The Ottawa Citizen from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada • 16

The editorial page THE OTTAWA CITIZEN THURSDAY, DECEMBER 27, 2001 Gaffes for Hall aplenty of Shame MBS ON BffffiHE YOUR MISSION ISTO DEFEND 9,922,330 SQUARE KILOMETRES AY HOME. AS WELl AS CARRY OUT PEACE' KEEPIMGTASKS IN FOREIGN COUMTRIES-WITM ANTIQUATED EQUIPMENT AMD INADEQUATE SI I -At EDITORIALS Revitalizing Parliament Susan Delacourt One of the problems with all these year-end reviews we see all over the place at least for politicians is that they revisit the high points and the low points of the 12 months just passed. The only way to endure the political life, I understand, is to constantly replay victory reels in your head, while developing a state of selective amnesia about your mistakes. This is why, for instance, Prime Minister Jean Chretien talks so much about winning elections and less about his near-loss in the Quebec referendum of 1995. This is also why Canadian Alliance MP Rahim Jaffer has regained an official title within his party, nine months after the stupid stunt in which his aide posed as the MP on a Vancouver radio call-in show.

Politicians have varying approaches toward apologizing for mistakes, depending on the severity of the error or their own shamelessness. But at the end of it all, punished or not, they must eventually be able to pretend the mistake never happened. But then the year-end reviews come along, and the public gets a chance to tut-tut again at the doltish behaviour that has long since been forgotten by the political perpetrators. In this vein, one online Canadian political magazine, www.punditmag.com, is running a year-end survey that reminds us of some of the political low points in 2001. Respondents are asked to choose among eight "ugliest moments" that could easily fill one corridor in a Canadian politics Hall of Shame.

Here's the magazine's list (feel free to add your own): Canadian Alliance MP Diane Ablonczy now a leadership contender for her party compares Prime Minister Jean Chretien to accused war criminal Slobodan Milosevic. The minister for state for multiculturalism, Hedy Fry, declares that white supremacists' crosses are burning "as we speak" in Prince George, B.C. Canadian Alliance MP Rob Anders speaks out against honorary citizenship for South African anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela, calling him a terrorist and a communist Toronto Mayor Mel Last-man pronounces an aversion to' visiting Kenya because "I just see myself in a pot of water with all these natives dancing around me." FUNWMO. motions of non-confidence. Even if it lost the odd bill, it would not automatically fall.

Governments (Liberal and Tory) fear this, but shouldn't. Ideological agreement would keep most MPs on-side on most bills. Ambitious backbenchers would seldom vote against the prime minister. Still, the need for ministers to persuade rather than whip backbenchers into line would, over time, make a difference. Ministers would become more willing to incorporate regionally and factionally sensitive changes into legislation before it is introduced, and more open to amendments afterward.

Second, let committees review nominees for judgeships, senior parliamentary offices and heads of Crown corporations. Third, select committee chairs by secret ballot among committee members. Fourth, put limits on how often time allocation closure may be used in a Commons session. A government could enact these modernizations of parliamentary process by convention. It could then turn its attention to more complicated but even more valuable reforms, such as binding referenda and provision for recall of elected officials.

Making Parliament work again could be a legacy for Jean Chretien, or whichever prime minister is bold enough to do it. If MPs became somebodies again, and electing them made more difference to how the country was run, perhaps the 40 per cent of electors who have given up on casting ballots might even return to the voting booth. That would be especially good for the health of our democracy. commentsnsns.southam.ca No, minister It is sadly that we report on Sir Nigel Hawthorne, elsewhere referred to as Sir Humphrey Appleby. While it would be premature to commit ourselves to a definitive position on his merits or even his existence, a committee is being struck to consider the possibility of a decision, in the fullness of time, to regret his passing, if any.

Ottawa Citizen 5H Mil tni ILTH Oil (i in Jl i 1 7 1 1 1 1 io Quebec Premier Bernard Landry calls the Canadian flag "a piece of red rag." Maria Minna, the minister for international co-operation, casts a ballot in a Toronto by-election even though she doesn't live in the riding, detouring around the residency rules by giving the address of her constituency office Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day flip-flops on whether he met with "spy" James Leigh, and then blames the media for the controversy. Liberal MP Tom Wappel writes a letter to an 81-year-old blind constituent, asking why he should help him in his bid to get government benefits when the man didn't vote for Mr. Wappel in the last election. Yikes. When you read all these incidents together, it really does make you cringe.

Who would have thought a mild-mannered country such as Canada could produce such noteworthy examples of bad political behaviour? A few interesting things show up in this list. First, note the international flavour of some of the egregious remarks: two revolve around Africa; a couple of others veer into foreign terrain as well. This could indicate that for some politicians, normal powers of rhetorical self-restraint stop at the Canadian border. Women are also represented here more than usual, meaning that female politicians may be nearing equality, if not in numbers, at least in bad-judgment territory. My vote goes to Mr.

Wappel, though, because his ugliest moment wasn't made in the heat of partisan debate or in the unforgiving glare of the media spotlight, when normal judgment or self-restraint can be impaired. No, quietly and deliberately, he sat down and wrote out a lecture in nasty Realpoli-tik to an elderly gentleman who had the temerity to exercise his democratic choice. Brazenly, Mr. Wappel insisted the man's election-day ballot was relevant to getting help from government. It's worrying enough that the MP thought this was the way things were done; worse yet that he assumed it was his job to pass on this corrupt theory to his constituents.

We just have to hope that Mr. Wappel learned from his mistake before he forgot it and that the others on the list absorbed some truths before their errors disappeared into the receding memories of 2001. Next year, no doubt, we'll have a whole new crop of nominees for "ugliest moment." Cross your fingers that none of these people, or those kinds of mistakes, are up for another run at the title. Susan Delacourt writes on national affairs. Reach her at sdelacattcanada.ca Patrick Brennan, Vice-President of Manufacturing Published by the proprietor, Ottawa Citizen Group at uoi Baxter Box 5020, Ottawa, K2C 3M4 A division of Southam Publications, a Can West company ed), defence spending is down by almost one-third in the past eight years.

Chretien is wrong to say, as he did in his Global TV interview, that now "It's all airplanes. It's all bombardment no troops on the ground, virtually." Yet even if he were right, how could he justify the fact that fewer than half our combat aircraft are capable of flying missions? Our forces have no attack helicopters. They lack long-range aircraft to patrol our coastlines. They are short ships and missile defence. The computers in their jet fighters are less sophisticated than those in a Nintendo game really.

The truth is, the Liberals have neglected and abandoned our military, and are now blaming the Canadian Forces for its own impoverishment. Lome Gunter writes for the Edmonton Journal Pierre Trudeau once scoffed that MPs "50 yards from Parliament Hill are just nobodies." Compared with the reality, that would be a vast realm of influence. Most MPs are nobodies even on the HilL Going back before even Trudeau, and then through his era to Brian Mulroney's and now Jean Chretien's, Parliament has calcified. Its debates rarely effect meaningful change on legislation closely sheltered by cabinet ministers. Since 1993, the government has used closure powers more than 70 times to shut down discussion altogether.

Last month, debate on the mammoth Anti-Terrorism Act was cut off after only three days. The biU infringes on fundamental Canadian rights such as free speech, free assembly, due process of law and the right to remain silent during a criminal investigation. Canadians deserved more debate on it The House of Commons ratifies less than one-third of the $180 biUion the federal government spends annually, and even that is by rote. The rest is determined by statutes, regulations and orders-in-counciL Increasingly over the second half of Canada's existence, Parliament has given way to the Prime Minister's Office. The members elect the Speaker of the Commons, but nearly every senior permanent staff member is appointed by the PM.

The chairs of Commons committees sit at his pleasure, so few ever use their committees to subject government policies, spending or legislation to rigorous scrutiny. Votes at committee are routinely "whipped" (an apt expression See his face Time magazine didn't name Osama bin Laden person of the year. He had the most impact if Sept. 11 changed the world as much as nearly everyone thinks, but Time feared some readers might see such a choice as an endorsement So it chose Rudy Giuliani for his inspiring response. In the same spirit, John Manley is Time Canada's Canadian newsmaker of the year.

An editorial from Southam News Editor-in-chief Murdoch Davis meaning party discipline is enforced) just as are votes in the Commons. Rigid party discipline has contributed to the fragmentation of Parliament. Their region's aspirations routinely frustrated within the governing party's caucus, westerners bolted to Reform, while Quebecois were driven to the Bloc A committee of House leaders reported several months ago on possible reforms, but limited to making unanimous recommendations, it merely tinkered. Short of a messy revamping of the Constitution, what can be done to restore Parliament's pre-eminence? Quite a lot First, relax the caucus discipline and ease the whips. Canadian MPs have less room for independent voice or action than members of any other federal legislature in the developed world.

Clifford Lincoln, a former Quebec cabinet minister and now a backbench Liberal MP, says ordinary members are treated as "stupid" and expected to act as "voting machines." Officially, enforcement of party discipline on all Commons votes is called the "confidence convention." But it is only a convention, a bad habit; it is neither a statutory nor constitutional requirement. The government should free its backbenchers to vote as they please, except on direct on the cover The Canadian Press and Broadcast News survey, by contrast, felt safe picking Stockwell Day. No one would suspect them of approving of him. Ottawa Citizen Winners and losers Bob Phillips looks back on the Outaouais. Please see City Editorial Page, D4.

OTTAmAClTIZEN James Orban, Vice-President Sales and Marketing and Assistant to the Publisher Susan Armstrong, Vice-President of Reader Sales Deborah Bennett, Vice-President of Human Resources and Finance Russell Mills, Publisher and President Scott Anderson, Editor LynnMcAuley, Managing Editor Don Butler, Executive Editor Christina Spencer, Editorial Pages Editor Even Nintendo is better-equipped than our Canadian Forces run LORNE GUNTER Robertson, the Secretary General of NATO, who has recently complained Canada is not pulling its weight? Chretien would argue, I suppose, that all these people and organizations are just fronts or. puppets for military contractors greedy to win lucrative deals for weapons and equipment the Canadian Forces doesn't need so long as it has pocket knives and an infinite supply of birch saplings it can whittle into pointy sticks. The truth is, even with the nearly $3 billion the Liberals have added to defence spending or plan to add ($1.7 billion since 1998, another $1.2 billion over the next five years), Canada spends half the NATO average share of GDP on its military. And while the defence budget is what it was when Mr. Chretien's government took over, that's in nominal dollars.

In real dollars (inflation-adjust There's one difference between my game and Chretien's vision of the Canadian military, though. Chretien wants the Canadian Forces to go into real fights with pretend ordnance. And that's a deadly difference. But don't you dare criticize the PM for his belief that our forces are "well-equipped." No, no; if you so much as venture a "Please, sir, I want some more," Mr. Bumble er, sorry, Mr.

Chretien will threaten to crown you with the gruel ladle. Actually, he'll attempt to divert attention from his government's appalling mistreatment of our army, navy and air force by seeking to undermine your credibility. In a gallingly arrogant year-end interview that aired Christmas Day, Chretien told Global TV's national anchor Kevin Newman that the Liberal government has restored the defence budget to its pre-1994 levels, and that anyone who disagrees is just a special-interest lobbyist. "There is an industry that produces armaments for government," Chretien sneered, "that says you should buy more of our stuff. There are a bunch of guys who are lobbyists who are representing those who sell armaments who tell you that." Gad, I'm sure he had the phrase "military-industrial establishment" on the tip of his tongue, and just couldn't spit it out So what about the company commander who worries his soldiers have had insufficient training in combat situations to face a real enemy in the field? Oh, he's a lobbyist.

A couple of summers back, I watched new recruits training at the base at Wainwright, Alta. They had helmets, uniforms, backpacks and rifles. They were prostrate on the ground pointing their weapons downrange at targets. When I didn't hear any gunfire, I asked my host what they were doing. "Aiming practice," he replied wryly.

There was insufficient money for bullets, so the recruits were, in effect, practising what it would be like to practise shooting. What about the battalion CO who has to plan a deployment abroad knowing he will be unable to take his armoured vehicles along, and will have to ask the British or Americans to supply his unit's food and water? According to our prime minister, that battalion CO is nothing more than a shameless shill for the defence industry. Or how about the auditor general, who estimates the Forces need $4 billion more over the next five years just to maintain its readiness for peacekeeping and limited combat? Or the Conference of Defence Associations? Or the Royal Canadian Military Institute? Or George Edmonton Pow. Pow, pow. Rat-a-tat-tat.

Tatatatatata. Tu-ooooo. (Sorry, that's supposed to be the whistling sound a bomb makes as it's falling.) BOOM! Swoooosh. (Jet plane.) Fump, fump, fump, fump, fump. (Helicopter.) Just what am I doing? I'm playing Canadian Forces as our prime minister, Jean Chretien, conceives of them.

I'm fighting with pretend bullets and pretend guns; pretend bombs, too..