From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy 

By Jay Goldberg

Losing seats has consequences. Bending the rules after the fact isn’t one of them

Are the present rules in Canada’s Parliament grotesquely unfair? The New Democratic Party wants Canadians to think so.

The NDP suffered a crushing blow in April’s federal election, losing more than two-thirds of its seats and official party status to boot.

Ever since, the party’s leaders have been trying to convince Prime Minister Mark Carney to bend the rules and allow the party to regain what is called official party status.

As of today, a party in the House of Commons needs at least 12 seats to qualify as an official party. The NDP’s interim leader, Don Davies, wants to see Carney lower the threshold so the NDP’s seven-member caucus can qualify.

“If he wants this Parliament to work and he wants to do anything progressive, he’s going to have to reach out to New Democrats,” said Davies. “It’s up to the Liberals.”

“Reaching out” means more than just a phone call. For Davies, it means granting the NDP official party status, which comes with millions of dollars of operational funding, paid for by taxpayers, as well as the right to participate as a party in Question Period and sit on parliamentary committees.

Changing the rules simply because the NDP failed to connect with voters last spring would be an insult to Canadian taxpayers.

But Davies’ plea does raise some questions. Why is the number 12? Why not 10, or 20 for that matter? And is the 12-seat threshold high by national standards?

The Westminster system of government, which Canada adheres to, is clear about many things. For example, in order to form a majority government, a party needs to hold at least 50 per cent plus one of the seats in the legislative chamber.

But in Canada, the threshold to qualify for official party status is all over the map. In the House of Commons, it is 12. In the Senate, it is nine. And in provincial legislatures across the country, it ranges from one seat in Prince Edward Island to two in British Columbia to five in New Brunswick and 10 per cent of the total seats in Ontario.

The federal NDP may have a point that the 12-seat threshold at the federal level is an arbitrary number. But does it fall outside the national range? Is it at the upper end of the spectrum, and thus perhaps genuinely unfair?

At the lowest end of the range among Canada’s provinces is British Columbia. In that province, a party needs to hold just two of 93 seats in the legislature, or 2.15 per cent, to gain official party status. At the upper end of the range is New Brunswick. In that province, a party needs to hold five of 49 seats, or 10.2 per cent, to gain official party status.

At the federal level, the NDP holds just two per cent of the seats in the House of Commons.

That means that even if British Columbia’s rules, the most liberal in the country, were applied at the federal level, the NDP would not qualify for official party status.

In other words, not only would today’s federal NDP fail to qualify for official party status in British Columbia, but it would also fail to qualify for official party status in province after province across the country.

Relatively speaking, the current House of Commons rules, which require a party to hold 12 seats, or 3.5 per cent of the total seats in the chamber, to gain official party status, are at the liberal end of the spectrum.

So the NDP’s argument does not stand up to the facts. Across the country, based on the size of its caucus, the NDP would not qualify as an official party. The present rules in the House of Commons are well within the normal bounds of rules in legislatures from coast to coast.

Canadian taxpayers should not be on the hook just because the NDP did not receive more support at the polls.

Jay Goldberg is a fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.

At a time when healthcare, housing, and transit are collapsing, the premier’s focus tells you everything you need to know

Ontario is in the middle of a housing crisis, a healthcare collapse, gridlocked cities, and a cost-of-living squeeze that’s eating people alive. And Doug Ford’s big move? Threatening to pull Crown Royal whisky from LCBO shelves.

This isn’t satire I can assure you. This is very real.

According to multiple outlets, Ford says he “can’t wait” to follow through on removing Crown Royal to “send a message.” A message to who, exactly? And about what? Because it’s hard to explain to a nurse working double shifts, a young family priced out of housing, or a senior waiting months for care why their premier is fixated on a liquor brand.

This is what out of touch really looks like. People aren’t asking for symbolism. They’re asking for solutions. Ontario residents are watching emergency rooms close overnight. Rent climb faster than wages. Transit grind to a halt. Homeless encampments become permanent fixtures in cities that used to feel livable.

And instead of addressing any of that with urgency or focus, Doug Ford is busy performing cultural theatrics with whiskey bottles. That’s not leadership, which is pretty clear. Its nothing more than another pathetic distraction.

It feels like the kind of move you make when you don’t have answers left, so you create noise instead. No one actually thinks removing Crown Royal from LCBO shelves is going to improve life in Ontario. Not even the people defending it.

This isn’t about public safety. It isn’t about affordability. It isn’t about health or infrastructure. It’s a headline grab. A gesture. Something to point at while real problems continue to rot underneath.

And the thing is, Ontarian’s aren’t stupid. They can tell when their government is playing dress-up instead of doing the job even if they won’t say it out loud.

Ontario doesn’t need any more messages, it needs someone who is competent. Doug Ford says this move is about “sending a message.” But Ontarians have already received plenty of messages from his government.

The message that healthcare workers are expendable. The message that housing affordability isn’t urgent. The message that congestion and gridlock are just things people should accept.
The message that optics matter more than outcomes.

If the government really wanted to send a message and cared to help, it would start with a serious, enforceable housing plan, emergency healthcare staffing solutions, transit timelines that mean something and accountability for ballooning costs and shrinking services.

Instead, we’re talking about Crown Royal like it matters. This is nothing more than what happens when leadership runs dry and has no where else to turn. When politicians stop solving problems, they start staging performances.

They pick safe targets. Harmless symbols. Things that won’t actually change anything but will dominate a news cycle. And they hope the public is too tired or distracted to notice the absence of real work.

But people notice. They notice when their lives get harder while government priorities get dumber. They notice when energy is spent on nonsense while essentials fall apart.

Ontario doesn’t have a Crown Royal problem. It has a leadership problem and always have since Doug Ford took office.

A premier focused on whiskey shelves while the province fractures at the seams isn’t “sending a message.” He’s broadcasting how disconnected his government has become from reality. If this is what passes for focus at Queen’s Park right now, Ontarians have every right to ask what else is being ignored while the cameras are pointed at the liquor aisle.

Because this province deserves better than distractions.

KELSI SHEREN

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