It does look like 2017 will be an interesting year, especially with our election coming up on the second Tuesday in May, but may I point out that our Constitution has us elect the members of our Legislative Assembly, the MLAs, to represent “the electoral district for which the member was elected,” not to give the leader of the party whose candidates receive the most votes, a mandate.
Our premier is the president of our executive council, comprising the ministers with and without portfolios, as per section 9, stating “the executive council is composed of the persons the lieutenant governor appoints, including the premier of British Columbia, who is the president of the executive council.”
We not only have the government of our lieutenant governor, with the power to return a bill presented for assent, under Section 48 “with amendments the lieutenant governor thinks fit,” but the Legislative Assembly may “not originate or pass any vote, resolution address or bill for the appropriation of any part of the consolidated revenue fund … that has not been first recommended by a message of the lieutenant governor” and that is the extent of the mandate our premier may have.
That is what makes our political system a constitutional monarchy.
Lehel Porpaczy
Saanich
