44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 2, 2022 11:00AM
- May/2/22 4:13:14 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am wondering if the member sees any hypocrisy when the official opposition members say that they would like to be able to have more debate on issues, and then they filibuster concurrence reports to prevent debate from happening and are voting against the government's Motion No. 11 to extend debate time so that members would have more time to debate. On the one hand, the government is providing the opportunity to debate and, on the other hand, the opposition members are saying that they want to be able to debate but are denying any opportunity for yourself. It is almost as if you want the chamber to self-destruct in terms of debate.
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- May/2/22 4:14:02 p.m.
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Just as a reminder, I do not want to self-destruct.
The hon. member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman.
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- May/2/22 4:14:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think we all sit here and witness every day the member for Winnipeg North self-destruct on an ongoing basis.
When we really want to get down to it, the member for Winnipeg North stands in here every day to help with the cover-up of government corruption and unethical behaviour. We know that we just voted on a closure motion to ensure that there was a vote on Motion No. 11. Motion No. 11 is going to be coming into force whether we like it or not. The government, with its unholy alliance with the NDP, will get its Motion No. 11 through, and we do not feel like it is necessary to sit here and debate this in a long, drawn-out process.
What is important is that we have committees that have been doing important work here on the ethical behaviour of the current government. We need to refer this back to the committee so that we can dig in deeper and the committee can do its work and report back to the House on those who actually held this place in contempt by refusing to appear before committee. The member for Waterloo perjured herself in committee by refusing to share information with the committee and lying about it, or misleading us. We have this opportunity to bring those people back and get down to the bottom of what actually happened in the WE scandal.
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- May/2/22 4:15:32 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I like the member. He is very experienced in the House, and I get along with him well, but I do not understand the Conservatives' strategy.
The official opposition House leader, just a few hours ago, was saying that the Conservatives do not want to delay things. They said that they understood the fact that teachers and farmers are trying desperately to get access to the tax credits, which the Conservatives have held up by refusing, in any way, to allow consideration of Bill C-8.
It is also the disinformation from Conservatives that concerns me. I mean, our Standing Orders are very clear. Standing Order 66 means that the concurrence debate that the Conservatives brought up last week, as the member well knows, is subject to a debate next week. That is in the Standing Orders. It is obligatory. The fact that they are doing their summer reruns by reintroducing a motion, reintroducing the same amendment that they did last week, does not allow the House time to actually get the legislation through that teachers and farmers and so many others are looking for.
I just do not understand the Conservatives' strategy. They seem to be blocking all legislation of all types at all times, and then they introduce a rerun when they know, and the member knows, that next week all of this will be considered, because the Standing Orders require it.
Why are they taking time from the House now when they know very well that this debate will be held next week and they can reintroduce, for a third time, the same amendment?
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- May/2/22 4:17:08 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I note the hypocrisy of that member. He used to stand in here and rail against the government on the WE scandal itself, because the Prime Minister and the former minister of finance, Bill Morneau, refused to recuse themselves from the decision process.
This is the member who always wanted to make sure that we did not do closure on debate, and now since he has become, I guess, deputy leader of the NDP-Liberal coalition or deputy House leader, NDP members are now standing here defending the government on moving things like closure on debate and trying to limit the ability of committees to do their work on things. He wants to kick the can down the road another week or two before we actually do it, but we have a chance to get this done today: to put it to a vote and let the committee get to work immediately on making sure that those who committed contempt on this Parliament are actually held to account.
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- May/2/22 4:18:13 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think it is clear, from the answer to the last question, that the Conservatives have absolutely no response to the great question that the member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman was just asked, because had he actually conjured up an answer to the question, he would have been able to provide some substance to the member's question.
I think it is in the best interests of Canadians that we get back to the business of this House rather than the political games that the Conservatives are continuing to play. Therefore, I move, seconded by the member for Winnipeg North:
That the House do now proceed to orders of the day.
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- May/2/22 4:19:20 p.m.
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If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes to request a recorded division or that the motion be adopted on division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.
The hon. member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman.
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- May/2/22 4:19:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I request a recorded division.
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- May/2/22 4:19:48 p.m.
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- May/2/22 5:03:12 p.m.
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I believe when we left this last, the member for Barrie—Innisfil, the House leader for the official opposition, had two minutes remaining in his question and comment period.
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- May/2/22 5:03:12 p.m.
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I declare the motion carried.
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- May/2/22 5:03:42 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my question to the member is actually very straightforward. When we look at the essence of Motion No. 11, all it wants to do is allow for more debate time so members of the Conservative Party, and others, would be able to talk about legislation more.
Why does the Conservative Party oppose additional debate time?
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- May/2/22 5:04:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have said this numerous times. The government has failed miserably in dealing with its legislative agenda. It is going to make everybody around this place pay a price. Conservatives are prepared to work 24 hours a day if we have to, and we will.
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- May/2/22 5:04:35 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, to the hon. House leader of the official opposition, I am torn about the debate. This happens to be, by the way, for everybody else who was elected May 2, 2011, our 11th anniversary. We have had a lot of late nights in June. This is the first time we have faced the prospect of staying until midnight in May and in June. We do good work that way, but it is not the best.
Does my hon. colleague from the Conservative Party agree with me that it would be far preferable if we adopted the rules we have that prohibit members from reading speeches? Then we would have fewer people prepared to keep debating forever and ever on a point—
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- May/2/22 5:05:23 p.m.
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We have to give the hon. member for Barrie—Innisfil time to answer.
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- May/2/22 5:05:25 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have already agreed to a schedule, which all of the parties agreed to last year. The last two weeks of June were proposed for extended sittings. The hon. member is quite right. This has never happened before.
What Canadians need to ask themselves, and certainly what the NDP members need to ask themselves, is why. Why are we doing this at the beginning of May? It is because the government has failed in its legislative agenda? The second reason is that it has the NDP in its hip pocket, so it can do whatever it wants now.
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- May/2/22 5:06:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, since I do not have the endless time allotted to the official opposition and have only 20 minutes for my speech, I will read it.
I rise in the House—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Madam Speaker, I would request a modicum of decorum because I cannot hear myself speak.
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- May/2/22 5:06:43 p.m.
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May I ask hon. members to take their conversations outside of the chamber, please.
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- May/2/22 5:06:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as I was saying, I rise in the House feeling extremely disappointed. I am disappointed with the government's vision of parliamentary democracy. What a waste of time and energy.
Since securing the support of the NDP, the government has been acting with the arrogance of a majority government. Some will ask whether I am truly surprised. I will answer that I entered politics because, first and foremost, I refuse to be cynical.
Last Thursday, I heard the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government brazenly state that this type of motion was nothing out of the ordinary. A brief review showed me that, indeed, this happens too often in the House.
The Liberals said that it was not uncommon and that it was not a big deal, because the Conservatives did it before. Just because the Conservatives did something once, that does not mean that another party is justified in doing the same thing once in power. There is no reason to normalize parliamentary mediocrity and an inability to manage the parliamentary agenda.
The government has been lax, not to say lackadaisical, in administering its legislative agenda, especially when it comes to medical assistance in dying. There was an election, there were three sessions before the election, and a committee was created, but the committee was not recalled until late March, and its first meeting was held on April 8. That is totally unacceptable.
In my view, this motion is unworthy of a democratic Parliament. It is despicable. Either this motion is malicious, deceptive and twisted, or it is astoundingly insensitive toward people who are suffering. Today, with this motion, not only is the government limiting the powers of the opposition parties, but it is doing so for partisan reasons. This is end-of-session quibbling over matters of life and death. The government is exploiting the issue of end-of-life care and capitalizing on the suffering of people who are dying, who are experiencing intolerable suffering, who would like to have access to support in dying with dignity and who would like the proper respect to be shown for their right to make a free, informed choice.
These people trusted us last year when we passed Bill C-7. They assumed we would spend the next year conducting a rigorous, thorough cross-party analysis and produce a credible report on the revision of the act.
In our opinion, the Liberals’ strategy is the epitome of cynicism. They are preparing to trample on the powers of the opposition parties with the NDP’s complicity, while in 2017, 2018 and 2019 the NDP voted against this type of motion. The Liberals are muzzling the opposition parties, something we have always voted against. They are imposing closure, but they are careful to add in the same motion what the Bloc Québécois wants, namely to extend the mandate of the joint committee until October 17. On the one hand, they are giving us less time. On the other hand, they are extending the deadline.
Fortunately, knowing that we could not divide the motion, the Speaker allowed us to divide the vote.
By tabling the motion last Thursday, however, the government placed the Bloc Québécois in a position where it had to vote against its desire to implement a rigorous and credible process to review the act respecting medical assistance in dying in order to allow the joint committee to submit a report worthy of expectations or alternatively compromise its principles of parliamentary democracy. This is the Liberals’ twisted way of governing.
Since the last election, the government has dragged its feet when it came to reconstituting the special joint committee. It did so not in a separate motion, but—nice going—in a motion adopted under a gag order, which muzzled the opposition.
Since the beginning of the 44th Parliament, the Bloc, represented by myself and my excellent House leader, has told the government that we were short on time and that we should proceed by consensus to extend the deadline for the joint committee’s report. A first compromise was made, and the deadline was extended until June 23. Unfortunately, to succeed, we would have had to sit continuously, and intensively, more than once a week, starting with the first meeting.
The way we conduct this process is important for ensuring the credibility of the findings. This part of Motion No. 11 should at least have been moved separately. Discussions could have continued with the Conservative party; so far, the Conservatives are claiming that the June 23 deadline is reasonable and sufficient.
Obviously, the schedule can be reorganized at the end of the session. Obviously, with this hybrid parliament, resources cannot be optimized to accommodate more work, even until midnight. Obviously, this limits the organization of business. Claiming that we can call witnesses and ensure—
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- May/2/22 5:13:41 p.m.
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I ask the hon. members to please take their conversations to the lobbies.
The hon. member for Montcalm.
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