Parliament got some things done in 2022 — but there’s a lot more work ahead | 24CA News
This is an excerpt from Minority Report, a weekly e-newsletter on federal politics. If you have not subscribed but, you are able to do that by clicking right here.
While the previous 12 months have been hardly uneventful, 2022 was not less than a “normal” parliamentary yr. The House of Commons calendar was not considerably altered by an election (as in 2019 and 2021) or the arrival of a worldwide pandemic.
Most of the parliamentary yr additionally performed out after the Liberals and New Democrats signed a confidence-and-supply settlement in March that dedicated the events to working collectively on a shared set of priorities.
So the federal government facet of the House had fewer excuses for not advancing and passing laws — and 2022 was not unproductive.
But the federal government nonetheless has way more work on its plate within the forty fourth Parliament.
What received executed in 2022
The House of Commons adjourned on Wednesday having handed 21 authorities payments over the previous 12 months. Fourteen of these payments have acquired royal assent after additionally passing the Senate, and yet another is awaiting assent. (The higher chamber remains to be sitting and will get just a few extra payments to Gov. Gen. Mary Simon for her signature earlier than everybody goes house for the vacations.)
Some of that output was easy housekeeping. Six of the federal government payments handed in 2022 have been appropriation acts wanted to fund the federal government and maintain the lights on.
A couple of different payments have been responses to surprising issues that arose over the previous yr.
C-28, as an example, was tabled in response to a Supreme Court choice in May and is supposed to make sure that excessive intoxication can’t be used as a authorized defence when somebody commits a violent act. C-14, which amended the components for allotting seats within the House of Commons, was handed to answer the prospect of Quebec shedding a seat within the upcoming redistribution.
For Liberals (and New Democrats), probably the most politically salient objects have been unfold throughout a half-dozen different authorities payments.
Two omnibus payments — C-19 and C-32 — coated objects promised within the spring price range and the autumn financial assertion, such because the “luxury tax” for costly plane and boats, the creation of tax-free house financial savings accounts and the elimination of curiosity on pupil loans. Two different payments — C-30 and C-31 — applied the federal government’s responses to the price of dwelling disaster: a rise within the GST rebate and housing profit and the creation of a brand new dental profit.
C-5 repealed quite a lot of necessary minimal sentences as a part of the Liberal authorities’s dedication to struggle systemic racism. A invoice to create a brand new nationwide council for reconciliation handed the House by a vote of 315 to 0 earlier this fall and is now at second studying within the Senate.
Simply counting the variety of authorities payments handed is a crude measure of productiveness. But together with the 4 payments that acquired royal assent in a post-election rush of exercise final December, the forty fourth Parliament will get to the tip of 2022 having handed not less than 19 payments. By comparability, the three minority parliaments that ran between 2004 and 2011 handed a median of 63 payments earlier than they expired.
Why 2023 must be a busy yr
But the forty fourth Parliament will get extra fascinating — and extra controversial — when one seems at what’s nonetheless within the legislative pipeline.
The authorities’s firearms laws (C-21) has slowed down at committee amid accusations of overreach. The Online Streaming Act, the federal government’s second try and carry main Internet platforms below Canadian content material rules, has additionally are available for prolonged Senate scrutiny.
The Online News Act, which might facilitate funds from Internet platforms to Canadian media shops, handed the House on Wednesday, however laws to cope with dangerous on-line content material remains to be excellent (regardless of a promise in 2021 to desk it inside 100 days of being re-elected). The authorities’s promised “simply transition” laws, which might set out its plans for serving to employees within the vitality sector navigate the shift to a low-carbon economic system, additionally has but to be tabled.
Last week, the federal government tabled new payments to vary international funding regulation and enshrine federal funding for little one care and early studying applications. Legislation to create a new incapacity profit (tabled in June) is being studied by a House committee, whereas laws on digital privateness (additionally tabled in June) remains to be at second studying. And the Liberals have promised that someday in 2023, they’ll desk laws to ban the usage of substitute employees throughout strikes.
Even although the House has solely simply adjourned for 2022, the parliamentary agenda for 2023 already appears heavy. Barring an surprising election or an unexpected world calamity, the House could have 130 sitting days to cope with all of it.
And that units up the following 12 months as a significant check of how briskly and the way effectively the federal government can transfer, and the way a lot could be achieved below that novel confidence-and-supply settlement.
