crescent around Sarnia from Lake St. Clair in the west, to Lake Huron in the
north.
Like
a lot of rural Liberal MPs, Ur is facing pressure from constituents to close the
billion-dollar registry. Since December, when Auditor General Sheila Fraser
revealed the depth of waste and ineptitude at the registry, Ur has been
advocating for its closure, pending an investigation into how nearly $1 billion
could have been squandered on a registry that is still at least three to four
years from functioning properly.
"We
are talking about huge amounts of taxpayer money here and it's simply been
wasted," Ur told her local Chatham Daily News the day after Fraser brought
down her report last December. "There is no excuse for it and it can't be
allowed to continue."
But
Chretien, in full dictatorial flower, says not only can the waste be excused and
continued, it must be excused and continued.
On
Tuesday, the House of Commons will be asked to approve $59 million to pay the
registry's bills to the end of the current fiscal year (March 31), plus another
$113 million for fiscal year 2003-04. So adamant is the prime minister that his
MPs vote the extra money -- even though no appreciable changes have been made to
the registry's ineffectual operations since Fraser's report -- he has threatened
to expel from caucus any Liberal who turns down the request.
He
has also threatened to make the motion a confidence vote in his government. If
by some fluke it failed, the government would then fall and an election would be
triggered.
Chretien
did not exercise this level of caucus discipline in 1995 when the registry bill,
C-68, was passed into law. In June of that year, nine Liberals MPs, including
Ur, voted against the creation of the registry.
But
the continuation of the registry is another matter. To cut off its funding now
would be to concede the Liberals' critics were right all along, and the Liberals
wrong. And that would never do.
The
only person more determined than a Liberal with a good idea is a Liberal with a
bad one, particularly one that has been revealed to all as utterly without
merit. To admit error would be to admit fallibility. And more even than the
Pope, a Liberal prime minister is convinced of his own infallibility. So the
more colossal the screw-up, the more lavish the defence of it must be.
Wednesday,
the Liberals sent a four-part series of talking points to all their MPs and
Senators with their typical distortions, half-truths and spin on the registry:
They claimed it is increasing public safety (although gun crime is up), support
for it is widespread (not anymore), opponents are spreading myths about the
registry (like the government's myth that it would only cost $2 million?) and
the action is being taken to improve operations (for instance, promoting the
last head of the registry to an even more senior post in the Justice
department).
It
is a hard-won power of Parliament that it alone may approve or deny the King's
budget. The ability to say "yea" or "nay" to the King's
plans for spending and taxing is Parliament's principal check against the
absolute power of the monarch. But when that power was won three centuries ago,
no one ever conceived of the day when the King would take up a place in
Parliament, when the prime minister would begin to rule as if by divine right --
as if he had been crowned, rather than elected.
Rather
than permit the handful of Liberal backbenchers with guts enough to oppose the
registry and the dignity to represent their constituents as they see fit, rather
than concede there is anything wrong with the registry, Chretien squeezes one of
his own MPs, in front of his entire caucus, until she breaks down and cries. Ooo,
big man.
Not
only is Tuesday's fully whipped vote a denial of the waste and futility of the
registry, it is also proof positive that Justice Minister Martin Cauchon told
Parliament a tall tale in December when he asked for, but failed to receive $72
million to fund the registry to the end of March. After withdrawing the request
for more money, Cauchon said the registry would survive through "cash
management." Apparently cash management was only good for $13 million of
the registry's expenses, though, not the full $72 million, which is why Cauchon
is back asking for another $59 million now.
Hiding
the registry's failures, distorting its record of crime-prevention, keeping
Parliament in the dark over its costs and berating one's own MPs to keep it
alive is what passes for democratic accountability in Liberal Ottawa.
lgunter@thejournal.canwest.com