I think coalition has become a bad brand. It got branded “bad” in 2008 by leaders of the Conservative Party. I thought that was very misleading. I've already said that I prefer a minority government arrangement to a coalition, but it's not “bad”.
The one thing to be sure about, even though there was a lot of criticism of the Liberal-NDP proposed coalition, is that there was not a convention established that to have a coalition you have to announce it before the election. That was the argument that some of the Conservative leaders made: if you're going to have a coalition, you have to say beforehand to the people that you are going to have a coalition, and then you can have one. I don't know a single country that has such a rule. Certainly we never have had one. You're free to have a coalition even though you didn't advertise it during the election.
I like the play in Parliament in minority government situations a little better than that in coalitions. New Zealand has a very interesting combination of both. It usually has minority coalitions, and the Green Party usually stays out. Because the minority coalition is a minority, there is a lot of interplay between the Greens and some others. There is now a separate Maori party, besides Maori seats. There's a lot of interplay even between parts of that coalition.
I like to see give and take in Parliament so that the outcome of parliamentary debates is not preordained. Everybody knows that, even if they talk all night, such and such is going to be the policy. I think that in a real Parliament, to be deliberative means they're really going to deliver.
I remember what I call the textbook example, Harper's first minority government. On foreign policy, we were divided about Afghanistan. We had a terrific parliamentary debate. It split the Liberals, but it created a modified Conservative policy. Then I think on the budget, the NDP negotiated some changes in child welfare policy with a Conservative government and got, at least for a while, a better policy out of it. It was the give and take in the House. I like to see that happening in the House of Commons.