Talk:House of Commons of Canada

Supply and Confidence Agreement

Looks like we’ll be getting the first supposed ‘supply and confidence agreement’ at the federal level here in Canada. We should discuss how to progress with this page once that is official. Mcnasty1point0 (talk) 12:58, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:House of Commons of the United Kingdom which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 12:31, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

I re-ordered the sections a bit

I re-ordered the sections a bit to try to make it a bit more encyclopaedic. As-in if I were to have an exam on this-or-that in civics class what would I need to know, style format. I tried not to intentionally remove anything just reshuffle up or down. Something I cannot figure out from USA since we no longer get Canadian news (here) once Newsworld International was bought by Al Gore and then shut down is-: I recall when Harper changed the election cycles to every four years (fixed dates), I thought it was to line up / match the USA. But the term-life of Parliament was 5 years??? It cannot be both, can it? a) Is the term-life of Parliament now therefore 4 years since the election must be held? Or b) Will elections be held, and then it'll just continue for a while longer and then shift house members later-on like the USA does? One thing I considered taking out is the part that Canada differs from the UK in that Canada has allocated more local authority to provincial parliaments. That's outdated as the UK House of Commons now also operates under that theory called 'Devolved parliament by granting Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland's parliaments more local powers and the ability to veto House of Commons legislation.reference. So this may need to be placed in its proper historic context as the UK has changed that. CaribDigita (talk) CaribDigita (talk) 19:33, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

I thought it was to line up / match the USA - No, that was never the intention. Check out Fixed election dates in Canada. If that article doesn't explain it properly, raise the issue on that article's talk page and we can improve it. A key difference between Canada and the UK is that Canada is a federation, and the powers of the provinces are constitutionally separated. The UK is a unitary state and theoretically Parliament can take back powers from and overrule the devolved governments. Indefatigable (talk) 04:13, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for alerting me to there being a whole article on it.

So it sounds like one spirited intent might then be as a safety measure to ensure it doesn't actually reach the maximum allowable life of the session of Parliament?

Essentially allowing that final year to almost act as a reserve period for emergencies in essence.

That appears a wise idea + timeframe too especially given the Fed. Government's fiscal year begins on April 1 (a full 6 months+2-ish weeks difference.) And Auditor-Generals annual reports in month of June. Not sure if that was intended, but if it was actually foresighted that was a prudent decision. It should mean elections would not collide into those legally mandated events.

Regarding the Provincial status vis a vis the Canadian House of Commons and UK with the Constituent countries. Good point there-in too that's very true concerning that angle. CaribDigita (talk) 07:40, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

Below are my quick explanations:

1. The maximum 5 years term for the Canadian House of Commons is a constitutional limit in regular circumstances (for sure the constituional laws allow the term be extended during some war related circumstances by a two-thirds vote);

2. However, the long-standing tradition/convention for government is to call a federal election around 4 years interval, one reason is because at that time, the government may take some advantages (or at least its approval rating might higher than at the end of five years interval);

3. In 2007, an amendment to the Canada Elections Act formally codified this tradition/convention, as 56.1 (2) states that [...] each general election must be held on the third Monday of October in the fourth calendar year following polling day for the last general election [...] formally customized 4 years election interval.

3.1 It should also notice that Canada Elections Act is an ordinary legislation, not a constitutional law, so Parliament could further modified it by a simple majority vote.

4. the Canada Elections Act does not limit the Governal General of Canada to call a federal election early, as the case in 2025 Canadian federal election.

5. I am curious on why you mentioned that [...] Devolved parliament by granting Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland's parliaments more local powers and the ability to veto House of Commons legislation [...], I feel that it actual opposite direction, since this UK House of Commons article clearly states that under question of 'Can the UK Parliament veto devolved legislation?', as [...] Section 35 of the Scotland Act (and equivalent provisions in the other devolution statutes) enables the UK Government and Parliament to veto legislation in an area that is devolved if it modifies the law as it applies to reserved matters.'‘

6. Please let me know if you have further questions :)

Haers6120 (talk) 02:34, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

No MPs, since parliament dissolved?

Is this how we did it, every federal election? Declare all seats vacant? GoodDay (talk) 19:34, 23 March 2025 (UTC)

Once the parliament is dissolved you don't have any members of that house. There are no votes in the house. There are no committees. And those who were members in the parliament aren't doing constituency work. It's not like the U.S. system where the house can be recalled to do business. 72.142.92.204 (talk) 01:14, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Fair Representation Act

@Mediatech492 I made an edit to remove outdated information about how the redistribution formula comes to be and I saw that you reverted it. While the senatorial and grandfather clauses are still active, the representation rule is no longer a thing. It has been repealed since 2022. Even Wikipedia's own article on the Fair Representation Act says so. 2607:FEA8:56C1:6400:15A9:EC1B:6F5A:1689 (talk) 15:22, 13 July 2025 (UTC)

I took the liberty of going to the Government of Canada Justice and Laws website, and read the act in its entirety. There was nothing there to indicate that it has been repealed. Mediatech492 (talk) 05:09, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

If you're talking about this page [1], that's the annual statutes version they put out for every act receiving royal assent, those pages don't reflect later amendments or repeals, they're "as enacted". WanukeX (talk) 02:11, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Saying "repealed" or not on the fair representation act is complicated, the act [2], other than a few transitional provisions, was just a series of amendments made to other acts, namely the EBRA, the Constitution Act 1867, and the Canada Elections Act, it didn't have many provisions of its own to be repealed, any future changes were further repeals or amendments to provisions the fair representation act had amended.

The Constitution Acts Footnotes on the Justice Canada websites shows all the amendments made to section 51 since 1867 [3]

In terms of the hoc representation formula in section 51 of the Constitution Act, 1867, of the amendments made by the Fair Representation Act, there were 2, the addition of the representation rule, and the changes to the quotient. neither of those were effected by the enactment of the Preserving Provincial Representation in the House of Commons Act [4], which made an amendment to the grandfather clause first enacted in 1985.

Also, for clarity, I know the FRA article said repealed, that was an oversimplification on my party when I added it a couple years ago, I've corrected it. WanukeX (talk) 02:24, 18 July 2025 (UTC)