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Mr. Frank Caputo (Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, CPC)

May/10/22 1:17:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the people of Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo. I would like to thank my colleague for his intervention and thank my colleague for Nepean who spoke before him, as well. While I agree with him that this should have been brought up at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, I do have a question. When this is eventually debated at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, would he support, for instance, the integration of other faiths, a multitude of faiths, in the opening prayer? Does he have any ideas on that?

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Mr. Kody Blois

May/10/22 1:17:37 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as I mentioned in my remarks, I had the chance to look over the history of how the daily prayer became what it is today. Since it was introduced in 1877, there have been modifications over time to reflect the fact that Canada and its makeup, in terms of demographics and faith backgrounds, have changed. There has been consideration given to that. If we feel that now is an important time to look at the text and to make sure we are reflecting a full scope of the different faiths that are recognized and worshipped here in Canada, then I absolutely think this is an opportunity to do so. I remain quite resolute, in that I think the prayer should stay. We can also have a moment of reflection, so that we recognize those who are both theist and atheist.

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Mr. Randall Garrison (Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, NDP)

May/10/22 1:18:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have been here for 11 years and I am probably the least familiar with the prayer. As a non-religious person, I believe I have only been in the House twice for that prayer: One time was after the shootings of 2014, to show unity, and the other time was actually by accident. I will be voting to eliminate the prayer, but I think the member made an interesting argument. Because opposition day motions are for the opposition to raise failings of the government, which failings of the government would he prefer to be discussing today: the failures on climate change, or the failure to introduce a disability benefit? Which failings would he rather be talking about today?

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Mr. Kody Blois

May/10/22 1:19:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a bit of a sinister question, of course. We are trying to actually improve decorum in debate in this place and, with all due respect to my hon. colleague, that was a very facetious question. Let me get to the point that he made, which is that he will be supporting this opposition motion, but in 11 years, he has only ever stood in this place twice to hear the daily prayer. It seems to me as though the ability to respect religious freedoms has not been a major inconvenience to him, and that he understands some colleagues who, as he mentioned, he has joined in solidarity. Perhaps he could continue to stay outside of the House for the 30 seconds that the daily prayer does happen and join for a moment of silent reflection. This is such a non-issue, I cannot believe I am standing here in the House even talking about it.

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Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)

May/10/22 1:19:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am a bit puzzled by everything that I have heard this morning. I am puzzled and perhaps angry as well. I have heard people question the appropriateness of having this debate today. There are great democrats in the Liberal and Conservative parties who are eager to tell us how we should be using our opposition day, not to talk about an issue that deals with secularism, but to talk about issues that relate to current events. I would remind my colleagues that we do this all the time and that it is rhetoric that I see in the House. I am thinking, for example, of the Minister of Canadian Heritage. If we bring up the French language, if we bring up Quebec's place, or if we bring up immigration, he tells us that the Bloc Québécois is trying to pick a fight. Talking about issues that affect Quebecers in this assembly is tantamount to picking a fight. I have heard that many times. Our colleague from Winnipeg North asked us why the Bloc members are not talking about health transfers or seniors. I would point out to him that we had two opposition days on these issues, which resulted in motions. However, I have yet to see any action by the government. I would also like to point out to my Conservative colleagues that, in the middle of the truckers' blockade in February, there was an opposition day about Canadian Pacific in Saskatchewan. That is not my issue, but I have no say in what the Conservatives choose. I participated in an NDP emergency debate on the pandemic in Alberta. The Alberta health care system is none of my business, and it is not the business of the House either. That is what they wanted to discuss, so good for them. The worst thing I heard today is that the prayer is a wedge issue. That is a convenient way to avoid taking a stand on something. Why would it be a wedge issue? I have a lot of trouble understanding my colleagues' logic when they say that prayer here is a wedge issue. Reciting a prayer before we meet for question period is complete nonsense. It is the opposite of what we see in the modern world, which is a neutral state. Yesterday, I was talking to a former French academic colleague who could not believe that we still do a prayer in the House of Commons before we begin our sittings. In his opinion, it is totally archaic and completely unthinkable. A number of people have come to us to ask why we have not considered this issue on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, or why we were even asking this question today. We put forward a motion about it in 2019. We never reached unanimous consent in the House. However, this is the kind of debate we need to have, and it has to be in the public eye. I want to hear what the Liberal Party has to say on how religious differences should be accommodated in this House. How our Parliament, the institution of institutions, can be neutral. I want to hear from the Liberal Party on that. I want to hear from the Conservatives. Their response is quite different. They say that this debate is a point of contention, perhaps because they want to charm certain religious communities in their ridings, for they feel that talking about this picks up on an obvious fact that no one wants to talk about. I am going to talk about the elephant in the room, namely the debate on secularism. There are people in the House who are having a very hard time with the debate on secularism. I would like to address it head-on. Earlier, the hon. member for Winnipeg North told us that no one in Quebec was interested in this topic. I have been observing Quebec politics for the past 30 years. Over the past 30 years, there has been a lot of talk in Quebec about the issue of religion in the public sphere. There was the Bouchard‑Taylor commission on accommodation. What was the cornerstone of that commission's mandate? The place of religion. How can ethnocultural minorities be accommodated in the Quebec context? What will be the place of the sacred in the Quebec context? These questions were examined by the Bouchard‑Taylor commission in 2008, as I recall. We spent more than 15 years going over this in Quebec. It led to Bill 21, which provides clear guidelines on the place of religion in the public sphere in Quebec. I suspect that the conflict between secularism and identity is what scares my Liberal, Conservative and NDP colleagues, who do not want to take a stand on this particular issue. However, there is a great deal to discuss. As I recall, one thing the Bouchard-Taylor commission explored is how to accommodate community identities in relation to their religion. To define secularism, the commission's report outlined four main principles. The first principle is the moral equality of persons. Whether one is a believer or thinks that Platonism, Neo-Platonism or Aristotelianism is what gives meaning to life, everyone is equal. The second principle is freedom of conscience and religion. This is actually an expression of the next principle, the separation of church and state. The third principle, as I just said, is the separation of church and state. The fourth principle is state neutrality towards religions and deep-seated secular convictions. I am trying to understand how saying a prayer at the beginning of one of our sittings meets the four principles outlined in the Bouchard-Taylor report. Now I would like to talk about something that seems essential to me but that has not yet been brought up. Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean was confronted with the issue of the prayer within its institutions for three years. I am not sure if my colleagues are familiar with the 2015 Supreme Court ruling entitled Mouvement laïque québécois v. Saguenay (City). I want to focus on two key aspects of the ruling. First, the definition of neutrality, found at paragraph 74: By expressing no preference, the state ensures that it preserves a neutral public space that is free of discrimination and in which true freedom to believe or not to believe is enjoyed by everyone equally, given that everyone is valued equally. I note that a neutral public space does not mean the homogenization of private players in that space. Neutrality is required of institutions and the state, not individuals. On the contrary, a neutral public space free from coercion, pressure and judgment on the part of public authorities in matters of spirituality is intended to protect every person's freedom and dignity. Is that not what is at issue today, namely protecting every person's freedom and dignity? That is the Supreme Court's answer to what neutrality means. Another essential aspect is the Supreme Court's definition of discrimination. Paragraph 64 reads as follows: Sponsorship of one religious tradition by the state in breach of its duty of neutrality amounts to discrimination against all other such traditions. If the state favours one religion at the expense of others, it imports a disparate impact that is destructive of the religious freedom of the collectivity. The debate we are trying to have today is about whether our institutions are neutral with respect to religion, is it not? That should be the underlying principle. The easy answer, which everyone fell back on today, is that the prayer happens before the doors are opened and does not inconvenience anyone. This is not about inconveniencing people. It is about sending a clear message that our institutions are neutral. Personally, what I want to hear in my colleagues' questions over the next few minutes, what I want to know from them, is what secularism means to them. If they think this debate is old news and unimportant, I have only one thing to tell them. They are out of step with what the people of Quebec think. I look forward to hearing my Conservative colleagues from Quebec comment on this subject. The last thing I want to say is that when the Prime Minister's ethics are at issue, the Liberals tell us they do not have time to talk about it and this is not the right time to talk about the Prime Minister's ethical irregularities. Last week, when people talked to the Conservatives about abortion, they said the same thing: now is not the time to talk about abortion; they have other problems to deal with. I hope they do not play the same card here. That is an outdated argument in politics.

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons (Senate), Lib.)

May/10/22 1:29:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, perhaps the only thing more perplexing than the issue being raised today by the Bloc Québécois is the responses to questions about why they raised it. Every time somebody gets up in the House to ask why they raised this and why it is so important, or to get them to explain why this trumps everything else when they have two opposition days, they become extremely defensive and say they have the right to bring forward whatever they want. Indeed, of course they do. I think everybody respects that right, but the question is, why this? Why is this more important than those other pressing issues? Can the member answer that question, rather than just saying they can do whatever they want? We are aware of that. Why is this issue so important?

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Mr. Mario Simard

May/10/22 1:30:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, basically, what my colleague is saying is as crazy as asking why democracy and collective deliberation are important. It makes as much sense as that. The primary principle in modern democracies is the neutrality of the state. What message does it send when this House, an institution that is supposed to be above all other institutions, says a prayer before it begins its proceedings? That sends a very bad message. If my colleague is unable to chew gum and walk at the same time, he has a serious problem, and maybe he is in the wrong place.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer (Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, CPC)

May/10/22 1:31:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a little perplexing that the Bloc sees this as a priority at a time like this. As someone who is Christian and was the chair of the National Prayer Breakfast for four years, I have deep respect for prayers in Canada, prayers in the House and the freedom to pray. The freedom of religion has been recognized in our charter. The first line in the charter says: Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law It is indeed the foundation of our society. This is a practice that was started in 1877 and later codified in the 1920s. Of all the things we are dealing with in Canada, freedom of religion and freedom of expression are sacrosanct. Why would the member choose to take steps to eliminate that for this place?

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Mr. Mario Simard

May/10/22 1:32:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there is a rather simple principle. Generally, the way our societies work is that they are divided into three parts: the state, which represents the public sphere; civil society, which represents the civic sphere; and the family, which represents the private sphere. Generally speaking, religion should be relegated to the civic and private spheres, not the public sphere. That is a key principle in the modern world. It is completely possible that our Constitution contains pious nonsense about how we put God first above anything else. In a polyethnic society, is it still acceptable for a religious statement to be made in the House that is completely inconsistent with the beliefs of the majority? Our beliefs must be relegated to the civic and private spheres, period. That is what the majority of the world's democracies do.

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Ms. Bonita Zarrillo (Port Moody—Coquitlam, NDP)

May/10/22 1:33:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member spoke about neutrality, and this place is not neutral for anyone who comes here in a wheelchair. When a person in a wheelchair arrives in this place and wants to sit in the House, they cannot get to a seat. They could not get to the seat I am sitting in. It is not accessible. I would ask the member to speak a bit about the physical barriers that he sees in this place.

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Mr. Mario Simard

May/10/22 1:34:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the principle of reasonable accommodations has been talked about extensively in the legal context. I think it would be reasonable to accommodate a member who wants to enter the chamber in a wheelchair, but that is not what this motion is about. I think it would be even more reasonable to respect the neutrality of the state and to eliminate this archaic tradition of praying before each sitting.

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Mr. Jean-Denis Garon (Mirabel, BQ)

May/10/22 1:34:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise today. I did not know where to start, so I decided to start by talking about myself, which is not something I often do. I grew up in a small town of a few thousand people in northern Quebec, north of Abitibi. Religion was a big part of this town, the community and my family. As a child, I had to go to mass every Sunday. It was not all bad. I do have some wonderful memories of the highly constructive conversations we would have when Bishop Drainville, who was the bishop of Amos, came over for dinner. Of course, there was religion at school. In elementary school, we had religion classes a few times a week. It was part of the curriculum. In May, the month of Mary, some of my teachers would start the day with a dozen or so rosaries. In high school, we had Catholic religious classes. In a class of 30 or 32 students, there were always three, four or five oddballs who were not of the same religion as the others. They would leave and go to moral education class. We looked at them as if there were aliens. When I was partway through high school, the Quebec government did away with these classes and took religion out of schools, deciding to leave religious education to families and communities. What happened when the schools became secular? God, religion and the priest did not leave the village. People continued to worship in private, at church and in their own private spaces. For me, that is exactly what secularism means. I believe that secularism means respecting every individual's religious observance. For me, secularism means going to Mirabel, passing by the magnificent Saint‑Benoît church, but not being obliged to go to mass there if I do not want to. The same thing goes for the Oka church. It means going for a walk in Outremont and passing by a synagogue but not having to participate in the service, even though I fully respect the Jewish community. It means helping out the Muslim community in Sainte‑Marthe‑sur‑le‑Lac, which teaches the Quran and gives Arabic lessons, as I do regularly without necessarily inviting myself to participate in their prayers. That is the kind of openness we should be aiming for. By extension, secularism does not mean transforming a school into a church, or making a court look like a synagogue. It means having the the assurance, in both appearance and substance, that the laws of the secular state are above those of any god. This is a principle that is extremely important to me. I am going to say something that I truly believe. I became a Catholic without consenting to it. I was baptized without anyone asking my permission. The first few times I went to church, I entered without really consenting to it. One day, for personal reasons, I decided that I would no longer go to church services, but that I would respect those who did. I was at peace with that. However, the day I walked into the House of Commons in 2021, that feeling that my freedom of thought and freedom of conscience were being violated came flooding back. When I walked in at the beginning of the sitting day and it was explained to me that there was a denominational prayer, I realized that I was not welcome. I experienced that feeling that I had hoped I would never have to experience again in my life. That is why secularism is important. It is a question of respect for everyone's beliefs. This debate has been held at every judicial level, right up to the Supreme Court, in a case that put an end to the prayer at Saguenay city hall. The debate is still very relevant and important in Quebec. As Justice LeBel said, “the evolution of Canadian society has given rise to a concept of neutrality according to which the state must not interfere in religion and beliefs...It requires that the state abstain from taking any position and thus avoid adhering to a particular belief.” The final ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada, a Canadian court that struck down sections of Bill 101, states that because of the state's duty of religious neutrality, it may not profess, adopt or favour one belief to the exclusion of all others. Some members will say, as the Liberals did earlier, that we can modernize the prayer, add denominations, make it more neutral and so on. However, the fact remains that it is a prayer. The problem is the ruling itself. It recognizes atheism as a personal religious belief that must be respected just the same as any other. The issue is not whether the prayer is appropriate in the House; it is not. The issue is how to replace it. We take that very seriously. We could have joked about it and proposed a prayer that would make the Liberals happy, something like, “Lead us not into the temptation of going to the Aga Khan's island on vacation, but deliver us from the Ethics Commissioner. Amen.” We could have also proposed one for the Conservatives, such as, “Hail Suncor, full of gas. The pipeline is with thee.” We could have proposed replacing the time for prayer with something more useful, like a training session for ministers on how to answer questions in the House instead of reading the Prime Minister's notes. We could have proposed that the member for Winnipeg North take a course on how to give a speech in the House in under 300 minutes. We took this seriously. We are saying that we must move forward. It is true that some legislatures still recite the prayer. It is true that not everyone is ready to embrace secularism. Quebec is not perfect either. We know that there is more to be done. However, major advances have been made. In 1976, the Quebec National Assembly made a decision to replace the prayer with one minute of reflection. I am going to read an excerpt from the proceedings of the National Assembly. This is what the Speaker stated on December 15, 1976. I remind the House that Quebec society was predominantly Catholic at the time. Out of respect for the members of this Assembly, who are not all necessarily of the same religious denomination, and out of respect for the Assembly, I have chosen to allow every member to pray as they see fit. During the moment of reflection, each member will have the opportunity to say a prayer to themselves, and it is out of respect for the Assembly that I have made this decision. Now the Conservatives are getting up and saying that this is not on the agenda and it is a question of freedom. They were talking about freedom yesterday, the day before yesterday, and they talk about it every day. The member for Carleton spends his time travelling from coast to coast to coast, saying that he is going to make Canada the freest country in the world. Freedom is always important to the member for Carleton. However, freedom of religion and freedom of conscience also apply to the religion of others. They also apply to the conscience of others. It is embarrassing to see the Conservatives invoke the right to say a confessional prayer. When these folks go around talking about freedom, they defend the convoys in the name of freedom and they use their opposition day to talk about the same thing as us. It is shameful. I am thinking of people like the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent who pointed out today that many of our towns and villages have the word “saint” in their names, such as Saint‑Lin, Saint‑Clin‑Clin and Saint‑Meuh‑Meuh. There is a very clear line between what heritage is and the neutrality of the state. For example, in Quebec, there are concerns that a police officer who wears a religious symbol might be implying that their religious beliefs change the way they do their job. That is the concern. It is not about whether a police officer who is not wearing a religious symbol hands out more tickets on Saint-Jean Street or Saint-Paul Street than on Park Avenue. These names are our heritage. It is really important to understand that. Anyone who makes that argument to counter the issue of state neutrality is ill-intentioned. I will conclude by saying that it would be inclusive to turn this prayer into a minute or two of reflection, although some members would do well to take three or four minutes. Hardly anyone comes into the House during that period because so many people feel uncomfortable, yet that is the only non-partisan part of the day. It is the only part of the day when everyone has the opportunity to be together. Everyone has the opportunity to reflect together. Everyone has the opportunity to come together and rise above the partisanship that can sometimes ruin our days, our weeks, our work and our democracy. We need to take advantage of this time. This motion would allow us to do just that, which is why I will be very happy to vote in favour of it.

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Mr. Kody Blois (Kings—Hants, Lib.)

May/10/22 1:44:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. I would like to ask him two questions. First, I am curious to know whether the Bloc Québécois is seeking to import the debate on Quebec's Bill 21 into the House to discuss secularism. Second, I believe that the current method, namely a prayer followed by a moment of silence, is equally appropriate for both people with religious values and those without. Why is my colleague against the current method?

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Mr. Jean-Denis Garon

May/10/22 1:45:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I can assure my colleague that if his god has any heart, his god will still hear him if he prays in silence. That being said, the Liberals are judging the way we use our time on our opposition days. Does anyone know what I have in my hands? It is the budget they presented a couple of weeks ago. It is a rag. They ruined a day's worth of budget discussions, and yet they talk to us about the way we use our opposition days—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

May/10/22 1:46:02 p.m.
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I remind the member not to use props in the House. I will let the member finish his answer, but he should make sure he does not show the document in the House.

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Mr. Jean-Denis Garon

May/10/22 1:46:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, they presented a very thin budget in which they overlooked health care, seniors, the provinces and just about everyone else. They missed a budget day, as well as a budget debate. Because budget debates annoy them, they want to cut them off. They feel that they can judge how we use our time. Shame on them.

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Mrs. Cathay Wagantall (Yorkton—Melville, CPC)

May/10/22 1:46:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the individual does not feel welcome here because of a 30-second prayer, yet freedoms that take away other freedoms are not freedoms for anyone. To me and my constituents, I have to say it is offensive that the Bloc members do not enter into the House until after the national anthem, O Canada, is sung, because they openly indicate that their purpose is to separate from Canada. They openly and freely do not pledge allegiance to Canada, yet I, and clearly all the members of this place, respect that reality. This is their choice. They have a choice of whether to attend to a 30-second prayer that all kinds of individuals in the House, whom I meet with and who are of different faiths, value. I believe that in this case everyone has a beliefs system, including the member who just spoke. That always impacts our decision-making, and we should have the freedom to continue to exercise this opportunity within the House. In the same way Bloc members have the freedom not to come into the House before O Canada, they can certainly do the same in regard to this prayer.

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Mr. Jean-Denis Garon

May/10/22 1:48:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I never thought about that. I just realized that, for my colleague, this represents only 30 seconds of our time. Well, I believe that every minute of my time is valuable. I work hard, which is something that she does not seem to do. That said, if my colleague does not like Quebec's ideas or seeing us raise these issues, then she should let us go. I am only too ready to leave.

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Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

May/10/22 1:48:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have no issues with the motion. I will likely vote in favour of it. However, I am of the opinion that opposition days are an opportunity to highlight issues that affect or constituents. I would like to point out, in the context of the affordable housing crisis in Quebec, that Mirabel has the lowest occupancy rates and the highest vacancy rates in all of Quebec. At 0.1%, it is tied with Granby. That means that the housing crisis hitting Mirabel is also hitting Granby. I know that community well, since I knocked on doors there. My question is simple. If the member were to go visit his constituents in Mirabel, and considering the low occupancy rates and the lack of affordable housing, would he talk to them about the prayer in the House of Commons or the lack of affordable housing?

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Mr. Jean-Denis Garon

May/10/22 1:49:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am perfectly capable of talking about all kinds of things. That said, the population of Mirabel has almost doubled in 10 years because it is an amazing place, a fantastic riding. Obviously the housing issue is top of mind. That is why we have frequently criticized the fact that the national housing strategy, which is out of line with Quebec's priorities and demands, was postponed for three years in Quebec because the federal government wanted to impose its conditions. I do not know if the New Democrats will still have opposition days now that they are in power. Maybe when they have a government business day, they can address this issue.

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