GUNTER: Conservatives must not support Carney Liberals’ Bill C-5 power grab

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Will the Conservative Opposition vote with the Liberal government to pass Bill C-5 before the House of Commons rises for the summer this Friday?

God, I hope not. Because if the Conservatives endorse all the arbitrary powers the bill gives to Prime Minister Mark Carney and his cabinet to act alone without approval of the House of Commons, there will be little point in reconvening Parliament in mid-September.

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The bill, which includes two subordinate pieces of legislation — the Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act and the Building Canada Act — sounds like a great idea on the surface.

The first part brings down the barriers to interprovincial trade erected by the federal government over the years, while the second part is supposed to make it easier to construct megaprojects that are in the “national interest.”

It’s not these cosmetically worthy goals that are the problem. Never mind that the feds already have the power to drop the internal trade barriers they themselves have erected over time. And forget for a minute that Ottawa already has the authority to compel provincial co-operation with national projects, such as transnational pipelines.

Both the Constitution and the Supreme Court have declared federal primacy on matters of interprovincial movement of goods, such as oil. That existing authority permitted the Trudeau government to override B.C.’s objections to the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion and get that line built from Edmonton to Burnaby.

So, it’s probably unnecessary to add the Building Canada part to Bill C-5.

Still, if all the Carney Liberals were doing was passing a single act to reaffirm their desire to get important economic projects done faster, I’d see no harm in that.

My objection to C-5, though, is twofold: First, it steals for cabinet a number of powers given by the constitution to Parliament. As an example, it suspends the need to consult MPs on which projects are and are not deemed in “the national interest.” It allows cabinet to make those decisions on its own without the approval of the Commons.

And second, what’s so sacrosanct about June 20 as a deadline for Parliamentary approval? The Liberals are creating the concern that rather than simply fast-tracking their bill so they can get on with the crucial business of building a unified national economy, what they’re truly after is a lot more power that’s not subject to Parliamentary scrutiny — and they want it in the bag by Friday so the House will be on summer recess and unable to hold cabinet accountable for three full months.

Summer recess isn’t as dramatic as prorogation. Prorogation, such as we witnessed from January through March, cancels everything Parliament was in the middle of doing at the time the doors were closed and locked. It makes it necessary for Parliament to begin an entirely new term when it resumes.

During a recess, little work in progress is wiped out. But recess does make it almost impossible for the opposition to question a government’s actions for the period of the recess, in this case until Parliament reconvenes on Sept. 15.

The national legislatures in most other developed democracies meet through at least some of the summer. The U.S. Congress seldom shuts down for more than a few weeks.

So, if C-5 is so vital to the nation-building process, why the ungodly rush to get it passed?

The Liberals claim C-5 is in response to a national economic emergency. Surely, then, it is more important for MPs to stay in Ottawa until they get it right rather than hurrying home to flip pancakes and burgers or ride on the back of a convertible in the local summer festival parade.

The act would give cabinet authority to add any project its wishes to its “national interest” list by order-in-council, rather than by motion in Parliament. Also, it would empower cabinet, acting alone, to suspend any federal law it feels stands in the way of one of its national-interest projects, just for that favoured project.

If the Conservatives support this, they are effectively writing themselves (and taxpayers) out of the Liberals’ nation-building effort.