Poof! Rebellious Liberal MP vanishes
Paul Wells
National Post
This can be a tough town to break into. Two dozen rookie Liberals got themselves
elected in 2000 and on most days, you'd never notice most were here unless they
actually vanished.
Which, as it happens, is precisely what Shawn Murphy did for half an hour yesterday.
Mr. Murphy is a sandy blond 50-year-old from Hillsborough, P.E.I. who sits, most
of the time, on the Commons finance committee. The committee is wading through last
December's federal budget. Yesterday, it considered amendments to the budget's
post-Sept. 11 national security provisions.
James Moore, the Alliance transport critic, doesn't like Liberal plans to charge
$12 for a one-way air ticket and $24 for a round trip to pay for tighter security.
Mr. Moore calls this charge a $2.5-billion tax on air travel and thinks it will
wildly exceed the real cost of security. Yesterday, he proposed that the charge be
dropped from $12 per leg of travel to only a few dollars.
Mr. Murphy's riding is on a big island frequented by airplanes full of tourists
with good money. The security levy could cripple tourism to P.E.I., he said. And
since the Finance Department hasn't been able to produce a single study justifying
the charge, he said he'd support Mr. Moore's motion if it cut the charge in half,
from $12 per leg to $6.
Well, this was all a bit much for Sue Barnes, the committee's new Liberal chairwoman.
Already one opposition amendment had passed. That time her tormentor was Roy Cullen,
another Liberal who believes the Prime Minister's Office installed Ms. Barnes as
the committee's chairwoman despite his campaign for the job. So Mr. Cullen reincarnated
himself as a lion of the proletariat and helped pass a New Democrat amendment to
put two labour union representatives on a new transport-security committee.
Well. Enough futzing around. When Mr. Murphy said he'd support this new opposition
motion, Ms. Barnes brought down her gavel for a recess.
This is where I came in. An Alliance MP collared me on the sidewalk and lured me
into the second half of the meeting with promises of a vanishing government MP.
He was as good as his word.
As the Hon. Members took their seats, Mr. Murphy was nowhere to be seen. Some other
guy was in his seat. Can't remember who; you try telling these guys apart.
Yvan Loubier (Bloc, Ste. Hyacinthe) was in his usual foul mood. "If you want
to have a different member, you change a Liberal member and it's no problem. Like
magic."
The committee's larger problem was that Ms. Barnes, the chairwoman, was absent,
too.
Eventually Ken Epp took her place. Mr. Epp is the committee's deputy chairman, an
Alliance member. "I call this meeting back to order as the properly elected
chairman," Mr. Epp said.
Immediately, two Liberals got up to leave.
"There's no quorum," Steve Mahoney (Liberal, Mississauga West) complained.
Mr. Epp paid him no mind.
Well, then: The rest of the committee's Liberals got up and walked out. "Walk
out," Stan Dromisky (Liberal, Thunder Bay) whispered as he passed Mr. Mahoney's
chair.
"Would somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?" Mr. Mahoney
asked.
At last Ms. Barnes showed up, at least 20 minutes late. Mock applause from the opposition
MPs. "Can't a person go to the washroom around here?" she asked. She looked
at the empty Liberal chairs. "There's no quorum at the moment."
The nine Liberal MPs filed back into the room.
Mr. Epp: "Madame Chairman, for your information, we passed a motion in your
absence..."
Ms. Barnes: "I don't think so."
Jason Kenney (Alliance, Calgary Southwest) said he was "disgusted with the
way this committee is being run."
By now the conversation was being interrupted sporadically by calls of "Where's
Shawn Murphy?"
Somebody moved that the committee send Mr. Murphy a get-well card.
Reg Alcock (Liberal, Winnipeg South) arrived and replaced some other Grit. More
calls of "Where's Shawn Murphy?"
Mr. Alcock: "Who's Shawn Murphy?"
Then Mr. Murphy arrived, looking sheepish. He kicked Tony Valeri (Liberal, Stoney
Creek) out of his seat. Mr. Alcock got up to leave too, less than five minutes after
he had arrived. Then he sat back down.
Apparently Mr. Murphy had learned a lot in his absence. "I've received reassurances
in the last half hour," he said, that the Finance Department will review the
flight tax in the fall. And if the $12 levy is taking in more revenues than expenses
justify, "it will be lowered."
The opposition MPs rolled their eyes. They voted on Mr. Moore's amendment, which
would have cut a fee worth $2.5-billion in half. Mr. Murphy voted with his fellow
Liberals. The amendment lost by one vote.
But that's all right. The fee will be reviewed, and probably lowered, in only eight
months. You have Shawn Murphy's word on it.