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A Citizen's Guide to Public Accountability, by Henry McCandless

II. Accountability in the New Canadian Minority Parliament

The federal Canadian parliament that opened in October 2004 offers yet another breakthrough opportunity in public accountability. This is because the government is in a minority situation. Noting the healthcare example, the opposition political parties can decide to install, for the first time in Canada's parliamentary history, reasonable standards for the executive government's public answering to the House of Commons. This is because they have the combined votes to do it.

Their voting power can also cause the reporting standards for the executive government to be statutory. No governing party would invite a confidence vote by saying in effect that they did not want parliamentarians and citizens better informed and having a valid base for confidence and trust in the government.

But opposition Members of Parliament must themselves want adequate public accountability, and thus far they have shown no inclination to go beyond their ritual rhetorical questions in the House of Commons or overcome partisanship in their committees to deal with a nonpartisan answering obligation.

As one example, the federal Conservative party's recent election platform offered better accountability. But the party defined it principally as having the Auditor General do more -- a totally wrong notion of government accountability.

Key issues for accountability in the new parliament are set out in the article: "Public Accountability in a Minority Government" in the Autumn 2004 issue of Canadian Parliamentary Review, published in October 2004 and received by all federal and provincial elected representatives. The article is reprinted here with permission. The three issue areas dealt with in the article are accountability for management control in government, accountability for government policy intentions and the need for a federal government Public Accountability Act.