Douglas Fisher, a longtime columnist, observer of Canadian politics and one-time Member of Parliament, spoke to the Hill Times upon his retirement at the age of 86. Included was a cutting observation about the Parliamentary Press Gallery, an organization that lately has attempted to hold the Prime Minister to account for his relative lack of media access:

“…The Parliamentary Press Gallery is a device that was created in order to ration in access and limit the reporting of politics on Parliament Hill in an ordered way. That’s the way I’ve always looked upon the Parliamentary Press Gallery. The gallery as a collective hasn’t any real function journalistically relating to what you might call ‘the profession.’ It’s just a device or an organization that enables the speaker and the government of the day to have a fairly normal and ordered relationship. So it’s not something, it’s not a collective of professional people who are carrying out or living up to any particular professional crude. [credo? sp.] …”