Angry in the Great White North

Bill Casey, the MP for the Nova Scotia riding of Cumberland-Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley, voted against the Conservative budget and so was booted out of caucus. He is now sitting as an independent.

He voted against the budget because of what he saw as an abrogation of the Atlantic Accord. Since then, Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Nova Scotia Premier Rodney MacDonald have reached a new agreement:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper extracted one of two political thorns from his Atlantic side yesterday by signing a new deal on federal payments to Nova Scotia with its premier, Rodney MacDonald.

The agreement settles a months-long dispute between the two governments over a new equalization funding deal announced by Harper's government in last spring's budget.

"I believe this is a historic breakthrough and a thoroughly sensible way to overcome a dispute which has bedevilled successive federal and provincial governments for over 20 years," said Harper.

Stephen Harper has made it clear, though, that Bill Casey is not going to be welcome back into the caucus:

The dispute cost Harper's government an MP when Nova Scotia's Bill Casey refused to vote for the budget in the spring. Casey was booted from the Conservative caucus.

Harper said not only will Casey not be allowed back, but that the party will be running another Conservative candidate in his riding next election.

Voting against your own government on a confidence motion is bad. Very bad. Voting against your own minority government is worse. So it comes as no surprise that Casey was given the boot.

But now that there is a new deal, should he be let back in?

The simple answer is no. Excommunication does not work that way.

Let me explain the parallel. In the Catholic Church, there is the concept of excommunication. A lot of people think it makes you some sort of criminal that is less enlightened times would have made you fair game for the stake. Perhaps there is some truth in that, but strictly speaking, excommunication is meant to be a corrective measure and not a temporal punishment. When a Catholic engages in behaviour that is sinful and continues to do so despite warnings to the contrary, and especially does so openly, excommunication is a public means of delivering to the community the message that this person's behaviour is not acceptable. Otherwise Catholics would get confused. When those women in Quebec were ordained priests by a rogue bishop, the Catholic Church had to excommunicate all of them, or else she would have run the risk of Catholics believing that the rules had changed on the ordination of women.

The excommunicated is welcome back once he has recognized the error of his ways.

Of course, many would insist that they did nothing wrong, and so remain excommunicated. The Church does not follow up with even more punishment, nor does she go to extraordinary lengths to bring that person back.

It boils down to agreeing to disagree.

The parallels with the Bill Casey situation are clear. On the question of confidence, a budget vote is a whipped vote, and government MPs are required to vote for the bill. If an MP refuses, the Party and the MP agree to disagree, and the MP leaves the caucus.

If Bill Casey was not removed from caucus, MPs would get the message that voting against the government on a whipped vote is acceptable, and that is not a message any party can send.

Should Bill Casey be let back in?

Well, the problem between the federal government and the province of Nova Scotia has been resolved. But that doesn't really matter.

First, it has to be noted that whatever work that was done to come to the new agreement was done without Bill Casey's help. Ejected from caucus, he could not lend a hand, and so his actions potentially weakened Nova Scotia's position. Fortunately the two remaining MPs for Nova Scotia, Peter MacKay and Gerald Keddy, we equal to the task.

Second, the act of voting against the budget is still an excommunicable offense, and remains so despite what happened since.

The real problem, though, is that Bill Casey doesn't seem to care:

"My plan now is to run as an independent, and I've told other parties that I'm going to remain an independent, and they have respected that," Casey said. "I have friends in all parties, including the Conservatives, but I'm going to remain as an independent and run as an independent.

"I hope they (the people) support me, but if they don't, I'll understand. I'm glad I did what I did."

That strikes at the heart of the issue. Unless Casey changes his position, he can't be let back in, or else MPs will get the wrong message.

On that score, of course, Stephen Harper might want to moderate his language:

The prime minister made it clear Wednesday that Casey will not be forgiven.

"When there is a federal election, there will be a Conservative candidate in Mr. Casey's riding and it will not be Mr. Casey," Harper said after he announced a deal ending the offshore revenue dispute.

Stephen Harper is not Catholic, so his understanding of sin and forgiveness comes from a slightly different tradition from mine, but I am wary of speaking in absolutes. I might have answered a question on Casey's future a bit differently: "Until Bill Casey recants his vote and demonstrates an understanding of caucus solidarity, he can't be let back in. Standing for your constituents is important, of course, but as we've demonstrated today, taking inflexible positions incurs a steep cost, while moderation and patience pays dividends."

Indeed, even the Catholic Church does not speak in absolutes when it comes to these things. A person dies excommunicated, so does that mean he goes to Hell? Catholics and non-Catholics might be surprised to know that the Church does not say one way or the other. The Church maintains a list of saints, but not a list of the damned. In the Catholic funeral rite there is a phrase spoken by the priest that goes "we commit the soul of the departed to Your mercy". What that means is that whatever we think of this person's sinfulness (obviously short of excommunication in this case, since the excommunicated don't get a Church funeral), we don't presume to put limits on God's capacity to forgive, even after death.

Drawing from that tradition, I would have avoided stating that there was no future for Bill Casey in the Conservative Party.

But it would have to be made clear that as long as Bill Casey continues to talk the way he does, expressing no regret or second thoughts, there is no way he would be let in.

Of course, this is politics, not the question of the soul and eternal damnation. Bill Casey has become a lightning rod for people who want to send a message to Stephen Harper. Premier Danny Williams of Newfoundland has said he will support Bill Casey's run. The riding association of Cumberland-Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley wants Bill Casey to run as their candidate, and will presumably resubmit Casey's nomination papers.

How do you neutralize this issue? Perhaps the best way is to stand firm, but with that hint of flexibility.

Yes Casey did what he thought was right. Of course no one believes he was acting with malice. But you can be mistaken without being malicious. As with any party in this system, there are times for public disagreement, and times that require solidarity. He chose a time when solidarity was needed to disagree, and until he recognizes the potential damage that could have been wrought, both for the immediate results of that vote and for the long term unity of this party, he is not welcome. It is not a pleasant choice for us to make, but a simple one, for there are no other path that we can take and still be acting in the best interests of this party and of the Canadians who support us. The door is always open, but until Bill Casey can recognize why we had to do what we did, and why we were right to do so, we will have to continue along a different path, and we expect the riding association of Cumberland-Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley to join us. Because this is also one of those situations, unpleasant as it is, that requires solidarity.

I don't know if that would do the trick. Maybe nothing will help and this fire will just have to die out over time. It doesn't help that people are cheering for Bill Casey. It's giving him resolve that is misplaced. At the very least, he ought to be considering if people like Danny Williams really have Bill Casey's best interests at heart.