The Governor General is appointed at the recommendation of the Prime Minister for a 5 year term, and is generally recommended based on years of distinguished service to Canada. The tradition is that it alternates between a Francophone and an Anglophone.
That she has so much power is an interesting quirk of the system, but it's an interesting one: You have a situation where she has essentially three reasonable options (and a number of other ones which she has theoretically the right to take, but lets look at the realistic ones)
1) All Prime Minister Harper to prorogue parliament in order to have time to resolve the problem.
2) Allow the coalition to form the sitting government.
3) Dissolve parliament and send voters back to the polls.
#3 actually becomes the worst option in this case, given that an election was 7 weeks ago we can't reasonably expect a wildly different outcome. As it is, she chose #1.
But what about #2? The formation of the minority government by that party with the most number of seats is a custom. The other parties could have formed a coalition right away and requested to become the sitting government. In fact, I'd expect that if we held another election (which would probably lead to a weaker minority for the Conservatives) that the coalition would do exactly that.
I haven't had time to explore it, but it appears that we have examples of Lieutenant Governors doing almost exactly the same things in Ontario in the last few decades. The goal of the Governors is to ensure the smooth operation of parliament however that happens. It's an interesting final catch that rarely gets used, but I can't think of another mechanism that wouldn't have us back at the polls 3 months after the previous election.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2008-12-05 03:01 am (UTC)That she has so much power is an interesting quirk of the system, but it's an interesting one: You have a situation where she has essentially three reasonable options (and a number of other ones which she has theoretically the right to take, but lets look at the realistic ones)
1) All Prime Minister Harper to prorogue parliament in order to have time to resolve the problem.
2) Allow the coalition to form the sitting government.
3) Dissolve parliament and send voters back to the polls.
#3 actually becomes the worst option in this case, given that an election was 7 weeks ago we can't reasonably expect a wildly different outcome. As it is, she chose #1.
But what about #2? The formation of the minority government by that party with the most number of seats is a custom. The other parties could have formed a coalition right away and requested to become the sitting government. In fact, I'd expect that if we held another election (which would probably lead to a weaker minority for the Conservatives) that the coalition would do exactly that.
I haven't had time to explore it, but it appears that we have examples of Lieutenant Governors doing almost exactly the same things in Ontario in the last few decades. The goal of the Governors is to ensure the smooth operation of parliament however that happens. It's an interesting final catch that rarely gets used, but I can't think of another mechanism that wouldn't have us back at the polls 3 months after the previous election.
In the end, we are still a monarchy. =)