Leader of the Opposition in the Senate (Canada)

In Canada, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate (Chef de l'opposition au Sénat) is the leader of the largest party in the Canadian Senate not in government.

Even though the position's name is very similar to the Leader of the Opposition in the House of Commons (the Opposition House Leader), the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate's role is more analogous to the Leader of the Official Opposition because its holder is the leader of the party's Senate caucus. The responsibilities that, in the House of Commons, are done by the house leaders—including day-to-day scheduling of business—are undertaken in the Senate by Government and Opposition deputy leaders and Opposition whips.

Selection
Since it is the House of Commons of Canada that determines what party(ies) form government, the size of party caucuses in the Senate bear no relation to which party forms the government side in the Senate and which party forms the opposition. Thus, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate may lead more Senators than the Leader of the Government in the Senate. Since senators normally have longer tenure than MPs, this is often the case immediately following a change in government, until the new prime minister can appoint more people from their party.

There are no set rules governing the manner in which the position is filled from within caucuses. When the Conservative Party (and its predecessor, the Progressive Conservative Party) have been in opposition, the party's Senate caucus has historically elected its own leader, although as noted by John Williams in a 1956 book on the Conservative Party, it may choose to follow the wishes of the national leader. The traditional practice of the Liberal party in opposition had been for the party leader to select their leader in the Senate.

The Leader of the Opposition in the Senate is not necessarily from the same party as the opposition in the House of Commons. From 1993 until 2003, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate was a Progressive Conservative despite the fact the Progressive Conservatives were not the Official Opposition in the House of Commons; this was because the Official Opposition in the Commons (Bloc Québécois, Reform, Canadian Alliance) did not have Senate representation. This scenario repeated itself following the results of the 2011 election that saw the Liberal Party lose Official Opposition status in the House to the New Democratic Party, but since the NDP had no representation in the Senate, the Liberals continued to form the Official Opposition in the Senate.

The Official Opposition also does not need to be linked to a party in the Commons. This was determined on January 29, 2014, after Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau announced that all Liberal Senators would no longer be members of the national Liberal caucus. When the Senate met in the afternoon, Senator Jim Cowan informed the Senate that the Liberal Senators intended to self-designate as Liberals, as well as sit and act together as a caucus. Following a lengthy discussion, the Senate Speaker ruled that the Liberal Senators met the definition under the Senate rules of being a caucus of at least five Senators of the same political party, that the rules state that the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate is the head of the party other than the government party with the most Senators, and that "as has been indicated by Senator Cowan, he has been elected by his colleagues and, therefore, meets the definition of the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate." (Debates of the Senate, January 29, 2014).