Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound Conservative MP Alex Ruff says Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s prorogation of Parliament is, “All about changing the channel,” and taking the focus off the WE controversy and the resignation of Finance Minister Bill Morneau.
The Prime Minister and Bill Morneau are facing ethics investigations for not recusing themselves during discussions about the since-cancelled government decision to award WE Charity a sole sourced contract, to administer a $912-million student volunteer grant program.
Ruff says, the prorogation shuts down the committees that were investigating the issue, “They don’t want the continued coverage and heat and light being put on the different testimonies that are being presented at the finance and ethics committees, official language committee,” says Ruff, noting it also shuts down the accountability session that was slated for next week.
The prorogation cancels the one sitting day left of the summer, which was set for August 26th.
Still, Ruff notes, he hadn’t predicted Trudeau would make such a move, “I wasn’t expecting it considering Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s past public statements that he would never do something like this, so it caught me by surprise. Maybe It shouldn’t have, but I thought when somebody says they’re not going to do something, they’re not going to do it.”
In 2015, Trudeau campaigned on a promise his government would not prorogue parliament to avoid answering questions after the Harper Government prorogued parliament four times during two terms.
When the government sits in its new session September 23rd, it will present a new throne speech.
Trudeau said Tuesday, “We are taking a moment to recognize that the throne speech we delivered eight months ago made no mention of COVID-19, had no conception of the reality we find ourselves in right now.”
The Prime Minister added, “We need to reset the approach of this government for a recovery to build back better.”
Trudeau’s plan is to have a cabinet retreat before coming back with a plan in September in the hopes of gaining the support of opposition parties with a confidence vote on it, he told reporters Tuesday, “We need to present that to parliament and gain the confidence of parliament to move forward on this ambitious plan. The prorogation we are doing right now is about gaining or testing the confidence of the house which is the opposite of what the Conservatives did, that we rightly railed against back in 2015.”
Ruff doesn’t believe Parliament needs to be shut down for the government to come up with a new plan, “To me, they can try to spin it whatever way they want. There’s nothing stopping the government from working a new economic plan as we’ve been asking them to do for months now. They haven’t had a budget released in over a year. Why not? They didn’t even provide a proper fiscal update back last month, they provided what they called a snapshot, yet everybody else, the parliamentary budget officer and all that, can do the prediction.”
He adds, “I’m very comfortable in saying that the great public servants that we have working within the finance department very easily could have put forth a plan, but this is all about changing the channel because they’ve now had a minister resign, there’s ongoing ethics investigations by the Ethics Commissioner of both Morneau and Trudeau. It’s a way for them to try to get the media and us in opposition from all three main opposition parties from questioning and trying to get answers for Canadians which is very frustrating,” says Ruff.
Meanwhile, ending this session of Parliament means any bills or legislation other than Private Member’s Bills, (which are exempt) are back to ‘square one’ says Ruff, “They could be reintroduced at whatever stage they were at but that requires a unanimous consent motion.”
As for his thoughts on Canada’s new Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland, who was appointed Tuesday to take Morneau’s place, Ruff says, he doesn’t know Freeland personally and has nothing to say about her appointment other than, “That’s the purview of the Prime Minister, is he gets to choose his Ministers and he’s chosen Ms. Freeland to do that.” Ruff says he hopes she doesn’t, “Have those same sorts of questionable ethical shortfalls that Morneau has, and hopefully she’ll perform there and do a better job.”
Meanwhile, the Federal Conservative Party expects to announce its new leader Sunday night, deciding between Erin O’Toole (who Ruff supports), Peter MacKay, Leslyn Lewis, and Derek Sloan.
On whether or not Ruff thinks that party leader will be soon be the next Prime Minister of Canada he says, “That’s up to Canadians to decide. That would be my vote, and my desire because I think we need a party and a leader that’s going to respect Canadians and actually is going to come up with an economic plan to get us through this.”
The Throne speech requires a confidence vote, and if opposition parties don’t support the plan it can trigger an election.