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House Hansard - 270

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
January 29, 2024 11:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)
  • Jan/29/24 4:38:36 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, knowing how important that particular question was to my colleague across the way, if he wants to walk over, he can look at the numbers I read off. I suspect it was there, as the clerk at the table is very efficient and has already indicated it is there. A number of thoughts come to my mind in regard to what we are debating. Members would be very familiar with my standing up to express concerns whenever there is a concurrence report that is brought to the floor of the House of Commons. I do that because I recognize the finite amount of time that the House is in fact operational or open where we are actually able to deal with Private Members' Business, opposition days, government business and so forth. Over the last number of months, we have seen a great deal of effort to prevent government agenda items from being debated. I am going to speak specifically to this concurrence report but before I do, I want to highlight that we are going to be sitting later tonight. The reason we are going to be sitting later tonight is that we have the 12th report of the Standing Committee on Finance that we have to deal with. We also have to deal with the 14th report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. These are all concurrence reports. Opposition members also have other mechanisms or tools, and this is where it becomes a little more relevant, even for the motion that has been put forward today by the Bloc. We all have a very good sense of our feelings with respect to the report, which I support, and I believe the majority of the House will be supporting the report. We know that because it passed through a standing committee with a majority vote. There were two opposition reports attached that are dissenting reports. My concern is that, in this case it is the Bloc, but most often it is the Conservatives, when they bring up these concurrence reports, they are actually preventing substantive debate on a wide spectrum of different issues. For example, today, we were supposed to be debating the fall economic statement and the legislation. It was interesting. The very first debate that we had was a private member's hour, and it was dealing with the farm carbon pricing. The member stood up, and the first thing he said was that they have four priorities, as the Conservative Party. It was interesting when, an hour later, the leader of the Conservative Party stood in this place and, in essence, said the same thing, that they have four priorities. He listed the four priorities of the Conservative Party. Mr. John Nater: Name them. Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: Mr. Speaker, I know what they are. “Axe the tax” is one of them. I do not really want to get into them. Housing was the second one. They then had the deal with the government cuts. That is the hidden Tory agenda. They then want to deal with the crime issue, even though they filibustered the bail reform legislation. We had the very first debate, and then we had the second debate on the fall economic statement. Then, during members' statements, we had another member of the Conservative Party stand up and say that they have four priorities they want to debate today. If one listened to question period, I think at least three of those priorities were, in fact, raised. The government says, “Let us talk about those priorities.” I love to contrast Conservative policy with the government's or the Liberal Party's policy. I love the contrast. I welcome it. In fact, I was looking forward to debating that today. Much like previous concurrence reports, by introducing the concurrence report, it is preventing that debate. We have already had the debate about the Speaker. We have spent hours debating that issue. It has gone to committee, and now the committee has provided a report. Why would we want to talk about the Speaker again? I do not believe it has the priority that members opposite think it has. Canadians are more concerned about issues like inflation, interest rates, jobs, investments and health care. Those are the types of things Canadians from coast to coast to coast are concerned about, not the regurgitation of another report that was already passed in the House by a majority of the members. Now there is a sense of frustration. As opposed to preventing the debate on those types of important issues, the Bloc has opposition day motions and could have incorporated this into an opposition day motion if it so chose. If the Bloc really felt that this was a road it wanted to take Canadians down, that would be an excellent opportunity. I listened earlier, because I am the one who asked questions of the Bloc members. This morning, they, too, started their debate on the fall economic statement. I listened. I disagreed with a lot of what they said, but there was some merit in some areas where comment was provided. I honestly thought we would have that continuation of what is so important in every region of our country, and that is the concern about the realities of what is taking place in our communities. I do not believe I am alone. I think a majority of members would agree that we need to talk about issues that are relevant to what our constituents want us to reflect on. I looked at the report. It is very short. There are three recommendations. Let me read the recommendation that surprised me. I would have thought it would have already been in place. Recommendation 2 That the House Administration be tasked with preparing, as part of the briefing binder, guidelines for any future Speaker of the House that presents clear boundaries for impartiality and non-partisanship. To be honest, I thought there would have been something of that nature, and I suspect there is maybe more of an informal one, but I do not know. I think that is a wonderful recommendation. As the member for Kingston and the Islands has pointed out on many occasions, it is not like what happened here with our current Speaker has never happened before. It has happened before. I question the motivation as to why the Conservatives and the Bloc want to persist with this issue. I believe it has more to do with the Conservative agenda. I often talk about the idea of that MAGA right and how things from the south creep up north. The Leader of the Opposition's office seems to be opening the door wide to it. They want to try to say that Parliament is dysfunctional. Today, they are trying to amplify the Speaker's chair as if there is something wrong with the institution. There is nothing wrong with the institution. The Speaker made a mistake like other Speakers in the past have made mistakes. That happens. This time when it happened, there was not only a great deal of debate before we adjourned but also a recommendation. That recommendation was to bring it to PROC for a report, and that is what they want to debate now, even though they had hours of discussions and debates prior to going into PROC, whether it was formal or informal, or while at PROC. There has been a thorough vetting in terms of what has taken place, and members have been able to express their concerns. I, too, believe in the impartiality of a Speaker. I understand the importance of it. I have highlighted that fact in my political career, and most of it has been while in opposition. I have gone through Progressive Conservative Speakers, New Democratic Speakers and Liberal Speakers, and I can tell members I do not think any of them are absolutely perfect. I can say that, with the discussions we have heard both here and second-hand and with what has taken place in the procedure and House affairs committee, the conclusion I would draw is that enough is enough. At the end of the day, I do not believe for a moment that this is the type of issue Canadians, in all regions of our country, want us to debate. It is much like when we talk about the Conservatives wanting to show, as much as possible, that the institution is broken. That is one reason, I would argue, they bring in the concurrence reports or they, at weird times, will try to adjourn debate or adjourn the day's proceedings. There are many different filibusters we see put into place by the Conservatives. There is legislation that is unanimously supported in the House, yet they will still filibuster. There are all sorts of tactics. I am used to the tactics. I spent many years in opposition. There is a good reason we have those types of levers. The way the Conservative Party is using it, in co-operation at times with others, like the Bloc today, is to disrupt the government's legislative agenda. Who really pays the price? It may be individual members because there is a legislative agenda, and we have to try to get that legislative agenda through. If there is a finite number of hours, that means the more they filibuster, the less time there will be for debate on government legislation. I was in opposition in a third party. The wonderful thing about Hansard is we would be able to find this. I remember saying that time allocation is a necessary tool, at times, to be able to use in order for government to get its agenda through the House, even if there is a majority government. There is a legislative agenda, a budget that has to pass, and that time is very precious. I look at what we have witnessed, which is a lot of politics. Let me give an example of that. There were some interesting quotes. When the issue first came up, the member for Mégantic—L'Érable stood up and provided some comments. This was actually before it went to PROC. He said, “The solution for the Speaker is none other than to ask for his resignation, because he has lost the confidence of the House.” This is something that he said in Hansard before it even went to PROC. PROC was responsible for studying it. The House referred the matter to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs with instructions that it recommend an appropriate remedy. That was the essence of the motion, which was actually brought forward by Conservatives. The member for Red Deer—Lacombe stated: Of course I will listen objectively to all the witnesses who will come to the committee.... I am looking forward to hearing from...the Speaker, who I hope will come to the procedure and House affairs committee.... 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 [who come]. The member for Red Deer—Lacombe supported the Speaker's resignation even before it went to the PROC committee. At the end of the day, when we look at some of these quotes, there is an actual report that has come up with those three recommendations, which I will go through very quickly, but there were also dissenting reports. Is there any surprise about that? I was not surprised, because we knew about this even prior. The official opposition's dissenting report states: The office of Speaker of the House of Commons is one of the oldest in our constitutional form of government, dating back seven centuries. It goes on: The current Speaker of our House...shattered that ancient tradition—three times in a week—earlier this month. In doing so, he failed to meet his duty of care to the House, thereby squandering the good-will and trust of the Official Opposition. Compounding that, the evidence before the Committee undermined the Speaker’s version of events. The Conservative Party, in a dissenting report, is suggesting that the Speaker resign. It is the same thing with respect to the dissenting opinion from the Bloc. However, we have the three recommendations that ultimately have the support of the majority. Recommendation 1 states: That the Speaker undertake the appropriate steps to reimburse a suitable amount for the use of parliamentary resources that were not related to the performance of parliamentary functions. I already made reference to recommendation 2, to ensure that there are guidelines. Recommendation 3 states: That the Speaker issue another apology clearly stating that filming the video both in his office, and in his robes was inappropriate, his remorse for the situation, and a clear outline of what he and his office will do to ensure this does not happen again; and that the principle of respect, impartiality, and decorum are values he will continue to prioritize as Speaker. As has been clearly enunciated over many hours of debate and discussion, both formally and informally, the Speakers from the past have also made mistakes. I think these recommendations are fair; we support them. We have seen the Speaker give a formal apology at the PROC committee itself, and he may have done so twice in the House. I suspect, and I am purely speculating, that he might have even said it informally to others. I say that because I believe he is very remorseful and that this is not going to happen again. We can take a lot from the main report from PROC and feel good about what it has done. However, I believe that the need to have the issue go back to PROC or to carry on the debate indefinitely in one form or another is doing a disservice to Canadians. At the end of the day, there are far more issues in reality that Canadians are facing every day that we should be dealing with. Today, we are supposed to be debating the fall economic statement, which is a wonderful opportunity for members to be able to express what their constituents are saying about what is taking place here in Ottawa.
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