Disgraceful behaviour continues

As anyone who knows me well or who has read some of my columns, knows I try to keep close track of political matters. There are good reasons for that. My parents liked to stay informed about local, provincial and national politics. My father came to Canada in 1913 and was a fan of Prime Minister Wilfred Laurier, if for no other reason than the family  benefited from Laurier’s immigration policies. Both my parents followed politics, always voted as soon as they were old enough and taught us the importance of being involved.

My wife Christine and I have long been involved in politics, have run for office a few times. I have known about or been somewhat acquainted with every Manitoba premier since Douglas Campbell in the 1950s. I have been in the gallery many times at the Manitoba legislature and have seen some good debates and momentous occasions. With all that background, it was very disturbing to hear about the vicious name calling that took place last week in the Manitoba legislature. I won’t repeat what was said, but I abhor the attitudes, the slurs and the sheer ignorance of the discourse.

For me, it goes even a bit deeper than that. In 2006, the leadership of the PC Party of Manitoba became vacant when then leader Stewart Murray lost a confidence vote at a PC Party Annual General Meeting. A leadership race was called. I entered that race and came in third out of three candidates. It was a great experience. Through that leadership process, I became more familiar with the house and its workings. I met with the winner of that race, Hugh McFadyen, many times,  and we talked about a wide range of topics and policies.

After all those years of political involvement, it had become evident to me that even then the level of discourse and decorum in the legislature had  badly deteriorated. I strongly suggested that he gather his Members of the Legislature (MLAs) together and set a new course of action, discourse and decorum. I suggested that he not participate in the heckling and that he direct his MLAs to do the same. I predicted he would get a lot of attention, even adoration from the media and greater respect from voters. Even then, things were pretty bad in the house, a disgrace to the MLAs and an abuse of people in the gallery and especially to the delegations of school children.

McFadyen didn’t apparently take my advice.

From that day forward, through the reign of now several premiers, the name calling, cat-calling and the general level of nastiness has accelerated.

It’s a mistake, a huge mistake for the legislature to carry on the way they have done for years now and with no relief in site. No sensible Manitoban should say they like the situation.

The problem is that, although politicians may not realize it, most voters don’t hold them in very high esteem. About 40 per cent don’t even vote, let alone think that politicians can be taken seriously.

At all levels of politics in Canada, school board, municipal, provincial and federal, it should be incumbent upon politicians to behave in a cordial and respectable fashion. Added onto that  is the amount of sad divisions that crop up in US politics and it’s no wonder that people don’t hold politicians in high esteem.

I am not about to quit preaching ,but it’s getting disheartening to see the level of disrespect that comes out of politicians’ mouths.

The bottom line seems to be that the worse the politicians behave, the more sour and dismissive the voters (and non-voters) become, the less politicians are held accountable. Maybe that’s the way they want it to be. With nobody caring and nobody paying attention, the politicians can do whatever they like without accountability. I hope I am wrong but the evidence is building up that politicians render themselves irreverent and irrelevant with the result that they can do whatever they want. That’s a sad prospect isn’t it?

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this column are the writer’s personal views and are not to be taken as being the view of the newspaper staff.