BECAUSE THE LEFT EXISTS ONLY TO AMUSE US:

Liberals spurn standing vote on Tory ethics bill (CURRY AND JANE TABER, 6/22/06, Globe and Mail)

The Conservative government's central piece of legislation – the federal accountability act – has passed through the House of Commons without a single record of which MPs support or oppose it.

Liberal Leader Bill Graham refused to say yesterday whether his party supports the bill and abruptly ended a scrum with reporters when he was pressed to state a position.

"We support increased accountability but there are certain elements in this bill which we clearly criticized in committee and we made our opposition to that clear," Mr. Graham said when asked to state the Liberal position.

He then said his MPs might have a position if the Liberal senators amend the bill. [...]

NDP ethics critic Pat Martin criticized the Liberals for not wanting to take a position on two of the major issues in the House.

"It's not much of an Official Opposition if they don't have an opinion on the single biggest centrepiece of the legislative agenda. I can't believe the Liberals don't have a strong opinion," he said. Mr. Martin said he suspects the Liberals felt they would be hurt politically no matter what position they took.

I kid you not--the bill on which they refuse to have their votes recorded is called the Accountability Act.

Posted by Orrin Judd at June 22, 2006 9:21 AM