With Michael Ma leaving the dark side and crossing to the liberals, last week, the liberals are now one seat, away from a majority government. Currently, the speaker of the house, Francis Scarpaleggia, is a liberal member. But, under parliamentary rules, he cannot vote, except for to break a tie.

While the liberals have 171 seats, the NDP, following the last election, have been reduced to seven seats. Both Jagmeet Singh, leader of the NDP, and Pierre Poilievre, leader of the conservatives, lost their seat in the last election. While Singh, went down with the ship, and resigned, Pierre decided that Alberta was his new home and we know the rest of the story.

Given that the NDP have less than 12 seats, they are entitled to for fewer resources than a party with 12 seats. They have also lost privileges such as a guaranteed seat on standing committees

Interim NDP leader, Don Davies, is floating an idea. He is willing to have one of his members assume the role of speaker of the house in exchange for the granting of additional resources for his parliamentary party.

This would give the liberals the majority they so deeply desire. As of now, and over the holidays, Davies will be sitting by the phone waiting for a proposal from the liberals that would make this happen. In the spirit of the Christmas season, the liberals should seriously consider the idea.

We all know that Pierre Poilievre would explode in indignation claiming that this is an abuse of our democratic system, but so what? Pierre might not be around in another month anyway.

Mark, we all know that you have a lot of things on your plate. I know that you’re secretly, hoping for more conservative members to leave the dark side and cross the floor. But it might not happen. So why not give Don a call and see what the two of you can work out.

That’s all I have for today.