44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 15, 2022 10:00AM
- Nov/15/22 4:52:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is actually the deal. As we know, we have an interpreter shortage. The interpreters do a fabulous job on our behalf. The NDP has offered important guidance in ensuring that we actually have the number of interpreters and to ensure they are safe and secure. This is something we would like the Conservatives to help with and support, to put in place the interpretation that is necessary.
I will say this. When a committee meeting is held and the Conservatives block it, and the CRTC chair is forced to wait while the Conservatives conduct a filibuster saying that the CRTC should come before the Canadian heritage committee, that is one of many examples of the Conservatives wasting everybody's time.
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- Nov/15/22 4:58:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Trois-Rivières.
I will answer the question the Conservatives asked about having quorum in the House and it being in the Constitution. The unfortunate reality for the Conservative member who asked the question is that he should know that he has participated in unanimous consent motions in the House to waive that provision in the past. He has already set the precedent himself, so has the Conservative Party and, as a matter of fact, every single person in the House has set the precedent to waive the requirements for quorum.
We cannot be selective as to when we want to interpret the Constitution to our benefit, which is what the Conservatives are trying to do now. The reality is that there is been a long-standing precedent to waive the requirement for quorum under certain conditions, and that is exactly what we are seeing in this motion. There is the same consistency that comes with that.
However, I think what we really have to do with this motion is get to the heart of what is going on. At the heart is the Conservatives' partisan interest and allowing that to supersede the needs of Canadians. That is exactly what is going on here, and I will demonstrate in my speech today how they have routinely done that, not over the last seven years of my being in the House and watching it, although they have done it over the seven years, but five examples just in this fall session alone when they have done that. They have done it on multiple occasions using multiple different tools.
Any individual who has participated in or is well versed in how the Westminster parliamentary system works knows that the one tool the opposition has is to delay. That is its sole tool, and it is important for the opposition to exercise the use of that tool when it can to garner support, or whatever it might be, when they find those issues to be so important. When the opposition feels the issue is the hill it will die on, it will fight, delay and filibuster if it has to, because it feels something is not right.
That is the main tool opposition parties have in a parliamentary system like this. The problem is that Conservatives are using it all the time. They are using that tool for everything. They are saying absolutely every piece of legislation that comes before the House is a hill they will die on, and the problem is that this diminishes the value of the tool they have. It also affects directly, and this is what I do not understand, their credibility on the issue. When they stand up to delay things they are fully in support of, do they not understand that the public sees that? They are doing the same thing, and their partisan interest in seeing the government fail is more important to them than actually providing supports for Canadians.
Let us review some of the legislation from this fall alone. With Bill C-29, the truth and reconciliation bill, the Conservative Party blocked a motion to sit late to try to pass the bill at second reading before the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, which is what the government, and I think all Canadians, would have loved to have seen. It was not until pressure was mounted on them by the public that they backed down from that position.
Another one was Bill C-30, the GST tax credit. This is a bill that needed to be passed in a timely manner to get real supports to Canadians. They were real supports for Canadians that needed to be done in a timely fashion to line up with when the GST payments were made. The Conservatives, again, blocked a motion to sit late on the second reading of that important piece of legislation. They only backed down again and changed their minds on how they would vote on that particular piece of legislation based on public criticism and the public holding them accountable for playing the games they are playing. That is the reality of what we are seeing.
Bill C-31 is the bill that afforded very important measures regarding dental care and housing supports. The Conservative Party, again, blocked the adoption of the legislation to help the most vulnerable, forcing the government, with the help of the NDP, to have a programming motion to get it passed, and this is what we see time after time.
The next is Bill C-9, which would amend the Judges Act, and I will remind members this is all happened during this fall session alone.
We had technical issues with interpretation with that bill. The Conservatives are always standing up and using the interpreters as one of their arguments for making sure we have the best quality of debate in the House. When there was a problem with interpretation, which delayed the debate of the bill, the Conservatives refused to support a motion to add time to the debate that day.
The Conservatives say that they want more time to debate. We literally said that we lost 30 minutes of time because of a problem and we had to temporarily suspend, so how about we add that 30 minutes onto the end of the day. The Conservatives said no. This is the group that is now sitting before us saying that they are in favour of doing absolutely everything to increase democracy and that they want more speakers on every issue.
The one glaring example of this happening in this fall session was with Bill S-5. The bill is on environmental protections, and it is a bill everybody in the House supported. It was unanimously adopted. Conservatives put up 27 speakers on it. I want to provide a comparison for those who might be watching. Compared to that number, Liberals put up six speakers, the NDP put up four speakers, the Bloc put up five speakers and the Green Party put up one speaker.
What is even more telling is that, if someone goes back to look at Hansard or watch the videos—
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- Nov/15/22 7:01:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, for the Conservative Party it is a game. The best way I can illustrate that game is to talk about the motion that is before the House. The Conservatives say they want to have more debate, and that is why they get all upset when the government is forced to bring in time allocation. If we bring in time allocation on a piece of legislation, they will stand up and scream and holler from their seats, saying they have more members who want to speak and how dare we bring in time allocation. That is what they will do. Then the government works with an opposition party in order to try to get legislation passed, and we bring in time allocation. The Conservative Party will then almost collapse with its debate on that legislation.
If we want to get something through the House of Commons, we have to bring in time allocation, unless of course the Conservative Party is feeling very merciful or has been shamed into supporting something that does not require the government to bring in time allocation.
The Conservatives' excuse is that they have more people who want to speak to the legislation. What does the motion do? If the motion were to pass today, it would enable the government, not on its own but working with any other opposition party to form a majority inside the House, to say that it wants to sit an extended number of hours. In other words, it would allow for more time to debate legislation.
One would think that if the Conservative Party was so preoccupied about ensuring that more of its members get to speak on legislation, it would support that initiative. However, that is not the case. This is not the first time it has been done. Is it that the Conservative Party does not believe it should work late into the evening? Millions of Canadians work past six o'clock in the evening. Hundreds of thousands work past midnight.
Liberal and New Democrat members of this House are not scared to work. If it means we can pass legislation by working the extra hours, we will do that, because the legislation we are passing is of substance. It is there to support Canadians through the pandemic. It is there to provide national programs, such as the dental care program. It is budgetary measures that enable the government to do all sorts of wonderful things for Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
There is a limited number of days for us to pass through all the measures that need to be passed, whether they be budgetary measures, legislative measures, or all different types or forms of debate that the government is ultimately responsible for bringing before the House. It does not take an incredible effort to prevent any piece of legislation from being passed if there is no time allocation. I could take 10 high school students from Sisler High School, Maples, R. B. Russell Vocational High School, Children of the Earth High School or St. John's High School, and I could prevent legislation from passing under the current rules.
If the Conservative Party genuinely wants to contribute to debate on legislation, that is being accommodated through this motion.
However, that is not the Conservatives' real reason. Their real reason is demonstrated by their behaviour. Imagine that members are working during the day and the Conservatives stand up and move to adjourn or shut down the House and our debate. They have done that on many occasions.
Imagine they have two Conservatives who want to speak to a bill; they both stand up and one moves that the other be heard. Why? It is to cause the bells to ring, not to facilitate debate. Why, whenever there is a concurrence motion from the opposition benches, is it always, without exception, during government business? It is to prevent debate on government bills.
These are all tactics that the opposition, the Conservatives, are so focused on. These are not normal times. We are going through a pandemic and there is extra legislation that is necessary. The government has been so focused on ensuring that we have an economy that works for all Canadians. We are a government that is focused on ensuring we have the backs of Canadians during a worldwide pandemic.
We now have worldwide inflation that is hitting Canadians too, even though our inflation rate is less than the inflation in the U.S.A. and many other countries in Europe. We are bringing forward legislation to provide real, tangible relief at a time when Canadians need that relief, but we have a Conservative Party that is more focused on political games and preventing legislation from passing. If only Canadians knew how the Conservative Party is behaving on the floor of the House of Commons. I do not say that lightly.
As I indicated at the beginning, I spent over 20 years in opposition. We do not have to be a destructive force. There are many positive ways to contribute and still be a strong official opposition. Members on this side of the House and other members are frustrated with the leadership of the Conservative Party, because we want to be there for Canadians in a real and tangible way, and the games that are being played indicate that it is not democratic.
That is a weird statement to make, when we are offering more time for debate. We are being accused of being anti-democratic because we want to give more time for debate. It is something they have been asking for, but it does not fit their agenda, because when they say they want more time for debate, what they are really talking about is that they do not want to work beyond the normal hours. If we work beyond the normal hours, that means they have to work a little harder to filibuster debate. It means they might have to sit past seven o'clock in the evening. They might have to go to midnight to continue to filibuster legislation.
The member for Kingston and the Islands, the government House leader and others in the House used Bill S-5 as an example. It is a wonderful example. Bill S-5 states that every Canadian has the right to a healthy environment. Do members remember the debate on it? Every member of the House supported that legislation. Everyone wanted to see it go to committee.
The Conservative Party could not get enough of debating that piece of legislation, even though they played some games. I have not done the research, but I suspect that if I did, I would find that they probably moved concurrence and they probably did what they could to kill time, even on legislation they supported and that was universally well accepted.
All we wanted to do was get it through committee and yet, they put up speaker after speaker after speaker. If we had approached them and suggested that in order for them to accommodate all their speakers, why not continue it on into the evening, no, they would not want to do that.
Our microphones work after eight o'clock in the evening. It is now seven o'clock. If we sit until midnight, the wonderful thing about the House of Commons is we have a civil service, a wonderful group of people. We have our security, our Hansard and the Clerk and his officers, and the administration. They allow this House to operate. It is truly amazing. They do a fantastic job. They respond to the needs of this House so that when the Speaker allows an emergency debate, we are able to sit and have that emergency debate. When the government proposes a take-note debate, they are there to support us into the evening. When there is a need for us to sit later in the evening to facilitate more debate, they will be there for us in order to ensure that it takes place, as well it should. This is Canada's focal point on our democracy.
I do not need a lesson on democracy from the Conservative opposition. Believe me, there are opportunities for opposition parties to abuse the rules. We have been witnessing that. I sat in opposition when Stephen Harper brought in time allocation after time allocation well over 100 times when he was in a majority government situation. I even stood up and defended him on more than one occasion, saying that at times there is a need to bring in time allocation.
Unlike opposition parties, we do not have programmed legislation. On an opposition day, opposition members know that they bring in a motion and within 10 days there is going to be a vote on it and it moves on. The government does not have that. There is no programming. Some jurisdictions do have programming. Maybe that is what we need to be looking into.
I supported programming when I was in opposition in the Manitoba legislature. It is not an advantage to the government or a disadvantage to the opposition. There are all sorts of checks and balances that can be put into place. As I say, if they give me 10 students and never bring in time allocation or any sort of a closure, I could prevent anything from passing. The issue is that when there is a majority of the House that in essence says it is time to move on to some other debate and it is time that a piece of legislation went to committee, there is a need to recognize that fact and allow it to go to committee.
With respect to the legislative process, first reading does not really consume the time of the House, but second reading does, as does report stage, as does third reading. Often, there will be amendments that come from the Senate, which require more time. That is on one piece of legislation. Let us look at the substantial legislation that we have brought forward. I have a list, but because of limited time, I will not go through its entirety.
We are talking about dozens of pieces of legislation of substance. It is legislation that is putting money in people's pockets, that is protecting small businesses and that is modernizing legislation that has not been modernized for decades. It is a substantial legislative agenda. Is it any wonder that a majority of the House, not just the Liberals but a majority of the members of Parliament, are saying that one of the ways we can try to get some of this legislation through and allow for more debate opportunities is by extending the hours. Then we get the Conservatives. I am going to wait and see what the Bloc members actually do on this. At the end of the day, I would like to think the Bloc members would support the need.
It is nothing new. It is not like parliaments in democracies, whether at the provincial level or national level, have not brought in motions of this nature in the past. It is not uncommon.
The core issue of this motion is to say that, if there is a majority of members of Parliament on the floor of the House of Commons who want to see extended sitting hours, that can take place. We can sit more hours to accommodate debate. To me, that is a strong positive. I do not believe for a moment that members can say no to this and then criticize the government for not allowing debate on legislation.
That is how I would conclude my remarks to my Conservative friends. If they vote no to this motion, they are really saying that they do not need additional time to debate legislation. If they are not saying that, then they are really saying they do not want to sit extra hours. It has to be one of the two, unless it is because they do not want to pass any legislation whatsoever and want to continue playing games and frustrating the House. I will let the individuals who follow the debate determine which one they think it is. I am hoping the Conservatives will turn the page, realize its benefits and pass this motion.
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