Parliamentary Secretary Paul Calandra speaks in the House of Commons during question period in Ottawa on Friday, Sept. 26. Photo: THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang The depravity of our politics is measured not by Paul Calandra’s sins, but by his confession; not by the confession, but the absolution.
Roasted for days over his performance in Question Period Tuesday, in which he had met a straightforward, factual question — on what date will the military mission in Iraq end? — with a series of non-answers about an NDP fundraiser’s views on Israel, the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary, Paul Calandra, rose in the House, his voice shaking, to deliver an apology.
In the style of most political apologies, it quickly turned to self-praise. He had, he said, been so carried away by his “passion” and his “anger” at these repugnant statements (such, we were to understand, was the acuteness of his conscience) that, quite without meaning to, he had put on this sustained display of contempt for the House.
Not that this was the first such display, nor it seems the last. “I’m fairly certain there will be other opportunities in this House,” he said, “where I will be answering questions [in a way] that you don’t appreciate. I don’t think this will be the last time I get up and answer a question that doesn’t effectively respond.” So: I’m very sorry, and I promise to do it again.
After which he sat down — to a standing ovation from all sides.
Paul Calandra, Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, during Question Period . Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press
There is no useful distinction to be made between sincerity and pretence in this tableau. Calandra’s self-pity was undoubtedly genuine, his manipulativeness admirably unforced. And the House’s empathetic response? We know you have no intention of changing anything. Neither do we. Indeed, your non-answers weren’t a great deal different than the non-answers we are normally given, or the ones we’d give ourselves, in the same position, just more obvious. Our chagrin was as feigned as your contrition.
Mind you, in a way being obvious does make it worse. Though the non-answer is as frequent a feature of Question Period as the non-question, it is ordinarily bounded by the time-hallowed conventions of hypocrisy. The minister who takes the trouble of pretending to answer does Parliament the courtesy of dissembling; by his efforts at concealment, he implicitly acknowledges there is a standard expected of him, even if he declines to meet it. He’s still not answering the question. But by observing the proper rituals, custom is respected, and a certain equilibrium between the parties is maintained. The Mafia operates on much the same lines.
Calandra’s overtly nonsensical answers, by contrast, represented a deliberate flouting of convention. He was not just refusing to answer the question: he was rejecting the whole concept of question-answering. He was not only taking no care to conceal his refusal: he was going out of his way to make it obvious. It was a calculated snub to the Opposition, offered up, what is worse, in full view of the public. No wonder they were so filled with fake indignation.
We should not attach too much importance, then, to this one episode, except as an illustration of how deeply sick our politics has become. The problems of Parliament do not begin or end with the 45-minute daily farce that is Question Period, and the problems of Question Period cannot be laid at the feet of the hapless Calandra.
Indeed, though he made a point of absolving the “kids in short pants” in the Prime Minister’s Office of any responsibility for Tuesday’s performance, news reports later indicated that it was in fact at their insistence. And though he can be faulted for accepting the assignment, he is hardly the first to do so. Pierre Poilievre, Dean Del Mastro — there is never a shortage of eager young backbenchers ready to sacrifice their conscience, their dignity and their reputation in the prime minister’s service.
Nor does the government side have a monopoly on bad behaviour. Calandra may have violated parliamentary custom, but much of what has become the custom shows no less contempt for the intelligence of all involved. I’m not sure failing to answer a question properly reserves you a spot on any lower rung of hell than jumping to your feet to applaud every stray utterance of your leader, or reading your question from notes written for you by party staffers, or making theatrical shows of delight at some grade-school taunt issuing from your side of the House, or equally theatrical shows of outrage at the same taunt if delivered from the opposite benches, or any of the rest of the mind-numbing, soul-destroying, stomach-turning charade our politics has become.
It isn’t a matter of a few especially obnoxious MPs or bullying leaders. It’s cultural: a shared culture of obsequiousness, cynicism and gall, a collective readiness to set aside the ordinary restraints on human behaviour. Shamelessness may have reached new heights in the form of a Calandra or Poilievre, but to some extent it afflicts our politics generally.
Culture is far more ingrained, far harder to amend, than mere rules and procedures. Change the rules all you like — for example, to give the Speaker power (or remind him of his existing power) to insist that answers be relevant, as Speakers in other Parliaments do — but unless the culture changes, the result will be much the same. Indeed, absent a change in the culture, you’re unlikely even to see changes to the rules. MPs have had several opportunities to reform various aspects of Parliament in recent years, and in every case declined.
Five years of minority government came and went, years in which the opposition could have forced through changes in the rules. Nothing came of it. Michael Chong’s 2010 list of proposals to fix Question Period? Nowhere to be found. Last year’s Speaker’s ruling, inviting members to stand to be recognized during member’s statements, instead of meekly taking their place on the party whip’s list? How many have done so? The newly eviscerated Reform Act is only the most recent missed opportunity. As long as MPs are unwilling to recover their independence, not to say their self-respect, it’s not going to happen.
It may have suited the government to humiliate Calandra today. But nothing else has changed, and on past form nothing will.
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