SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 214

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 15, 2023 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 214 - Jun/15/23
Mr. John Brassard (Barrie—Innisfil, CPC)
  • Jun/15/23 4:14:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, obviously, I feel profoundly disappointed again that we are here facing time allocation on a profoundly substantive change to the way Parliament functions. We have had just a few hours to discuss this. I am planning to speak to this issue later on. This is an issue that goes back to during the COVID pandemic. The government made its intentions very clear at that time that this is the direction it wanted to go. There are a lot of voices that want to speak on this issue because of the substantive nature of this change, and I cannot quite understand why the government is invoking time allocation on something that would have a profound impact on the way this place functions. Here we go again. I am not surprised that the government House leader has risen on this matter. Does he not understand how substantive this issue is and how many voices he is silencing in this place, the voices of members of Parliament in this place, who are representing millions of people across this country? It is just ridiculous.
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Context: House Hansard - 214 - Jun/15/23
Hon. Mark Holland
  • Jun/15/23 4:15:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think the member recognizes well why we have to use time allocation. He can see that the Conservative Party has done everything from faking technical problems to raising point of order after point of order to try to disrupt the House from doing its business. In fact, last Friday, an entire day of Parliament was lost as a result of procedural tricks by the Conservatives, and the leader of the official opposition himself has said that they will do everything to block the ability of the House to do its job. Of course, one party that represents one-third of the seats does not have the opportunity or right to stand in the way of every other party from doing its business. That is most certainly not democratic. The other thing I would point out is that it is the Conservatives' right to make the same point again and again, which is that they are against the utilization of hybrid Parliament, which they have said they would never support under any conditions. They can keep making that same speech again and again, but it is not a restriction of democracy to hear that speech 10, 20, 30 or 40 times. At some point, when they say the same thing, the message is heard. They are against it. I am sorry, but the House is moving forward with this because it is the right thing to do.
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