Striking silence descends on Quebec’s Question Period after peace pact

theglobeandmail.com
Sept. 18, 2015
By Les Perreaux

The spectacle plays out in legislatures across the land: A member rises to pose a mundane question and his opponent responds without even pretending to answer. Around them, fellow caucus members rise to express ecstatic support, clapping and barking like trained seals looking for a half-rotten fish to be tossed their way.

No more in Quebec. This week marked the start of a bold experiment in parliamentary decorum where members of the National Assembly sat on their hands, shut their mouths and used their ears during the daily Question Period.

“Thank God for it,” said Ned Franks, an emeritus professor of political studies at Queen’s University and an expert in parliamentary procedure. For years Prof. Franks has longed for an end to the rote applause that has spread like a virus in our houses of assembly.

Few people believed when the unanimous motion passed Tuesday that MNAs might actually manage to stifle it during Question Period, a daily 45-minute show that rang with hoots of derision and occasional insults - a frat-house routine similar to the one that plays out in the House of Commons and most provincial legislatures. But shut up they did - at least for a week - as Speaker Jacques Chagnon used his newfound mandate to crack down on the occasional rogue “bravo!” or clap that sprung up spontaneously.

The peace treaty was the idea of PQ MNA Francois Gendron, the most senior member of the assembly who will mark his 39th year there in November. He has long worked on improving decorum and the quality of debate in the National Assembly.

“I’m very happy with the new attitude, this new level of respect,” said Mr. Gendron, who is a deputy speaker of the assembly. “It won’t solve everything, but it’s a start.”

Mr. Gendron said an exercise that was supposed to be a check on government power had descended into “a ridiculous spectacle. Nothing has done more damage to the reputations of politicians than the antics of Question Period.”

One sign the parties were serious about calming down occurred last week when Liberal House Leader Jean-Marc Fournier made a surprise appearance at a news conference of his adversary in the Parti Quebecois, Bernard Drainville. The two men shook hands and declared a pact of non-aggression to incredulous reporters.

By Tuesday, they were ready for a first try. The results were striking. At first, it seemed awkward, as though every exchange lacked punctuation as the usual rhetorical flourishes bounded from the benches and were met with near silence instead of rapturous cries. But it also felt like everyone was paying more attention.

“We managed to do more questions than usual,” Mr. Chagnon said to close the first session. “Maybe we could see this model exported.”

Don’t count on it, at least not in Canada. Many legislators across the country seem to take glee in the juvenile tactics employed in their houses. In British Columbia, one MLA was nicknamed “Thumper” for his enthusiastic desk-slamming and is rumoured to have damaged the hearing of his desk mate. In Ontario, even Premier Kathleen Wynne and Tory Whip John Yakabuski get into the heckling while the Speaker seems to have a high tolerance for noise. The dean of Queen’s Park, Jim Bradley, likes to break the no-prop rule, flashing signs taunting opposition members.

Reporters across Canada often note how school children on field trips visit the public galleries and are aghast to see behaviour they could never get away with.

However, Prof. Franks said legislatures shouldn’t go too far in extracting emotion from debate. Outbursts are part of British parliamentary tradition, he said. He doesn’t mind tapping on desks or the occasional shout as long as everyone shuts their mouths when the Speaker rises.

“I get unhappy when the Speaker’s on his feet and the members are still yelling at each other. Speakers should all yield the staff a little bit harder on them,” he said. “But one has to accept the basis of parliamentary government is opposition. They disagree, they fight, they fight to rule. You’ve got a bunch of alpha males on both sides of the house and if you expect it to sound like the quiet meditation of an Oxford classroom it’s not going to happen.”

Quebec’s political parties, notorious for being chronically late for nearly every event, also agreed to start Question Period on time and so far have shown remarkable discipline.

Mr. Gendron hopes to introduce other measures before he hits his 40th anniversary as a member in late 2016. He wants to find ways to waste less time in the house, and maybe even encourage members to actually answer questions. “Maybe we can turn it into answer period,” he said.