SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 319 - May/28/24

May/28/24 6:32:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree. There is only one qualification for the Speaker role, and that is impartiality. The Speaker has demonstrated three times that he cannot be impartial. If anybody else, in any other industry, in any other setting around the country, had failed the core competency of their job three times, what would happen? They would be fired. The Speaker should resign.

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Ms. Lindsay Mathyssen (London—Fanshawe, NDP)

May/28/24 6:32:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I find it very difficult, within the context of what the member has put forward, to take this seriously. I have just gone on to Hansard and did a quick search of our current Deputy Speaker, the member for West Nova. He has said so many things that are partisan as well. I could list them off. He criticizes the Liberals consistently. He was an opposition member. However, that seems to have no play in this place. Throughout our careers, there are roles we have here. The member, herself, was on the government side. She is no longer. Our roles change. I believe her argument against the current Speaker, in the context she was using throughout her speech, is poor. I would like to hear her response to that, considering we all have roles, and they change over time. This could be said about the current Deputy Speaker. It could be said about you, Madam Speaker. This is all applicable.

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Hon. Michelle Rempel Garner

May/28/24 6:34:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, tu quoque is the most obvious logical fallacy in debate. The member did it, too. If the member was going to take this logical fallacy to the end, she should have raised a question of privilege on any of those matters she just raised, but she will not. Why is that? It is because they do not meet the level of partisanship the Speaker has been found guilty of. She knows in her heart that this man should not be Speaker. I encourage her to go to her House leader to say that this is the third time this has happened, so why are they making her vote to prop up a guy who spoke out against a woman who was elbowed in the chest by the Prime Minister?

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Mr. Rick Perkins (South Shore—St. Margarets, CPC)

May/28/24 6:34:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am rising today, as are other members, to deal with a very serious motion, the privilege motion ruled on by the Deputy Speaker and brought forward by the member for Grande Prairie—Mackenzie. It is yet another incident of the Speaker pursuing partisan elements of his personal or previous life as a partisan MP while in the neutral role of the Speaker. It is important to note and understand why it is that the Speaker is neutral and where that comes from. It is a very ancient parliamentary tradition. For those who do not know our history, Bosc and Gagnon, the great book we use, has a very instructive history of why the Speaker is neutral. I should mention that I will be splitting my time with the member for Calgary Rocky Ridge. The first Speakers were appointed in the 1300s in the mother of all Parliaments, and they were essentially an agent of the king or the Crown until about 100 years later. The book notes, on page 312: The Crown’s influence over the Speaker came to an end in 1642, when King Charles I, accompanied by an armed escort, crossed the Bar of the House, sat in the Speaker’s chair and demanded the surrender of five parliamentary leaders on a charge of treason. Falling to his knees, Speaker William Lenthall replied with these now famous words which have since defined the Speaker’s role in relation to the House and the Crown: May it please Your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see, nor tongue to speak in this place, but as the House is pleased to direct me, whose servant I am here; and I humbly beg Your Majesty’s pardon that I cannot give any other answer than this to what Your Majesty is pleased to demand of me. The historic element of that is that the Speaker was no longer the servant of the Crown. The Crown is the government. The current Speaker has operated his partisan breaches in the last six to eight months. I would say there are six, but the first breach occurred in October, shortly after he became Speaker, as we have talked about, when he filmed a video not far from here, in his office, which he used at the Ontario Liberal Party convention. In the video, he extolled the virtues of the outgoing leader, which was a total abuse of the neutrality of the Speaker. I would add that, in Bosc and Gagnon, on page 323, it says: When in the Chair, the Speaker embodies the power and authority of the office, strengthened by rule and precedent. He or she must at all times show, and be seen to show, the impartiality required to sustain the trust and goodwill of the House. Not only must the Speaker live by the letter of the law, he has to be seen to be living by the letter of the law on neutrality. Doing a video in the Speaker's office, in his Speaker's robes and using House of Commons resources was a clear breach. He was found to have made that breach by the procedure and House affairs committee of the House and fined. Yes, he profusely apologized to the House. Apparently, in the past, that would have resulted in a Speaker having resigned, but the House accepted a fine. However, two of the parties, the real official opposition, the Bloc and the Conservatives, because the NDP is in a coalition that jumps when the Liberals ask, with the seriousness of this, voted with the government to keep the Speaker in place. The British still maintain this neutrality. The U.K. Parliament says, “The political impartiality of the Speaker is one of the office's most important features – and most emulated or aspired to outside the UK. Once elected, the Speaker severs all ties with his or her former party and is in all aspects of the job a completely non-partisan figure.” That is not the process that our Speaker has been following in the breach. The breach we are talking about today, of course, is that we know that he put out a very partisan invitation to an event in the riding of Hull—Aylmer, which coincidentally happens to be the Speaker's own riding. The government members would have us believe that the Speaker had nothing to do with the invitation to an event in his own riding. I do not know about other members, but I always review anything my EDA sends out in my riding. I would not let them put it out. It would be irresponsible for me to let it put them out, especially to an event like that. The Speaker, in the invitation, described a summer evening with the hon. Speaker, scheduled to be held on the evening of June 4th in the shadow of Parliament Hill at a location adjacent to the Gatineau bank on the bank of the Ottawa River, less than a kilometre from here. The promotional material of the event used very partisan, inflammatory language concerning the Conservative Party and the leader of the official opposition. I will just read a little bit of it for members. It said, “Join us for an event in your community - you don't want to miss it! It's an opportunity to join fellow Liberals and talk about the ways we can continue to build a better future for all Canadians - because a better future starts with you.” It goes on to say, “While [the Leader of the Opposition] and the Conservatives propose reckless policies that would risk [the] health, safety and pocketbooks [of] our Liberal team” because, of course, it is all about the pocketbooks of the Liberal team. It continues that it “is focused on making life more affordable for Canadians and moving forward with our bold plan to grow an economy”. The very partisan nature of this is actually emphasized in a footnote in the rhetoric, which explains that “Team [Prime Minister] events are posted by local volunteer teams”. That means that the locals in his riding posted this, not the claim that the government is making, which is that he was not responsible and that somebody else was responsible. It sounds like a six-year-old saying that their brother did it, that they did not do it, that they did not steal the chocolate bar, but their brother did. That is unacceptable. The reason this is important is because the Speaker has to protect the interest of the opposition in challenging the Crown. The Speaker is not a mouthpiece for the Crown. The Speaker is a protector of the rights of our democracy in this place, in this chamber. It used to be that the NDP, not so long ago, agreed with that. I will quote, if one can bear with me for a minute, the member for New Westminster—Burnaby, the NDP House leader, who said, after the first incident, when it was at the procedure and House affairs committee, “This cannot happen moving forward. From now on, you cannot have the Speaker engage in partisan activity.” He also said that if there was any derogation of that in the weeks and months to come, and we are only months from that, his party would join in voting non-confidence in the Speaker, and that is what we are doing today. We have a motion for the Speaker to vacate the chair. The NDP House leader said that this is what they would do if this happened again. It has happened again, but apparently the NDP has been whipped by the Liberal whip into keeping its coalition alive and betraying the words that it said to the public about what it would do going forward. Some might say that NDP members were Liberal lickspittles rather than members of the official opposition holding the government to account. Going forward, we know that, in the coalition government, one cannot depend on the NDP to protect the democratic interests of the House and the privileges of individuals. We are not suggesting that what happened to King Charles I should happen to the Speaker if the Speaker had integrity the first time, the second time, the third time, the fourth time, the sixth time, now that he has breached, in six months the partisan nature of his post. I am partisan as well, but I do not aspire to be the neutral guy or the neutral woman sitting in that chair. I do not like to be the referee. I would rather play on a team and fight the fight. Some like to do that job. The Speaker seems to want to do both, not the Speaker who is presently in the chair, but the Speaker we are debating today, along with his future, and why he has to vacate the chair. He has to make a choice. His choice has clearly been that he is using that position for partisan purposes. That has to stop.

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Hon. Ruby Sahota (Brampton North, Lib.)

May/28/24 6:45:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, so far, what I have been hearing throughout the debate is “do as we say, not as we do”. It has been indicated several times that the former Conservative Speaker also promoted and went to fundraising events. It has been cleared up in this case that the fundraising event invitation did not go out from the Speaker or from the Speaker's office. What does the member have to say about that? I find it quite hypocritical that a previous Conservative Speaker attended fundraisers and promoted fundraisers on his social media, yet the Conservatives have wasted almost two days in the House talking about this matter when we could be talking about affordability.

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Mr. Rick Perkins

May/28/24 6:45:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I know the government finds democracy a bother, and by the way, this was an opposition day, so no government business has been lost. In response to the question, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, who was Speaker at one time, was not promoting an event. It was another member of our caucus from Saskatchewan who posted the picture that has been talked about a few times. The former Speaker picked up another member of our caucus and drove him to an event, and a picture was taken outside of the event by that member and posted. Somehow, the Liberals are trying to compare that to the language used by the invitation sent out by the current Speaker, which was taking shots at the leader of the official opposition and the Conservative Party. I dare anyone on that side to find anything near comparable, with the previous Speaker, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, making comments publicly against the Liberals or opposition members while he was Speaker. I would point out to my NDP friend from earlier that she should look at the dates of the quotes she is looking at. They are from prior to when he was appointed.

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Saskatchewan

Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

May/28/24 6:47:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from South Shore—St. Margarets for his speech, in which he talked about partisanship. He said that a Speaker should rise above partisanship. That is an interesting thing to point out in this debate. However, I wonder if he could comment on something else that we have come to expect from the Speaker, because his role is essentially to make judgment calls on what is happening in the House. It is really all about exercising judgment. Does my colleague believe that the current Speaker has shown good judgment, and is that a quality that should be essential, along with impartiality, in the role of Speaker of the House of Commons?

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Mr. Rick Perkins

May/28/24 6:48:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, obviously, judgment is a key part of any role in the House, and the judgment in this case, when one is Speaker, has to be to say, “No, I will not go to a partisan event; my role does not allow for that.” In fact, in the past, Speakers have left their party and sat as independent members when they became Speaker. That is a choice the current Speaker has to make in judgment, and he showed that his judgment errs on the side of partisanship, not on the side of being neutral. That is why he has to vacate the chair.

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Mrs. Anna Roberts (King—Vaughan, CPC)

May/28/24 6:48:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my friend from South Shore—St. Margarets has been involved in politics for a long time. I know you are older, but that is not what I mean. You are very experienced, so I look to you for—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

May/28/24 6:49:07 p.m.
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The hon. member has to speak through the Chair.

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Speak

Mrs. Anna Roberts

May/28/24 6:49:17 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will insult him through the Chair. Some hon. members: Oh, oh! Mrs. Anna Roberts: Madam Speaker, I am wondering if the member can tell the House this: In his experience, has he ever seen a Speaker as partisan as this one? Also, I am wondering if the member can share his opinion on why the NDP-Liberal government is so desperate to defend its clearly very partisan friend who is the Speaker now.

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Partisan

Mr. Rick Perkins

May/28/24 6:49:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think I should thank the member for the question, but I am not quite sure. I was not here at the time of Sir John A.; that is a myth. However, I was here at the time of the Right Hon. Brian Mulroney during the transition from appointing Speakers to electing Speakers. Since then, I have never seen a Speaker engaged in partisan activities while Speaker and, in an overt way, criticizing members of the opposition or an opposition party while still serving in the chair. I have not seen that in 40-plus years of my very young life.

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Mr. Pat Kelly (Calgary Rocky Ridge, CPC)

May/28/24 6:50:35 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this evening, participating in this debate gives me no joy whatsoever. However, it is always an honour, including at this moment, to speak in the House of Commons. The matter before us is the the motion of the member for Grande Prairie—Mackenzie, which notes: ...the Speaker's ongoing and repetitive partisan conduct outside of the Chamber is a betrayal of the traditions and expectations of his office and a breach of the trust required to discharge his duties and responsibilities, all of which this House judges to be a serious contempt and, therefore, declares that the office of Speaker shall be vacated.... I cannot believe this is the second time in six months that this chamber has had to come to a halt to debate and ultimately rule on the fitness of the Speaker to continue. The impartiality of the Speaker is fundamental to this institution. This House is where 338 members of Parliament, elected to represent the people of Canada, come to legislate the laws of Canada. This is where vigorous debate occurs on bills proposed most of the time by the government, but also by private members and those from the other place. This is where the most powerful people in Canada are held to account. The votes in this place determine the continuation of the government. This is where, on a day-to-day basis, the most powerful people in Canada come to face an opposition. It is where their ideas have to be tested. When bills are brought into this place, the process of debate is designed to be adversarial. It is designed to be partisan. If the government is going to propose a bill to change the laws of Canada and impose law on Canada, it has to be tested by an opposition. The only way the democratic privileges of Canadians can be protected is through an impartial Speaker whose impartiality is absolutely beyond reproach, yet here we are, for the second time in six months, debating whether that is the case with the current Speaker. I bring members to the latest issue and question of the impartiality of the Speaker, wherein the Speaker's Liberal electoral district association advertised a “Summer Evening with the [Speaker]” and talked about “fellow Liberals” joining with the Speaker to discuss issues. I will not repeat or read the portion of this invitation that had a very aggressive attack on the Leader of the Opposition and the Conservative Party. Anybody who read this invitation could see that this was an absolutely unpardonable departure from the norm of the Speaker's impartiality. As the member before me talked about, the impartiality of the Speaker has been well understood since the mid-17th century. This is not something new, and the entire system relies on this impartiality, so the invitation to this event alone is a departure from that. We have heard all day the speakers from the government say that this does not have anything to do with the Speaker at all and that this is from the Liberal Party. Really? There is a date on it. Are we left to believe that the Speaker did not know about this event that was advertised with his name on it on a particular date in his riding? Of course he had to have known about this. However, that may even be beside the point. Once a Speaker is elected, would not one of the very first things that any newly elected Speaker do be to sit down with the officials of the electoral district association for their party and tell them that they cannot advertise fundraising with the Speaker's name? They cannot do that. Everybody knows this. It is so simple. There is no excuse for it. The Liberal Party may want to claim responsibility for this to deflect from the Speaker, but no reasonable person would buy that the date in question had not been communicated to the Speaker. Is the EDA really going to have a fundraiser and put the Speaker's name on it to advertise it without checking to see if he is going to be available to attend? Of course they must have done that. The fact that this happened is why we are here today, but even if we could say this was a mistake, a one-off, by somebody who did not know better, the problem is that the Speaker has had a history of these types of events and no longer gets the benefit of the doubt. He does not get the benefit of the doubt when the House has already gone through a protracted question of privilege over his filming of a video in his Speaker's robes in the Speaker's office, which was played at a Liberal Party convention. He does not get the benefit of the doubt when this has already happened. When the debate on that earlier question was under way, the Speaker was in Washington attending another event, where he waxed nostalgic about his history of Liberal activism in a celebrity crowd of international Liberals. I want to set that aside for a minute and ask what the Speaker was doing in Washington that week. That was a sitting week of the House of Commons. To the Speaker of the House of Commons, no other business is more important than a meeting of the House of Commons. Presiding over question period, presiding over important votes and presiding over the procedural issues that come up in Routine Proceedings each day are core responsibilities of the Speaker. There is no excuse for the Speaker to not be in the chair for these moments, other than incapacity and illness. If a Speaker is well enough to get out of bed and go out for the day, they are well enough to be in the chair when the House is sitting. We have seen this over and over again. We have seen travel. We have seen the Speaker vacating the chair, probably, I am told, for diplomatic functions or meetings in the lounge. There is no excuse for these things. The Speaker ran on a platform to be Speaker, saying that nobody pays to see the ref; it is all about the players. However, under this Speaker, it has been about the Speaker, and that is just as offensive as the constant partisanship. We have other examples of his partisanship. He attended an event for the Liberal member of the National Assembly in his riding. He got a former Liberal MP to write an op-ed to prop up his own standing and attack the Conservatives. Again, it is partisan attacks. The Speaker's job is not to care what the press gallery thinks or what the school kids in the gallery think or what anybody out there thinks of their conduct. The Speaker's role is to protect the privileges of members of the House of Commons. It is about protecting members. It is about ensuring that all of the people who elected the 338 members of the House of Commons have the tools and ability to hold the government to account and express their democratic will. That is the role of the Speaker, not hanging out with diplomats, not flying off to Washington and not any of the other things. Despite the Speaker's role of protecting members' privileges, we are still waiting for a ruling. Four weeks ago, a question of privilege was raised over the alteration of Hansard, and the Speaker still has not ruled on it. It is about time that we had a Speaker that will uphold the privileges of members of the House of Commons in an impartial fashion.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

May/28/24 7:00:25 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we know why we are here today. It is because of the Conservatives' persistence in playing a shameful game of character assassination. The issue arose because something was posted on social media, a website, and we have a third party saying they are the ones who did it, apologizing to the Speaker's office for doing it and taking full responsibility. However, when I posed a question to the member's deputy leader asking why the Speaker was being blamed, her response was, in essence, that he “probably, might have, most likely approved” of it. Does the member have anything of substance to say showing that the Speaker was aware of it?

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Mr. Pat Kelly

May/28/24 7:01:24 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member might have listened to my speech because I addressed this in my speech extensively. I will say that if someone already has the same history that the current Speaker has, they do not get the benefit of the doubt at this point. At this point, it is over.

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

May/28/24 7:01:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have always known the member to be a fair person. I have enjoyed working with him. I know he believes in due process, and we have a situation where the Liberal Party of Canada screwed up and has apologized now for disrespecting both the Speaker and Parliament. I am concerned, and I know in his heart of hearts the member is concerned, about the ongoing attacks on the Speaker, given that we have seen as well the attacks by the conservative Saskatchewan Party in the Saskatchewan legislature, in going after an independent Speaker. We have seen violence, intimidation, and verbal and physical aggressive intimidation of the Speaker of the Saskatchewan legislature by the House leader, Jeremy Harrison, a former colleague of his and former MP from the Conservative Party. Will the member condemn unequivocally those actions in the Saskatchewan legislature, directed at the Speaker?

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Mr. Pat Kelly

May/28/24 7:02:58 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am here to talk about the motion at hand. The member said, the last time we debated the partisanship of the Speaker, that if there were any further transgressions of impartiality, particularly involving Liberal and partisan action, he would vote for removal of the Speaker. Therefore, I call on him to remember his words from last December and vote accordingly.

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Mr. Kevin Waugh (Saskatoon—Grasswood, CPC)

May/28/24 7:03:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, here is the issue we are going to have in the hour. It is not a secret vote. We are going to stand up and vote yea or nay on the removal. Can members guess who is going to sit at home watching our vote? It will be the Speaker. Let us see what the Speaker does when he comes back. We all know that the NDP has supported the current Liberal government. We tried today to remove the Speaker. I suspect with the vote that we are going to be unsuccessful tonight with respect to dumping the Speaker. Therefore, what happens when we come back, when the Speaker acknowledges every one of us standing up to vote nay or yea to get rid of him over his partisan shots that he has taken the last six months?

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Mr. Pat Kelly

May/28/24 7:04:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member quite rightly points out through his question that the Speaker's position is untenable. This cannot go on and it would be best for him to resign before this vote occurs.

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Resign

Mr. Tom Kmiec (Calgary Shepard, CPC)

May/28/24 7:05:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, off the top, just so that this is not a surprise, not to you as the Chair, but to the Speaker, I want him to know that I lost confidence in him long before now. I know I am supposed to split my time, but I usually look around to see if the member is in the chamber; he is behind me now. I was hoping to get the whole 20 minutes, but I will split my time with the member for Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry. He is deserving of the time. I am sure he will make fine points, too. Actually, the Speaker knows this, because I heckle him on a semi-regular basis that I have lost confidence in him. I do not believe he is doing a great job. He has given ample opportunity for members of this House to not believe that he is able to conduct himself in a way that takes the Speaker's position and rises above the fray of the House. He said on the very first day or second day that he was like a new car and that he was hoping to avoid having dents in it. At this point, this thing is now in the scrapyard. It is done. There is nothing more to do. There is no way to fix this vehicle and give it a second life. There have been three events. Other members have talked about them. The Speaker provided a provincial politician with a very partisan going-away video in Speaker's robes at a partisan convention. As the member for Calgary Rocky Ridge mentioned, the Speaker went to Washington, D.C. during a sitting week of the House in order to wax and wane about Liberal dogma. Now we have this latest issue of an email that was sent out inviting people in Hull—Aylmer, his riding, to an event where the Speaker was going to be. As other members, like my seatmate, the member for South Shore—St. Margarets said, it is impossible not to believe that the Speaker would not have known about that. All of us tell our EDAs what we want to know. I review every email a constituent gets from my office. If it goes out under my name, I see it automatically. It does not matter if it is EDA fundraisers sent by my EDA from the partisan emails we have. Nothing leaves my office without me seeing it. I look at those emails once my volunteers have set them up. I refuse to believe that the Speaker did not know. He can decline to take fault for it. If he wants to do that, that is fine. In ethics, there are two things that matter: actual conflicts of interest and the perception of a conflict of interest. The same thing applies here. The perception of partisanship should be sufficient for any Speaker to say to themselves, “I am not important”, just like I am not important as the member of Parliament for Calgary Shepard. None of us are. We are stewards of these seats on behalf of our constituents and for future generations. The Speaker is the steward of that office, which is independent. We have been blessed to have had that office for hundreds of years in this country, thanks to Speaker Lenthall, as the member for South Shore—St. Margarets reminded us. I have a print of a painting in my office so that when constituents come for a visit, I can talk about how important that was. It is a depiction of when King Charles I lost his head in the Palace of Westminster. It has a beautiful brass dot on the floor. You know about this, Madam Speaker, because you saw it with me; it was a wonderful experience to see that. It shows the exact place where King Charles I was executed, partially for invading this Parliament, trying to take it over and trying to arrest members of Parliament. The Speaker, every Speaker, needs to remember that it is not just about the pretty paintings they have in the hallway where the Speaker gets to walk around with the mace in a procession, wearing the robes, and having all of the clerks and analysts who help them do their job. Their job is literally to be a steward for the next generation, for the person who comes after them. The Speaker keeps forgetting that. It is just all about him; it has become about him. If he does not believe it is about him, in his heart of hearts, he should tell himself that his job is to protect the role and the job. The only honourable thing to do would be to resign before the vote is taken to protect that office. I have a Yiddish proverb. I wrote it down, because I always have one when I am speaking. I went looking for it. My Yiddish-speaking Jewish friends will forgive me for my pronunciation of this proverb: “Eyn alter fraynd iz beser vi naye tsvey.” That means one old friend is better than two new ones. The Speaker has chosen his old friend, the Liberal Party. I find it unusual that Liberal members of Parliament are throwing the Liberal Party of Canada under the bus. Liberals are throwing Liberals under the bus, including their whole organizational structure. Everybody in the party apparatus in the Liberal offices is in some way at fault for sending out a partisan email that the Speaker should have looked at. The staff in the Speaker's office should have realized it could not go out in his name under any circumstances. Obviously, they did not catch it. I will also say that his name was not on my ballot. I refused to put him on my ballot because this particular Speaker has been very partisan in his role. I do not fault him for it. There are many partisan members here. Partisanship is part of being a member of Parliament, and I accept that. I had the names ordered in a different way, as you know, Madam Speaker. You know exactly who was my first choice on that ballot, who was my second choice and who was my third choice. You know why as well. I have found, with Speakers in the past, and I have had a few Speakers now who have been responsible for the House, as a spectator, that Speaker Milliken was probably the best modern Speaker the House has had. I think that is a widely shared opinion. He was a Liberal member of Parliament who became the Speaker. It almost did not matter which party one was in, he was generally approved. I think even the clerks and the analysts of the different committees think so too. I have even looked at videos of his past decisions on how he behaved in the House and controlled it. I would say that in the United Kingdom the most interesting Speaker of late was Speaker Bercow, who was renowned for trying to keep order in the House with his shouting down of members and his quips. It worked for him in his situation. However, this particular Speaker has never been able to restore confidence after the errors he has made, and he does not give me more confidence that it can get better. I will also add that, when the member for Manicouagan tried to amend the motion we are considering to make it a secret ballot vote, just like when we elect a Speaker, she was shouted down by the member for New Westminster—Burnaby. He was the first member to start saying no over her as she was trying to read her motion. He did not even wait until she was done to say no, but did it while she was trying to add a very reasonable amendment. The member for New Westminster—Burnaby is the same member who, when speaking to journalists on behalf of the New Democratic Party, after the review by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs of the issue, said, “This cannot happen moving forward. From now on, you cannot have a Speaker engage in partisan activity.” He also said, “if there was any derogation from that, in the weeks and months to come”, that his party would join in voting “non-confidence” in the Speaker. That is essentially what we are doing right now. We want the Speaker to vacate the seat. I personally believe that is the right solution here because the Speaker has chosen his old friend, specifically the Liberal Party. I do not mean the individual caucus members here, because I am sure some of them, if allowed a free vote, would also believe that he has simply lost the confidence of the House. About half of the members here do not believe he can do the job. Any Speaker in that situation, just like any CEO or chair of a board of directors, should then say that they could not continue in their role and step down. I have chaired Conservative caucus meetings. If members think we are rambunctious in public, wait until they see us in private and how difficult it is to chair a meeting of the Conservative caucus with our senators. I survived for two and a half years. My members knew that there were many times when I came very close to making a decision as to whether I could continue as the chair of my own caucus, so I set the limits of what was acceptable in our caucus meetings and what the rules were. This Speaker cannot do that because we do not have confidence in his ability to be non-partisan in the role. He allows emails to be sent out that are partisan in nature and then pretends he did not know about it. He travels overseas, goes to Washington, D.C., and waxes on about Liberal dogma. He made a video on behalf of Liberal politicians in Speaker's robes. If it was just a one-time thing, I could absolve him of that sin, but he very obviously is choosing his old friend, the Liberal Party of Canada, which is now protecting him as well, instead of choosing his new friends, those of us who are looking to him to be a neutral, non-partisan referee. In his own words, he is like an unblemished car with maybe a dent or two so far. That car is now in the wrecking yard because he has chosen his old friends. He cannot continue. I invite the Speaker to resign before the vote.

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