Thursday, July 13, 2006

Qualified Politicians

Our political system and our system of government are not perfect. It is the best system we know, but it is a system that desperately needs improvements.

I support the election of young men and women to our provincial legislatures and our federal parliament. In many ways they serve as effectively as their more senior colleagues.

My problem is with those members who have no work or life experience. They draw the largest salary they will likely ever draw and are part of the decision making process that affects each and every one of us.

The worst case is an individual who gets out of high school, has no post secondary degree or training, works for a few months in the political system that he or she has not necessarily earned, gets a starting wage first ever job in the private sector for a few months, runs for elected office, gets elected and votes to send our young men and women to war.

Don’t you have to ask yourself what qualifications these young elected members have to make such monumental decisions? Goodness, these kinds of people may not even have a credit rating. Some may not even qualify for a credit card and yet our democratic system of politics and democracy allows them to run for office, get elected and make decisions they are simply not qualified to make on behalf of the voters they are expected to serve.

Granted, we send younger people to war who too often die on foreign soils, but they are trained and qualified to serve the will of our nation. The same cannot be said of all our elected officials.

It is time to consider improvements to our system of politics and government. Our politicians should, at the very least, have the same qualifications as the men and women politicians vote to send to war.

Qualified people should make important decisions. I fear this is not always the case. Improvements to our political system are needed to attract more qualified people to elected office.

On the job training simply does not work in the world of politics and government.