helmer.ca → academic : The Importance of MPs
The Importance of MPs
Jesse F. Helmer
For Dr. Robert Williams
Political Science 260B
10 June 2003
Pierre Elliot Trudeau is Canada's most famous politician. Canadians interested in politics are not indifferent to Trudeau: he incited extreme feelings in both friends and foes. Compared to most Members of Parliament, Trudeau was, to say the least, unusual. His experience of Parliament Hill was also unusual. It is not surprising, then, that Trudeau's opinion on the relative importance of MPs — that they are nobodies 15 minutes away from Parliament Hill — is incorrect. This paper divides MPs into three groups: those in government, those in opposition, and those independent of parties. Government MPs are subdivided into five subgroups: Cabinet ministers, caucus officers, backbenchers, committee chairs, and parliamentary secretaries. Opposition MPs are subdivided into three subgroups: caucus officers, critics, and backbenchers. Independent MPs are not subdivided. Drawing heavily on David Docherty's Mr. Smith Goes To Ottawa: Life In The House Of Commons, this paper outlines the various parliamentary responsibilities of each of these groups, describes the role of an MP in his or her constituency, and argues that the concentration of power in the Prime Minister's Office from Trudeau to Chrétien and the political realities of the party system in Canada mean that most MPs are — and will remain for the foreseeable future — much more important in their constituencies than they are on Parliament Hill.
Clearly, the few MPs who are also members of the Cabinet are more important on Parliament Hill than backbenchers are. Cabinet ministers have, in addition to the responsibilities of regular MPs, several additional, time-consuming responsibilities (Archer 248-49). These additional responsibilities give Cabinet ministers a great deal of legislative influence, depending on how the legislation relates to their departmental responsibilities (Archer 253).
Parliamentary secretaries, as assistants to Cabinet ministers, play somewhat important roles on the Hill. Since they are appointed by the PM and are subordinate to Cabinet ministers, their legislative influence is limited. They do, however, have more influence than government backbenchers.
Government and opposition caucus officers — House Leader, Whip, Deputy Whip, and others — play important partisan roles. Some of these positions, such as Whip and Deputy Whip, are directly responsible for party discipline. Docherty convincingly argues that these positions are used indirectly by the party to ensure party discipline (23). MPs who hold these positions are more important on the Hill than simple backbenchers: if these partisan positions did not exist, party discipline would be much harder to enforce and the governing and opposition parties would be less effective. Caucus officers, then, are quite important on the Hill. Their importance on the Hill likely varies inversely with the size of their caucus, however, since caucus officers in a small caucus would likely devote fewer hours to their caucus duties than caucus officers in a large caucus.
Opposition critics play an important role on the Hill. Since the media tends to focus on Question Period (Archer 199), these MPs, along with Cabinet ministers, are the public face of Parliament. If an opposition critic is able to consistently embarrass his or her corresponding Cabinet minister, then he or she plays a very important role. As opposition MPs, however, their legislative influence is marginal. Opposition critics can be very important on the Hill, but they are generally only important.
Committee chairs have more legislative influence than caucus officers or opposition critics, but less than Cabinet ministers. Committees can propose amendments to bills, so committee chairs have some legislative influence (Archer 181). Since they are now elected by the House of Commons, rather than appointed by the PM, committee chairs are even slightly protected from sanction by the PM.
The legislative influence of backbenchers is limited to introducing Private Members' Bills and suggesting amendments to bills in committee. As Archer notes, only three of the 312 PMBs introduced between October 1999 and October 2000 were enacted into law (217). The government can easily ignore suggested amendments to bills. For example, consider what Ken Epp, Canadian Alliance finance critic, said about the government calling for time allocation and closure on a discussion on 11 March 2002:
Instead, when it came time to vote, the members who had heard the witnesses, who had been there to hear our arguments, for the most part were pulled off the committee. Substitute members were put in whose only credentials were that they were able to vote the way they were told (qtd. in Globe And Mail).
Epp describes the intervention of the government to limit the effectiveness of committee work. Knowledgeable committee members were replaced with agreeable government MPs. This power of the PM to grant and remove committee memberships curtails the legislative influence of backbenchers.
Independent MPs fare no better than backbenchers; indeed, they are simply backbenchers without teammates.
An MP fulfills at least two roles in his or her constituency: informal ombudsman and lobbyist for program spending in his or her constituency (Archer 196). As ombudsmen, MPs help constituents with "disputes about pensions, employment insurance, passports, agricultural subsidies, and a myriad of other program areas" related to the federal government (Archer 196). A recent example of MPs acting as lobbyists for spending in a particular constituency is University of Waterloo's Research & Technology Park. Secretary of State Andy Mitchell (Parry Sound-Muskoka) announced the federal funding and Andrew Telegdi (Kitchener-Waterloo) was present at the announcement (Redmond).
Cabinet ministers have less time to deal with casework than backbenchers do. As a senior member of government, however, Cabinet ministers may, in less time, be able to handle the same number of cases as backbenchers. To varying extents, the positions of different types of MPs limit how much time they can spend on constituency work. Non-Cabinet minister MPs who served in the 34th and 35th parliaments and responded to Docherty's survey, however, reported that they spend approximately 42% of their time on constituency work (Docherty 129). Interestingly, MPs who felt that the leadership had too much control over promotion spent more time (48.7%) on constituency work; moreover, their staff members spent 62.0% of their time on constituency work (Docherty 193). MPs have two very good reasons to pursue constituency work: first, it increases their local profile; and second, it can be done without causing conflict within the caucus or the party (Docherty 194).
With the exception of Cabinet ministers and the PM, MPs are more important in their constituency than they are on the Hill. The responsibilities of various legislative and partisan positions, while they do elevate the influence of an MP on the Hill above that of a backbencher, do not elevate it high enough to make MPs more important on the Hill than they are in the constituency. Docherty writes, "Members of the public who are cynical towards federal politicians constitute the majority of citizens who have not had to turn to their MP for assistance" (264). This partly explains why Trudeau, despite his formidable intellect, was unable to see the importance of MPs in the constituency: he had simply never needed an MP to assist him (clearly, the fact that he was leader of his party for most of his political career is an important factor, too).
The importance of MPs on the Hill is a pressing concern for MPs and the public. Front-runner Paul Martin has won the support of most Liberal MPs for his leadership campaign with, among other things, promises for increased influence to backbenchers. The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada published a report on democratic reforms in August 2002. The proposed reforms would, according to the PCPC, "significantly reduce government and party leadership control of Parliament" (Report 2). The reforms would, in essence, attempt to reverse the concentration of power in the centre of the government. Donald Savoie correctly observes: "No one, at least in government in Canada, believes any longer that the prime minister is primus inter pares" (13). The PM is not first among equals, and, until the power of the prime minister is curtailed significantly, most MPs will remain more important in their constituency than they are on the Hill.
Archer, Keith, et al. Parameters of Power: Canada's Political Institutions. 3rd edition. Toronto: Nelson, 2002.
Docherty, David. Mr. Smith Goes To Ottawa: Life In The House Of Commons. Vancouver: UBC Press, 1997.
"MPs as nobodies on Parliament Hill." Editorial. Globe And Mail. 18 March 2002: A12.
Redmond, Chris. "Feds join in funding research park." 19 December 2001. http://www.bulletin.uwaterloo.ca/2001/dec/19we.html
"Report on Democratic Reform." Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. 12 August 2002. http://www.pcparty.ca/democratic_reform/democratic_report_e.pdf
Savoie, Donald S. Governing from the Centre: The Concentration of Power in Canadian Politics. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999.