Liberals Won't Turf Rona Ambrose

PM Harper has found a political strategy to keep the Liberal party from calling an early election before they have a leader in place: threaten dissent by declaring that actions taken by the opposition parties will force confidence motions.

The Liberals on the environment committee decided to abstain from a vote they might have won to ask Environment Minister Rona Ambrose to resign.

The motion seemed to have a good chance of passing, since the Conservatives are in a minority on the committee, and the Liberals have also been highly critical of Ambrose.

But Prime Minister Stephen Harper raised the stakes Tuesday, saying he would consider the motion a matter of confidence, meaning its passage in the Commons would have toppled the government.

Ambrose has been promising a Conservative party 'made in Canada' plan to replace the Kyoto protocol ever since she accepted her appointment to the ministry. Yet, when pressed daily in Question Period, the best she can come up with is that the government will consult with interested parties. In other words, the Conservatives don't have a plan and are stalling as long as they can. (We, in Alberta, are more than familiar with this whole 'consultation' excuse that's been used so many times by Ralph Klein to refuse to take action on important issues.)

It's been a colossal waste of time yet she and her colleagues keep denigrating the Liberals day after day for failing to reduce Canada's pollution problems. That's fine. They ought to be criticized, but holding that up as a diversionary tactic while they refuse to present anything of their own gets old really fast. The Conservatives are in charge now and they need to get their act together instead of continually whining about the past.

If Ambrose is not going to do her job, she should resign.