Breaking the Bargain: Public Servants, Ministers and
Parliament
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abstract
Breaking the Bargain: Public Servants, Ministers and Parliament,
Donald J. Savoie, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003, pp. xiv,
337Most of us have been taught, and have taught, about the traditional
relationship between public servants, ministers and parliaments under the
Westminster tradition of government. Ideas like the accountability of the
neutral, non-partisan, anonymous senior public servant to his minister,
and concepts like ministerial responsibility and collective cabinet
responsibility to Parliament, and the oversight and legislative role of
Parliament, are part of what Donald Savoie calls the traditional bargain
that underpins the political and administrative process in Canada. The
central thesis of this book is that this traditional bargain has been
broken and a new bargain needs to be struck if our system of responsible
government is going to continue to function effectively.
