On incentives

Both Andrew Coyne and John Robson have pointed out the absurdity of the Harper Cons having the largest cabinet in the democratic world. But while I agree entirely with the sentiment, I'd wonder whether there's any realistic prospect of addressing the issue.

After all, I'm not aware of any point in the process of selecting a cabinet where there's any room for public or parliamentary input. The first step taken by a new government is to have its new cabinet sworn in, so presumably it's able to start doling out the perks of cabinet membership even in the absence of the budgetary review processes which nominally result in Parliamentary vetting and approval of government expenses.

Of course, there might be some ways to impose checks on the size of cabinet through legislation. But as things stand now, we can probably safely assume that the Cons aren't about to accept anything of the sort as long as they're in power. And indeed, it doesn't seem unlikely that many opposition MPs would prefer the prospect of someday holding a position in an expanded cabinet to a system that limits them to "ego gratification (which depends) on annoying the executive as effective committee members".

With that in mind, it would seem surprising that more parliamentary governments around the world don't abuse the ability to unilaterally proclaim that public dollars will be used to reward MPs from the governing party while quieting anybody whose ambitions might involve questioning a party's actions from within. And it may be worth watching whether the lack of a political price for the choice made by Harper (and other PMs before him) might set a precedent which leads to worse governance around the globe.