44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 6, 2023 02:00PM
- Dec/6/23 5:29:31 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Calgary Rocky Ridge.
We are continuing in the debate. We just had a vote in this place, in which we amended the motion. I am a member of the procedure and House affairs committee, which, if this motion is passed, will be dealing with the question at hand. The amendment that my colleagues have just made says that the procedure and House affairs committee would deal with the matter within the first 24 hours of the passage of the motion I am currently rising to debate, and report back to the House by December 14. That would be next week, before the House adjourns and rises for the Christmas break.
I frankly cannot believe that I am witnessing what I am witnessing, as a member of the chamber for what will be 18 years in January. It is a rare thing indeed to have a member of Parliament get elected as Speaker and then have to resign in the middle of a parliamentary term. Normally, the member of Parliament who is elected to be Speaker jokingly resists being cast into the Speaker's chair, because, supposedly, nobody wants the job. However, it is actually an important job and an important role to serve as the independent arbiter of all of the rules by which we conduct the debates and the business of the nation.
A Speaker's resigning is something I have not seen in the last 18 years. As a matter of fact, we would have to go back a long time in our history to recall a previous Speaker's resignation due to issues in this place. Now, just two months after we have replaced one Speaker in an unprecedented situation, the House is seized with a privilege question about whether the replacement of the resigned Speaker, a new Speaker, ought, himself, to resign.
I am a Conservative member of Parliament, and my party has been very clear about whether or not we think that what the Speaker has done should constitute grounds for the individual's resigning. We are not the only political party; our Bloc Québécois colleagues in this place have also indicated that they have lost confidence in the current Speaker.
I guess we will wait and see whether the motion passes the chamber. Given the fact that it was unanimous to amend the motion, as all MPs in this place just moments ago voted in favour of an amendment, one can only presume that the question would be referred to committee and the matter would probably be dealt with in the 24 hours after the vote. Likely, if it does not happen today, it would happen tomorrow, which means that the procedure and House affairs committee would be seized with this matter as early as tomorrow, or, at the very latest, Friday of this week, and report it back to this place next Thursday at the latest.
The procedure and House affairs committee is seized with a number of issues. We are dealing with a question of privilege regarding our colleague, the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, in relation to foreign interference in his duties as a member of Parliament. The procedure and House affairs committee is also still seized with the general question of foreign interference in our elections. In addition, the procedure and House affairs committee has yet to begin its study on the matter of the previous Speaker's issue of having invited a former Nazi into this place during the visit of Ukrainian President Zelenskyy. Now, it seems that the very busy procedure and House affairs committee would have to study the question at hand as a matter of precedence either today or tomorrow, should the motion continue to get support and pass.
Here is why the procedure and House affairs committee is seized with all of these issues: Trust has been broken. At the end of the day, this is all about trust. It is about trusting that the government has the best intentions and the ability to manage not only the institutions of government but also the institution of Parliament.
I would submit to my colleagues here in this place that we need to get to the bottom of this in a timely fashion, because it is another stain, I would call it, but perhaps that might be too strong a word. It is a stain on the reputation and credibility of this place.
I should note that if we were to count the number of members of Parliament in this place who serve in the Bloc Québécois caucus and in the Conservative caucus, they constitute almost half of the MPs in this place. I do not know how everybody voted. Sometimes the person who is the Speaker is somebody I voted for, and sometimes the person who is the Speaker is not somebody I voted for. That is okay because up until now, I have been able to get by in this place knowing, with some confidence and semblance of trust, that the referee who was elected, whether I voted for them or not, was actually able to carry out the duties of Speaker in a way that at least appeared non-partisan.
However, here we are. The Speaker has used the privileges of his office, put on his robes and recorded a video acknowledging that he is the Speaker of the House of Commons, for an address to an Ontario Liberal Party partisan event. That is beyond inappropriate.
Anybody who has just undertaken the responsibility of Speaker would, I assume, have been given briefings. They ought to have known the roles and responsibilities of being the Speaker before they put up their hand, or in this case, not removed their name from the list, allowing their name to stand for Speaker.
It is this overt partisanship after having been elected Speaker that has put us in this scenario today. It is a question of trust. If my privileges or those of any other member of the House are in some way impacted, we would expect that the Speaker would be able to carry out a non-partisan view of the rules and protect not only the integrity of this institution but also the integrity, the rights and the privileges of every member of Parliament. This is fundamental to the ability of our democracy and our democratic chamber to proceed with confidence, the confidence not only of the House but also of all Canadians.
I will just remind my colleagues in this place that this is not the first time that the individual who is currently the Speaker has gotten himself in trouble for being partisan. I remember quite clearly that the member wrote letters, in his capacity as a former parliamentary secretary, that breached some of the ethical provisions we have in this place. I also remember the individual's vehemently defending the Prime Minister when it came to the “elbowgate” matter with former MP Ruth Ellen Brosseau, and then his actually calling into question the integrity of Ms. Brosseau; if I remember correctly, he actually said that the incident was being exaggerated by her.
One can only draw some conclusions that the individual has shown his true colours and cannot help but be partisan in a role that is specifically designed to be non-partisan. That is why I would implore my colleagues in this place to vote for the motion and refer the issue to the procedure and House affairs committee so we can deal with the matter forthwith.
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- Dec/6/23 5:40:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, far be it from me to know the inner workings of the mind of the member for Kingston and the Islands, even though he purports to know what is in the hearts and minds of everybody else in this chamber.
Of course I will listen objectively to all the witnesses who will come to the committee. I have been here longer than the member for Kingston and the Islands and everybody who seems to be supporting him. I have seen this show before, and I will say to any colleague willing to listen to what I have to say that I am looking forward to hearing from not only the Speaker, who I hope will come to the procedure and House affairs committee, but also all the other witnesses who would know what the conduct ought to be in the role of Speaker. I will make a determination at that particular point in time.
I alone am not judge and jury on the procedure and House affairs committee. I am just one member. I will have my questions, and I expect that I will get fulsome answers from all the witnesses who appear, including the Speaker.
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- Dec/6/23 5:41:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the procedure to deal with this is the procedure when there is a prima facie case. We brought the issue up in the chamber, the Speaker had to make a ruling and we waited for the ruling. The Speaker found a prima facie case, which then invoked the moving of a motion. The Conservative House leader moved that motion, which is what we are debating right now. I am not sure what the member does not understand about the process. We are following the process as it is laid out, and we will see what happens should this motion get passed on to the procedure and House affairs committee.
I would like to thank her party, which has been clear in what it stands for. We in the Conservative Party want a fair and objective Speaker. We believe in this country, in this institution and that the person sitting in the Speaker's chair—
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- Dec/6/23 5:43:47 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the members of the procedure and House affairs committee, in the limited time I have been there, debate issues robustly. We all have our own thoughts and ideas and generally get good work done, so I am confident that the procedure and House affairs committee will work constructively toward a resolution on the matter at hand should it get referred.
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- Dec/6/23 6:02:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I believe that the rules of this place are that members should not impugn anything upon other members as to their thoughts. He is welcome to have his own opinions on the matters at hand, but when he is actually characterizing other members and impugning what their thoughts, ideas and reputations are, I believe that is—
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