In our constitutional democracy, it is Parliament that is supreme: not the Governor-General, not the Prime Minister, not the Government of the day, not the Supreme Court.

Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper has published a book, one section of which presents his views on the Governor General’s 2008 agreement to prorogue Parliament barely two weeks after it was opened, only four days before Parliament was going to determine whether the Harper Government had the confidence of the House of Commons.  Harper writes: “we never really had any doubt of being granted a prorogation. Our constitutional position was rock solid on the matter.”

This assertion must be challenged: it is both false and flip.  Although the Governor General has a constitutional duty to accede to the advice of the Prime Minister, the GG has a higher and primary obligation to Parliament.  Without the approval of Parliament there is no GG and no government: been that way since 1689.  In setting aside Parliament’s right to vote no confidence only four days hence, the Governor General was in effect denying the supremacy of Parliament.  Harper’s constitutional position was far from rock solid.

Harper himself recognized that his Government did not have the confidence of the House of Commons, as he noted the agreement among the opposition parties.  Regardless of the credibility (rather the lack thereof) of the Opposition plan for government, it was not in Harper’s rightful power to deny the opposition the right to vote no confidence: certainly not in a two-week-old Parliament, four days before a planned confidence test.

The expression of confidence, or the lack of it, in a government is a core function of Parliament, an essential part of a constitutional democracy.  Stephen Harper’s prorogation manoeuvre was destructive to the ideal of parliamentary government.