Individual Ministerial Responsibility in Canada

Canadian Parliament Responsible Government Individual Ministerial Responsibility

Each cabinet minister has individual ministerial responsibility, or is obliged to answer for the performance of the department he or she leads. Important departments include Human Resources Development, Foreign Affairs, Finance, Justice, and Health. The doctrine of individual ministerial responsibility has legal, administrative, and political components.

Legally, each minister is responsible for all official actions by his or her department. Cabinet ministers also assume the administrative responsibility to direct and guide their departments. The cabinet minister is the official spokesperson for his or her department and must explain and defend departmental actions. Each minister has the political responsibility to answer to Commons for the performance of his or her department. Cabinet ministers must introduce all government bills (proposed laws) that relate to their departments, and the ministers must appear in Parliament to defend them. The House of Commons holds daily question periods, during which the ministers must be prepared to answer the opposition parties’ attacks on government policies and actions, as well as explain and defend their department’s actions.

In theory, if a minister fails to explain adequately significant mistakes made by his or her department, Commons can force the minister to resign from the Cabinet. In practice, however, Commons no longer forces ministers to resign when unwanted developments take place in their departments. Instead, the prime minister decides the fate of such ministers and only demands that a minister resign if he or she is a liability to the government. The real penalty for poor ministerial performance has become a lasting vulnerability to attacks from opposition parties. Such attacks can cost not only the minister his or her seat in Parliament at election time, but can also reflect badly on the minister’s entire party and result in it losing additional seats. (1)

More about the Canadian Parliament

• Canadian Parliament
• Parliament Powers
• Parliament Constitutional Conventions
• Responsible Government
• Collective Ministerial Responsibility
• Individual Ministerial Responsibility
• Debates About Ministerial Responsibility
• Parliament Membership
• Parliament Structure
• House of Commons
• Senate
• Governor-General
• Parliamentary Sessions
• Legislative Process
• Influences on the Legislative Process
• History of Parliament
• Parliament (in General in Canada)
• Parliament (in the World)

Resources

Notes and References

1. Encarta Online Encyclopedia

See Also

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This entry was last updated: March 23, 2014