OTTAWA—Given the pre-game hype and the immediate call to arms by supporters of Conservative MP Michael Chong’s democratic reform bill, anyone poking holes in it could stand accused of also opposing motherhood and apple pie.

The train of support for Chong’s bill had not only left the station, it was hurtling down the track as the thoughtful Wellington–Halton Hills MP was still conjuring images of monuments to reformers Robert Baldwin and Louis-Hippolyte LaFontaine that grace Parliament Hill.

There are reasons for this sudden coalescence in a divisive capital, not the least of which are the backbencher himself and the times in which we live.

Chong is already a rarity in these parts, a man who works hard but quietly, who respects the history and tradition of the place, who has taken a previous stab at substantive Parliamentary reform and who has actually resigned a cabinet seat on principle.

Chong has been down a version of this road in the past. In 2010, he set out to reform question period with a series of measures that would actually compel ministers to answer questions and allow backbench government MPs to ask substantial questions of ministers, not lob balls that their bobble-head colleagues applaud on cue. Three years later, the mid-afternoon circus is no closer to being known as answer period.

He is unassailably correct on so many of the underpinnings of this piece of legislation.

There is an “imbalance” between the power of the Prime Minister’s Office and the elected caucus; Canadians are unhappy with the state of their democracy and they are showing their discontent with the system by staying home on polling days.

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Chong’s bill was repeatedly hailed Tuesday as “historic,” and he said it would still leave our leaders powerful, not just “all-powerful.’’

The bill is advertised as being all about accountability, but in the end he is trying to legislate a spinal transplant into a system that could function, as he sees it, by simply summoning the use of the spine that exists.

He is clear that he backs Stephen Harper and this bill was long in the works. It would not take effect until after the 2015 campaign.

But we have also been told that as many as 25 of his Conservative colleagues have worked with him on electoral reform, or grumbled about a revolt, or darkly mumbled about Harper’s office and the need to change the system.

Under Chong’s bill, that is more than enough dissent to trigger a leadership review. If empowered by legislation that would give them that right by placing their signature on a list, would they walk into the Conservative caucus meeting Wednesday and start the process? Just as unlikely then as it is under the lack of legislation today.

On one point, Chong would take away the power of the party leader to select or reject election candidates, making that decision binding from the local electoral district association.

It is silent on the fate of a leader who watches a candidate die, or deal with past indiscretions or criminality, or start spouting contrary policy during the campaign.

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The leader cannot fire the candidate and he or she must deal with the damaging fallout until the electoral district association deals with the matter. The leader also cannot move to dissolve the local association.

The NDP supports the bill, but it elected 59 candidates in Quebec in 2011 with a combined provincial membership of fewer than 2,000 in party riding associations and six of the winners didn’t spend any money. Had Jack Layton left it to local riding associations, as NDP statutes already allow, candidates may not have emerged. NDP officials say all parties appointed candidates in 2011, but for the NDP, this electoral anomaly was key, and one the party is trying to build off as it seeks to form the government in 2015.

The Liberals also seem ready to back Chong.

But Justin Trudeau should be careful because the Chong bill would allow a leadership review to be triggered by written notice by 15 per cent of the caucus. The leader can be dumped by 50 per cent plus of the caucus.

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That means it would take six disgruntled Liberals to trigger a review and a leader who survives is still a wounded leader.

These are matters that require debate. Right now we have a bandwagon, but one of our great democratic deficits is lively debate. Chong would be the first to say let’s slow down and hash this out.

Tim Harper is a national affairs writer. His column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. tharper@thestar.ca Twitter:@nutgraf1

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