OTTAWA — In what will be remembered as a historic precedent, the Senate is defying the House of Commons and insisting to amendments on an omnibus transportation bill.
It’s been 12 years since the Senate went this far in disagreeing with the Commons. But Thursday marked the first time that a chamber populated by dozens of new independents flexed its muscles in earnest, after it capitulated on quibbles with last year’s federal budget and with doctor-assisted dying legislation a year before that.
The move will surely cause headaches in the Liberal government, now seeing consequences after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau mandated the emancipation of senators from a purely rubber-stamp role.
“I think the reason that we are here at this particular juncture is because of the independent nature of the Senate which has been created by the prime minister,” Conservative Senate leader Larry Smith told the National Post.
He agreed that with government legislation, “at a certain point in time we have to defer.” But Smith said this week’s machinations are simply a reflection of Trudeau’s philosophy, “that people can voice their concerns so that the best possible laws can be implemented.… I think what we see is democracy in Canada being effective.”
At the end of March, the Senate passed 18 amendments to Bill C-49 — an unusually high number, but for an unusually large bill that saw industry groups lobbying senators an unusual amount. Last week, the Liberal-majority House agreed with three, tweaked a few more and rejected the rest.
In arguing for the Senate to insist on two of the amendments on Wednesday, Conservative Sen. David Tkachuk invoked “a very popular and famous publication you all know well” — The Wise Owls, a children’s book authored by the Senate’s communications staff, in which forest-dwellers discover that “what’s good for one animal is not necessarily good for all of them.” He got a round of applause.
The first of the two amendments would extend a rail shipment remedy — which would let long-haul shippers apply to switch between rail carriers at interchanges, under certain circumstances — to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. The government rejected this because it said Maritime provinces have access to other remedies.
Amid considerable disagreement among independent senators over whether or not they should fight the House, those who agreed — such as Sen. Elaine McCoy, who had previously held that senators should defer to elected MPs except in dire circumstances — did so because of the Senate’s constitutional responsibility to prevent discrimination against regions.
“We must vote yes on this motion to send this bill back to the other place to show the government that they must treat the Maritimes with respect,” Prince Edward Island Sen. Diane Griffin had argued in the Senate chamber, though adding that if the Commons rejected the amendments a second time, “we should yield.”
But her colleague, New Brunswick Sen. Pierrette Ringuette, argued that because rail lines in the Atlantic provinces are limited, the amendment doesn’t reflect reality. It is “political football” from the Conservatives, she said. “That was a used car salesman’s pitch.” In rebuttal to such arguments, Smith noted that independents and Liberal-affiliated senators voted with the Conservatives to stand up to the Commons.
The second amendment the Senate is insisting on would adjust a mechanism called final offer arbitration, which allows shippers and carriers to settle disputes over freight costs. Its drafting in Bill C-49 was a major point of contention for business groups.
Shippers of commercial goods on Canada’s rail system, including mining companies, farmers, lumber producers and retail chains, have long complained that they are beholden to Canada’s two rail giants, Canadian National Railway Co. and Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd.
That heavy dependence came into sharp focus this winter when a shortage of rail cars caused crippling backlogs for grain farmers, who fell months behind on orders of barley, wheat, and other products. The backlog prompted Transport Minister Marc Garneau to compel the railways to provide plans detailing how they would ease the bottleneck, calling their performance “disappointing.”
In recommendations to the House, the Mining Association of Canada and other groups called for an amendment to increase data transparency in rail dispute settlement, which Garneau had rejected but the Senate is now insisting on.
As C-49 continues to meet delays, pressure is mounting on Ottawa to pass the bill quickly.
“We’ve had several winters where grain wasn’t moving. And the farmers are seeding now, and it’s time to move on,” said Independent Manitoba Sen. Patricia Bovey, who cited “urgency” as a major factor in her decision to vote against insisting on the amendments.
Garneau’s press secretary, Delphine Denis, told the Post that she couldn’t speculate on timing. “We’ll let the parliamentary process run its course. We hope C-49 passes quickly because farmers are counting on these measures,” she said.
The Commons could deal with the Senate’s message as early as Friday. If not, since Parliament is on break next week, it could be late May before the two houses resolve their differences.
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