Federal politicians get back to work Thursday
Posted May 30, 2011 9:29 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Parliament will resume Thursday for the first time since the historic election a month ago.
The House of Commons will look a lot different with the Conservatives now holding a majority and the NDP filling the opposition benches.
A new speaker will be elected Thursday and on Friday the Governor General will read the speech from the throne.
The parties are busy getting prepared for the new session. Having a majority makes things a bit easier for government house leader Peter Van Loan but that doesn’t mean the next three weeks will be a cake walk.
“The only difficulty of course is we have a limited amount of house time available, and we have the very important priority of getting the new budget through,” says Van Loan.
For the NDP it’s a different challenge. With 68 rookies, Deputy Leader Thomas Mulcair says the party is taking steps to get them up to speed.
The new MP’s have to go through media training and many still have to hire their staff. Mulcair says he also has to set up a new schedule and structure for question period due to the size of the Quebec caucus.
The Liberals on the other hand are working with far fewer MP’s, focusing on rebuilding the party.
