44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 28, 2024 10:00AM
- May/28/24 5:28:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond to the speech by my colleague from Cypress Hills—Grasslands.
In fact, I want to tell him how disappointed I am. I could see where he was heading. He started off with a metaphor when he said that, after three violations, it is time to resign. I was hoping he would use a baseball metaphor because I am a baseball fan. He ended his speech by talking about baseball and mentioning the career of a star umpire, and that got me excited. Unfortunately, he did not use the requisite metaphor for the occasion.
I am going to show him how disappointed I was and do it with a question. What happens after three strikes? I would like him to tell us.
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- May/28/24 6:15:58 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is a question and comment period, but I am going to make a comment because I am no longer sure what questions to ask in this circus atmosphere. It is degrading for the institution we represent.
My colleague's leader would not have been ejected if he had made respectable comments in the House, comments worthy of the institution we represent.
My Liberal colleagues are defending the indefensible. It is a lesson in politics 101. I do not even understand why we are here today. As my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue said, three strikes is the limit in baseball.
Trying to be the adult in the room, the Bloc Québécois moved a motion. We made a democratic proposal that a secret ballot be held. It is a completely democratic process. I could hear people in the NDP shouting that they did not want that. Frankly, what is happening right now is degrading for the institution we represent. That is my comment.
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- May/28/24 7:21:01 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, if members think ethics and integrity are important, I think most Canadians would be stunned at the fact that we would have to say, “six strikes and he should be out”. We are still here, six strikes in on the Speaker of the House, over and over again, as the Liberal MPs mock and just say, “Why not ten?” They have such a low bar they have set for themselves that we are here again today. The Speaker has been in the role for eight months, and there are numerous examples, time and time again, of his being incapable of being neutral, impartial, and non-partisan. Let me talk about the six strikes from my perspective.
We are aware of what happened late last year. The Speaker had the extremely poor judgment to record a video in the Speaker's office, in his Speaker's robes, talking at the Ontario Liberal Party convention, doing a video praising another Liberal. It is completely unacceptable. The second strike was when the Speaker did an interview, cited in his role as Speaker in The Globe and Mail, regarding Mr. John Fraser, to whom he paid tribute by video. He referred, in his role as Speaker, to the Ontario Liberal Party as “our party”. It is completely unacceptable and just common sense not to do that as a Speaker of the House.
If that were not bad enough, right in that time frame, the Speaker decided, when the House was sitting, to take a trip to Washington, D.C. It is nearly unheard of for the Speaker of the House of Commons to leave the country when the House is sitting, let alone when under a cloud of scandal, calls for his resignation and debate about his future. It was poor judgment to leave the country, not just when the House was sitting but also when he was under a cloud of investigation, scandal, criticism, and calls for his resignation.
One would think that would be enough, but it goes on. He gets to Washington, D.C., as Speaker, goes to a private retirement party for a friend instead of being in the House of Commons, and gets caught on video talking about his partisan, Young Liberals of Canada history and how great those times were back in the day, and celebrating his Liberal roots. This is literally while he is under calls for his resignation for time and time again not showing impartiality but showing bias and partisanship towards the Liberal Party. That is number three of the six strikes we are now at.
Number four is the photos that came out right around the time that PROC finished its investigation, showing that the Speaker attended a Quebec Liberal Party fundraiser locally, just across the river. When one is Speaker, they should not go to partisan fundraisers for political parties of any jurisdiction. That has just been the common-sense consensus of every Speaker we have had in this country for over 150 years. That is a strike again.
Now we get to where we are when the Speaker, knowing the amount of criticism that has been lobbed rightfully against him, gets caught using such partisan language on an invitation to a partisan Liberal fundraiser for himself that it would make the member for Winnipeg North blush, probably. It is not just an accident to do all of this.
Here is the thing that is interesting. After all of what I have just laid out, the Speaker promised, because the NDP propped him up, that this would never happen again. He said that he would put procedures in place to make sure that it would never happen again, and that he would be be completely impartial. This was just a rough start, and he wanted a new slate to do it all over again.
One would have thought that the Speaker would have gone back to his riding association as he organized fundraisers, and thought, “Maybe we should watch the way we word our invitations.” I am not one to give free political advice to anybody on the other side of the aisle, particularly when it comes to fundraising, but nobody forced the Speaker to hold the fundraiser.
He had promised to have procedures in place so this would never happen again. He could have simply mailed a letter out from the president of his riding association saying, “Our Speaker is busy being the Speaker and should be non-partisan. I am John Smith, the president of the Hull—Aylmer Liberal Association. Donate $100 to help out our local candidate in the next election.” It would have been free advice that would not have gotten him in trouble. However, it was put in an event, and here we are again. That was strike number five, and I am not done yet.
The sixth strike was today. I am a member of the procedure and House affairs committee. The Speaker appeared today to talk about the topic of violence and harassment prevention policies of the House, PROC, Board of Internal Economy and so forth. The member for Calgary Nose Hill had an exchange with the Speaker about his past, his judgment and his actions of being overly partisan, and that it was on the floor of the House of Commons that the Speaker wrongfully defended the Prime Minister when he was not accused of but admitted to elbowing the chest of an NDP MP.
What frustrated me as I sat in the room and listened was what the Speaker said in response to the member for Calgary Nose Hill's calling him out, saying the Speaker questioned the former member's integrity and her events of the story, literally mocked her on the floor of the House of Commons minutes later and suggested she took a dive reminiscent of something in the World Cup. He was called out for it. In the committee today, and anybody can go and watch the exchange, he said, “I can tell you that I never questioned Ruth Ellen Brosseau's accounting of the situation.”
He literally stood up on the floor of the House of Commons, and it was infamous because he mocked her, and the Prime Minister had to apologize. The Speaker never did. Here he was today, when he was confronted about that situation, and I have to be careful of the words I use in the House so I do not get a point of order, and what he said in his response was completely false. People can listen to what he said that day only a few years ago, and can watch the footage from the cameras in here. That is strike number six.
In 150 years, this country has now had 38 speakers. The current speaker is the 38th. I am not saying they have all been completely innocent. There have been blemishes. There have been issues. However, to have a Speaker with so many accusations against him of being partisan, having poor judgment, showing bias, and of not being neutral and impartial, and to have a couple of strikes, is not good. Some people say, “Three strikes and you're out.”
We are at six strikes. The Speaker has not been here for eight years; he has been here for eight months. We have had Speakers who have served for about 10 ten years. Peter Milliken was raised earlier. He did not have eight issues and ethical violations in a matter of 10 years. The current Speaker has six strikes against him, from what I have outlined here tonight, in eight months.
The question needs to be, “Who is the common denominator?” Liberal MPs have gone on to be Speaker before, with success in being able to balance. When the Speaker is elected, there is a tradition that the Speaker gets dragged in by the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, dragged to the chair. That tradition is the fun part that everybody sees on TV.
Nobody forced the Speaker to run in the first place. He did not ask me for my opinion, and it is probably better that he did not. I kind of wish that he had, because I would have told him that I did not think he was the best fit for the job, because whether it was in the ethics committee or public accounts over the years, time and time again, he was constantly unflinching in his defence of the Prime Minister and the Liberal Party, no matter what. It was a recipe for disaster.
We need to have a Speaker in the chair who can be respected, command the respect of the House and allow us to get to business. We are here tonight not because of Conservatives. We are here because the Speaker, over and over again, has violated trust and has violated the code that for 150-plus years has not resulted in issues. The simple thing I will say again is that it is time for the Speaker to resign. Let us put a new Speaker in the chair, one who can unite the House and focus on the democratic importance we have in the chamber.
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- May/28/24 7:32:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is the typical Liberal response. It is everybody else's fault but theirs.
There are six strikes that I outlined in my speech: the video he made; the comment in The Globe and Mail about the Liberal Party being “our party”; his trip to Washington, D.C. and talking about his history in the Young Liberals of Canada; attending a Quebec Liberal Party fundraiser across the river when he was Speaker; the invitation that went out that was completely inappropriate and over the top; and then, the shameful comments he made today, completely distorting the reality of what he said and, again, attacking the integrity of an NDP MP. The NDP has no problem propping him up.
Which six of those are wrong? None of them. They all happened, and Liberals continue to give him more chances, wrongfully. He has zero reason to give up the chair, if that is going to be the attitude of the Liberal Party. The more strikes he has, the more they seem to love him.
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- May/28/24 7:36:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour to take my place here and to follow the great speaker we heard earlier. I was shocked when he outlined the six strikes. Not one or two strikes, but six strikes. There is a seventh one, with the doctoring of Hansard, which has not been ruled on for weeks by the Liberal Speaker. We need a new Speaker.
Madam Speaker, my remarks will be through you, but they are really directed to the power that is being held in this place by the NDP. We have an agent of the Crown, our Speaker, and I am most concerned about the orange portion of that Crown. The orange portion used to stand for the common man, for the common person in this place, and it has fallen so far from that position. The green carpet in this place is to represent the common people the NDP used to represent. Those people have been ignored by the NDP. Some would say they have been forgotten.
It is an interesting exercise to consider the NDP's position with all these violations. The most recent violation, not the one that we are talking about today, but the last one, is the most telling. It is due to that allegation the NDP referenced, that if the Speaker messes up one more time, then there is going to be hell to pay. Guess what? The Speaker messed up. We are here. We have yet to hear the ruling on the Hansard cover-up that is going on right now.
We are looking at seven violations, and maybe more, within eight months, and you have confidence in the Speaker?
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