So Who's the Dictator Now?

Recenty, former NDP MP, Bruce Hyer, has come out to the press about his former boss's dictatorial style and problems he had with honesty; evident in the way that he is constantly contradicting himself.

When asked during his interview with Peter Mansbridge about this, Mulcair only said that Hyer did not want to vote with his colleagues.

In an email to HuffPost, however, Hyer called Mulcair's statements "a total fabrication."  "I always supported 95 per cent of the NDP party platform. I still support much of it! But I feel very strongly that my primary role is as the representative of my constituents," Hyer wrote.  

"On some issues, an MP's responsibility is to put … constituents ahead of the party line. It is interesting that Mulcair immediately contradicted himself and said that I was 'someone who walked away from the party on a single issue.' Again and again, I see and hear a man who in his pursuit of power will contradict himself."

In fact as early as 2013, the Globe and Mail had already noticed the trend.

Much attention has been given to Conservative backbenchers who push socially conservative issues and are later overruled by cabinet. What is not well known is that Conservative MPs are far more likely to support motions from other parties – all of which are to the political left of the governing party. In contrast, the voting record of the official opposition under NDP leader Thomas Mulcair shows ironclad discipline. Not a single vote has been cast that is out of step.

This certainly lends credence to Hyer's comments. One of Mulcair's nicknames when he was in the Quebec legislature was objet immobile or immovable object.  He was very obstinate.  Recent analysis of voting patterns have shown that the NDP vote with their leader 100% of the time, while the Conservatives only 76%. So who's the dictator now?

During the 2004 election campaign, many Canadians were concerned with Stephen Harper's views on the Constitution, and fears that his platform would result in many court challenges.  It has.  But how is that any different from Mulcair's platform?  He is also threatening the Constitution with his promise to abolish the Senate.

Harper was also antagonistic toward the Supreme Court, suggesting that they had too much power.  As a populist, he believed that all the power should rest in the hands of elected MPs.  Is this not exactly what Thomas Mulcair is suggesting today?

He claims that if elected the Senate will have to answer to him.  I find that rather frightening.  Yes, the Senate is wounded but it is not broken, and is a vital part of our democracy.  They are supposed to the sober second thought, that would protect us from leaders like Mulcair and Harper, who believe in an autocratic style of government.

Sadly, they have become little more than a partisan cesspool, but that is where we need change.  Senators should not belong to any party.  If they are caught campaigning for, or against, any political party, they can no longer be a senator.  We need them to represent us.  We are the ones paying the bills.

Both Harper and Mulcair want the Constitution reopened to push their own agendas.  It won't happen because both Quebec and Ontario, have already said that they are not prepared to do that.

I have been accused recently of not being progressive because of my opposition to Thomas Mulcair. However, it is as a progressive, that I am sounding the alarm.

In November of 2009, Linda McQuaig wrote in the Toronto Star

If, as polls suggest, Stephen Harper is poised to win a majority, it's largely due to the media notion that his past reputation for extremism no longer holds. In fact, apart from his reluctant embrace of economic stimulus, Harper has shown little of the "moderation" that supposedly now puts his government comfortably within the Canadian mainstream.

I feel as McQuaig did then.  The media is once again being blissfully ignorant, or intentionally misleading, by ignoring Mulcair's past.  He was not an "extremist",  but he was virulently right-wing.  Most progressive journalists warned of Harper's devotion to the principles of Margaret Thatcher, yet most, including McQuaig, are now eerily silent on Mulcair's.

We can't make the same mistake twice.  If Mulcair is re-elected it will be as a Member of Parliament. Depending on the outcome of the election, he could be prime minister, opposition leader, or leader of the third party.

But under no circumstances will he be elected supreme being.  He will not dictate to the Senate.  He will not unilaterally change our constitution and he will not simply repeal anything, without the support of both Houses.

We've had a decade of this kind of government, and Canadians are weary of it.

Including this progressive.

A Deceptive Democracy: A Confidence Game

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

"Nothing is inevitable." - John Ralston Saul, Canadian Essayist

When Michael Ignatieff was in Kingston at the start of his summer tour, he was asked about one of the bills presented by the Harper government, and the egregious nature of some of it's elements. Ignatieff said that standard for this government was to present a bill, then tell the opposition to pass it, or they would call an election. "That" he said, "is what passes for democracy in the Harper government".

In the book I've been reading and sharing: Parliamentary Democracy in Crisis, one of the contributors, Gary Levy, also noted the pattern. In a section Playing Fast and Loose with the Confidence Convention, he says:

... there is no hard-and-fast rule about what is a question of confidence. It is widely accepted that certain traditional motions —namely, the motion to adopt the Throne Speech, the motion to adopt the budget, and the Appropriation Bill (government estimates) — are automatic votes of confidence.

There is less agreement on other areas related to confidence. What would happen if a government refused to resign when it had lost confidence? Does defeat of an important government bill always constitute a vote of confidence? Can procedural motions be considered matters of confidence? Can a government claim to have lost confidence without being defeated in the House? The failure of successive minority parliaments, starting with Paul Martin's, to find the right answers to these questions led to the December 2008 crisis. (1)

All governments have manipulated the process, but none to the extent of the Harper government. But they misjudged their power. They challenged the opposition to bring them down, and then were shocked when they called their bluff, resulting in the Coalition proposal.

What happened next was a horrible attack on our democracy, by a man who knew that the proposal was legitimate in a Westminster Parliamentary system, but intentionally misled the public into believing that this was some kind of coup. Former insider Tom Flanagan, after admitting that Harper's 2004 coalition attempt included the full support of the Bloc (2), justified Harper's actions by saying that he was fighting for his political life. His. Not ours.

But focusing on the nature of "confidence" issues, Levy also reminds us of Rob Nicholson's attempt to threaten the Senate into passing a bill. He should have known as Justice Minister that the Senate is not a confidence chamber.



But that was not the first time they tried to manipulate this body. Besides stacking it with fundraisers and party faithfuls, they also devised a clever scheme to make sure that senate bills they didn't like, never saw the light of day.

Bills that require a sponsor, were grabbed up by the Harperites, and then they never followed through, knowing that a bill automatically dies if its sponsor fails to show up twice for debate on it. This was noted with a bill aimed at ending pre-election partisan advertising binges. If passed this could have saved us over 100 million dollars on the Harper advertising extravaganza. (3)

And that's what passes for democracy in Harper's World.

Elected MPs can't talk, the media is banned, he prorogues when things get too hot to handle, he adds lobbyists to his staff, he squashes dissent, he sets fixed elections then ignores his own law, he bans books, closes our borders to "undesirables", launches witch hunts on anyone who might challenge him and attacks anyone who does.

This is democracy?

In his book The Myth of the Good Corporate Citizen, Murray Dobbin reminds us of how we accomplished our democracy, that is under attack by the corporate world. And he is blunt in his claim that the only ones who can reverse democracy's decay is us.

We have forgotten how we first achieved the things we are now losing. None of these community institutions was simply given to us by benign governments and good corporate citizens. The struggles of hundreds of thousands of men and women — citizens — in labour movements, farm movements, and social organizations made democracy real at a time when many of them did not know where their next meal was coming from. For them democracy was a process to be engaged in. (4)

This is how Stephen Harper is getting away with the things he is getting away with. Canadians are no longer engaged. They have thrown their hands in the air and their butts on the couch.

The social and psychological distance between citizen and government has become so great that the notion of government as an expression of community is weaker now than at any time in the post-war period. For far too many people political citizenship is an afterthought or, at best is reduced to brief and alienated participation in electoral rituals.

Maybe we got into this habit because we believed medicare, public education, a full-time job, and a future for our children would always be secure. These things are our right. But as corporations prove every day, rights, like democracy, are a process, not an institution. As community, as citizens, we haven't caught up with the new reality. (4)

We haven't started fighting back. If Olga Hudson can do it. If Betty Krawczyk can do it. What's the matter with the rest of us?

We've seen some positive changes. We won small victories with Kory Teneycke and Fox News North. Care for the elderly is back on the table. We've got a long way to go but it's a start.

The assault on democracy and equality by corporations and those who benefit from their power is couched in such terms as globalization for good reason. It creates an atmosphere of inevitability. We can, by this definition of reality, do nothing but attempt to adapt to the predetermined course of history. (4)

But remember John Sauls three little words: "Nothing is inevitable."

1. Parliamentary Democracy in Crisis, By Peter H. Russell and Lorne Sossin, University of Toronto Press, 2009, ISBN: 978-1-4426-1014-9- 2, Pg. 20

2. Ignatieff 'quality guy,' Flanagan says, By: Frances Russell, Winnipeg Free Press, December 11, 2009

3. Tory procedural ploy 'hijacks' Senate bills: Conservatives sponsor legislation they oppose, By Joan Bryden, Canadian Press, July 06, 2009

4. The Myth of the Good Corporate Citizen: Canada and Democracy in the Age of Globalization, By Murray Dobbin, James Lorimer & Company, 2003, ISBN: 1-55028-785-0, Pg. 5-6

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

More on Stephen Harper's announcement that he will be making nine patronage appointments to the Senate. Don Martin was having a good hair day.

PM's patronage sinks to new lows
By Don Martin,
Calgary Herald
August 27, 2009

When he anoints his very own Hallelujah Chorus to represent Canadians in the Senate in the coming days, Prime Minister Stephen Harper will have delivered his most compelling argument for electing senators.

Sources say up to nine vacant Senate seats will soon be filled, bolstering the Conservative standing to 46 seats in the 105-seat chamber.

Among the rumoured appointees are fawning Conservative party president Don Plett, bare-knuckled campaign manager Doug Finley and obedient former staffer Carolyn Stewart-Olsen.

An ideological politician who was disgusted at watching Parliament's upper house turned into a vote-stacking exercise, where only the faintest of serious or sober second thoughts actually take place, Harper has turned ruthlessly partisan in making his Senate appointments, elevating party loyalty into the sole consideration for the cushiest job on the Hill.

The argument for such warped behaviour was first advanced after Harper rushed 18 bums into Senate seats when the Liberal-NDP-Bloc coalition was threatening to take down his government. Better to load up the red chamber with loyalists before the Liberals handed out those juicy plums, he argued. (Don got this wrong. The Bloc were not part of this coalition. They only agreed to support it on confidence motions for 18 months)

But is it absolutely necessary for Harper to fill these $132,000 positions, with retirement deferred to age 75, with fanatical loyalists?

These insiders may not be known outside the parliamentary precinct, but that only makes their appointments more outrageous.

Their strongest, indeed ONLY, character traits for the job are blinkered vision and blinded loyalty. They will serve as little more than a vote administered by remote control from the PMO for as long as Harper owns the job.

There is a certain shenanigan symmetry to this, of course.

The Liberals appointed a former prime minister communications director named Jim Munson to the job. Stewart-Olsen comes from the communications wing of Harper's PMO.

The Liberals put their election wizard, David Smith, into the Senate. Finley has been the campaign guru for the Conservatives through all Harper-led elections.

But there's something sad about justifying the sliming up of the Senate with patronage trough-feeders on the grounds that Tories are no worse than the Liberals.

There's also the incongruity of giving faithful Conservatives a job representing provinces which rejected them in the polls. Fabian Manning grabbed a Senate gig representing The Rock just two months after he was defeated as an MP there in the last federal election. Rumours have former premier Rodney MacDonald, ousted from power in Nova Scotia only two months ago, landing a seat.

The Senate is becoming the land of the misfit politicians, but at least most of those types have solid people skills.

Not so much for gruff Doug Finley, who excels at campaign donor shakedowns and serving as guard dog in deciding who was worthy of receiving Conservative nominations (including his wife Diane Finley) . Ditto for Stewart-Olsen, severed from the PMO a few months ago, whose enforcement of low-level directives and constant singing of Harper's praises are somehow seen as ideal senator material.

Of course, the ultimate objective can only warm the hearts of true blue Conservatives. This batch of appointments edges the Senate closer toward the glorious day when it will fall under Conservative control.

But Harper could've and should've done better--even though the inside view is that he did not get enough credit for delivering decent appointments under his watch.

True, the appointment of Bert Brown, who had been voted in twice in Alberta elections, was commendable.

Former broadcaster Pamela Wallin deserves credit for projecting a dignity of independence as a bona fide celebrity senator, even while standing with the government when the votes are called. And while I've been hard on former CTV icon Mike Duffy, at least he bonds with average Canadians even while shamelessly promoting the Conservative agenda.

But the names so far fall short of having any skills to represent their assigned provinces in a more effective Senate. They will only represent Stephen Harper. That's why we must find a better way of making quality Senate appointments --or elect to abolish it entirely.

I say abolish it, since the Conservatives have simply found a new way to make it dysfunctional.

Conservatives Use Dirty Tricks To Silence the Senate

Since coming to office in 2006, Stephen Harper has silenced the media, silenced the civil service and silenced his caucus; but now he has also found a way to silence the senate, by ensuring that bills he doesn't like will never see the light of day.

From his little black book of dirty tricks to make sure that Parliament doesn't work, he is now also making sure that the Senate doesn't work, giving him free reign to run the country in the way he sees fit.

Unfortunately, his ideas do not resonate with the majority of Canadians, so we are now being 'dictated' to, by a man who has only managed to gain the support of about 35% of the country.

This is a democracy?

Tory procedural ploy 'hijacks' Senate bills
Conservatives sponsor legislation they oppose
July 06, 2009
Joan Bryden
THE CANADIAN PRESS


OTTAWA – When Liberal Senator Dennis Dawson introduced a private member's bill this spring, it was instantly denounced by the governing Conservatives as an "unCanadian" and anti-democratic assault on free speech.

So he was taken aback to discover a few weeks later that a Conservative MP had volunteered to sponsor his bill once it makes its way to the House of Commons.

Dawson's bill is one of 28 private members' bills proposed by Liberal or independent senators that Tory MPs hastened to sponsor last month – a novel procedural tactic that, despite government denials, Liberals suspect is designed to stop the bills dead in their tracks.

"They've found a way to hijack the process," fumed Dawson.

"Now I know that even if I get (my bill) through the Senate ... it will be hijacked in the other place by somebody who represents a party that's already opposed to it."

Normally, the author of a Senate private member's bill arranges to have a sympathetic MP sponsor it once it clears the upper house and arrives in the Commons. The sponsor informs the clerk's office that he or she will take responsibility for shepherding the bill through the Commons.

But last month, Tory MPs began rushing to the clerk's office to sponsor bills almost the moment they were introduced in the upper house, whether or not they actually supported the bills and without waiting to see if they'd actually ever make it to the Commons.

Jay Hill, the Conservative government's House leader, denies the government is trying to pre-empt Senate bills. Rather, he says the move is aimed at controlling the volume of senators' private members' bills so that they don't unduly eat into the limited time available for MPs' private members' business.

"I can tell you there's no intention to start a war with the Senate," Hill said in an interview.

"The intent is to ensure that we have a fair system and by that I mean fair for both houses."

Still, Hill acknowledged there are "a range of ways" the government can kill a senator's bill it doesn't like. He didn't rule out using them on bills such as Dawson's, which is aimed at ending pre-election partisan advertising binges.

Hill noted that a bill automatically dies if its sponsor fails to show up twice for debate on it.

"It was not my intention when we started this strategy to use this process to make sure bills don't see the light of day," he said. "Certainly within the rules that could be the outcome. But we're going to review them on a case-by-case basis."

Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale said the latest ploy is "an effort to muzzle a house of Parliament," and part of the government's continuing "vendetta" against the Senate. He said it's particularly hypocritical given the Tories' denunciations of the unelected chamber as an affront to democracy.

"What they're basically saying is these topics (in the senators' bills) will not be debated. So it is very clearly the stifling of free speech."

Tory procedural ploy could muzzle Senate

Three of the 28 bills sponsored by Tory MPs were initiated by Lowell Murray, who sits in the Senate as a Progressive Conservative (not to be confused with the current Conservative government, that is neither progressive nor conservative).

He said he suspects all three of his bills are sufficiently controversial – particularly one calling for repeal of the Conservative's vaunted fixed-election-date legislation – that his uninvited Tory sponsors won't be keen to advance them through the Commons.

"It's a corruption of the system, that's what it is," said Murray.

"And it's stupid along with everything else because if the Senate dug in its heels, it would be very difficult for the government to get its business done."

But Hill said the government resorted to the tactic only after opposition parties rejected proposals to make the private-members' business process fairer for MPs. (And yet he claimed they weren't doing it all)

MPs' names are drawn in a lottery for precedence in presenting private-members' bills or motions. Typically, there are 15 top bills or motions before the Commons at any point, with another 15 ready to go.

Whenever a private-members' bill arrives from the Senate, it is accorded priority in the queue immediately following the initial 30 – pushing back all the MPs in the tail-end of the lengthy line-up.

Hill said the process is unfair to MPs, many of whom never get a chance to introduce private-members' business. He wants to end the priority precedence given to Senate bills but opposition parties won't go along with him.

Ralph Goodale, the Liberal House leader, said MPs' private-members' bills are accorded the same priority when they arrive in the Senate. He predicted the Tory ploy to give lesser priority to – or simply kill off – senators' bills in the Commons will lead to tit-for-tat treatment of MPs' bills in the Senate.

Since both houses of Parliament must approve all bills before they can be enacted, the tactic could put an end to private-members' business altogether.

"You would, in effect, kill private-members' business, period."

Goodale said the latest ploy is part of the government's continuing "vendetta" against the Senate. And he said it's particularly hypocritical given the Tories' denunciations of the unelected chamber as an affront to democracy.

"What they're basically saying is these topics (in the senators' bills) will not be debated. So it is very clearly the stifling of free speech. It's an effort to muzzle a house of Parliament."

Goodale said Liberals may launch a procedural challenge to the Tory tactic when Parliament resumes in the fall.

EDITORIAL
Stifling debate in Ottawa
Toronto Star
July 07, 2009

In opposition, the federal Conservatives used to fret about the "democratic deficit" in Ottawa. "A new Conservative government will be committed to significant democratic reform of our parliamentary and electoral institutions," vowed their 2006 election platform.

Little did we know that by "reform" the Conservatives meant stifling any debate on initiatives that run counter to their views or interests.

Thus, we have witnessed a series of anti-democratic manoeuvres by the Conservatives, such as: an effort to steer all committee investigations into the ditch (lest they embarrass the government); a declaration that all votes on government bills would be considered confidence votes (the direct opposite of what they said they would do); and an attempt to cancel public financing of political parties (which would have hurt the opposition much more than themselves).

Now, thanks to The Canadian Press, we learn that the Conservatives are attempting to silence debate on private members' bills emanating from the Senate by bending the parliamentary rules. Here's how:

A private member's bill from the Senate must have an MP as a sponsor in order to be considered in the House of Commons. But there is no requirement that the senator has to approve of the sponsor. Taking advantage of this loophole, Conservative MPs are stepping forward to sponsor Senate bills even when they don't agree with them. Then the Conservative sponsors see to it that these bills never come forward for debate in the Commons.

Some 28 private members' bills from the Senate have been targeted in this way. They include bills to impose spending limits on pre-election advertising by the parties, require the government to promote and protect aboriginal languages, and loosen up restrictions on the delivery of generic drugs to Africa to fight AIDS.

With their oh-so-clever tactics, the Conservatives have now ensured these bills will not even be debated, let alone approved.

That the Conservatives feel they must stoop to such tactics says much about their bunker mentality in Ottawa today.

Why Mike Duffy Must be Removed from Senate

Last October, during the final days of the election campaign, and the Liberals were starting to climb in the polls; Mike Duffy pulled out all the stops, not to broadcast news but to discredit Stephane Dion.

We all know how he was repaid for his efforts and as he sits in Senate, no longer accountable for his actions, it begs the question. Does he have the right to continue to enjoy the benefits of such a position after being charged by the Canadian Broadcast Council for unethical behaviour?

Along with his partner in crime, Steve Murphy, he greatly impacted the views of voters. However, he only impacted them to stay home on election night, because none of the lost Liberal votes went to the Conservatives, who were also down from last election. Duffy merely helped to muddy the waters of the entire electoral system, and in turn, the democratic process. This puts into question his ability to represent Canadians in a fair and intelligent manner.

I'm helping to pay his salary and as such believe he should now be fired.

CANADIAN BROADCAST STANDARDS COUNCIL
national specialty services Panel
CTV Newsnet re an episode of Mike Duffy Live Prime Time(Stéphane Dion Interview)
(CBSC Decision 08/09-0213 & -0281)
Decided April 6, 2009

THE FACTS

Mike Duffy Live Prime Time was a political public affairs program of limited duration. While Mike Duffy Live was a regular series, the special Prime Time episodes were at times material to this decision only aired during the 2008 Canadian federal election.

On October 9, 2008, CTV Atlantic journalist Steve Murphy interviewed Liberal leader Stéphane Dion for the second time during the 2008 federal general election campaign. During the interview, it appeared that Mr. Dion had not understood Murphy’s first question and the Liberal leader asked to re-start the interview a total of three times. On the fourth occasion, the uninterrupted interview continued for about twelve minutes. CTV Atlantic (CJCH-TV) aired the interview process in its entirety, that is to say, the false starts followed by the complete interview, on its 6:00 pm newscast.

Later that evening, Mike Duffy Live Prime Time, broadcast on specialty service CTV Newsnet, had as its primary subject of discussion the Murphy-Dion interview and restarts, which had by then begun to generate considerable public controversy and interest on the part of various news organizations (although it is unclear to the Panel whether any other broadcasters had aired the stops and restarts). The complete interview was not included in the Duffy episode, which began with the host’s introduction of that day’s principal topic:

Hello again and welcome to the Thursday edition of Mike Duffy Prime. Well, the Harper Conservatives got some good news today and it wasn’t just the World Economic Forum, which rated our banking system as the best, the most secure in the world. This good news came in the form of a devastating reminder of Stéphane Dion’s struggle with the English language. We’ll have the tape in just a few moments. If you’ve got a PVR, set it on “record”. This is going to be one you’ll be talking about for days....

First, the tale of the tape..... What we’re going to show you is exactly what happened in that Halifax hotel suite. The tape has not been edited. CTV Newsnet then broadcast the interview stops and retakes, ending shortly after the final restart, which resulted in the Liberal leader’s response to the final, only slightly altered, version of the initial question.

Murphy: "Monsieur Dion, the economy is now the issue in the campaign and on that issue you’ve said that, today, that Mr. Harper’s offered nothing to put Canadians’ minds at ease and offers no vision for the country. We have to act now, you say. Doing nothing is not an option. If you were prime minister now, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper has not done? (In order for Mr. Dion to be PM 'now', he would have had to have been elected in 2006)

In the rest of the full interview, which continued from that point but was not broadcast on the Duffy show, the Liberal leader, in response to Murphy’s several questions, dealt with what he would say “to ease the minds of Canadians”, the Liberal economic plan, the proposed carbon tax, deficits, the green shift, taxes, comparable European national policies, and Canada’s military mission in Afghanistan.

At this point in the Mike Duffy Live program, Duffy facilitated a panel discussion with representatives from three of the major federal parties. The caption at bottom of screen during this portion of the program was “Campaign Exhaustion?”

The topic of discussion then shifted to other aspects of the election, primarily the various parties’ prospects in different ridings. The MP panel portion of the program concluded and Duffy spoke to CTV correspondents Tom Clark and Craig Oliver via telephone. During this segment, the caption at the bottom of the screen was “Dion’s False Starts” and live footage of Dion giving a speech was shown as the commentators discussed the issue.

Duffy: CTV’s Tom Clark is covering the Liberals in Laval. Tom, how are the Liberals explaining this Dion language problem? Are they doing the Geoff Regan move here and saying it’s all about his handicap and anybody who mentions it’s picking on him?

Clark: No, uh, surprisingly, Mike. Um, the Dion Tour is not saying it’s because of a physical handicap. They are saying he did not understand the question. But they are steaming mad, I can tell you. They are saying that this is an “appalling”, in their words, they say this is an “appalling breach of journalistic ethics”.

They had asked for the TV station, CTV station in Halifax not to run those false starts. Uh, they believed that they had, initially, an agreement that those false starts would not be run and now they are saying that nefarious or higher-ranked, uh, uh, people within the organization, within the network, uh, went back on that word, uh, and ran what everybody has seen tonight.

Duffy: Well, it’s clearly part of CTV News policy that no reporter on the street can make deals. Uh, the camera’s rolling and, and we don’t make deals with anyone. It doesn’t matter who they are....

Duffy: Yeah, well, Geoff Regan put it down to being a handicap and we’re making fun of a handicapped person, which we are not doing. We’re covering the election campaign. Thank you both for joining us tonight. Undoubtedly this will be water-cooler talk tomorrow as Canadians, uh, get ready to make their choices in the upcoming election.

The CBSC received numerous complaints about the Dion interview, both about the original CTV Atlantic broadcast of the clip and about its rebroadcast on this episode of Mike Duffy Live Prime Time. A total of ten complaints specifically identified Mike Duffy Live Prime Time as their subject of concern. Of the ten, six provided enough information for the CBSC to engage its process and, of these, only two individuals requested that the CBSC rule on the matter following receipt of the broadcaster’s response ...

Those complainants were concerned about the inclusion of the Murphy interview in the Mike Duffy Live Prime Time program. They expressed the view that Murphy’s question had been awkwardly worded, so it was understandable that Dion had comprehension difficulties, which were compounded by the fact that he was operating in his second language. They wrote that the broadcast of the false starts was unfair, particularly since CTV Atlantic had initially told Dion that they would not air them (that fact was clearly acknowledged by Steve Murphy in his introduction to the clip on the CTV Atlantic News at 6 newscast).

One of these two complainants characterized the broadcast of the Dion footage as an attempt to “make news rather than simply report it,” while another articulated his concerns about Duffy’s presentation by questioning whether “Mr. Duffy’s words and facial expressions reflect professional journalism?”

The formulation of the question itself.

Since much turns on what was asked and what was understood, or misunderstood, the Panel considers it useful to look carefully at the formulation of the question itself. It was initially put as follows: “If you were prime minister now, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper has not done?” When the interview recommenced, the question was framed almost identically, the adverb “already” having been inserted to qualify the verb: “If you were prime minister now, what would you have already done in this crisis that Mr. Harper hasn’t done?” And then, in the context of the “good” interview, that ran in full, there was no structural change, the word “today” having been substituted for “now” and “by now” for “already”; the question was worded in this final incarnation as follows: “If you were Prime Minister of Canada today, what would you have done by now that Stephen Harper has not done about this economic crisis?” […]

In any event, any moderately attentive analysis of any of the three forms of the initial question would reveal that the question is confusing, and not only to a person whose first language is other than English. In the strictest grammatical sense, Steve Murphy’s question mixes not only tenses (present and past), but also moods (subjunctive and indicative), both being syntactically relevant in French and English.

It follows that several interpretations of what the interviewer intended to ask are possible. What the Panel (speculatively) believes the interviewer wished to ask was essentially what Mr. Dion would have done in the past about the economy and this crisis had he been in Mr. Harper’s shoes during the same period. If such is the correct understanding, the question would have been more properly framed, “If you had been prime minister during the period that Mr. Harper has been prime minister, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper has not done?” Or, it may be that the question Murphy wished to put was meant to have a present/future articulation, as in “If you were prime minister now, what steps would you be taking about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper has not yet taken?”

Given the confused question, the Panel considers that the interviewer may even have intended to ask whether Mr. Dion would have taken specific steps to obviate such an economic crisis in the first place. Alternatively, did Murphy mean to inquire how Mr. Dion would have tackled the economic crisis had it landed on his plate after two years in office? Or did he wish to request how, if Mr. Dion were elected as prime minister on the day of the interview, he would handle such an economic crisis encountered that day or thereafter, in the future? Indeed, Mr. Dion appeared to understand that there could be a difference in the answer depending on how long he might have been in office before being called upon to face such a problem. As he ultimately pointedly asked, “give me a first date where I’m prime minister that I can figure out what, what is your question […] about [emphasis added].”

The Panel’s only point is that the question was unfocussed, unclear and ultimately confusing, even to Anglophones (as all Adjudicators on this Panel are). It was neither crisp nor even clear, and it left doubts as to its meaning in the interviewee, the audience, and even this Panel, after viewing and reviewing the logger tape. In other words, blame for misapprehension cannot simply be laid at the feet of the interviewee.

The Newsworthiness Issue

There are two aspects to the newsworthiness issue, one that was raised in the CTV Atlantic decision and one that flows from the Duffy rebroadcast of the false starts.

The first issue relates to the broadcast of the outtakes at all. The majority of the National Specialty Services Panel agrees with the Atlantic Panel. The undisputed newsworthy element of the original broadcast was the complete interview, which ran for about twelve minutes after the restarts, beginning at about 6:41 pm. In that part of the 6:00 pm newscast, Mr. Dion discussed his platform and offered suggestions for dealing with the economic crisis in response to the initial poorly formulated question. The balance of the interview (a little more than an additional ten minutes in duration) dealt with what he thought should be said “to ease the minds of Canadians”, the Liberal economic plan, the proposed carbon tax, deficits, the green shift, taxes, comparable European national policies, and Canada’s military mission in Afghanistan.

That is where the substantive meat was, not in the restarts. Despite the presence of that complete interview following the initial four minutes of introduction and restarts, the Atlantic Panel concluded that it was a code breach “for the broadcaster, CTV Atlantic, to reverse its commitment and broadcast the outtakes.” In the matter at hand, where almost none of the substantive electorally-relevant content was provided to the audience, the Panel finds that the rebroadcast was unfair in terms of Clause 6 of the CAB Code of Ethics.

The second issue relates to the fact that the CTV Atlantic broadcast of the restarts was itself newsworthy, that it had become newsworthy. As the President of CTV News said in his November letter, “That evening and the next day, the interview and the restarts were reported by several news organizations including The Canadian Press, CBC, Newsworld, Global News, The Globe and Mail and The Toronto Star [emphasis added].”

The majority of the Panel considers the following conclusion of the Atlantic Panel to be of relevance: What then was the broadcaster really seeking, if not the full questions and the full answers? It appears to have been the stumbles, the whoopses, and the mis-starts. Given the poor quality and confusing syntax of the question, the Panel does not accept the “justification” that Mr. Dion’s command of English could be shown to be “so poor that he could not understand a question with different tenses.”

Fairness

[The Atlantic Regional] Panel (two-thirds of the industry Adjudicators being themselves members of RTNDA and broadcast journalists of considerable experience) considers that restarts and retakes are a common, not a rare, occurrence. The decision to extend such a courtesy was neither unreasonable nor even unusual.

Such outtakes, the Specialty Services Panel concludes, are very common, even absolutely routine. The Panel does not, therefore, even find it a modest stretch to have a person in authority agree to a restart, or even more than one restart. After all, once that ball was rolling, there was no reason to expect that anything had changed when it came to restart three or even four. On any of those restarts, the interviewer could have said “No, we must carry on from here.” Murphy did not and, in the view of the Panel, the Liberal leader and his team had every reason to expect that the restarted matter was, in effect, “overwritten” or banished from use. ... Had the question been articulate and well-framed, the Panel might have expected the Liberal leader to wear some responsibility for the confusion that ensued. That was not, however, the case.

Even had the question been properly put, though, the broadcaster’s commitment to permit the restarts would likely have put the filmed content off-limits. In the circumstances, the question was bad and the commitment was made. The Panel views the broadcaster’s actions in the rebroadcast of the outtakes on the Duffy show as an unfair and improper presentation of news, opinion, comment and editorial, contrary to the rule established in Clause 6 of the CAB Code of Ethics.

The National Panel also acknowledges that, while the host, Mike Duffy, was entitled to have and manifest an opinion, as this was, after all, a mixed news and public affairs show, not a pure news program, he went too far. He was not fair, balanced or even-handed. In addition to the unfairness of the rebroadcast noted immediately above, the host significantly misrepresented the view of one of the three members of his Panel, namely, Liberal MP Geoff Regan, who had attributed the misunderstanding as a hearing issue and had said, “I don’t think that we should […] spend a lot of time talking about someone’s physical impairment.”

About 20-30 seconds later (all of the following emphases being added), ignoring totally the actual words of MP Regan, Duffy said “you fob it off as, we’re making fun of someone’s physical impairment.” And, in his next observation, the host reiterated the fallacious assertion, “And then you tell me we’re making fun of his physical impairment?” Despite the fact that guest panellist Geoff Regan twice said, “That’s not what I said,” and it is clear from the transcript that was not what he said, Mike Duffy persisted in his misrepresentation.

In talking with his CTV colleagues Tom Clark and Craig Oliver, Duffy next said, “Are they doing the Geoff Regan move here and saying it’s all about his handicap and anybody who mentions it’s picking on him?” He concluded the item with these words, “Geoff Regan put it down to being a handicap and we’re making fun of a handicapped person.” The National Specialty Services Panel concludes that the consistent misrepresentation by host Mike Duffy of the MP’s point of view constituted an unfair and improper presentation of opinion or comment contrary to Clause 6 of the CAB Code of Ethics.