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Prorogue nation

Glen Pearson leaves for Africa with much on his mind.

Like many reading this blog, I’ve done a lot of thinking over the present prorogation of Parliament and I presume I’m in the vanguard of those who are deeply troubled by the development. Yet in so many ways, Canada has been prorogued for years. Suspending or cancelling our international commitment to Africa is bad enough, but where also is our commitment to battling climate change, or how could we spend so abundantly with no plan in place for how we pay it off? While our Aboriginal communities still suffer from our prorogation of the human spirit, this country yet refuses to sign the UN’s Declaration of Aboriginal Rights. We went AWOL on medical isotopes and have done absolutely nothing to deal with the emerging healthcare crisis already at our doorstep. Child poverty is roughly what it was 20 years ago and we still haven’t figured out what our development plans look like as we leave Afghanistan.

Heck, this country has been in prorogation for a long time, enough that it might be time to worry that it’s becoming part of our collective DNA. In our inability and lack of maturity surrounding minority government, we take the kind of incremental steps that lead to … nothing. Parliamentarians sit fewer days in the House than ever before and these significant issues lie in wait for someone to use power for anything other than the desire to hold on to it.

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