‘Shouldn’t all politicians be willing to have their ideas challenged?’ Letters to the editor for Jan. 2

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I know you are but what am I

Re “Democracy is not a dinner party” (Opinion, Dec. 30): In his defence of the adversarial role of the Opposition, writer David J. Murray lost the opportunity to highlight the importance of Parliament in shaping government policy. The Opposition should focus on the pressing problems of the country and offer better alternatives.

Parliament should of course probe government mismanagement, but it seems that Question Period has become almost exclusively devoted to personal “gotcha” politics aimed at someone on the government front bench.

This preoccupation is why we have an Opposition determined to make us believe our beloved country is in shambles, rather than a stately vehicle for diplomacy and a viable government-in-waiting.

Lyle Clarke Whitby, Ont.

While parliamentary debate may not be a dinner party, it surely is meant to be more than the heckling, shouting and belittling we often shamefully witness. One of the prime rules of procedure is for the Speaker to preserve order and decorum, implying that all members have an obligation to abide by the rules that minimize disorder, including not interrupting members who have the floor and avoiding repetition and irrelevancy. The Westminster system was meant to be the trustee of the nation’s liberties, where free men and women can air honest differences of opinion in open debate.

Unfortunately, as Alexis de Tocqueville noted in Democracy in America, people living in democratic centuries have an instinctive contempt for forms and procedure. “Yet it is this inconvenience that make them so useful to liberty, their principal merit being to serve as a barrier between the strong and the weak, the government and the governed.”

Gary William O’Brien, former clerk of the Senate Nepean, Ont.

David Murray, Pierre Poilievre’s former director of policy, argues that adversarialism is necessary in the House of Commons to keep the government honest. Otherwise, he writes, ministers would hide behind press releases and carefully curated events. But if the Official Opposition is crucial for keeping the government honest, surely the press is equally important for keeping all politicians honest.

Poilievre has been notable for his disdain and even contempt for journalists, as well as for avoiding real engagement with the mainstream press in favour of fringe media figures and carefully curated messages on social-media channels. Shouldn’t all politicians be willing to have their ideas challenged and their policies questioned in an open and forthright way?

Jim Ellis Calgary

Question Period should not be a lunchroom brawl either. Watching Pierre Poilievre’s theatrical and non-serious performances daily, I do believe that HR should definitely step in.

Catherine Ellis Calgary

Give us a break

Re “How to ensure universal health care stays that way” (Report on Business, Dec. 27): I feel UBC professor Paul Kershaw discriminates against the boomer generation with his call for charging some seniors more to fund health care. I’m a boomer, and Prof. Kershaw seems to view me as a burden for society to bear, rather than a living, independent human being. We boomers are still paying taxes and supporting Canada’s economy – and our children and grandchildren – even after retirement.

Prof. Kershaw’s agenda for making some seniors pay “annual medical-care premiums collected through the tax system” fails to recognize the great achievements boomers have made to health care, through the careers of thousands of doctors, nurses, specialists, researchers and others. Plus, he ignores the massive contributions we’ve already made to medical infrastructure, hospitals and equipment through our taxes and donations. I am sure much of this has improved longevity in our country. Ironically, longevity seems to be a curse rather than a blessing.

Millions of us did the prudent thing and saved for our retirements. Now, after we’ve achieved independence, Prof. Kershaw would have us pay more while others use our so-called universal health care system at no additional cost.

Bernie Hermsen Kitchener

Doing the right thing

Re “2025: Canada’s naïveté gets brutal reality check” (Report on Business, Dec. 31): This article confuses the status quo, the actions of other countries and even the past with what Mr. Turley-Ewart calls “reality.”

Just because something is hard doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. There is such a concept as “doing the right thing.”

And being ambitious and an initiator does not constitute “naïveté.” With that kind of regressive, negative attitude, it’s not surprising Canada can’t get ahead.

Luke Mastin Toronto

Spies all around

Re “In this brave new world, Canada urgently needs a foreign human intelligence service” (Opinion, Dec. 30): Jodi Thomas and Patrick Lennox make a case for Canada to urgently develop the capacity to systematically collect human intelligence abroad. Surreptitiousness is implicit to any such undertaking. Confidentiality of sources and product will have to be “absolute.” People will die for any mistakes we make.

Day-to-day operations must be entirely independent of government and our own courts, although budgeting remains a function of the federal government of the day. Secrecy must be absolute. Collecting human intelligence is not at all new. A number of departments have been, more or less, at this for years. It’s way past time to systemize it.

W.J. McCullough, colonel (retired) Nanaimo, B.C.

The pitch for a Canadian “foreign human intelligence service” to address the “brave new world” of emergent threats to our country may well be putting the cart before the horse – offering a solution before we have paid sufficient attention to understanding this brave new world.

Just as Shakespeare’s Miranda lacked her father Prospero’s sombre appreciation of the real world, Canadians should be wary of facile solutions to our national angst that promote security intelligence services as the optimum means of addressing existential global threats to our country and society.

What we really need is an intelligent foreign policy grounded in a comprehensive grasp of the world as we know it: a multipolar world with growing international tensions reflected in regional conflicts and a global arms race, massive displacement of human populations owing to environmental collapse and the persistent failure of national governments and international institutions to address these existential threats.

Scott Burbidge Port Williams, N.S.

Money poorly spent

Re “Flu cases in Canada rise above three-season high: federal data” (Dec. 31): As a front-line health care worker, I see the morbidity, mortality and financial cost of undervaccination against influenza (and COVID, RSV, pneumonia) every day, much of it in people at significant risk of suffering adversely from infection. It seems to me that the money spent by the Ontario government on TV ads extolling their intentions in the Ring of Fire (the purpose being?) would have been better spent promoting the benefits of influenza vaccination. Oh, but this might upset their anti-vaccine base. Interestingly, this same base generally favours lower taxes.

Arthur Vanek MD Toronto

Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Keep letters to 150 words or fewer. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com