Motions could delay budget vote
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 27/04/2012 (5194 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
A day of dramatic political theatre last Thursday over a change in federal immigration policy continues to reverberate at the Manitoba legislature.
The fallout has generated a pair of Opposition motions asking the Speaker to censure the NDP government, tying up business to the point a planned vote on the provincial budget might be delayed until next week.
The Progressive Conservatives have charged the NDP government inappropriately instructed a civil servant — assistant deputy minister of immigration Ben Rempel — to invite people to the Legislative Building to watch a debate on a resolution calling on Ottawa to reverse its decision to reclaim management over immigration settlement services. Immigration Minister Christine Melnick replied this week she wasn’t behind the email.
On Thursday, the PCs accused the government of pressuring Legislative Building security officials to revoke 25 visitors gallery passes the Tories had reserved for the day of the immigration services debate.
“The fact that the government MLAs were given the opportunity (to bring in guests) and the Opposition MLAs were not is not fair treatment,” Opposition House Leader Mavis Taillieu (Morris) said.
But government House Leader Jennifer Howard said the NDP was also asked to relinquish 40 passes it had reserved that same day.
Howard said security wanted to ensure the large number of observers would be accommodated on a first-come, first-served basis.
A crowd of 400 immigrants and immigration workers arrived for the debate, with many diverted to a large committee room equipped with television monitors so they could watch the proceedings. To add to the drama, four Manitoba Conservative MPs viewed the debate from a couch on the floor of the legislative chamber reserved for dignitaries. They later denounced the NDP government in a scrum with reporters.
Howard rejected the notion Thursday immigrants and immigration workers would have felt compelled to attend the event because they were invited by a provincial bureaucrat.
“You would not have seen hundreds of people here if they weren’t legitimately interested in what was happening that day,” she told reporters.
larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca