Thank you, Chair.
Welcome, witnesses. Thank you very much for making yourselves available to us, one in person and two in different time zones.
Professor Milner, on behalf of all of us, I'd like to thank you for your very insightful paper for the Institute for Research on Public Policy. It has given us a great grounding and framework by which to discuss this important project. I think you're right in your reading of both our discussions in this committee and in the House, that there is general agreement that going to a more fixed system is a good thing.
I'd like to just raise a few issues for each of you, with reference to points that each of you have made.
I hope I haven't misunderstood you, Professor Milner, but you've suggested that we need to be explicit about the constraints on the right of the Prime Minister to request a dissolution, and only in exceptional circumstances—I think you used the word “exceptional”—should that be permitted in a majority government. If I could just leave those “exceptional circumstances” for a moment, I would look to Professor Heard's comment that this bill in front of us does really nothing in terms of convention other than to shorten the maximum length of a parliament.
Then I go to Professor Massicotte's reflection that in fact, as a matter of equity, this is a good thing—that's the key reason—but also, when there was a majority government, it would be seen as an act of electoral opportunism. Therefore, there would be a sufficient constraint against a Prime Minister seeking a dissolution in a majority situation.
My question is this generally. If it's only in “exceptional circumstances”, how do we define them? If we define them or however we define them more explicitly in the bill, do we then keep the courts out in the situation of Professor Heard's third situation? And I agree with him that it's wise to try to keep the courts out of parliamentary issues of this sort.
The final question is on the equity position that has been mentioned by Professor Massicotte. There's equity between parties, yes, but there's also an issue of equity within a party, which I wouldn't mind your reaction to. The Prime Minister, as leader of that party, may actually threaten to dissolve Parliament and call an election, threaten his own caucus with such an action, in order to block any attempt to overthrow his leadership. I wouldn't mind the experience of any of you with that sort of situation.