Accountability for national defence : Ministerial responsibility, military command and Parliamentary oversight

Although the administration of national defence in Canada is not perfect, it ensures that the prime minister and the minister of national defence are well informed about their defence policy choices, and that the policy preferences of the government are respected by the military and the defence bureaucracy, regardless of whether senior officers and officials agree with these preferences. [...] These calls for reform have centred on two broad issues: the role of the House of Commons and the Senate in over- seeing and shaping national defence policy; and the administration and policy-making process- es of the Department of National Defence. [...] Section 15 of the Constitution Act states, “The Command-in-Chief of the Land and Naval Militia, and of all Naval and Military Forces, of and in Canada, is hereby declared to continue and be vested in the Queen.” With this provision, the drafters affirmed that the authority for maintaining and command- ing military forces flows from the sovereign power, and that the defence and security of the new [...] The National Defence Act is the most important of these statutes.5 Section 3 of the Act specifies that, by the authority of the Crown, there shall be a Department of National Defence, and that the minister of national defence shall preside over it. [...] In the absence of such pro- visions, the Act defers to the Crown’s executive prerogative to use the armed forces as it deems fit to preserve the public peace, defend the state and protect the body politic.