Academics from across Canada have signed an open letter questioning Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s decision to prorogue Parliament. Out of the more than 100 academics to sign the letter, 11 are UBC professors.

Prorogation occurs when the Prime Minister suspends the activities of the House of Commons. After prorogation ends, a new throne speech is given to Parliament which both addresses the House, which in turn reopens a brand new parliamentary session.

The speech will allow Harper to readdress his parliamentary priorities, restart debate within the House, and will have dissolved pre-existing bills which had not yet passed.

The professors who signed the letter come from the departments of Philosophy and Political Science as well as the Faculty of Law.

The letter addresses public and academic concerns about prorogation, including how it has allowed Harper to avoid “the Afghan detainees question and evade Parliament’s request that the government turn over documents pertaining to that question.”

The signatories stress the necessity to require “our governments to face Parliament and justify their actions in the face of vigorous questioning.”
Margot Young, a signatory and Associate Professor of Law at UBC, describes this as “a political, not legal crisis.”

When asked about the intended effect of the letter, signatory Dr Phillip Resnick, Professor of Political Science, said, “I think the letter…has helped to alert public opinion to the implications of the government’s actions. It would be nice to see some limits placed on the PM’s power to prorogue, [for example,] the need to first secure majority approval for this in the House of Commons.”

Michael Bliss, a respected historian who holds an honourary degree from UBC, recently criticized the letter in The Globe and Mail. Referring to, amongst others, the “strange gaggle of academics who signed the long, sanctimonious letter against prorogation,” Bliss maintains that “a few days after prorogation ends on March 3, Canadians will mostly have forgotten all the words written and spoken about it. They’ll be rehashing the Olympics instead.”

“The House of Commons, which is not very well-respected by either ordinary or informed Canadians when it is sitting, will now sit for three weeks less than it would have otherwise….The Afghan hearings…will be delayed for a few more weeks. And that’s about it,” he told the Globe.

Christine Boyle, a signatory and UBC Law professor, said of Bliss’s statement, “[It is] slightly odd for an academic, rather than respond to the arguments, to just try and dismiss them.” Instead, Boyle said that “[she] would like to think of the university as a place of discussion, not just dismissal of ideas.”

“I think the fact the letter elicited his comment shows the letter’s importance, and that it has fostered healthy, democratic debate,” Young said.
So is this just politics as usual or a case of unusual politics? In the words of Margot Young, “Part of our jobs [as academics] is to think about issues of importance to our nation.”

Boyle contends that Parliament should be in session. “We’re at war, our soldiers are in Afghanistan, we have major economic problems.”

Professors who signed against prorogation
Barbara Arneil (PoliSci)
Joel Bakan (Law)
Susan Boyd (Law)
Christine Boyle (Law)
Cristie Ford (Law)
Darlene Johnston (Law)
Mary Liston (Law)
Philip Resnick (PoliSci)
Paul Russell (Philosophy)
Mark Warren (PoliSci)
Margot Young (Law)

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