In his memoir, Fire and Ashes, Michael Ignattief recalls being surprised that the current Oath of Allegiance to the Queen, which he was required to take before taking office, included nothing about the people who had voted him into office.
“Instead, as in all Commonwealth democracies like ours, I swore an oath to Her Majesty the Queen and her heirs and successors,” he says. “The ‘heirs and successors’ part stuck in my throat, since I think we ought to decide, when the current Queen dies, whether to continue to acknowledge her family as our sovereign.
.
For all his very real admiration for Her Majesty, Ignattief says he didn’t believe [that] he had responsibilities to the Crown alone.
“Our current oath of allegiance reinforces rather than reduces the gulf between the representatives and the citizens [whom] we represent. It seems regrettable that I was not able to swear to uphold the Canadian Constitution and to defend the rights of the people of Canada.”