I wish we could take the cameras out of the House of Commons. It was bad enough when politicians were playing for a clip on the evening news; now they're angling for a clip they can share on social media.
Parliament would work better if the real audience speakers were addressing were the other MPs in the House.
@jerome Sure, #PierrePoilievre shouldn't have called the PM a wacko, and he should have withdrawn the remark once the Speaker asked him to do so. It's a lowering of the discourse, unworthy of any MP, let alone the leader of the opposition.
But let's acknowledge that debate in the House of Commons has been deteriorating for sixty years at least. It's not so much a matter of individuals, there's a structural problem. I think the underlying cause is that they play to the cameras.
Mr. Clark and PM Trudeau had learned their parliamentary craft before cameras came in and the point became to gain a 30 second clip on the evening news.
I'm not saying that parliamentary debate in Canada was some Socratic ideal in the past, but it really was better.
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