MPs and Congressmen both produced below-average numbers of bills this year but does anyone believe more laws will solve our problems?

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End-of-year news stories in both Canada and the U.S. pointed to very unproductive years in both countries’ legislatures. Incessantly observant Tristan Hopper calculates that the House of Commons sat for just 72 days in 2025, “the least that Canada has used its Parliament” since 1937. By my count, the U.S. Senate passed 72 sitting days by May, even if much of the U.S. government shut down for a month in the fall. And, by the way, many of us feel that in this century it’s Parliament that uses Canada.

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The Americans beat us in volume of legislation, too. Hopper says Parliament passed just seven laws this year. On the other hand, the Washington Post’s Paul Kane reported that as of Monday Congress had passed 40 — though that’s a modern record for the fewest laws enacted in the first year of a new presidency. In Barack Obama’s first year, Congress passed 115 bills.

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