Limits not necessary

At its final meeting before the summer break, a majority of Oshawa’s councillors voted against the implementation of time limits when it comes to asking questions of city staff and delegations.

While 10 minutes is, more often that not, more than enough time to ask questions, that isn’t going to be the case 100 per cent of the time. Hampering the amount of time a councillor can ask questions and therefore come to an understanding on a potentially complicated and convoluted issue is unfair to the citizens who elected these people to be their eyes, ears and voice on municipal matters.

As Councillor Amy England said during the meeting, it is the job of elected officials to ask questions.

Councillor Bob Chapman argued that 10 minutes is more than enough time, and that councillors should be able to flesh out their questions ahead of time or while the matter is in the committee phase. Of course, that would work in a perfect scenario, but this is far from one of those. Inevitably, questions that didn’t get asked the first time around will make their way to the surface on the second go round. Anybody who has gotten into a heated argument or even just a regular back-and-forth conversation has walked away from it and, a while later, had the thought of, “Oh, I should have said that!” or “I should have asked that!”

Also, what if the councillor couldn’t make it to the committee meeting? People do get sick after all, and family emergencies arise. That means the council meeting could be the first time that councillor has had a chance to ask questions on the matter – and some councillors want to put a time limit on that? Hardly seems fair.

Councillor John Aker put it best by saying that when it comes to efficiency versus democracy, democracy should always come out the victor.