Preville on Politics

But did he buy a helmet?

Posted on March 19, 2007 by Philip Preville

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This is silliest twist on tradition since this guy wore these back in 1979. Wonder if he’ll actually wear them in the House.

The most noteworthy thing about the budget-day-shodding tradition is that the Library of Parliament, tired of answering hundreds of curious e-mails and phone calls every year about its origins, actually conducted a mini-inquiry on the matter and posted its findings, which are far more fascinating than the tradition itself.

Apparently it was invented in 1978, and somehow the public imagination immediately invested it with gravitas and nostalgia stretching back to colonial England. Maybe Tinker Bell waved her little wand or something. Anyway, it was all fabricated out of thin air and swallowed whole by a public starved for some means, however contrived, of empathizing with the chief bean-counter in Canadian politics. Which means it’s not really a tradition at all, but a hoax, and a really good one at that—our very own Piltdown Man. Sadly, no one has ever come forward and taken credit for it, though the meager evidence available points to this possible culprit.

Oh, and as for this year’s budget, I’ll just say this: whatever goodies it will contain, it will put Liberals and New Democrats at odds, because a divided left is an important part of Harper’s plan to win a majority, especially in Toronto.

Image credit: Reuters/J.P. Moczulski (Victoria Times Colonist)

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Philip Preville

Veteran freelance writer Philip Preville lived much of his life in Montreal and Edmonton before he was lured, like so many Torontonians before him, by the promise of more work and a better living. A National Magazine Award winner and former Canadian Journalism Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Massey College, Preville writes Toronto Life’s politics column. He lives with his wife and one-year-old son in Riverdale, just close enough to the Don Valley Parkway that he can hear it when he steps outside his house—but just far enough away that it doesn’t keep him awake at night. On his office wall hangs a 1938–39 press pass belonging to his grandfather, Elias Gannon, who wrote for the Montreal Star.


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