When’s a deal a deal?

MP Peter MacKay keeps getting in the limelight, no matter how dim it makes him appear.

The point here is the latest verbal barrage in the House of Commons regarding the side deal signed with Nova Scotia and the prime minister over the future of offshore revenues.

MacKay tried to grandstand against opposition MPs who questioned his motives behind the deal and the subsequent validity of it. MacKay said, “in addition to the letters of exchange, in addition to the premier and the prime minister having this meeting of the minds, that’s a contract…There’s verbal contracts. There’s implied contracts. There’s implicit contracts. Any first-year law student knows contracts take many forms.”

This lesson didn’t sit well with Cape Breton Liberal MP Robert Cuzner, who said if anyone should know better about lecturing on contracts, it’s MacKay.

“I appreciate getting the lecture in first-year law….What I learned from it is that his (MacKay’s) contract with David Orchard would have been a written contract that was broken. The expulsion of Bill Casey from caucus after MacKay had pledged he wouldn’t be thrown out; that would have been a verbal contract that was broken. All Nova Scotians know is that there was a deal signed by two levels of government. That was a real contract and that was broken.”

Cuzner said all Nova Scotia would get from the ‘new’ deal signed with the federal government is exactly what we had in the first place.

Canadians are wary of government officials playing with words and pitting one area of the country against another for purely political reasons. One could argue that the contract MPs make when they agree to do the best for their constituents was broken when Stephen Harper fired Bill Casey.

Casey only did what he thought was right and judging from the overwhelming words of support from across the country, most Canadians agree. What did he get in return? Fired and banished to the backwoods of parliament.

A battle is brewing in Casey’s riding among Conservative officials who were nearly unanimous in favour of Casey representing them as a Conservative in any upcoming election. The party brass didn’t see it that way and quickly set in motion a new list of potential candidates.

This is one example where democracy just isn’t working. On the one hand, we have a rebel MP who was labeled as such for voting his conscience. On the other we have a prime minister who is the most autocratic since R.B. Bennett rode about in his carriage and finery during the Great Depression while establishing work camps for men desperate for a way to provide for their families. In the end, Bennett left for England, where he remained, disgraced and relegated to the yellowed pages of history books, a footnote to the real nation-builders.

Stephen Harper appears to be heading down the same path. The only difference is he has much more in common with former Alberta premier Ralph Klein in that the country is experiencing growth at an unprecedented rate and these are very good times financially compared to past decades.

Problems arise when a leader takes advantage of another to promote his own agenda. In this case, Mr. Harper has run roughshod over Bill Casey to meet ends he thinks he deserves.

We believe history will judge Casey the victor after this mess finally fades away.