Canada’s 41st Parliament: Hansard, Members of Parliament, Public Servants, and Cost Savings

Abstract

In acknowledging that the Hansard Oral Question Period records did not focus on the increasing personnel expenditures, this thesis will seek to identify and analyze how political party members convey their support or opposition for these austerity measures, during the first session of the 41st Parliament Oral Question Period exchanges; in particular, how these exchanges are structured within the setting of parliamentary debate and for what purposes. Furthermore this thesis examines, how parliamentary exchanges relate to the five (5) debate purposes identified in the literature: (1) position claiming; (2) persuading; (3) negotiating; (4) agenda-setting; and, (5) opinion-building (Ilie, 2017), within the four (4) categories identified in the review of the Hansard records; that is: safety and security concerns, Canada’s official language policies, regional cuts, and public service reductions in areas directly related to the Canadian Forces and Canadian Veterans.