An Elected Senate for Canada?: Clues from the Australian Experience

Ashley Thomson is a full librarian at Laurentian University and co-editor or co-author of nine books, most recently Margaret Atwood: A Reference Guide, 1988-2005.

More ink seems to have been spilled on the matter of what to do about the Canadian Senate than just about any other topic in Canadian politics. Written by a professor of political science from York University who is well known for his work on Canadian federalism, this paper urges those who would reform the Senate by making it an elective body to pause just for a moment to consider Australian experiences.

Yes, acknowledges Smiley at the outset, Canada is not Australia — and not just because we don’t have kangaroos. On the other hand, both countries have inherited the British parliamentary tradition, and it is possible, therefore, that the Australian experience could be suggestive here as we grapple with such questions as these: Does the very existence of an elected Senate offer a standing challenge to the principle of responsible government? If there is a contradiction here, how may it be appropriately dealt with? Is it inevitable that an elected Senate will be subordinated to political parties? How might an elected Canadian Senate be expected to affect the respective legitimacies of the federal and provincial governments and the relations between these two orders of government? How well could an elected Senate be expected to play the house-of-review role?

Apart from these broad considerations, specific matters of institutional design would be involved in the establishment of an elected Canadian Senate, including the powers of the Senate, the procedures for the resolution of conflicts between the Senate and the House of Commons, the electoral system by which members of the Senate are chosen, the terms of office of members of Senate, and the possible impact of an elected Senate on the reserve powers of the Governor General (pp. 3-4).

In grappling with these and other questions, Smiley has given us a thoughtful paper that is sensitive to the political landscapes of both countries — although, in his honest discussions of the problems that have bedevilled Australians, he has done little to convince the reviewer that an elected Canadian Senate is the answer to our problems.