- Member of Parliament
- Deputy House leader of the official opposition
- Conservative
- Mégantic—L'Érable
- Quebec
- Voting Attendance: 69%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $94,201.00
- Government Page
- Feb/6/24 2:35:22 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister keeps misleading the House.
On September 27, the Prime Minister said in this House that he had no idea that a former Nazi was going to be involved in the events surrounding President Zelenskyy's visit. We now know that the Prime Minister personally invited the Nazi to his private reception in Toronto. He said that the Speaker of the House should resign for inviting a Nazi into the House of Commons. After eight years, it is safe to say his relationship with the truth is pretty questionable.
Will the Prime Minister apply the same standard to himself and resign?
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- Dec/5/23 4:12:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, personally, I agree with what my colleague just said. If we do not have confidence in the Speaker to be the referee, then how do you expect us to then respect his decisions and his calls for calm and order? It is total chaos.
In any event, I am already wondering one thing. Two political parties have already called for his resignation and another is questioning the Speaker's judgment for taking part in a partisan activity. Three out of the four parties in the House of Commons have already questioned the Speaker's judgment with respect to his participation in an event that calls into question his ability to be non-partisan.
Because that happened, I do not see what other option my colleagues at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs have. The only thing they can do is call for the Speaker to tender his resignation.
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- Dec/4/23 12:41:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment on this very serious question. I wish to do so so that the people watching us in Quebec and all francophone communities across the country understand what we are talking about right now in the House of Commons.
Today, we provided notice of a question of privilege concerning the Speaker's public participation in partisan events over this past weekend.
As the Speaker himself indicated this morning in his statement, I hope that he will recuse himself from the deliberations concerning this question of privilege. This is an extremely sensitive issue, especially since the question of privilege has been compounded by a number of other issues.
The Conservative Party asked that the question of privilege be referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs to study the event and recommend any appropriate remedies. Today, another political party asked that the Speaker simply resign. This is an extremely serious matter that deserves to be looked at very seriously.
Words and deeds matter. I am going to quote the member for Hull—Aylmer, before he took the role of Speaker, from the speech he made in the House to all his colleagues and to all Canadians. Let us not forget that before the vote, all those running to become Speaker were given the opportunity to make a speech in the hope of winning the support of their peers, their fellow MPs. The member for Hull—Aylmer took advantage of his speaking time to call for respect, saying, and I quote:
The words we use matter. Symbols matter. I know this all too well.
These are weighty words in relation to the events reported to us by The Globe and Mail this weekend. Subsequently, we have had the opportunity to see them on social networks and, today, they are being repeated just about everywhere on all platforms and in all media.
Let me remind members what happened. The Globe and Mail published an article on Saturday under the following headline, “John Fraser finishes his time as interim Ontario Liberal leader as party elects permanent replacement”. The article was written by Laura Stone. She quotes the Speaker of the House quite remarkably. Here is how the member for Hull—Aylmer referred to Mr. Fraser: “He's demonstrated so much calm, and conviction and resolve and determination, and he's held it all together at a very challenging time in the history of our party.”
Let me repeat that last part because it is very important for what happened next: “He's held it all together at a very challenging time in the history of our party.”
I will now quote an excerpt from the statement made by the Speaker of the House this morning, at the opening of the House, speaking about that video.
Hon. colleagues, it was played at a convention for a party that I am not a member of, in a province where I do not live in and where I have been unable to vote for nearly three decades.
I can remember the Speaker's exact words in the video, which was viewed by a number of Canadians. The Speaker of the House, wearing his robes and standing in his office, said of Mr. Fraser that he “demonstrated so much calm, and conviction and resolve and determination”, and “held it all together at a very challenging time in the history of our party”.
That is the opposite of the statement the Speaker of the House and member for Hull—Aylmer made this morning. What does he mean by “our party”?
Regardless, the video went even further. The Speaker of the House took part by video in the election of the leader of the Ontario Liberal Party. This is an excerpt of what he said in the two-minute video produced as part of a tribute to Mr. Fraser, and I quote: “We had a lot of fun together through the Ottawa South Liberal Association, through Liberal Party politics, by helping Dalton McGuinty get elected. This was really a seminal part of my life. When I think of the opportunities that I have now as being Speaker of the House of Commons, it's because of people like John and Linda, and especially you, John, that I am the person I am today.”
In that same video, once again, the Speaker himself mentioned his affiliation with the Liberal brand. He was wearing the Speaker's robes and standing in the Speaker's office, and the video was probably filmed using House of Commons resources. For the benefit of the people tuning in, I will just remind them that the video was played at the Ontario Liberal leadership convention as a message from the Speaker of the House of Commons of Canada. As I mentioned earlier, he made these remarks while standing in the Speaker's office in West Block and wearing the Speaker's robes.
The decision to take part in a political convention is in and of itself very ill advised for someone who must be seen to be non-partisan. Some people may say that the situation would have been different if the member for Hull—Aylmer had done this wearing jeans in his backyard and using a personal computer rather than House of Commons resources, but that is not true. The Speaker of the House is the Speaker of the House, regardless of the circumstances and regardless of what he is wearing. When he does something like this while deliberately dressed in the full regalia of his non-partisan position in the offices of the Speaker of the House of Commons, that is what we would call a partisan gesture on the part of someone we would expect to show absolute non-partisanship.
I thought it was important, and I still think it is important, that we inform all of the francophones across the country who watch our proceedings of what is going on. It is important to remember that the House of Commons Procedure and Practice is very clear on the non-partisan nature of the position of Speaker of the House of Commons.
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- Jun/13/23 2:41:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the special rapporteur announced his resignation four days ago, but he will remain on the payroll long enough to produce a final report that has already lost all credibility.
The Prime Minister is the one who chose partisanship by ignoring the three calls by the majority of members of the House to launch an independent public inquiry. As everyone knows, he selected a friend, a member of the Trudeau Foundation, whom he literally threw under the bus to protect himself and prevent Canadians from learning the whole truth.
I am giving him another chance to call an independent public inquiry to uncover the truth about any interference by the Beijing regime in our democracy.
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- Apr/20/23 2:51:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, they do not want to talk about the Prime Minister because they know that we will talk about ethics and ethics violations.
There was the Prime Minister for vacationing on a private island, the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, Infrastructure and Communities for giving a permit to a company with ties to his family, the Prime Minister a second time in the SNC-Lavalin matter, the Minister of International Trade, Export Promotion, Small Business and Economic Development for awarding her best friend a contract, the member for Hull—Aylmer, and we learned yesterday that the interim Ethics Commissioner, the sister-in-law of the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, had resigned.
To whom will the Prime Minister now turn for advice about his next vacation at the estate of his rich friends from the Trudeau Foundation?
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- Feb/14/23 3:06:36 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, here are the facts. The Liberal Minister of International Trade was found guilty of contravening the Conflict of Interest Act for awarding a contract worth several thousand dollars to her best friend. We learned this week that the same minister hired a former Liberal cabinet minister, Michael Chan, to work on her election campaign.
The problem is that CSIS informed the Liberals that Mr. Chan is on a watch list because of his connections. With whom? With the Chinese Communist regime.
Why has the minister not yet resigned from her position for blindly following the bad examples set by her Prime Minister?
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- Jun/16/22 2:20:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, another example of Liberal incompetence is the mismanagement of the Pinocchio affair.
Two senior ministers contradicted the Minister of Public Safety in committee by testifying that no police force specifically asked for the Emergencies Act to be invoked. The President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Emergency Preparedness said, and I quote, “I'm not aware of any recommendation from law enforcement.” There is squabbling in the Liberal ranks. The Minister of Public Safety has lost the confidence of his own colleagues.
When will the Prime Minister demand his resignation?
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- Jun/15/22 2:36:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, who asked, when did they ask and what exactly did they ask for? The Prime Minister just said that police officers asked the government to implement extraordinary measures by invoking the Emergencies Act.
The Prime Minister is repeating what the Minister of Public Safety said. This is scandalous. The Prime Minister is misleading the House too. He has a choice today. He can do the honourable thing: apologize and ask his minister to resign. Will he do so, yes or no?
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- Jun/14/22 2:34:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Emergencies Act cannot be invoked when other legislation can do the job.
The Minister of Public Safety knew that, which is why he justified his decision by stating repeatedly that the police had requested these extraordinary powers. No police officer, police force, chief of police or commissioner has confirmed the minister's assertion. There is no misunderstanding. This Liberal minister no longer has the confidence of Canadians.
When will he be honest with Canadians and resign?
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- Jun/14/22 2:33:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we have a Minister of Public Safety who has repeatedly said that the serious decision to invoke the Emergencies Act was made at the request of police authorities.
All the police forces deny having requested the Emergencies Act. The minister knows this, and as a former Crown prosecutor, he knows the importance of telling the truth and nothing but the truth.
Since he cannot take back what he said and a major decision about civil liberties was made, will he now do the honourable thing and resign?
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