Hello everyone and welcome back to my blog. Today in our first post back in grade 11 we are looking at the question “how is the Canadian government structured and elected?”  This was all started by the recalling of an early federal election by our current leader, Justin Trudeau. Through a chain of events this has lead our very first PLP project is learning how the government of Canada works, how it’s structured, and how it’s elected. Due to the fact that the government and the way it is elected is a very complicated and nuanced process and situation. With that point in mind I want to argue the more specific point that the idea and process of a minority government is useless and slows and complicates an already arduous process.

I have a three main arguments to prove to you the reader that the a minority government is a waste of time. Here are my three points that I will argue with a paragraph for each.

– A minority Government will always struggle to pass new laws, bills and motion through parliament due to the need of bipartisanship.

– A minority Government is ultimately significantly less stable than a majority government in the Canadian system.

– In a country with a minority government there is less accountability for a government action as there is no real party in charge.

My first point really brings to light probably the most obvious flaw of a minority Government system; the inefficiency of the parliament. The fact that there is no fully governing party to pass things through parliament leads to the need for unnecessary diplomacy and shaky alliance’s. Whenever the leading party wants to get a a document through parliament approval the are faced with the necessity of making a uncertain alliance with the most similar or likeminded party. This may not always happen and when it doesn’t it clogs the parliamentary system and leads to ineffectiveness. This flaw is especially glaring when it comes to problems that need immediate attention such as budget and foreign policy and affairs.

My second point brings the problem of political instability to the table. When a party wins a minority Government they are faced with the choice to drag themselves through a tough and inefficient four years or to call a generally controversial early election. Both options are negatives and may divide a party from within. When an already inefficient government leading party has internal instability it when inevitably fall apart. The fact is that a minority Government is a very unstable platform with no real power by itself. A bonus fun fact is that the average lifespan for a minority Government in Canada is 18 months which is not even half a term. Source.

My final point that I will argue is that there is an inevitable problem of accountability or lack thereof. When there is the need for a coalition of parties to pass a bill there is the problem of who to blame when mentioned bill goes wrong or bad. There is no way to locate something to blame. Consequently the fact that there is no single entity to blame leads to fighting between parties and potential feuds to erupt between the parties that manage to actually pass a bill.

In summary after reading these points there is little doubt that the negatives of a minority Government option far outweighs the limited positive attributes that might try and redeem the system. There is simply too many flaws that can be hindering and negatively consequential for a country to continue to keep the possibility of a minority Government in power. When there is a minority Government in power I urge you to survey the parliamentary system and try and find one of the inevitable complications I argued in this post. To accompany my argument I am going to include a piece of media showing the main points of my argument.

Thank you very much for reading the very first blog post of the year. Have a good day