Indeed - it was only the reduction in size of 5p and 10p coins in 1990/92 that took the last of the George VI shillings and florins out of circulation, 40 years after his death.
I dunno, but there’s always a first time. And why not? As I said above, everything is impossible until it isn’t.
That’s how the German states work. Also South Africa I think.
While South Africa has a Parliament, it’s not a parliamentary system because the head of government is the President, in the executive branch, rather than a prime minister in the legislative. (It’s not really a presidential system either, in that the president is elected by the parliament rather than by popular vote. It is a pretty much unique system.) I think the provincial governments do use something more akin to a combined head-of-state/head-of-government arrangement.
The German states I’m not really familiar with–certainly at the national level Germany has a separation between the head of state (president) and head of government (chancellor).
You started off talking merely about just “dumping those twits”; now you are talking about completely revising the entire form of government in Canada. Sure, you could develop a new style of government unlike anything seen anywhere else in the world–that, however, is not a cost-saving measure, in part because without models to follow you’ll be spending an enormous amount of time, negotiation, litigation, and so forth trying to figure out exactly how this new model will work, and all of that costs money. Canada, e.g., is a federal system and the provinces want and expect to have powers of their own; a new form of government would end up rewriting the relationship between the national government and the provinces. You think that’s cheap or easy?
What exactly are you trying to accomplish here, and on what basis do you conclude the costs of working out and implementing this new system would be less than the costs of all the royal tours that have ever visited Canada or ever will visit Canada?
Yes, I’m puzzled too by exactly what KenM’s concern is. Is it the monarchy, or is it the parliamentary system?
I have no problem with the parliamentary system. I have a problem with the monarchy. I want it out of Canada. Completely. I want a monarchy not sleeping or pining for the fjords, but expelled. Gone. Finished. Finito.
I went into the queen’s representatives issue because it appears on this board to be central to the existence of the parliamentary system, which is complete nonsense.
The parliamentary system doesn’t hinge on the existence of a boat load of lieutenant governors or of a governor general. Despite them, and even because of them (they can take any heat) the power rests in the first minister who dictates to the monarch’s representative a course of action.
I well know the history of the monarchy and Parliament and why the system developed as it did. But that day is over. A recent example is Stephen Harper’s unprecedented prorogation of Parliament in 2008 to avoid a possible vote of non-confidence. Governor general Michaëlle Jean rolled over after much thought — why, a whole two hours! — and granted the “request.” Opinions to the contrary, Jean rubber-stamped Harper’s diktat to slam shut Parliament’s doors.
That woman is so stupid she even claimed to be Canada’s head of state.
From the same page linked above:
The position of governor general is a transparent fiction, as is the position of lieutenant governor in the provinces and territories. Those particular “queen’s representatives” have and always did have no responsibilities whatsoever, except to throw publicity banquets and once in a blue moon presiding at some official opening or other (as long as it reflects well on the governing party).
The parliamentary system would not disappear if the head of state (laughable provincially and territorially) shifted to the first ministers of any of them. They are the defacto heads of state, if not on paper, then in reality.
The easiest way to dump the lot of them would be to dump the foreign monarch, who forever pretends to sprinkle pixie dust over democratically elected governments of a country they don’t give a farthing for, except for the monarch’s own public relations and, possibly, cannon fodder if the need arises.
Kenm, read what you quoted:
<quote> The “Crown” is a recognized and essential component of Canada’s constitutional and legal structure; the “head of state” is not. </quote>
At the national or provincial level, what would replace the Crown? Shifting the role of head of state to the first minister of the province, or even the prime minister nationally, does not replace the Crown, so what would?
Kenm, I’m curious. Canada is a stable, prosperous, reasonably equitable society - perhaps more European than it’s imposing neighbour and certainly less a victim of capitalism. It ranks very well on world tables of corruption and transparency.
It has a Head of State who is about as ring-fenced and immune from political or financial corruption as it’s possible to be.
What are you hoping Canada gains from leaping into the unknown?
It isn’t more European than the U.S. Even in Quebec, where if you were run over by a truck it likely would be a Chevy or a Ford pickup.
If a person were dropped into the middle of a city in English Canada, there would be precious little information as to whether the city is in the U.S. or not.
Opening the door of an electronics or department store might reveal a wall of TVs, all tuned to any of the U.S. networks, all of which are here. Satellite radio wouldn’t help, either. AM radio might be blasting out that horse’s ass Rush Limbaugh or that nitwit George Noory.
The only tell-tale signs it’s Canada would be the higher price tags and French on cans and cereal boxes. Police cars looks the same; there’s even a few Crown Vics still trundling around the streets, serving and protecting.
Because she’s thousands of miles away. I’m sure any head of state wouldn’t find it easy to steal the spoons from that distance.
What’s so scary? Britain does nothing for Canada, and hasn’t for decades. Canada wouldn’t be the first country to sever it’s connections to the long-gone empire. You’d think we’d fall off the edge of the Earth. There would be no panic in the streets. The buses wouldn’t stop running. Hell, the trains might even be on time for a change.
Would France invade? It’s more likely the U.S. would, or at least build a wall. But that would’ve happened anyway. Britain could do nothing to stop it, even if it wanted to, and it wouldn’t.
Canada can and should stand on its own. Why should it be beholden to a wealthy woman who owes her status and that of her children, grand children and great grandchildren to nothing more than an accident of birth? Besides, the U.K. does nothing for Canada, and why should it? Long ago it’s attention turned to Europe, not that it had much attention for Canada since 1945.
Canada to the U.K. is as an adult child living in its mummy’s basement, an adult child with an inferiority complex. It’s long past time to cut whatever is left of the gold-thread apron strings. Off with the queen’s head from the coinage!
Australia came this close to doing so. Would that it had.
Nothing. Nothing need replace the Crown. Why would something need to?
If people’s delicate psyches require something to venerate, I’d volunteer.
The Crown is the underpinning of the present Canadian Constitution. Without a Crown or a replacement thereof, you’re back to rewriting (not just amending, but rewriting) the basic governing document. The Queen-in-Council, the Queen-in-Parliament, even the Queen-on-the-Bench, represent authority (as distinct from power). Without a new fount of authority, what legitimates the government?
Now you can certainly make “the people of Canada” as the fount of authority, which replaces The Crown with The People, but that is a replacement, and not really a direct replacement because “The People” can’t be slotted neatly into the Crown’s places in the constitution. For example, the Constitution Act 1867 provides that the Canadian Parliament has three parts: the Queen, the Senate, and the Commons. If you eliminate the queen, do you go to a two-part Parliament, or somehow make “The People” the third part? How would that work, and how does that change the nature of the parliamentary system? Have you even considered the question?
Which means nothing can change because it’s just too difficult.
What’s the big deal? Dump the Senate, dump the queen, change Crown to The People (if you wish) and have at it.
And we’re right back at completely upending the Canadian system of government and rewriting the constitution. Certainly it can be done, at enormous expense and with immense effort. Other countries have done it, Canada could do it. My objection here is your apparent inability or unwillingness to realize that it is indeed a big deal to redo an entire government. You are coming across as very naive about how Canada works now and what would be required to get from here to there. As a cost-saving measure (which is where you started), this is a nonstarter.
Wiki notes that Quebec, Ontario, Saskatchewan and Alberta don’t have vice-regal residences, although apparently Sask’s Government House is used as a party pad.
That’s not what I meant at all. Perhaps I should have been clearer. Anyway, you sound abut 18 years old which is fine but I’m not going to debate with you. Good luck.
It’s worth noting that the person of Elizabeth is the Queen of Canada, which constitutionally entirely different from her person also being Queen of England and a few other places. Quite simply, constitutionally we have our own monarch, and since our monarch must act on the advice of the monarch’s privy council other than to constitute Parliament or dissolve Parliament when the government no longer holds the confidence of the House, and a few royal prerogatives that are for the most part under the government’s thumb, it would not require a major constitutional change to simply replace the monarch with another monarch, such as an elected Canadian resident, or some guy named Fred pulled out of a hat, or the President of the USA Donald Trump, or via primogeniture of a line of housecats.
There are some things about our system that are obviously a bit odd. One is that the role of one of the three parts of Parliament is filled by a nice elderly lady who lives in a palace in a far off land and only flies trough the air to visit us every three years or so. Another is that there is no requirement for the Prime Minister to actually be elected to Parliament, of for members of the Privy Council or of the Cabinet to be elected, or for any parliamentarians, ministers, privy councillors or monarchs to even be Canadian. In a perfect world, none of the oddities would exist, however, we do not live in that world.
The question then is does this system work or not? That’s a bit of a no-brainer for all but disaffected nutters. Can it be improved? Of course! Our constitution and our Parliamentary system continue to evolve. There’s even a safety valve built into the process in case the government tries to act against the majority in the House, so that the friction of change does not end up in a big ball of fire that burns the house down. That safety valve is monarch’s prerogative power to dissolve and form governments.
How do we then prevent the monarch from arbitrarily squishing the government like a bug by using this prerogative power? We keep the monarch politically distant and politically neutral. The existing tradition of the monarch of Canada living abroad and leaving Canada to its own devices goes a long way to protecting us from an over-involved. Realistically, if the monarch tried to interfere (other than to properly dissolve or constitute Parliament), there would be hell to pay. Conversely, if the government tried to act improperly in a very great way, the monarch through the monarch’s power to warn would serve as an indicator of just how heinous the government’s actions were.
What it comes down to is that we have a system of checks and balances that is both effective and evolving. I submit that it would be reasonable to tinker with the system enough to require the monarch to be both elected and resident in Canada, however, i also submit that there is neither a pressing need to do so, nor an identifiable risk to our not doing so, so I’d rather we work on far more pressing issues than fixing what ain’t broke.
I’m far from 18.
You sound like you’re 110, waving the Union Flag for the boys heading over to give the damn Boers what for.
Three cheers for Queen Victoria, God bless her.
You can state as many times as you wish that she’s the queen of Canada, separate from the queen of England and the queen of Scotland and the queen of New Zealand and the queen of Australia and the queen of Bumfuck Atoll, but the fact remains she’s no magic super-hero Multiple Girl. She’s one, single woman living thousands of kilometres away and a nice, elderly, useless twit who flies to Canada on her broom every three years or so to visit her inferiors.
The country is no longer a reflection of the Plains of Abraham empire builders, and hasn’t been for at least 70 years.
If it’s so outrageous to want Canada to stand on its own two feet instead of cowering under the skirts of a colonial mistress, so impossible to make constitutional changes, so difficult to change Canada’s status in any way, then nothing has changed since 1867 and we’ve been living in the matrix.
By the way, there’s no difference between president Trump of Canada and queen Elizabeth of Canada. Each has done as much for Canada as the other. Sweet fuck all.
That’s always been the objection, so while you conservative nutters continue inhaling Stephen Harper’s farts full of the scents of the War of 1812 and mailing wool socks to our brave boys fighting with the mother country’s army for the relief of Ladysmith, we’ll drag you kicking and screaming into the current century.
Conservative? Moi?
People from all points of the Canadian political spectrum, including republicans, have been pointing out major problems with your “wave a magic wand” proposal. All you offer in response is invective. That’s not much of an argument.