Some of the basic rules of Canadian democracy exist not as laws or regulations, but as unwritten conventions. That’s supposed to be a feature, not a bug — a way of allowing for a useful degree of adaptability and flexibility.
But perhaps a few things would be better off written down.
“To have a lack of clarity around these issues that are so central to the proper functioning of our democracy is to invite the kind of toxic debates and intractable disputes that we see too often now in western democracies,” NDP MP Daniel Blaikie told the House of Commons last week.
“The
