Phil Green's community web site

Welcome to philgreen.ca. This is my on-line Mississauga South home.

Erosion of Democracy

First published on June 30, 2010 in the Mississauga News

The Conservative Party has parachuted Stella Ambler into Mississauga South by calling a nomination for June 28, without opponents. Ambler, who works for Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, moved to Mississauga South last August from Bramalea-Gore-Malton, where she ran unsuccessfully in 2008.

Members of both the Conservative Party and the public should be angry.

Party leaders gained the power to fire and appoint candidates when the Elections Act was changed in the early 1970s. They used it sparingly at first. Now leaders from all parties use it routinely. They've learned it gives them tremendous control over both candidates and Members of Parliament. They can tell their MPs how to vote, what to say and with whom to speak — or else.

It turns MPs into party representatives to the people, rather than the people’s representatives to Parliament. It means that what matters about candidates is not their standing in the community and their stand on the issues, but what powerful people they know and what they'll do for them.

Interfering in nominations corrodes our democracy. “A prime minister demeans local democracy when he parachutes a candidate into a riding over the objections of local members,” said Prime Minister Harper in 2005 — something he clearly no longer believes, or cares about.

I wish members of political parties would put a stop to it. Party zealots take the unprincipled and dangerous stand that over-riding local democracy is justified if it leads to power and the chance to implement party policies. Other party members recognize that it's wrong, but argue that undermining democracy is a small price to win an election or get rid of a nomination contestant they don’t like. Still others give up their party memberships in disgust or dismay, leaving greater control of the party to the unprincipled and power-hungry.

Finally, there are those party members who feel torn between principle and party loyalty. They feel very uncomfortable, but don't know what to do. When they voice their discomfort, they're told, as I — a former Conservative candidate who was also banned from running — have been repeatedly told, to be a team player, not to offend the party or the leader, to wait until a new guard takes over the reins, or any number of other reasons to submit to arbitrary and undemocratic authority, and to abandon their principal duties as party members — to select candidates and to hold their leaders to account. The clear — and false — implication is that party members are accountable to their leaders for behaving well.

The Conservative Party used to say that candidates should be nominated in a fair, transparent and democratic manner. I remain loyal to that principle. I refuse to vote for a candidate, even from my own party, that was not. Such a vote is a vote for the subversion of our democratic rights. If that offends my party today, too bad.

Our politicians tell us what kind of light bulbs to use. They tell us what kind of fats we should eat, that we borrow too much and do not save enough. They tell us to get more exercise. They have no business telling us how to live — even if you happen to agree with them. Now they select our candidates. How long will it be before they select our Members of Parliament, too?

Phil Green is a longtime Mississauga resident and two-time federal Conservative candidate in Mississauga South.