SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 328 - Jun/10/24

Hon. Andrew Scheer (Regina—Qu'Appelle, CPC)

Jun/10/24 4:47:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I wanted to add some additional comments regarding the question of privilege raised by the NDP's deputy House leader. In her comments on Thursday, as in her original submissions the week prior, the member for London—Fanshawe failed to offer any arguments that would extend the applicable requirements for the Speaker's impartiality to the other chair occupants. For his part, the hon. Member for Mégantic—L'Érable cited at length from House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, as well as rulings delivered from the Chair, in 1993 and 2023, on the subject matter. The NDP deputy House leader failed to answer those points and explain how well-established precedents should be thrown out the window. Finally, the hon. member for London—Fanshawe neglected to address the NDP's disappointing hypocrisy in raising these concerns, all while the NDP website leverages the hon. member for Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing's Assistant Deputy Speaker title for fundraising and volunteer recruitment purposes. Her silence speaks volumes. I would just like to point out that when my colleague raised this point, the response from the NDP House leader was to refer to the question of privilege as “the dumbest question of privilege” he has ever heard. I agree with him. I just believe that his comments should be addressed to the member for London—Fanshawe's raising of the original point, not to the point that my colleague, the deputy leader for the Conservatives, made, which is that, if the New Democrats were upset with the original point, they should look at their own examples before they raised theirs in the House of Commons. In closing, Mr. Speaker, I would urge you to agree with my hon. friend, the deputy leader for the official opposition, that there is no question of privilege here.

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Context: House Hansard - 328 - Jun/10/24

Hon. Andrew Scheer (Regina—Qu'Appelle, CPC)

Jun/10/24 4:49:15 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, while I am on my feet, I would also like to address the question of privilege raised by the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre regarding the hon. member for Saskatoon West. First, I am pleased to hear that she accepted the apology of our colleague when he rose on Thursday morning to advise the House that he had misspoken one word. It is an age-old tradition in this place that we accept the word and the apologies of our colleagues. That said, it apparently did not draw a line under the matter, so we are left to address the question of privilege raised concerning the accuracy of the Debates. I will read from page 1229 of House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition: The availability of the blues on the House of Commons’ internal website permits Members and their authorized delegates to use the web page or email to submit suggested changes for Parliamentary Publications editorial staff to consider.... It is a long-standing practice of the House that editors of the Debates may exercise judgment as to whether or not changes suggested by Members constitute the correction of an error or a minor alteration. These practices were the subject of a very recently delivered ruling by the Speaker; on May 30, at page 24087 of the Debates, he said: While the Debates are published under the authority of the Chair, the House should know that the Chair plays no part in editing the Debates. The editors of the Parliamentary Publications team craft a record that, in their judgment, best corresponds to the proceedings, without political interference and in a completely non-partisan manner. The editors may make changes to the records of the House proceedings, whether or not those changes are proposed by members, in accordance with their own guidelines and long-standing practices. If the Speaker himself plays no part in editing Hansard, then it must similarly follow that a private member on the opposition benches could claim no power or authority to override the editors' guidelines and long-standing practices. I would respectfully submit that, on that basis alone, the question of privilege must be dismissed. In any event, though, I would also refer the Chair to these comments, found on pages 1229 to 1230 of Bosc and Gagnon, where we read: Substantial errors in the Debates, as opposed to editorial changes, must be brought to the attention of the House by means of a point of order as soon as possible after the sitting, if a Member wishes to have the record changed.... When a question arises in the House as to the accuracy of the record, it is the responsibility of the Speaker to look into the matter. In short, the correct procedure would have been for a point of order, not a question of privilege, to address a concern of this nature with Hansard. Therefore, the question of privilege must also fail on these grounds. Nonetheless, I would underscore for the House that the member for Saskatoon West has done the honourable thing. He apologized and advised that he had misspoken one word, thereby properly correcting the record to reflect the intention of his remarks. As such, Mr. Speaker, I would submit that you may now simply find the matter to be closed.

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Context: House Hansard - 328 - Jun/10/24

Mr. Yves Perron (Berthier—Maskinongé, BQ)

Jun/10/24 5:49:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always a privilege to speak in the House. I want to begin by saying that I will be sharing my time with my respected colleague from Saint‑Hyacinthe—Bagot. I say that it is always a privilege to speak because it is a great privilege just to be in the House. Out of more than 40 million people, there are 338 members. It is a prestigious position, and the people have put their trust in us. That is what I want to start with: The people have put their trust in us. What we are here to do, every time we stand up in the course of our work as parliamentarians, is work for the people who have put their trust in us, for the common good. That is not always evident because we sometimes play partisan games, but things are worse than usual right now. We have learned that there are people who are probably working for foreign powers. It is completely mind-boggling, surreal even. It is like something out of a bad movie, especially considering the incidents that have already taken place in Surrey—Newton. I would like to tell my colleague that we stand in solidarity with the people in his riding who have suffered this horrible tragedy. If all the information we have is correct, it is absolutely atrocious. It is appalling that something like this could happen in a G7 country. Not only is this appalling and surreal, I find it unbelievable that the Bloc Québécois is once again the only responsible adult in the room. The political party that seems best placed to govern is the only political party not interested in forming a government. How ironic. I do not understand why a government that claims to be responsible did not take stronger action than that to counter foreign interference. I will return to that later. What our motion proposes is quite simple. We take note of the report on foreign interference. We note that some elected officials could be acting under foreign influence and working not for the people in their ridings, but for other countries with interests that, more often than not, are probably detrimental to our own. People are saying that this is outrageous, and that something must be done about it. What we are saying is that the Hogue commission's terms of reference need to be expanded, that it should not just investigate the last two elections, for a few months, within the framework of a modest, very restricted mandate that requires a report to be tabled by Christmas. What we are asking for is a full investigation of this country's democratic institutions, including its members of Parliament and senators. We need to investigate all parliamentarians. We need to figure out what happened. We need to get this information out. In the House, we are often caught between right-wing populism and left-wing populism. Some people want names, even though everyone knows perfectly well that that is impossible, as things currently stand, without facing a harsh penalty or even criminal sanctions. No names can be released. The Conservatives can create sound bites for four days, demanding names, but everyone knows that is impossible. The way to get those names out is to expand the commission's terms of reference. That is what we want to do. I am pleased that all political parties in the House of Commons will be supporting this motion. The revelations are extremely serious. People who likely received money, people who are in the pocket of foreign powers, people whose election was financed with money from foreign countries, it is all outrageous. I am going to offer a bit of a solution to prevent foreign forces from funding electoral activities. I am going to suggest, once again, that Canada look to Quebec, which reformed its election legislation. Let us be serious, how many people, just ordinary citizens, are in a position to give a political party $1,700? There are some. I know some, obviously, but there are not that many. How is that some ridings have so many of them? It may be because those people want something in exchange. It is at least an incentive. In Quebec, we solved that problem by setting the maximum annual contribution at $100. We have prevented that from happening. There is public financing. This public financing had been removed by the Conservatives, who found that the Bloc Québécois was too powerful. I will not get into that. That would be a solution that could help us prevent this type of foreign influence. Earlier, the parliamentary secretary had the nerve to tell me that his government was very proactive, that it has done good things and that it established the commission of inquiry, which would not have happened were it not for this good, forward-thinking, serious and proactive government. I am sorry. First, CSIS agents had to leak information to get the ball rolling and to inform the opposition of what was happening, because we were not aware of it. Then, we asked questions for weeks and months. The good Liberal government did what it usually does and turned a blind eye and waited for the problem to go away on its own, hoping that everything would be okay, but that did not happen. After hearing it over and over, it seems to me that the government should be beginning to understand that there comes a time when it has to take action. When the government waits six months or a year to act, then it always seems to be behind and is never able to catch up. The next time something happens, the government should ask our advice if it wants our help. When a party forms the government, it has to take action. This is appalling. I cannot believe how many times we have had to repeat this. I was a teacher for 25 years before becoming an MP. I always told my students that it is okay to make a mistake. There is nothing wrong with that. The important thing is being able to admit it. A person has to be humble enough to say that they missed that one. They have to look at what they did wrong and not do it again. This government has been dragging its feet on every file, all the time, for the nearly five years I have been here, and it was probably doing the same beforehand. It is appalling. The government needs to learn. I was told earlier that the government is taking action. First, it took leaks to get things moving. Then we insisted on an inquiry, but the government said we did not need one. They threw vague answers at us for weeks. Finally, one weekend, on a Saturday afternoon while barbecuing, they had a brilliant idea: They would appoint a special rapporteur who would say that there was no issue and who would put an end to the affair. For that task, they chose a good friend who had donated several thousand dollars to the party in recent years. Everything would be fine. Except that it did not work out that way. We asked questions for months. We questioned this person's integrity. By the way, he was an honourable person. I am not attacking anyone. It is mind-boggling to see the way the government is acting. Earlier I was told that if it were not for the upstanding Liberal government, there would not be an inquiry. Can we be serious for a minute? Why is it that the Bloc Québécois is the one saying today that we have to go further responsibly? Are we are the only ones who are able to do so? I wonder. We have to clean house, because the people are watching. They are being accused of cynicism toward politicians and all that, but considering how this kind of issue has been handled, how could it be otherwise? This is serious. It puts us under a cloud of suspicion, a permanent cloud. Every time I talk to a member of another party, I wonder which country he or she is spying for. Am I in danger because of what I just said? Did I just compromise something? It is crazy. Knowing that some of the MPs among us are under foreign influence but doing nothing about it is unacceptable. The Bloc Québécois chose this as its opposition day topic because more must be done. Let us be serious about this. The grown-ups in the room are urging all 338 MPs to adopt this motion unanimously. I hope that the inquiry will produce conclusive results and that we will be able to restore people's trust. That is what this is about: trust in elected representatives.

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Context: House Hansard - 328 - Jun/10/24

Ms. Jenny Kwan (Vancouver East, NDP)

Jun/10/24 6:01:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would absolutely agree with the member that those who knowingly, intentionally, wittingly work with foreign states should not be sitting here as members of Parliament. They should not be running in the next election. There is no question about that. At this time, because the NSICOP report has exposed that there are elected officials sitting around this table who are collaborating and working with foreign states to undermine Canada's democratic processes and democratic institutions, that means all of us are in a shadow. We are operating in such a way that quite possibly my privilege is being breached, and all of our privilege is being breached, because of this situation. Unless we were to know who they are, the privilege of all of us would be compromised. Would the member agree with that?

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Context: House Hansard - 328 - Jun/10/24

Mr. Yves Perron

Jun/10/24 6:02:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am glad to know that at least one member listened to my speech from start to finish. We get along well and agree on most things. That is why the commission's terms of reference need to be expanded, so that these individuals can be identified and each party leader can do their job and kick these people out of Parliament. I completely agree with my colleague that these members should not be sitting in this place. I agree with her that they should not be allowed to run again. We are on the same page. When she talks about parliamentary privilege, that is fine, but what I consider to be even more important is public trust in the government.

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