Across Canada, elected representatives are opting to toe the party line on major discussions about the future of the country — or even to sit out the debates entirely.
Take recent events in Alberta. Bill 2 (the Back to School Act) ended a provincewide teachers’ strike by imposing a contract and ordering more than 50,000 teachers back to work. Most government members of the Alberta legislature (MLAs) chose to remain silent throughout the entire dispute.
The incident drew national attention because the government also invoked the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms’ notwithstanding clause to remove the teachers’ Charter right to strike.
