- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Regina—Qu'Appelle
- Saskatchewan
- Voting Attendance: 61%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $195,980.34
- Government Page
- Sep/19/24 3:37:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Liberal House leader's argument was fourfold. She believes that the House order exceeded its authority in adopting the order, that redactions were authorized because the order did not explicitly require unredacted documents, that any use made by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police of the documents produced could amount to a breach of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and that the only permissible remedy here would be to refer the matter to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. Permit me to address her arguments in turn.
First, it would not surprise you, Madam Speaker, to know that I actually believe that the House order of June 10 was entirely within the authority and jurisdiction of the House and that clear jurisprudence will support my position. In her submissions, the government House leader cited page 190 of Parliamentary Privilege in Canada, second edition, which states, “The only limitations, which could only be self-imposed, would be that any inquiry should relate to a subject within the legislative competence of Parliament”.
While I will also revisit this citation from Maingot later, let me first add for good measure a quotation from page 1 of the Prime Minister's former caucus colleague Derek Lee's book The Power of Parliamentary Houses to Send for Persons, Papers and Records: “Based on principles firmly established in constitutional and parliamentary law (and apart from the following limitations pertaining to Her Majesty, other Houses of parliament and foreign jurisdictions), a House of parliament has the full authority to summon and compel the production of any document.”
It is also worth recalling that the order originated from a Conservative opposition motion, and Standing Order 81(13) provides that, “Opposition motions...may relate to any matter within the jurisdiction of the Parliament of Canada".
I would respectfully submit that the motion debated on June 6 and adopted on June 10 was squarely within the jurisdiction of Parliament. It concerned Sustainable Development Technology Canada, an organization incorporated by Parliament through the Canada Foundation for Sustainable Development Technology Act. Many of its directors and the chair of its board are appointed by the federal cabinet, which is most certainly accountable to Parliament. Quite importantly, SDTC's operations are run with monies that have been appropriated by Parliament. The motion was precipitated by the bombshell report of the Auditor General of Canada, an officer of Parliament, which outlined a massive scandal.
Conservatives were troubled that, given the conduct uncovered by the Auditor General and brave whistle-blowers, crimes may well have been committed. The criminal law is, of course, a well-established area of federal jurisdiction. The documents were to be transmitted to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Canada's police force, also established by an act of Parliament—
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- Sep/16/24 12:21:33 p.m.
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I want to pause here to recognize the Privacy Commissioner's, our former law clerk's, gold standard approach. He provided a set of records with what he called proposed redactions along with a clean copy of the records, because, as he wrote, “these provisions [of the Access to Information Act] do not limit the House of Commons' constitutional authority to seek and obtain information and documents.” At least he gets it.
Regardless, there is clear and convincing evidence before the House today that a contempt was committed by the government's flagrant and systematic disobedience to the House's June 10 order. While I think it is clear-cut, it is, of course, ultimately a decision for the House to take.
In his March 9, 2011, ruling, Mr. Speaker Milliken cited page 281 of Sir John Bourinot's Parliamentary Procedure and Practice in the Dominion of Canada, fourth edition:
But it must be remembered that under all circumstances it is for the house to consider whether the reasons given for refusing the information are sufficient. The right of Parliament to obtain every possible information on public questions is undoubted, and the circumstances must be exceptional, and the reasons very cogent, when it cannot be at once laid before the houses.
From there, the Chair added, at page 8841 of the Debates:
It may be that valid reasons exist. That is not for the Chair to judge. A committee empowered to investigate the matter might, but the Chair is ill-equipped to do so. However, there is no doubt that an order to produce documents is not being fully complied with, and this is a serious matter that goes to the heart of the House's undoubted role in holding the government to account.
The U.K. procedure committee, in its May 2019 report, concluded, at paragraph 16, “The way in which the power [to require the production of papers] is exercised is a matter for the House and not subject to the discretion of the Chair.” That committee commented, at paragraph 35, similarly to the views of Mr. Speaker Milliken, on the means of assessing compliance:
There is no recognised procedure to assess the papers provided to the House as a whole in response to a resolution or order, and no means of appeal against non-compliance, short of raising the issue as a matter of privilege.
Where papers have been provided to a body of the House, compliance has been easier to assess. Select committees in receipt of papers have been able to review the information they have received and to determine whether the House's instructions have been complied with.
The U.K. procedure committee concluded, at paragraph 86:
The House alone determines the scope of its power to call for papers. In its consideration of each motion it is able to discern whether an inappropriate or irresponsible use of the power is sought, and whether it is being asked to require the production of information from Ministers on a scale disproportionate to the matter under debate. We expect that in each such case the House will continue to exercise its judgment in favour of a responsible use of the power.
A similar point was also made in the first report of our House's former Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections, tabled on May 29, 1991, and of which the House took note on June 18, 1991:
It is well established that Parliament has the right to order any and all documents to be laid before it which it believes are necessary for its information. ... The power to call for persons, papers and records is absolute, but it is seldom exercised without consideration of the public interest.
In our present case, the House has before it, I would submit, a thorough record upon which to take a decision. The law clerk's reports, with the annexed correspondence from assorted deputy heads, lay before the House both sides of the argument. Personally, I side with the law clerk and his defence of the rights of Parliament. For those who would advocate that we must temper the House's authority with a willingness to accept the government's decisions to withhold information, supposedly in the name of the public interest, I would recall that these balancing acts are represented within the House's own self-restraint and not by any veto exercised by an outside authority.
Mr. Speaker Milliken articulated the concept on April 27, 2010, at page 2043 of the Debates:
It is the view of the Chair that accepting an unconditional authority of the executive to censor the information provided to Parliament would in fact jeopardize the very separation of powers that is purported to lie at the heart of our parliamentary system and the independence of its constituent parts. Furthermore, it risks diminishing the inherent privileges of the House and its members, which have been earned and must be safeguarded.
As has been noted earlier, procedural authorities are categorical in repeatedly asserting the powers of the House in ordering the production of documents. No exceptions are made for any category of government documents, even those related to national security.
Therefore, the Chair must conclude that it is perfectly within the existing privileges of the House to order production of the documents in question.
Having established that it is for the House to decide how to exercise its authority in ordering the production of papers, how can we go about such mechanisms to strike the right balance?
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- Sep/16/24 12:16:21 p.m.
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On the next page, they articulate the well-established categories of contempt, including:
deliberately altering, suppressing, concealing or destroying a paper required to be produced for the House or a committee;...
without reasonable excuse, refusing to answer a question or provide information or produce papers formally required by the House or a committee; [and]
without reasonable excuse, disobeying a lawful order of the House or a committee....
In the present case, the government has disobeyed a lawful order of this House. It has failed to provide all of the papers that were formally required by this House, and in so responding, many papers were altered or outright suppressed through the redaction process.
On June 10, the House ordered the government to deposit a series of documents concerning SDTC, the Liberal green slush fund, with the law clerk within 30 days. No redactions or other alterations were contemplated by that order, nor was any information permitted to be otherwise withheld, though I would not be surprised if there is a fresh update for us today.
We do know, based on the law clerk's July 17 and August 21 reports to you, Mr. Speaker, which you tabled the same days, that the Department of Finance, Sustainable Development Technology Canada and the Treasury Board Secretariat each provided only partial responses.
Several government institutions redacted the records they deposited with the law clerk, including the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency; the Business Development Bank of Canada; the Canada Revenue Agency; the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency; the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development; the Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities; the Department of National Defence; the Department of Natural Resources; Public Services and Procurement Canada; Western Economic Diversification Canada; Export Development Canada; the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario; Pacific Economic Development Canada; the Privy Council Office; the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council; and the Standards Council of Canada.
I would add that the Department of Natural Resources also decided only to provide the House with records from the director general level and higher. For those not familiar with government hierarchy, a director general is a pretty elite bigwig within the government. They are typically at least four layers above a typical frontline worker. Who knows what pertinent information from the front lines, so to speak, was concealed by this manoeuvre? The House order certainly did not contemplate this approach.
Three other organizations fall into both of these categories, by providing incomplete responses and redacting what they did provide: Innovation, Science and Economic Development; the Department of Justice; and the National Research Council Canada. For its part, the justice department brazenly put the House on notice that some 10,772 pages of relevant documents were “completely withheld”. The Communications Security Establishment, meanwhile, simply wrote that it was refusing to turn over any documents, even redacted ones. Then we have the case of the Public Sector Pension Investment Board, the body that manages a quarter of a trillion dollars of public sector pension assets, which claimed it is not part of the government. I guess it is not just campaign managers who are distancing themselves from the Liberal Prime Minister.
The Auditor General, for her part, also refused to provide documents, referring to her obligations under the Auditor General Act to honour whatever security restrictions the government imposes on its information. Not only has the government refused to comply with the House's order; it has also shackled the Auditor General, an officer of Parliament, from being able to comply as well.
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- Sep/16/24 12:11:12 p.m.
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The privileges held by the House of Commons are an integral part of the Constitution Act, 1867, and the Parliament of Canada Act. These rights include the right to require the production of documents....
The privileges in question, like all those enjoyed by the House collectively and by members individually, are essential to the performance of their duties. The House has the power, and indeed the duty, to reaffirm them when obstruction or interference impedes its deliberations. As guardian of these rights and privileges, that is precisely what the House has asked me to do today by ordering the Speaker to reprimand you for the Public Health Agency of Canada's contempt in refusing to submit the required documents.
In parallel, the Liberal government, quite shockingly, initiated proceedings in the federal court against the House and its Speaker, seeking to block any further attempts to obtain the documents. Our then Speaker quite fearlessly fought back in court against a government of his own party background, seeking to have the government's court application thrown out. The Prime Minister's selfish and self-interested early election call brought an abrupt end to the federal court proceedings.
In the new Parliament, an ad hoc committee of parliamentarians, similar to that in the 2010 example, was eventually established to look at the Winnipeg lab documents. In February of this year, its work on 600 pages of documents was finally tabled, some 35 months after the standoff in the special committee began. In the end, we discovered that most redactions were not about national security but about protecting the government from embarrassment.
There have also been developments in the United Kingdom Parliament in recent years that some of our colleagues may not be fully familiar with. In the 2017 general election, the incumbent Conservative government did not secure a majority in the House of Commons. The Labour Party subsequently devoted some 10 of its opposition days in the first session of Parliament following that election to ordering the production of documents. Half of the motions were defeated by the House, and of the remaining five, four were responded to in a satisfactory manner by the government.
It is the fifth motion that warrants our attention and was a case that prompted the U.K. House of Commons procedure committee to study the matter and issue its ninth report, entitled “The House’s power to call for papers: procedure and practice”, in May 2019, which I quoted earlier.
On November 13, 2018, the U.K. House of Commons adopted the following motion, proposed by Sir Keir Starmer, who is now the country's Prime Minister:
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, That she will be graciously pleased to give directions that the following papers be laid before Parliament: any legal advice in full, including that provided by the Attorney General, on the proposed withdrawal agreement on the terms of the UK’s departure from the European Union including the Northern Ireland backstop and framework for a future relationship between the UK and the European Union.
Subsequent events can be summarized by the following extracts from paragraphs 41 to 43 of the U.K. Parliament's procedure committee's 2019 report:
Ministers advanced arguments against the motion from the Despatch Box, but did not seek to divide the House. The motion therefore passed unopposed. In points of order raised immediately after the House’s decision, Members sought to clarify the obligations on the Government arising from it: no Ministerial statement was made in response.
An agreement between the United Kingdom and the EU on the UK’s withdrawal from the EU was endorsed by heads of state and government at the European Council meeting of 25 November 2018.... On 3 December the Attorney General presented to Parliament a Command Paper which purported to describe the “overall legal effect” of the agreement of 25 November 2018. On the same day he made a statement to the House...neither the Command Paper nor the statement made reference to the resolution of 13 November, and the Command Paper did not purport to be a return to the resolution of the House.
Following the presentation of the government's command paper to the House, Keir Starmer, together with representatives of four other political parties, wrote to the Speaker alleging that the government had not complied with the terms of the resolution of 13 November. The Attorney General also wrote to the Speaker with his observations on the matter. He argued that the government was in considerable difficulty in knowing how to comply with the resolution.
Speaker Bercow ruled, on December 3, 2018, at column 625 of the official report:
The letter that I received from the members mentioned at the start of this statement asks me to give precedence to a motion relating to privilege in relation to the failure of Ministers to comply with the terms of the resolution of the House of 13 November. I have considered the matter carefully, and I am satisfied that there is an arguable case that a contempt has been committed. I am therefore giving precedence to a motion to be tabled tonight before the House rises and to be taken as first business tomorrow, Tuesday. It will then be entirely for the House to decide on that motion.
The following day, after defeating a government amendment, the House voted to adopt the following motion:
That this House finds Ministers in contempt for their failure to comply with the requirements of the motion for return passed on 13 November 2018, to publish the final and full legal advice provided by the Attorney General to the Cabinet concerning the EU Withdrawal Agreement and the framework for the future relationship, and orders its immediate publication.
In response, the government produced a complete, unredacted copy of the Attorney General's legal advice the next day. According to the procedure committee's report, at paragraph 68, “The Attorney General later said that he had complied with the order of the House of 4 December 'out of respect of the House’s constitutional position.'” A government that respects the constitutional position of the House of Commons; let us all just imagine that for a moment.
As I mentioned earlier, the Liberal government is, on the other hand, in my submission, in contempt of Parliament yet again. Bosc and Gagnon comment, at page 81:
Thus, the House also claims the right to punish, as a contempt, any action which, though not a breach of a specific privilege: tends to obstruct or impede the House in the performance of its functions;...or is an offence against the authority or dignity of the House, such as disobedience of its legitimate commands....
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- Jun/13/24 11:36:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Conservatives agree, and Conservatives will be voting non-confidence, no.
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- Jun/12/24 6:32:02 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, a short while ago, I asked the finance minister a question during question period and was completely unsatisfied with the response, so here we are trying to get some details from the tax-and-spend Liberal government.
We have now known for months, if not years, that Canadians are worse off with the carbon tax than with any rebate that the government claims that they would enjoy. We know this because we experience it. We all go out and fill up our cars. We pay our home heating bills. We see the prices in grocery stores of anything that has to be grown, shipped, refrigerated or heated. All of those extra costs get passed on to the consumer. This is what Conservatives warned Canadians about in the last few cycles. We said that the government would never be satisfied with the rate of the carbon tax, that the government would increase it. The former environment minister, Catherine McKenna, accused Conservatives of making that up. In fact, many of her friends and Liberal friends in the mainstream media, the government-funded, taxpayer-subsidized mainstream media, carried that message for her. Then she was caught on tape saying that if one wants to get people to believe what one is saying, one just has to keep saying it louder, over and over again. Even if it is not true, people will begin to believe what one said. That is the Liberals' attitude towards voters: Just repeat the lie louder and louder, more and more often, and eventually people will believe what they are saying.
However, the fact is that we cannot argue with numbers. We cannot argue with math. No matter how many times Liberals say something here in this House, on television, or out in the communities, it will never take away from the fact that every single time a Canadian family struggles to pay that grocery bill or gets hit by an even higher home heating bill, or winces as they see the fuel pump tick over $100 for that fill, they know what the math shows, that they are worse off with the carbon tax. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has confirmed that. The Parliamentary Budget Officer looked at all of the costs of the carbon tax, not just what we pay directly, which are the fiscal costs of the carbon tax.
A person will see the carbon tax, that fiscal cost, on their fuel bill after filling up their car. A person will see the carbon tax on their home heating bill. In many cases it is rising to 25%, 30% or even 40%, of the total bill itself, meaning it is almost as expensive as the fuel that we are using, whether it is natural gas or otherwise, to heat our homes. Those are fiscal costs. That direct line item people see when they pay a bill is called a fiscal cost.
The economic costs are a little bit difficult to see, but they still have a cost, nonetheless. The economic costs are the cascading effect of all those price increases; the fact that the retailer who sells the food has to make up for the fact that they pay higher utility costs, the fact that the farmer who grows the food has to pay to get it shipped, has to pay to fertilize it, to combine it, to store it, to dry it and to ship it. All of those businesses have less money to pay higher wages or to make investments in expansions. When we factor those costs in, Canadians are far worse off. The government is trying to only look at the fiscal costs, only look at one side of the ledger.
Here is the thing. Canadians do not have a choice. They cannot pick and choose which costs they are going to pay. They have to pay all of them. There is a report that the Government of Canada has possession of. The government produced the report. It has studied the report. The government has shown it to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, but it will not show Canadians the report.
My question last week is the same as it is tonight: Why will the government not just show Canadians what its own report says about the total cost of the carbon tax?
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- 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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- Jun/6/24 10:44:55 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think the member is absolutely right. Canadians would ask themselves why a government would do this. Why would there be government officials in the room overseeing these types of decisions, knowing that there were conflicts of interest? I think it goes back to the fact that this is the desired outcome. It is why a Liberal minister put his friends on the board.
It is said that a fish rots from the top. The Prime Minister faces no consequences for his myriad conflicts, and there are other ministers with similar types of findings against them. The Prime Minister has been convicted three times. Nothing happens to the ministers and nothing happens to the Prime Minister. We can see the culture of corruption that the Prime Minister has created.
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- Apr/8/24 5:55:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, if you were to seek it, I believe you would find unanimous consent for the following motion.
I move:
That, notwithstanding any Standing Order, Special Order or usual practice of the House,
(a) at the ordinary hour of daily adjournment later this day or when no Member rises to speak, whichever is earlier, the motion on the question of privilege standing in the name of the member for Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes regarding summoning Kristian Firth to the bar of the House and the amendment standing in the name of the member for Kingston and the Islands, be deemed withdrawn, and
(b) the House, having considered the unanimous views of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates, expressed in its 17th report, find Kristian Firth to be in contempt for his refusal to answer certain questions and for prevaricating in his answers to other questions and, accordingly, order him to attend at the bar of this House, at the expiry of the time provided for Oral Questions on Wednesday, April 17, 2024, for the purposes of:
(i) receiving an admonishment delivered by the Speaker;
(ii) providing responses to the questions referred to in the 17th report;
(iii) responding to supplementary questions arising from his responses to the questions referred to in the 17th report;
provided that
(iv) during Mr. Firth's attendance at the bar for the purpose of responding to questions, which shall be asked by Members, with questions and answers being addressed through the Speaker,
(A) ten minutes be allocated to each recognized party for the first and second rounds in the following order: Liberal Party, Conservative Party, Bloc Québécois and New Democratic Party,
(B) during the third round, five minutes be allocated to each of the recognized parties with an additional five-minute period for the Green Party,
(C) within each 10- or five-minute period of questioning, each party may allocate time to one or more of its members,
(D) in the case of questions and answers, Mr. Firth's answers shall approximately reflect the time taken by the question,
(v) at the expiry of time provided herein, and after Mr. Firth has been excused from further attendance, the House shall resume consideration of the usual business of the House for a Wednesday,
(vi) it be an instruction to the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates to consider Mr. Firth's testimony at the bar of the House and, if necessary, recommend further action.
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Mr. Speaker, I wanted to make a very brief intervention in response to the government House leader's parliamentary secretary's response to my question of privilege on Bill C-63 and the leak that occurred.
The parliamentary secretary's 25-minute submission extensively quoted the Internet. What it did not do, however, was explain exactly how the sources whom Travis Dhanraj and Rachel Aiello spoke to were lucky enough to state precisely which of the options the government consulted on would make it into the bill.
Had the reporting been based on the published consultation documents, the media reports would have said so, but they did not. They quoted “sources” who were “not authorized to speak publicly on the matter before the bill is tabled in Parliament.” The parliamentary secretary's implication that the sources were all stakeholders uninformed about the ways of Parliament is demonstrably untrue. CTV's source was “a senior government source”. The CBC attributed its article to “two sources, including one with the federal government”. Besides, had these sources actually all been stakeholders speaking about previous consultations, why would they have sought anonymity to begin with, let alone specify the need for anonymity, because the bill had not yet been introduced?
As I said back on February 26, the leakers knew what they were doing. They knew it was wrong, and they knew why it was wrong. We are not talking about general aspects of the bill that might have been shared with stakeholders during consultation processes. We are talking about very detailed information that was in the legislation and was leaked to the media before it was tabled in the House. That is the issue we are asking you to rule on, Mr. Speaker.
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- Mar/18/24 8:25:42 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, given what you have just said, and after having some discussion among members of various parties, I am sure there will be agreement to allow members to do their due diligence.
If we are going to take this seriously, if we are going to show Canadians and the world that foreign policy is not done on the back of a napkin with two negotiators and without any kind of consultation, I ask for unanimous consent to defer the vote until tomorrow.
Some hon. members: No.
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- Mar/18/24 8:10:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I understand that, in the moment, you might have made a ruling. It is common for Chair occupants to do this, before necessarily hearing arguments, when it is expected to be of a routine nature.
However, as many Chair occupants have had to deal with in the past, when parties raise substantive objections after an initial ruling, the Speaker can go back and take a look at it in light of the objections raised. In that spirit, I hope that you, Mr. Speaker, will seriously consider the points that I am about to raise.
First, we should talk about how we got here. Normally, under the motion that was adopted to guide votes in the House, there is a provision that any recorded division that is demanded is deferred until the next sitting day. First and foremost, that would be the normal course of events. Today is the allotted day for the NDP. If that happened normally, at the end of the day, the Speaker would interrupt and defer the vote until the next day. All members would have the opportunity to study the main motion and any amendments that were received.
That is not happening today for a very particular reason: On the sitting day prior to the two-week constituency break, all parties agreed to not sit on the Friday after the passing of the Right Honourable Brian Mulroney, former prime minister of Canada. In order to facilitate the respect being given to former prime minister Mulroney, all parties agreed to a couple of things.
The NDP agreed to have their opposition day today, Monday, instead of the Friday before that break period. In exchange for that, Conservatives agreed to a motion that would require the vote to be held at the end of the day. That was a good faith measure in order to accommodate the spirit of all MPs who were paying tribute to a deceased prime minister. That was granted.
Now we find ourselves, today, literally at the eleventh hour of the debate, with a massive change to the motion. We are not just talking about a slight amendment to a coming into force date or tweaking a number here or there. We are talking about 14 substantive amendments to the main motion. Many of these rise to the level of what I would urge you, Mr. Speaker, to rule out of scope. They rise to the level of having the same effect as defeating the motion itself. House of Commons Procedure and Practice is very clear on this, saying that to have such a substantive amendment that it completely changes the nature of the original motion is out of order.
The proper way of dealing with a motion that is unacceptable to a member of Parliament is to vote against it. If there is a small adjustment that could be made to accommodate one group, one desire or one perspective or another, that is one thing. This happens all the time. There are amendments moved at committees and on the floor.
However, the jurisprudence from the Speaker on altering the main motion so dramatically is very clear. Rather than seeking to amend that motion, the proper course of action is for MPs to vote against the motion, defeat it and come back with a substantive motion that would incorporate the changes that any member was seeking.
As I go through the list, the first one is so glaring. The original motion calls on the Government of Canada to unilaterally recognize the state of Palestine. The amendment is so different, and it is not just my view. I think any fair reading of the motion would say that this has the effect of negating the original motion.
Amendment (m) seeks to replace paragraph (h) with the following: “reaffirm that settlements are illegal under international law and that settlements and settler violence are serious obstacles to a negotiated two-state solution, and advocate for an end to the decades long occupation of Palestinian territories”. That is substantially different from unilaterally recognizing the state of Palestine.
Amendment (n) seeks to replace paragraph (i) with the following: “work with international partners to actively pursue the goal of a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, including towards the establishment of the State of Palestine as part of a negotiated two-state solution”.
That is so different. The original motion just says that Canada would recognize the state of Palestine. The amended motion says that it would work toward achieving that goal, work toward a negotiated two-state solution, which by the way is the long-standing position of previous governments. That change is no mere grammatical or semantic change. It is the crux of what is being debated today.
It is a major point in the debate that has been carried all day today, so to bring that amendment forward in the form of a last-minute amendment to the main motion rises to the level of being so out of scope and so fundamentally altering the nature of the main motion that it should be ruled out of order.
I could go on and on. There was no notice of this. We, in the opposition, negotiated in good faith before the break week to accommodate the NDP supply day. We agreed to hold the vote at the end of the day. Normally, this vote would have happened tomorrow. At the very least, there should have been some kind of notice.
I believe this calls for the Speaker to rule this amendment out of order, or at the very least, to use the power of the Chair to defer the vote until tomorrow, where in so doing all MPs would have time to absorb these massive changes and vote on them. In essence, give members of Parliament the time they would have had if the normal course of the parliamentary calendar unfolded with supply days and deferred votes.
I strongly object to this amendment being ruled in order. I urge the Speaker to reconsider this in light of the precedents I cited and the aspects of the amendment that contradict in such a direct way the essence of the main motion. At the very least, and I do not want to give the Speaker an alternative to what I just suggested because that is the main thrust of the argument, use the power the Speaker has to so order the flow of business to defer the vote until tomorrow, after which MPs will have had the time to examine exactly what is before them.
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- Feb/26/24 1:19:06 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, this is what Liberals do. They attack others for the very things that they are guilty of themselves. If this member wants to talk about respecting this institution, we can talk about how the access to information commissioner has said that it has never been harder to get information from a government than it has under the current Prime Minister.
How about the fact that the government decided not to fund the Auditor General appropriately to do her important work of uncovering Liberal waste and mismanagement? How about all the times the government has shut down debate before many members have even had a chance to speak on behalf of their constituents? The Liberals then come in and blame the opposition for all that.
They are the ones who have the power to be more forthcoming with information. They fight and they redact. They try to keep documents hidden. They have to be dragged kicking and screaming, at committees and here in the House, just to provide factual information and copies of correspondence. They do everything they can to block that, then they try to have some debate about when the House should adjourn, whether it should be 6:30 p.m. or midnight. They say that this is how they are protecting a democratic institution.
That is baloney. The real way we can protect our institutions is to be open and accountable. Independent officers of Parliament have denounced the Liberal Prime Minister for the assault that he has launched against information accountability and transparency.
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- Feb/26/24 12:49:03 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, common-sense Conservatives are focused on axing the tax, building the homes, fixing the budget and stopping the crime, while the Liberal Prime Minister proves day in and day out that he is not worth the cost or the corruption.
What we are seeing today is a perfect example of how the government is focused on the wrong things. While the Conservatives are putting forward tangible and practical measures that will lower costs, bring interest rates down, get homes built around the country and put dangerous criminals behind bars, the Liberal government is focused on the Standing Orders of the House of Commons.
Canadians are going to food banks in record numbers. People have moved away from home and have found jobs. They are now finding themselves having to renew their mortgages and are being forced to move back with their parents. Communities once safe and secure, where people would go to bed at night without locking their doors, are now investing in security cameras and other measures because their neighbourhoods have become so dangerous. All of this is going on in Canada, while the Prime Minister continues to break so many aspects of Canadian society. While the Liberals come in with a programming motion, using a valuable day of House time debating how bills are going to be debated and how many hours the House will sit, the Conservatives will continue to raise the important issues that Canadians face. The Liberals want to debate and delay, have a day-or-two-long debate arguing about how the process should be handled in the House of Commons.
We are not going to let them off the hook. Let us go through these points one by one.
The government is saying that it has to do this to get its agenda through. We in the official opposition would happily help advance an agenda that would actually accomplish these priority items. If the Liberals were to bring in a bill to cancel the carbon tax or at least cancel the increase that they have scheduled for April 1, we would support that. If they brought in tangible measures that would actually get homes built, we would support that.
We found out just a couple of weeks ago that the current housing minister launched a brutal and devastating personal attack on the previous immigration minister, who, by the way, are the same people. The former immigration minister is now the current housing minister. The current housing minister attacked the former immigration minister, blaming himself for mismanaging the immigration system in our country, which has caused terrible consequences on the housing side of things. After eight years of the Prime Minister, Canada builds fewer homes than the number of new Canadians added every year.
The minister admitted at committee that all of the Liberals' billions of dollars, their fancy photo-ops and their repackaged announcements did not build specific homes. The vaunted and much-celebrated, in Liberal circles, housing accelerator fund sounds active. It is one of those buzzwords. I wonder how many consultants they had to hire to come up with a name like the housing accelerator fund. That sounds exciting. It sounds like it will really pick up the pace of home building. We asked him a simple question. How many homes had this housing accelerator actually built? He said that it did not actually build any homes. Pardon the official opposition members if we come to this place to defend taxpayer dollars and if we oppose billions of dollars of spending that does not build new homes.
One of my Conservative colleagues, and I believe it was my colleague, the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, asked a very simple question of the government when it came to the carbon tax. He asked whether the government could tell Canadians how many greenhouse gas emissions were reduced by the carbon tax. We would think that if the signature economic policy of the government is the carbon tax that it might measure that, that it might actually count how many greenhouse gas emissions are reduced by its signature policy. However, the answer that came back was that it did not keep track of it. It does not know; it does not measure that.
The Liberals have imposed this carbon tax on Canadians and have hiked it year after year, after promising not to, by the way. Remember that promise going into the 2019 election when former Liberal environment minister, Catherine McKenna, promised that they were never going to raise the carbon tax? The Liberals attacked me for telling Canadians not to believe the Liberals, that once the election was over, when the Prime Minister did not need the votes of Canadians but still needed their money, he would absolutely raise the carbon tax.
Catherine McKenna's other famous comment was that if we repeated a lie louder and over and over again, eventually people would believe us. That certainly bears out how Liberals have communicated about the carbon tax. They promised not to raise it and now they are forcing a hike on everyone year after year.
In the fiscal update in the fall of 2022, the Liberals promised that they would stop pouring inflationary fuel on the fire. The current Liberal finance minister said that in order to fight inflation, they had to get a grip on government spending, and there was that glimmer of hope. After telling Canadians that the Prime Minister did not think about monetary policy, in the few days after the fall economic update in 2022, there was that brief moment of hope when Conservatives thought that maybe he finally got it, that maybe someone finally read that part of macroeconomics textbooks to the Prime Minister and explained to him how, when governments go deep into deficits and force central banks to create brand new money out of thin air to bankroll government spending, that caused inflation. We thought maybe he finally got that and that the Liberals would work toward getting back to balanced budgets.
Of course, that hope was very short-lived. Just a few weeks after that, they went right back to their Liberal ways, borrowing and spending, plunging the country deeper into deficit. Immediately afterward, inflation started going up again. That is why so many Canadians cringe every time interest rates go up, because the Bank of Canada has to raise interest rates to fight the inflation that it caused in the first place by bankrolling the government deficit spending.
The Conservatives want to stop the crime. After eight years of the Prime Minister, Canadians are less safe. In fact, many areas in Canada are experiencing a dramatic spike in violent crime, which we have not seen in decades, hitting all-time highs in many areas and for many different types of crime.
Crime, like inflation, does not just happen. It is not like the weather. It is not like we can read the Farmers' Almanac one year and say that we will probably have an early frost or that inflation might hit 3.5%. Inflation and crime are directly linked to the government's policy decisions.
The previous Conservative government brought in tougher penalties for dangerous and repeat offenders. We are not talking about young people making a mistake for the first time in their lives. We are talking about hardened criminals, people who use dangerous weapons to commit their crimes, people who commit the same crime over and over again or people who cause grave bodily harm or even death in the commission of their crimes. We toughened those penalties. What did the Liberal Prime Minister do early on in his mandate? He started repealing those common-sense Conservative tough-on-crime bills and made bail much easier to get.
It used to be that if people had prior convictions, had proven to society and the courts that they were dangerous offenders and were accused of committing new crimes, it would be harder to get bail. In other words, it would be harder for them to be released before their trials. The Prime Minister's ideological obsession with putting the rights of criminals ahead of the rights of law-abiding Canadians decided to make bail easier to get. He actually mandated judges to err on the side of granting bail, even for dangerous and repeat offenders.
Again, we are not talking about a young offender being picked up for the first time for shoplifting or someone who has lost their temper for the first time and maybe lashed out at someone in a restaurant or a park. We are talking about people who commit the same crime over and over again. The government decided to put them back on the streets as early as possible. It is no surprise that crime started ticking up. Now we are in the midst of a crime wave that we have not seen in over a generation, and it is all directly linked to the government's agenda.
The Conservatives offer practical solutions. We offer many different ways of providing Canadians tax relief when it comes to the carbon tax. Obviously, we would like the government to acknowledge the failure of its signature economic policy. It does nothing to reduce emissions. The government does not even count how many emissions are affected by the carbon tax. It increases the cost of literally everything. Everything that needs to be produced, shipped, refrigerated, heated or sold in a store that has to have lights or any type of refrigerator or freezer has to pay the carbon tax, and that is built into the price that consumers pay.
We are going to hear Liberals saying throughout the day, and we hear it all the time, that Canadians are better off with it, because of the rebate they cooked up. What they do not tell Canadians is that the budget watchdog, the person the government appointed to scour through all the data and to go into a room, read all the reports and measure everything, account for everything and model everything, the non-partisan independent Parliamentary Budget Officer, has concluded that the vast majority of Canadians pay far more in the carbon tax than they hope to get back in any rebate.
The reason for that is that when the Liberals designed it, they deliberately excluded the knock-on effects of the carbon tax. Therefore, the only thing the rebate even contemplates, when it is being calculated, is the actual line item we might see on our bill when we fuel up or when we pay our utility. What we do not see, and what the calculation does not take into account, are all the price increases that go from farm to plate and from forest to Home Depot. All the aspects of the supply chain where costs are added on, the carbon tax applies every single step of the way and increases that price.
We offered a common-sense plan to scrap the tax, and it was rejected. Then we proposed to at the very least stop raising the carbon tax in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. When we are in a hole, we stop digging. Homer Simpson has the idea that when we are in a hole, we can try to dig up, but that does not work, and it certainly does not work to keep digging, to add on those costs.
The government is hiking the carbon tax. It is due to go up again on April 1 by 23%. Media reports say that the rebate is only going to go up 17%. Even with the fact that the rebate does not cover all the costs, as the government hikes the carbon tax, the rebate does not keep up with it. Canadians are falling further and further behind.
We proposed to at the very least stop hiking the tax, and that was rejected. Then we talked about grocery prices going up. There is that heart-breaking scene that so many of us see when we go to the grocery stores in our communities. We see well-dressed men and women, often with children, going through the grocery aisle. They pick up a package of beef and they stare at it for sometimes a full minute or maybe even a minute and a half. Maybe they pick up something else to compare with it. Then they put both of them back because they cannot afford them. Grocery prices have gone up so quickly and so dramatically because of the inflation and the carbon tax.
What is the government's answer? It is to keep hiking it. We proposed to at least take the carbon tax off groceries and farmers, to remove the carbon tax off farm production so that we do not tax the farmer who grows the food and we do not tax the trucker who trucks the food or the retailer who sells the food. That was rejected too. The government does not want the carbon tax to be lifted off our agricultural producers. That is a tangible practical way we could bring costs down. The government rejected that.
We have proposed a common-sense approach to tackle car thefts. Our leader announced a signature policy to deal with this scourge that is now plaguing Canadians from coast to coast. Stolen cars are becoming one of Canada's fastest-growing exports after the Liberal government weakened penalties and made it easier to get bail. It also diverted much-needed resources from frontline border service agents, who have the responsibility to inspect and track things leaving the country, and it spent those resources on the arrive scam.
An app that should have cost $80,000 ballooned to over $60 million because of phony invoices, work that was never done and all kinds of corruption that we are uncovering. The government paid billions to consultants instead of investing in the frontline resources that would actually bring that crime down.
We offered to fast-track that bill too. We could have easily had those types of things passed. Instead, the government is doubling down on its failed agenda and using the coalition it has with the NDP to ram through more of the same agenda, the very same policies, the very same ideology that caused the cost of living crisis, the inflation, the massive interest rate hikes, the crime wave plaguing our cities and the housing shortage that has driven the dream of home ownership out of the reach of so many Canadians. The government wants to double, triple and quadruple down on that and ram its agenda through. While Canadians are going through this cost of living crisis, as they have to pay more because of the Liberal Prime Minister, he has decided to put everything on pause and to use this valuable House time to effectively try to make changes to the Standing Orders.
If one went door knocking in their constituency and hit 100 doors this evening, how many Canadians does one think would say they are really concerned about how the House of Commons manages its time and to please go back to Ottawa to sort that out? The government is wasting the valuable time of the House and of members of Parliament because the government cannot admit its failures. The Liberals cannot put their egos aside. The Liberal Prime Minister cannot put his ego aside and admit he is the reason so many Canadians are suffering right now.
The Liberals also have a coalition partner in the NDP. It used to be that the NDP and the Conservatives could agree on a few things. We disagreed on many policies. I live in Saskatchewan, and we know what NDP economic policies can do to a province over time. NDP members promised in the last election that they would not enter into a coalition with the government. They broke that promise. Canadians believed them when they said they would not enter into a coalition. As soon as the election was over, they started hatching their scheme.
One thing Liberals and Conservatives used to agree on is transparency and accountability. The NDP members have decided to protect the Prime Minister personally against political embarrassment and to help him cover up his corruption. Time and time again at committee, we see the NDP vote against Conservative motions to investigate corruption and scandals, vote against our attempts to summon witnesses and vote, in essence, to protect the Prime Minister from his corruption being exposed. Their policy agenda is not working. That is why Conservatives are holding them to account.
I will make one final point about how Liberals are handling the proposed changes to the way the House operates. These are substantive changes that would fundamentally alter the timeline for bills to be debated and moved through the House. It would give the government incredible new powers that are not in the Standing Orders and that have not been contemplated by any of our procedural books. Normally, those types of major changes require all-party support and go through the proper process of procedure and House affairs examining the proposal, studying it and allowing all recognized parties to have some kind of say in it.
The government is establishing a precedent today by using this type of motion. I want to point out to the government that it is now doing, through government motions, what used to be done through consensus and through all-party support. If its members want to talk about protecting democracy, one of the most fundamental ways to protect a democracy is to ensure that even when there is a working majority, because of the NDP support, they still hold that tradition of not making major changes without all-party support. That would mean any party could work with the government, in a minority parliament, and could ram through massive changes to the Standing Orders over the objections of other recognized parties. That has consequences.
However, they are choosing to do it this way, and they are establishing a precedent for future governments. They cannot come to this place and start talking about the rights of members of Parliament and the ability of opposition parties to hold the government to account if they are going outside the normal process to make major changes in the House.
That being said, we are going to continue to oppose their agenda because it has failed. Their economic agenda continues to drive up inflation and interest rates. Their housing agenda continues to drive up home prices by rewarding local gatekeepers and by preventing new homes from entering the market. Their crime and justice agenda continues to let dangerous and repeat offenders back out into the streets where they terrorize law-abiding Canadians. For those reasons, we are going to oppose this motion, and we are going to oppose the rest of the government's agenda.
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- Dec/5/23 3:55:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague has made an important point. With the Bloc Québécois and the Conservatives, we are almost at a majority of the House.
I just have to say, for anybody in a leadership capacity to lead a group, especially a group such as members of Parliament in the House of Commons, who are divided by party, that relationship cannot be maintained with such a significant percentage of the group not having confidence in him. I hope the Speaker reflects on that.
I do not want to prejudge what may or may not happen or deal in hypotheticals, but I do not see how a Speaker could continue in the role knowing that virtually 50% of the people he has to administer over or guide have lost confidence in him. I hope he reflects on that in the coming hours and days.
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- Dec/5/23 3:40:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I move:
That the Speaker's public participation at an Ontario Liberal Party convention, as Speaker of the House of Commons, constitutes a breach of the tradition and expectation of impartiality required for that high office, constituting a serious error of judgment which undermines the trust required to discharge his duties and responsibilities and, therefore, the House refers the matter to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs with instruction that it recommend an appropriate remedy.
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- Dec/4/23 12:07:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am rising on a very serious matter today. As you know, I have provided notice of a question of privilege concerning the Speaker's public participation in partisan events over this past weekend.
I do note that, in his statement earlier today, the Speaker indicated that he has recused himself from this matter, which clearly touches upon him and his conduct. He has also indicated that he will follow the practices laid down in the October 19 ruling concerning recusals by the Speaker found at page 17635 of the Debates.
I recognize that, in some instances, complaints about the Speaker, and more particularly those concerning rulings, should proceed by way of a motion placed on notice, but I believe the current circumstances amount to such a breach of the impartiality of the Chair that it warrants immediate and priority consideration by the House.
Saturday morning's Globe and Mail article entitled “John Fraser finishes his time as interim Ontario Liberal leader as party elects permanent replacement”, written by Laura Stone, rather remarkably quotes the Speaker. I will read the relevant paragraph:
'He’s demonstrated so much calm, and conviction and resolve and determination, and he’s held it all together at a very challenging time [for] our party'...the Speaker of the House of Commons...first met Mr. Fraser in 1989 while working in Ottawa. He said Mr. Fraser will be remembered for 'experience, good judgment and a real passion, and authenticity.'”
In any event, the partisan engagement did not stop there. That afternoon, he appeared via video at the leadership election for the Ontario Liberal Party. Here is a sample of what he had to say in his two-minute video greeting as part of the tribute to Mr. Fraser. He said, “And boy, did we have fun. We had a lot of fun together...through the Ottawa South Liberal Association, through Liberal Party politics, by helping Dalton McGuinty get elected. This was really a seminal part of my life. And when I think of the opportunities that I have now as being Speaker of the House of Commons, it's because of people like John”.
These remarks were introduced to the Liberal convention as, “A message from the Speaker of the House of Commons of Canada.”
He made these remarks from the Speaker's office in the West Block while dressed in his Speaker's robes. As bad as it would have been to appear at a party convention at all, it might have at least been a little different if he had been introduced as the member for Hull—Aylmer, and worn a suit or a sweater, while standing in front of a scenic backdrop in his riding, but he was not. He was standing there in the full, non-partisan trappings of his non-partisan office, paying a partisan tribute to a partisan friend at a partisan event.
I recognize that Mr. Fraser tweeted yesterday that there could have been some confusion about what the Speaker's office was told about where the remarks were to be shown, but it does not change one iota the fact that he was dressed in his Speaker's gowns standing in the Speaker's office making a partisan tribute video to be viewed somewhere.
Similarly, Mr. Fraser's tweet does not address the Globe and Mail interview I just read where he offered partisan praise for Mr. Fraser. If you do an interview with the Globe, quite frankly, you should expect to see your comments printed and posted for all to see. This conduct is simply unacceptable. It defies all long-standing traditions and expectations attached to the high office of the Speaker.
Late yesterday afternoon, the Speaker's office released a statement in his defence claiming, “the Speaker acknowledges how this message could have been perceived”. This is it exactly. Perception is everything.
House of Commons Procedure and Practice, 3rd edition, explains at page 323, “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.”
Continuing on the next page, it states, “In order to protect the impartiality of the office, the Speaker abstains from all partisan political activity (for example, by not attending caucus meetings), does not participate in debate and votes only in the event of an equality of voices, normally referred to as the 'casting vote' of the Chair.”
Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, 6th edition, adds, at citation 168(1):
The chief characteristics attached to the office of the Speaker in the House of Commons are authority and impartiality.... Confidence in the impartiality of the Speaker is an indispensable condition of the successful working of procedure, and many conventions exist which have, as their object, not only to ensure the impartiality of the Speaker but also, to ensure that there is a general recognition of the Speaker's impartiality.
That passage originates from the United Kingdom's parliamentary bible, Erskine May, and can be found virtually word for word in its 25th edition at paragraph 4.23. Beauchesne's continues at citation 168(2):
In order to ensure complete impartiality the Speaker has usually relinquish all affiliation with any parliamentary party. The Speaker does not attend any party caucus nor take part in any outside partisan political activity.
As a former Speaker myself, I understand completely what this means because I lived it for four and a half years. That is why I was absolutely flabbergasted when a photo of his participation at the Liberal convention was first drawn to my attention. I am still, 48 hours later, deeply appalled and, frankly, deeply offended.
Having served in the chair, I wholeheartedly appreciate that Speakers do not arrive there through some form of immaculate conception. Speakers have all been politicians before being elected to the chair, and some of us have even gone on to further partisan service after our tenure in the chair. Bosc and Gagnon acknowledge this point at page 314:
The Speaker has almost always been elected from among the Members of the governing party, and although the Speaker eschews partisan political activity, he or she does not make a complete break. When running for re-election, incumbent Speakers are usually careful to avoid partisan statements that might prejudice their perceived impartiality in the future.
The impartiality of the Speaker is not unique to our federal Parliament. Indeed, it is a common sentiment throughout the Commonwealth. In addition to the authority I already referenced from the U.K., where the Speaker leaves partisan politics for the rest of his or her life, let me cite a few others for the Chair's consideration.
Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand, 4th edition, which is also known as McGee, advises at page 78:
The member who is elected Speaker does not thereby become a non-party member of Parliament. However, the Speaker does not play a politically partisan role, and exercises restraint in the speeches or comments he or she makes outside the House. The Speaker must be prepared to assert an independence from the Government to ensure that the rights of all sides of the House are protected in the course of the parliamentary process.
The Indian Lok Sabha's Practice and Procedure of Parliament, 7th edition, adds, at page 107:
While the Speaker stands on party ticket for his election to the House, he may or may not continue to be the member of his party after his election as Speaker. Even when he does not sever connections with his party, he has refrained from attending any party meeting. However, a convention has, more or less, developed at the Union for the Speaker to dissociate himself from his party.
The same text observes, at page 306, that:
Office of the Speaker, Lok Sabha, is a constitutional office and enjoys exalted status in our democratic set up. Though it is not necessary for the Speaker under the Constitution or the Rules of Procedure to sever his connections with the political party to which he belongs, once he is elected to the Office, he, while conducting the House nevertheless acts in totally impartial manner. Impartiality is, therefore, an integral attribute vis-á-vis the Office of the Speaker.
Turning back closer to Ottawa, Parliamentary Procedure in Quebec, 3rd edition, makes this astute point at page 132:
While the legitimacy of the Chair stems primarily from the rules that govern the selection process, the impartiality of the Chair is essentially determined by the attitude adopted by the President in the exercise of the functions of office. Of course, the rules of parliamentary procedure state that the President does not belong to any parliamentary group, does not participate in any of the Assembly’s debates and votes only to break a tie, but it is the manner in which the incumbent oversees the proceedings and follows those rules that determines whether actual impartiality and the appearance of impartiality are maintained.
The universally expressed point here is that, while the Speaker is vested with the responsibilities of being the Speaker, he is expected to check his partisanship at the door. It can be difficult, but it must be done.
In a recent interview on CTV Question Period, the Speaker claimed it took “all of 60 seconds” to shed his decades of Liberal sensibilities and political bias upon becoming Speaker. This weekend's events call that into doubt.
Yesterday, the Speaker's office said he would be more “diligent going forward”. The House needed his total and complete diligence since day one. This is not the first communications challenge during his brief tenure as Speaker in which his diligence would have been helpful. I am recalling how a teenaged blogger noticed, 10 days before the House, a procedural decision he had taken.
About 35 years ago, he was one of the pages, upon whom this House truly relies to function smoothly. Back when he was a page, had he participated at openly partisan events, he likely would have been fired. What message does this send to today's pages, that the Speaker of the House, the one who is supposed to embody impartiality and devotion to the whole House, can be involved in political party conventions?
This conduct, in my view, should be treated as a prima facie contempt of the House.
Bosc and Gagnon explain, at page 60:
Any conduct which offends the authority or dignity of the House, even though no breach of any specific privilege may have been committed, is referred to as a contempt of the House. Contempt may be an act or an omission; it does not have to actually obstruct or impede the House or a Member, it merely has to have the tendency to produce such results.
At page 81, they continue:
Thus, the House also claims the right to punish, as a contempt, any action which, though not a breach of a specific privilege: tends to obstruct or impede the House in the performance of its functions; obstructs or impedes any Member or officer of the House in the discharge of their duties; or is an offence against the authority or dignity of the House....
The House of Commons enjoys very wide latitude in maintaining its dignity and authority through the exercise of its contempt power. In other words, the House may consider any misconduct to be contempt and may deal with it accordingly.... This area of parliamentary law is therefore extremely fluid and most valuable for the Commons to be able to meet novel situations.
There are no precedents in our House nor are there any obvious precedents from our sister parliaments, which are directly on point for the issue I raise today, possibly because no Speaker in the major Commonwealth parliaments has been so bold as to participate openly at partisan events and certainly not doing so as distinctly and visibly as the Speaker. That is, as I have just explained, not a barrier.
There is, however, one ruling from Speaker Fraser, in front of whose chair the Speaker once stood as a page, that is strongly persuasive in these circumstances. In 1993, the then deputy speaker Andrée Champagne had agreed to act as the co-chair of her party's convention. A question of privilege was raised arguing that her decision amounted to a contempt of the House because it affected the appearance of impartiality attached to her office, as she was the deputy speaker.
Speaker Fraser ruled on March 9, 1993, at page 16685 of the Debates, that this situation did not amount to a prima facie case of privilege because: “I have some difficulty in agreeing with the hon. member for Cape Breton—East Richmond that the Deputy Speaker is cloaked with the same exigencies that are expected of the Speaker himself or herself, and I am deliberately careful in not extending such a responsibility by way of ex cathedra comments in this decision.”
This ruling, I believe, stands for the proposition that the Speaker's participation at a partisan convention would, on the other hand, have amounted to prima facie contempt in Speaker Fraser's view.
He is clearly saying, in that ruling, that the expectations and the very high bar set upon the Speaker did not apply to the Deputy Speaker but, in making that explanation, he acknowledges and reinforces the idea that it would be wholly inappropriate for the Speaker to do what the former deputy speaker did in that situation.
Many of our rules and practices here operate on a binary basis. For example, I cannot call a colleague a liar because everyone is presumed to speak the truth. Therefore, every member has a corresponding obligation to tell the truth in the House. Similarly, the rulings of the Speaker and any comments on the partisan implications they may carry would be impermissible. That is because the House is entitled to assume that the Speaker would be wholly non-partisan while holding that office.
McGee sums up the point well at page 79:
The Speaker's exalted position and the consequent constraints it imposes require members to treat the Speaker or any other temporary occupant of the Speaker's Chair with respect and deference.
If the Speaker openly engages in partisan conduct, it opens the door to public analysis of any partisan motivations underlying his rulings. I can assure members that, despite a mere two months in the chair, that would not be a difficult feat.
Australia's House of Representatives Practice, seventh edition, at page 168, articulates the point well. It reads:
The Speaker must show impartiality in the Chamber above all else. A Speaker should give a completely objective interpretation of standing orders and precedents, and should give the same reprimand for the same offence whether the Member is of the Government or the Opposition....
Members are entitled to expect that, even though politically affiliated, the Speaker will carry out his or her functions impartially. Likewise a Speaker is entitled to expect support from all Members regardless of their party.
After this weekend's events, the implied contract between the Speaker and the House, which relies on mutual trust, has been broken. It would be very difficult for members to retain trust in a Speaker who engages in partisan activities.
As Bosc and Gagnon wrote, in the very first citation I offered:
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.
Should I be permitted to present my privilege motion, I will propose that the House denounce the Speaker's public participation in partisan events and, accordingly, ask the procedure and House affairs committee to recommend an appropriate remedy for this utterly unprecedented and completely avoidable problem.
I just want to address a few other points, in light of the Speaker's statement earlier today. First of all, many members of Parliament find themselves in the Speaker's chair after they have demonstrated their impartiality or non-partisanship for some time. Often, someone has served as the assistant deputy or deputy speaker and shed some of the partisanship that we often come to this place with as newly elected MPs.
In the case of the current Speaker, after being the former president of the Liberal Party and the Prime Minister's own parliamentary secretary, he entered the chair with a great deal of partisanship still surrounding him. Therefore, it would be incumbent upon him to go the extra mile, go beyond what a speaker elected under normal circumstances would do. He would have to set the bar even higher for himself, knowing that he has come so quickly from hyperpartisan activities. To be the president of a party is not just normal partisanship. To be the Prime Minister's parliamentary secretary obviously establishes a very close relationship with the leader of the Liberal Party, the Prime Minister of Canada. He has taken on a role now in which he is called upon to defend the rights and privileges of each individual MP, and it would take a conscious effort for members to set aside his recent partisanship.
In one of his first interventions in the House upon being elected as Speaker, the Speaker accused a female member of Parliament from the NDP of exaggerating her injuries when she was elbowed in the chest by the Prime Minister. Right there, we can see an immediate reaction to defend the Prime Minister. Now we are being asked to accept his rulings without any doubts about partisanship or bias.
Just recently, we had a situation that was very difficult for many members to understand. The Speaker ordered the Conservative member for Miramichi—Grand Lake not just to withdraw comments but also to actually apologize in the chamber for making an association between a political party and an odious entity abroad that is conducting horrible activities, namely, Hamas. A few days later, the government House leader made a very similar accusation against Conservative MPs; in that situation, the Speaker did not order an apology, saying that he considered the matter settled. In the moment, we were asked to accept that it was the Speaker's ruling based on precedent, convention and an unbiased understanding of the rules. Then we see him, just a few days later, giving remarks to the Liberal convention.
I have more points based on the Speaker's statements today. He said he did not know where it was going to be broadcast. As we pointed out, he gave an interview to the Globe. Obviously, that was going to be printed in The Globe and Mail. I have already covered the fact that he was wearing his robes in his office, but I will also point out that John Fraser is not retiring. He is just leaving his role as interim leader and going back into partisan activities.
An hon. member: Really?
Hon. Andrew Scheer: Yes, he is still going to be an MPP.
Mr. Speaker, despite the fact that the Speaker and Mr. Fraser might be close acquaintances and may think fondly of each other, it is not as though John Fraser was filling a non-partisan role. He was playing a very partisan role in partisan politics at the provincial level in Ontario.
The House might decide that it would like to see any correspondence between the Speaker's office, the Speaker himself, Mr. John Fraser, the Liberal Party of Ontario and the convention organizers. We might decide collectively, as a House, in the procedure and House affairs committee, that we would like to see correspondence to determine if that is, in fact, accurate.
To conclude, because of the seriousness of this issue, I would urge the Chair to rule immediately. I invite you, Mr. Speaker, if necessary, to suspend the sitting to take counsel from the clerks and to prepare your ruling.
I thank you for listening, Mr. Speaker. I believe there are other members who would like to intervene. I would like to reserve the right, if there are comments from other parties, to seek the floor again to offer my reflections on those commentaries.
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- Sep/19/23 7:04:49 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I guess we could start with the government releasing some information. In all different areas the government has an aversion to transparency and accountability. It would be a great conversation to start. It can start by sharing what it believes it can at this moment. I think Canadians would welcome that.
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- Jun/15/23 3:06:02 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, nobody likes an “I told you so”, except for everyone who told them so.
It was not only Conservatives, but also our major security partners, such as Japan and the United States, and foreign affairs experts, who said the same thing, that the Communist regime would use the bank to bully developing countries and expand its power and influence.
This bank built railways and ports with taxpayer dollars while Canadians here at home are struggling just to pay the bills. Now that the con has been exposed, will the government do the right thing and get Canadians their tax dollars back?
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- Jun/12/23 7:58:35 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, her main point is that this is a massive overhaul to the Standing Orders. The House of Commons has been operating pretty much the way it has been, in terms of members being physically present and how we conduct votes, through two world wars, the Great Depression, the turbulent sixties and seventies, and everything else, including a terrorist shooting here on the precinct itself.
Our point is this: When we are making this level of changes and we are going to make them permanent, we have to do it by consensus. We would have agreed. We would have said that we have our reservations for hybrid participation in the House but that we would go along with it if we enacted a sunset clause, where we know that there would be time for the unintended consequences to be determined and that a future Parliament could say it would not renew them or it could amend them. We could have had that consensus. We were willing to set aside some of our reservations for the very points that some other colleagues have raised, as long as there were that safety valve of a sunset clause to make sure that something that has a negative impact on the way parliamentarians fulfill their duties does not get entrenched, making it so difficult to change back.
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