44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 2, 2022 10:00AM
Mr. Speaker, I would like to answer my colleague by saying that informed politicians who are familiar with Quebec and Canadian politics would know that we have been talking about these issues for more than 50 years. At some point we need to stop debating; we need to do something.
We are moving this motion today. I do not think it is illegitimate or irrational to ask that a nation like the Quebec nation be ensured 25% representation in the House for the time it remains in Canada. I do not think that this is unreasonable. As I said earlier, it was part of the Charlottetown Accord. We talked about it on our opposition day.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North often uses closure these days to say that we must move things forward. This is the Bloc’s answer to that. It is the Bloc’s closure. We want to move our issues forward. I invite my colleagues to look at it that way, in a spirit of friendship and cordiality.
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Mr. Speaker, what we are seeing is the real motivation behind this: The Bloc wants to have a debate on the Constitution. If the Bloc members are so gung-ho on debating an issue that Canadians do not want to deal with today, why do they not just introduce it as an opposition day motion and make very clear that they want to talk about the Constitution, as opposed to trying to do it through a back door?
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address the debate, even though at the beginning of the day, many colleagues from both sides of the House anticipated that we would be engaging in a debate on the Standing Orders. Every election cycle there is a date set aside when members can give their opinions on changes to our rules and how we can enhance opportunities to make the chamber more effective, whether it is in the chamber or at committees.
That is technically what we are supposed to be debating today. After going through motions we went on to petitions. I know that some of my colleagues had petitions to bring forward. Then we were meant to go into the Standing Orders debate. I was prepared to speak to the Standing Orders, but now we find that the Bloc has found a way to bring back a debate on Bill C-14 to the floor of the House of Commons, a debate that we have already had. We already debated Bill C-14 in the House of Commons.
It would appear that Bloc members, with the support of the Conservative Party of Canada, are trying to push forward this motion. I am going to know when the vote occurs, but I am speculating my quarter on the fact that the Conservatives and the Bloc have already negotiated this as a part of their double blue coalition. What we will see is an attempt to get this motion passed. When they do that—
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Madam Speaker, what I know is that the Prime Minister is a great defender of the French language. I know that first-hand, not only in the province of Quebec but in all regions of our country. We understand. We can have that debate. I would encourage the members, if it is the French-language debate that the member wants to see, to bring it forward in a motion.
I would suggest to my colleague across the way that having that debate could be a positive experience for all of us here in the House of Commons. For the people of Quebec or the people of Saint-Boniface and Saint-Pierre-Jolys in my home province, there is a very strong French connection. There is a high sense of pride in the language from coast to coast to coast. If that is what the member would like to debate, I am happy to debate it.
To me, what we are really debating is a political manouevre to try to get legislation held up at committee stage, when we should not be doing that. We need that legislation to pass through committee.
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Madam Speaker, why does the hon. member want to prevent this House from debating the Standing Orders on the one day per Parliament set aside for doing precisely that?
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- Jun/2/22 4:04:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I do think more debate is helpful. The great struggle we have here is between the desire to have fuller debates with more potential for meaningful exchange and the fact that this takes time. We are constantly time-starved here.
There are a number of different possibilities. I am not sure I want to recommend one or even suggest that only one is the right thing. The issue of a dual chamber, a second debating chamber, as they have in the U.K. and Australia, might make sense if the House thinks so, but let us say we went down that avenue. I would still say that having longer sitting hours is a reasonable thing to consider.
One thing that the member did not suggest but that I think is reasonable is sitting more weeks a year. We sit 26 weeks a year. There are 52 weeks in a year, which means that there are 26 additional weeks. If we look back at our history, we will see that we regularly sat in the summer, and as recently as the first year of the pandemic, we did so again. It is not the end of the world, especially now that hybrid sittings exist. This is another option that could add something substantial, and it is probably the easiest of the various options to fit into the system we now have.
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- Jun/2/22 5:06:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member mentioned something that piqued my interest, because I too am in agreement with respect to committee membership and chairs, and I like the idea of having a secret ballot for naming committee chairs.
One aspect of committee work that I found quite surprising when I first got here is that it is very adversarial given the way that committees are structured. We have an issue before us and want to study it, but we are sitting on opposing sides instead of having a workgroup that sits together so we can say, “Here is the issue. What do we think about it?” There is no interchange, really, between committee members. We sit on opposing sides, we have witnesses at the end of the table and we have little time to ask questions, but we are not actually speaking to each other and trying to figure out a solution to whatever issue we are debating or whatever study we are doing.
I would like to know if the member has any comment on how we can be more collaborative in committee when trying to find a solution we can all agree with.
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