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House Hansard - 305

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
April 30, 2024 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 305 - Apr/30/24
Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)
  • Apr/30/24 6:46:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I gave notice to the table regarding this point of order following what we witnessed this afternoon and the Speaker's decisions, which were good decisions. I want to start by saying that the rules have to apply to all in the House of Commons, and what we saw today was the Speaker enforcing the rules of the House of Commons. We have the Standing Orders, and we chose, together as members of Parliament, a Speaker. The Speaker's job is to ensure that the Standing Orders are respected. I will read what a former Speaker, who is now the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle and the Conservative House leader, said. He spoke to this issue, which I am going to raise, on September 24, 2014. I was in the House, so I remember this. He said, “Another of our time-honoured traditions is that of respect for the office of Speaker.” He then quoted from O'Brien and Bosc: Reflections on the character or actions of the Speaker—an allegation of bias, for example—could be taken by the House as breeches of privilege and punished accordingly. The former Speaker then continued: I wish to conclude with an appeal to members on all sides. Needless to say, the kind of unsavoury language or expression that we heard yesterday does little to assist the Chair in managing question period proceedings, and I urge all members to be judicious in the expressions they choose to use. This is the former Speaker of the House of Commons, who is currently the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle and the current Conservative House leader, stating that reflections on the character or actions of the Speaker, for example, an allegation of bias, could be taken by the House as breeches of privilege and punished accordingly. I want to submit for your attention, Madam Speaker, two posts that have come out on social media. One is from the member for Carleton, which says, “Today the Liberal speaker censored me”, before going on to provide deliberately misleading information in his Twitter post. This is very clearly challenging that ruling from 2014 of the former Speaker and current member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, the current Conservative House leader. The second tweet is from the member for Lethbridge, who also has shown a wanton disregard of the rules of the House of Commons. She stated: “How did partisan hack, [the Speaker] respond?!” These are unacceptable terms and warrant a full apology from those members. I will read, for the record, what we have in our House of Commons Procedure and Practice, which is the procedural bible of the House of Commons. These are the rules that Canadians expect us to live by. When they elect us in ridings across the country, they expect members of Parliament to abide by the rules to ensure that there is decorum in the House and that we are doing the job that Canadians have sent us here to do. The House of Commons Procedure and Practice says, concerning the impartiality of the Chair: The actions of the Speaker may not be criticized in debate or by any means except by way of a substantive motion.... Reflections on the character or actions of the Speaker (an allegation of bias, for example) could be taken by the House as breaches of privilege and punished accordingly. There are a number of examples where that rule has been breeched. For example, in 1981, when there was clearly a question of privilege being raised, the leader of the opposition at that time withdrew his remarks, and that settled the matter. In 1993, there was a similar attack on the dignity of the House, an attack on the Speaker. Again, the member rose in the House and withdrew the remarks. It is very clear that the rules of the House, which are put in place to ensure that our democracy functions properly so that we can have orderly discussions and debates, were violated. It is very clear that these two social media posts do not abide by those rules. In my opinion, both members should have to apologize and withdraw their remarks before returning to the House.
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