Brown Skips Parliament Duties for Hockey Fantasy Camp

According to Hansard for Wednesday, January 30, 2013, Barrie MP Patrick Brown did not take part in any of the 5 votes that took place in the House of Commons that day.

Minutes of the Thursday, January 31, 2013 meeting of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health indicate that Patrick Brown, a member of that committee, did not attend.

Brown's twitter feed gives us a clue as to his whereabouts ...

To see what Brown was referring to, I checked out Alan Thicke's twitter feed and found the following:

I did some searching and discovered that Wayne Gretzky was running a hockey fantasy camp at the Bellagio in Las Vegas from January 27 to January 31, 2013.

The roster of players for the fantasy camp was posted on Gretzky's Facebook Page.

As you can see, Brown is listed on the roster of 'Team Keenan', while Thicke is listed on the roster of 'Team Keith'.

A video of the hockey camp final game, posted on YouTube, shows Brown playing.

It's worth a watch. The commentary is rather humourous.

In another video, Brown is mentioned specifically.

Was this hockey fantasy camp more important than the votes on Bill C-43, the Faster Removal of Foreign Criminals Act, which took place on January 30, 2013?

  

Was it more important than 'the study of technological innovation, including best practices, in health care' which was discussed at the January 31, 2013 meeting of the Sanding Committee on Health?

What is your answer, Mr. Brown?

This is not the first time Patrick Brown has put a hockey game before his duties as a parliamentarian.

In hockey, as in politics, if you don't show up for practice, you just might get cut from the team.

Mr. Brown might want to think about that.

Playing Hooky to Play Hockey

According to a recent 'tweet' from Patrick Brown, the Barrie MP took part in a charity hockey game in Ottawa on the 24th of March:

# played in ALS charity hockey game in Ottawa tonight organized by MP Gord Brown and MP Paul Dewer. it was ottawa police vs mps from all sides 5:32 PM Mar 24th via mobile web

Source: http://twitter.com/brownbarrie

At the same time, the House of Commons Government Operations committee was meeting to study the government's economic stimulus package. Although Patrick Brown is a member of the Government Operations committee, he apparently chose to play hockey rather than attending the meeting.

Barrie residents may recall that when hundreds of his constituents rallied in downtown Barrie on January 23rd to voice their displeasure over Stephen Harper's decision to prorogue Parliament, Patrick Brown chose to be at a charity hockey game in Peterborough.

When the House of Commons Health committee met to discuss government preparations for the upcoming flu season on August 12, 2009, Patrick Brown, who is a member of that committee, did not attend. The 2009 'Hockey Night in Barrie' fund-raiser was held the following day.

There's nothing wrong with playing hockey. I'm sure that most of us would rather be playing hockey, or doing some other fun activity, instead of plugging away at our daily work routine, but as adults, we know that our responsibilities come first.

If Patrick Brown continues to make poor decisions, like putting hockey before his duties as a Member of Parliament, he might just find himself 'benched' by his constituents come the next election.