Senator Dean: No.

Senator Housakos: Would Senator Dean take a question?

Hon. Tony Dean: Honourable senators, I give notice that, at the next sitting of the Senate, I will move:

That, notwithstanding the order of the Senate adopted on Thursday, February 10, 2022, the date for the final report of the Standing Senate Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs in relation to its study on:

(a)services and benefits provided to members of the Canadian Forces; to veterans who have served honourably in the Canadian Armed Forces in the past; to members and former members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and its antecedents; and all of their families;

(b)commemorative activities undertaken by the Department of Veterans Affairs Canada, to keep alive for all Canadians the memory of Canadian veterans’ achievements and sacrifices; and

(c)continuing implementation of the Veterans Well‑being Act;

be extended from June 30, 2023, to December 31, 2025.

Hon. Tony Dean: Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to the time allocation motion for Bill C-11. This is, to say the least, an extraordinary day in the chamber, and yet, in some ways, more of the same.

I will start by saying that I support the motion. Our Conservative colleagues — and they are our colleagues — have once again laid out just about everything that they don’t like about an independent Senate. And it has also become more evident as the day has gone by that our Conservative colleagues would have been happy to see the demise of this bill. I certainly don’t feel the same way.

“We should have changed the Rules,” as we were told earlier today. Well, we gave that a try, and we faced a barrage of obstacles. That’s probably to be expected because our Conservative friends found every possible way to shut that down at the Rules Committee. They like the world just the way that it is, and I understand that — that sort of goes with being Conservative and change-resistant.

Our Conservative colleagues made the case that the Government Representative in the Senate did not have the power to move time allocation because he’s a non-affiliated senator; he’s not a member of a political party. They would have preferred to see a Government Representative Office, or GRO, with no powers, while conveniently retaining all the powers that they have to delay. That would be very convenient, indeed, wouldn’t it? That is what we have heard today.

Not surprisingly, our Conservative colleagues are no strangers to time allocation, and we’ve heard that already. It was first adopted in the Senate in 1991. Since then, it has been used 68 times. During the Forty-first Parliament, under the previous Conservative government, notice of motion for time allocation was given 24 times in the Senate. On two of those occasions, the notice was withdrawn. Therefore, time allocation was used 22 times by Conservative senators during the Forty-first Parliament.

Senator Gold has noted some of the more aggressive and fast-tracked Conservative time allocation motions — and it was on some quite important bills: Some of the bills in question included Bill C-23, the Fair Elections Act, which made sweeping changes to the Canada Elections Act; and Bill C-51, the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015, which expanded state powers, policing and national security powers, while undermining civil liberties and democratic rights. Both bills received Charter challenges after their swift passage.

This was business as usual for our Conservative colleagues. So I find it a little bit rich that our colleagues have seen the light, temporarily at least, in accusing the government of shutting down debate on a bill which, as we’ve heard already, has been before Parliament for two years, has been addressed by 142 witnesses and has had significant time for debate and deliberation — and which was an electoral promise in the last election. It is our duty as senators to ensure that the bill can reach a final vote.

This is the first time in seven years, obviously, that the Government Representative has invoked time allocation. We’ve heard that this followed many attempts to come to an agreement, to negotiate and to move the bill to a final vote. Time allocation is not what any of us would have wished for, but, after a significant amount of review, the Government Representative obviously decided, as is his right, that there is interest in moving this to a vote using the tool he has at his disposal: time allocation. We know, and the Speaker has confirmed tonight, that this is eligible in the Rules.

We have heard that Bill C-11 is the most debated piece of legislation in Canadian history. Consequently, none of us can reasonably say that we haven’t had enough time to study the bill. Our colleagues in the chamber have spoken at length about the clear objectives of the bill, as well as the very technical details in which this legislation will create new regulatory requirements for Canada’s legacy broadcasters and online social media platforms. We have learned, colleagues, all that we are going to learn, and it’s time to bring the bill to a final vote.

Balancing rules is obviously important in any context but, among other things, some rules have established an unproductive and conflict-based Senate in which the ability of the official opposition to endlessly delay the progress of bills — through the use of adjournments — is theoretically offset by the government’s ability to time allocate, while cutting short debates on bills. At their very worst, our current Rules permit a single senator to delay and frustrate proposed legislation for months and — as we’ve seen in some cases — years by depriving the Senate from even voting on it. We’ve seen many examples of that.

Tonight, it’s clear once again that Senate Conservatives have been unhappy about the shift to a more independent and less partisan Senate from the outset. It’s no surprise, is it?

Tonight, we heard that Senator Plett — I’m glad that you find this so amusing — is still lamenting the loss of the “take turns in power” duopoly. We had to argue, and we had to negotiate — when we came here as independent senators — for office space, for resources, for committee seats and, in the longer term, for more equity in the complex world of rules in this place. Nothing came easy, so spare us the advice to “Just go and change the Rules if you don’t like them.”

It doesn’t end there, does it? We also entered a Senate still reeling from a scathing Auditor General’s report on spending scandals, ethics issues, a Senate Administration leadership structure without a single point of accountability and a dark cloud of sexual harassment. That’s the context that we walked into.

Independent senators tackled these long-standing, long-ignored issues one at a time. The long-delayed recommendation on an independent audit function has been addressed. We fought hard and achieved support for a much stronger workplace harassment policy in the face of considerable delay and opposition. We have a Senate that is healthier and more efficient.

So, colleagues, while some in this place lament the old duopoly, they obviously feel comfortable with the same old hard‑nosed politics. By the way, I don’t believe for a moment that in the last few years of the Stephen Harper government, it was a golden time of sweetness and light for the Liberal opposition in this place. That’s fair enough, I think.

Let me conclude by saying that, like other independent senators, I’m grateful that I don’t have to take instructions from Pierre Poilievre, as I do not have to take instructions from Justin Trudeau. I would not have it any other way. I’m working with my colleagues in this place to do the best job I can for Canadians, bringing a policy-based approach to our work as opposed to a political one.

My final note is that I have a great deal of respect for my colleagues in every caucus and group in this place. We can do great things together if we work more effectively and more efficiently together.

The us-versus-them nature of some remarks that we have heard over the last months and years — and that we have heard this evening — tells me that we have some way to go in achieving this, but I still believe it’s worth our work. Thank you, colleagues.