Bill C-10 (Historical)

Constitution Act, 2010 (Senate term limits)

An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 (Senate term limits)

This enactment alters the tenure of senators who are summoned after October 14, 2008.

Constitution Act, 2010 (Senate term limits)

[Steven Fletcher, Conservative, Minister of State (Democratic Reform)]

Mr. Speaker, this Liberal member has just demonstrated why we need Senate reform. The member just stated that being appointed to the Senate is just like being elected. That is not the case at all. Elections require accountability. Elections--

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

I did not say that. I never said that.

[Steven Fletcher, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia, MB]

The member is heckling, saying she did not say that. We will check the record afterwards. The member certainly left the impression that being appointed to the Senate is just like being elected to the Senate.

I understand the Liberal Party's zest in protecting the Senate and the status quo, and they know very well that wholesale change to the Senate would require constitutional negotiations that would never end, hence we would end up with the status quo.

We are proposing incremental changes and the Conservative Prime Minister has said that he will select whoever the people of a province select in an election. That would be a concerned Prime Minister's selection for the Senate. If the people elect an NDP member, a Liberal member, a Conservative or a member of the Green Party, that is who the Prime Minister will select. So the stacking argument that the member presents is completely undermined.

What is really astonishing during this debate is the fact that the Liberal member does not acknowledge what her previous critics have said, that term limits are needed, yet she goes on about Senate reform.

There is only one party that--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. We must go to the answer. The hon. member for Random—Burin—St. George's.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Mr. Speaker, the member knows that the point I made is that to those senators who work very hard, their job is as important to them as ours is to us. The point is that they have a job to do, just as we have a job to do.

The problem here is that we have a government that does not even acknowledge that the senators count, that does not even acknowledge that the work they do is important, that thwarts legislation, that holds up legislation in the Senate instead of working to make sure that legislation gets passed in the best interest of all Canadians.

We have a government that has decided on eight-year term limits. If one gets an eight-year term, one can be elected for two majority governments and it can be stacked, and that is exactly where the government is coming from. As the Prime Minister has said, he makes the rules, and he wants to make the rules on everything, including the Senate, not just the House of Commons.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with much anticipation and relish that I enter this debate on Bill C-10, regarding Senate term limits, not so much because what we have before us is something that can actually make things better for our country and for our future but because it gives me and my party an opportunity to talk about some of the worst aspects of our parliamentary system that exist right now and that need to be fixed in order to make this place better, in order to help begin the process of restoring the faith that Canadians need to have in their democratic systems.

I use the word “democratic” very specifically because all the discussion we are having here today in this democratic institution, in this House of Commons, is about some sort of historical relic, and that is what thePrime Minister used to call the Senate, an historical relic, in which being friends with the prime minister of the day is enough to get a person a job that does not end until that person is 75, which has no accountability whatsoever, no constituency at all, and uses up to $90 million a year of taxpayer money, for what purpose?

To listen to the Liberals talk about the Senate and accuse the Conservatives of stuffing the place with cronies is a bit rich. The entire history of their party seems predicated on the idea that simply being entitled is enough to gain power, that simply being connected, who one knows, is enough to have influence in the country. It is a crying shame, because at a foundation, every political movement, if it stands for nothing else, should stand for that moment when voters walk in to a ballot box and make a decision about their future and the future of their community. That is a sacred moment in our democracy.

In terms of hearing elected members in this place defend a Senate in which none of that happens and a senator simply knows somebody, I would like to read a quote. There are a number of great quotes, but a recent appointment of the Conservative government to the Senate, Senator Gerstein, said something that I think is very important for us to put into some context. On January 27, 2009, the good Senator Gerstein said:

Every one of you knows why you are here. I would ask if you might indulge me and let me tell you why I am here....

Well, I want to tell you that I do not admit to being a bagman; I proclaim it.

He does not want to admit that he has been a bagman for the Conservatives, a fundraiser, and a good fundraiser apparently; he proclaims it. He says that is why he is there, because he helped the government of the day raise money. That is why, not because of his ability to look over legislation or to think about the affairs of state, about where our country needs to go. It is because he can shake money out of the pockets of Conservative supporters better than the next guy. The Prime Minister seems to like that a lot, so he has given him this gravy train of a job. He is accountable to nobody. He gets paid $140,000 a year for doing virtually nothing if he so pleases, showing up less than 50 days to work.

Most Canadians would find this offensive, and do.

The reason we support and ridicule this particular piece of legislation is because it is tinkering around the edges of the fundamental problem, tinkering with the idea that we can somehow write on to an unaccountable place some level of accountability. We know it cannot be done this way. We are certain that when witnesses come forward and say the Constitution dictates this and dictates that, the tinkering around this $90-million slush fund that happens down the hallway is not going to enable any sort of democratic enhancement of the country.

Here is a sober second thought. There is no sobriety test when senators go into that place. There was no sobriety test last night when they took a piece of legislation that was voted on democratically here and they decided, without any debate, without any discussion at all, without any questions about a piece of legislation passed democratically, that they were just going to simply kill it.

Some of my hon. colleagues may say, “Well, so what? That is just one bill and maybe some of the Conservatives did not particularly like the bill”. To them I say, let us follow this through and talk about the future where an unelected, appointed body is able to override the democratic will of the chamber. We all come here with the bond between ourselves and our constituents that we seek through elections. We, parties and individuals, seek a mandate to do things that we hope will improve the lives of ordinary Canadians.

There is the idea that when we grind away on a piece of legislation, make changes, have studies and send that across, these folks are not going to tinker with it or smudge out a few lines; they will just kill it, and there is no recourse to that. The government says that, if it did not get its way in the elected place, it will get its way in the unelected place, and that is fine.

I ask the Conservative members to walk through what the future looks like if one of the fundamental constitutional traditions of parliamentary democracy in Canada begins to unravel, and appointed people with no accountability, no constituencies, no one to report back to, to hold them to a higher regard, are simply able to undermine laws and are simply able to veto the will of this place. What value are we getting for $90 million?

I wish it was only an irritant. I wish, for the $90 million we pour in there, that it was just a hassle once in a while. However that is not what we get. In fact, we have created a system and have allowed the system to go on existing in which we fund the erosion of our democratic principles. How utterly obscene is it that Canadians say they are paying people to go to work and undercut the work of elected members?

This allows direct control for the prime minister of the day. We know this. There is an interesting quote from a Conservative spin doctor that came out just after the Prime Minister broke the record on appointments. Canada is a relatively young country, but of many years and many prime ministers and circumstances, this Prime Minister broke the record in appointing 27 senators in one year.

A Conservative spin doctor said that we need Conservatives in the Senate who are loyal to the party, to the cause and to the Prime Minister. Notice in that list of loyalties that country was not mentioned. That is in fact what these folks are there for. That is why they got there, as Senator Gerstein has so eloquently pointed out. He says he is a bagman and proud of it, and that is how he got there. He was not just talking about himself; there are others, of course, who are there for their fundraising abilities not for their intellectual capacities or their devotion to this country.

I think we as Canadians are quite a forgiving people. We allow our politicians to make mistakes from time to time. There can be redemption. We can do something that we later regret and then correct the error.

What Canadians do not tolerate is outright hypocrisy. I will read a couple more important quotes into the record, because they are important. They are not that old, which I think is also significant.

From January 15, 2004:

Despite the fine work of many individual senators, the upper house remains a dumping ground for the favoured cronies of the Prime Minister.

Who said that? The current Prime Minister. We can only take him at his word, that in breaking the record of dumping-ground cronies he is ensuring that the system continues.

Here is another quote from a little later on, 2006:

A Conservative government will not appoint to the Senate anyone who does not have a mandate from the people.

It was “we will not”. It was not “we may not” or “we will consider”. That is as broken a promise as there can be. I think the thing that frustrates people who voted Conservative in the previous elections is that they believed these quotes, because they were so clear. They were not nuanced or subtle.

I know my Conservative colleagues sitting in the House today said similar things when the topic came up for them when they were in elections, when they were at all-candidates debates and the issue of the Senate came up. They had seen the Liberal Senate up close. They remembered the Mulroney years of stacking the Senate year after year, and they thought it was an abuse of power. I believed them. I think their constituents believed them. Certainly people who voted for them believed them, but how can they believe them now? How can they believe them now after this many years in power, having broken the record of cronyism?

Here is a last quote, which is a little older. It is from Hansard:

They are ashamed the Prime Minister continues the disgraceful, undemocratic appointment of undemocratic Liberals to the undemocratic Senate to pass all too often undemocratic legislation.

That was said by the current Prime Minister on March 7, 1996.

An appointed Senate is a relic of the 19th century. Why would the government come forward with a bill that seems to put a fresh coat of paint on an old relic and say this is brand new, this is something special?

New Democrats, because it is in our name, believe that democracy is something so fundamental that we have to fight each and every day for its survival and renewal, because democracy is not something we are entitled to. It was fought over. It was bled over for generations. Its maintenance requires us to sustain it.

There was a most egregious example just last night as we were all shocked to hear that the Senate called a snap vote. I am surprised the senators even bothered to vote. The vote was on a bill named, ironically enough, the climate change accountability act. What does the bill propose to do? The bill says we must set targets for our greenhouse gas emissions to reduce those emissions over the years and that the government must report on its plans and then report back on how those plans worked out. How offensive is that? The government would be accountable. Whether it was Liberal governments or the present Conservative government, there has been no accountability when it comes to climate change.

I can remember my Conservative colleagues railing about this when they were in opposition. They asked: Where is the accountability? Promises were made and promises were broken. This is what the act enshrined into law. It is the only climate change legislation in this place. It was, until the Senate called a vote last night and killed the entire bill.

One must think that the senators must have studied it. They had 191 days with it. They must have studied it. They must have found some fatal flaw, in their debate and discussions and hearing of expert testimony. But there was no testimony. There was no debate. There was no discussion. The senators just simply killed the bill outright with no reason given. A bunch of Liberals stayed away. A bunch of Conservatives voted to kill it, undemocratically. The Conservatives feel fine with this. It undermines all of our work. It undermines our principle of being here. It undermines the last election, the one before that and the next one. The Senate needs to be abolished.

Some will say this cannot be done, yet we know there are no senates at any of the provincial and territorial levels. But there were. In fact there were many. In 1892 New Brunswick said no more senate. Nova Scotia said it in 1928 and Quebec in 1968, in recent living memory. These provinces decided that the so-called sober second thought place was not worth the money or the time. They realized that they could actually be sober and have thoughts. They could do this. They do it all the time.

P.E.I. in 1893 and Manitoba in 1876 said no more senate. They tried senates. They had them. They were constituted. I am sure they thought they were valuable. Those with a vested interest in sitting in those senates thought they were valuable.

Is democracy any less in any of our provinces and territories? Do we concern ourselves in Ontario, P.E.I. or Quebec that democracy is somehow not being done, that sober second thought is missing and bills are going through that ought not to? Of course not.

The next question for Canadians is: If senators can do this with environmental climate change legislation, what else will they do it with? What is the next bill that the Prime Minister happens not to like but cannot win a vote here in the elected place and simply says never mind the election, because he will have the legislation killed down the hallway by his cronies, as he calls them?

The Senate seems to be the place for him to dump his cronies, his bagmen, spin doctors, past presidents of the party and failed candidates. The list is quite specific. One has to have some deep and profound and loyal connection not to country, God nor Queen, but to the Conservative Party. That is the qualification that is needed.

The government is tinkering around the edges and saying it will put limits on Senate terms. It seems to feel that if it puts an 8-year limit, the bagmen, spin doctors, past presidents and failed candidates will only get in for 8 years of patronage as opposed to the 20, 30 or 40 years of patronage. Any patronage is bad.

I remember Conservative-Reform-Alliance members all talking about the patronage gravy train that was the Liberal Party of Canada. The formation of the Reform Party was in response to the Progressive Conservative Brian Mulroney patronage. As he was leaving office, Mulroney could not sign those patronage appointments fast enough. The Reform Party was born. It had had enough. The west wanted in. It wanted some kind of accountability.

The first bill in 70 years that the Senate killed was a bill called the climate change accountability act. These are mere words now. The promises that the Prime Minister can make in the next election mean so much less.

The concern, the sadness that I have over this entire issue, is that it erodes what little faith remains in the Canadian public over what this place is meant to do. Why do they bother to vote? We all lament the low voter turnout. We all lament that young people are not getting involved enough. How can we expect any different if we allow this fundamentally hypocritical action of a government to go untested and unchallenged?

For the people who formed the Conservative Party to say that breaking the all-time record of patronage appointments is a good thing for this Prime Minister to do, spinning in their graves does not quite account for it. The Liberals lament because they could not do it first, that they were not at the trough first. That is the Liberal complaint about this whole process. The people on the list to whom the Liberals promised the Senate now have to wait supposedly until they form office, whenever that tragic day will come again.

Senators have to be loyal to the party, to the cause and to the Prime Minister, those three things.

The conflicts of interest that reign supreme in the Senate are also quite staggering. A senator can maintain his or her position on a private corporation board while also being in the Senate. I see no accountability change within this bill for that. Senators can have private interest in a bill that comes before them and not remove themselves from the discussion or from the vote. They can simply vote on it and improve their own lot in life. That is fine. As far as this government is concerned, that is okay too.

This is what we mean by putting a fresh coat of paint on an old broken-down car. It is still broken down. To put a splash of paint on it, say it is new, that the grievances have been fixed, is one thing, but to allow the inherent conflicts of interest to exist within the body and not change those, it seems to me, and to everybody else, is mere tokenism.

Again, Canadians can suffer much and have been asked to suffer much from their elected governments, with the switches, flip-flops and changes of mind. The current government will not allow a free and fair debate on extending a dangerous mission in Afghanistan for another three years. Canadians have been asked to suffer a lot.

When a party campaigns explicitly on accountability, transparency and reform of the place, and then comes in and does this, and says “trust us for another mandate”, then Canadians can be forgiven for doubting. They will doubt and they must doubt because the evidence is before us.

Many of us believe in climate change, although I am sure there are some Conservative members who still think it is a socialist conspiracy, as the Prime Minister used to call it. However, there are those who believe that climate change is a real issue and needs to be addressed, and I think some of my colleagues within the Conservatives do.

When we take an issue like this and simply shred the only bill and offer nothing else, then Canada is going to show up at the next UN meeting in Mexico in a couple of weeks with nothing again. Right now we are spending on green energy at a rate of $1 to $22 versus the Americans. The Americans spend $22 per capita and we spend $1.

Green energy and technology companies are coming to us saying that we must have certainty when it comes to the pricing of carbon and that we must do something about cap and trade. The government's response is just, “Well, wait for Washington”. Imagine the abrogation of sovereignty at such a fundamental level as our environment and economy.

Finally, I wish to move the following amendment:

That the motion be amended by striking out all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

“the House declines to give second reading to Bill C-10, An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 (Senate term limits) because the term limits do not go far enough in addressing the problems with the Senate of Canada, and do not lead quickly enough to the abolition of the upper chamber, as recent events have shown to be necessary.”

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

The amendment is in order.

[Steven Fletcher, Conservative, Minister of State (Democratic Reform)]

Mr. Speaker, what we are proposing as a government is something that is within the purview of this chamber.

I am concerned that the amendment that was just proposed would go beyond what would normally be expected of this chamber.

Having said that, I would also like to reflect on some of the comments that were suggested before. The Prime Minister has said that he will appoint whomever the people of a said province would elect. He is willing to give up that power to ensure that people of the province are represented in the Senate through elections. In this way, we are moving the yardsticks forward.

The member talked a great deal about how the Senate has benefited one party, particularly the Liberal Party, in the past. I wonder if the member could speak to how the Senate as an unelected body has benefited the Liberal Party. What other methods, outside of abolishment, which is simply too difficult, does the member suggest that we adopt for Senate reform? We have the elections going with Bill S-8, and we have term limits.

This is a democracy, and I am open to hearing the member's suggestions.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the minister said that it is going beyond what is expected of us. I think we need to go much further beyond what is expected of us and challenge the very notion that the existence of this place is a good thing.

It is to be noted, and the minister can correct me later, that by doing it this way the Prime Minister remains under no legal obligation. The reason I point this out is this: let us say a province holds an election for a Senate seat that is apparently valid. As we can see in the provinces that have tried this so far, to call them elections is a bit of stretch, and the minister knows it.

However, the Prime Minister is not legally obligated to do any of these things. The reason I raise this is that the Prime Minister has chosen to break promises before.

The last election we had was not meant to be. He made a promise in law, which he broke. He said we would have fixed election dates, which we supported. The New Democrats supported this initiative. As soon as the Prime Minister saw the ink drying on that law, he broke it.

It is not good enough to say we have this new bill and we will make appointments only after an election. The credibility of the Prime Minister, after having just broken the record by appointing 27 of his cronies and pals, does not carry water.

How has it benefited the Liberals to have this situation for so many decades? It has benefited them a lot and now it is benefiting the Conservatives. That is the problem. Crony after crony is sitting there. To whom are they loyal? Not to this place, not to this country, but to the party. That is what is wrong. That is why it needs to be abolished.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, we in this party are at a point with the Senate that we cannot envision how we can continue with a body that can pull off an action like it did today

If the House accepts this action that occurred within the Senate, then we are accepting that the powers of duly elected members of Parliament are diminished enormously.

How can we move forward from this point? Is that not the reason why we must have an amendment to the bill at this time, to challenge the affront to our democracy that occurred last night?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the idea that an unelected place can simply undo what an elected body has chosen to do should be an offence to all of us. I remind my Conservative colleagues that, while they may think they have won on this issue and got a bill killed that they did not like, the other shoe drops in politics. What works for us on one day, if it is fundamentally flawed, may not work on another day. That should cause deep concern, because we are all diminished by this.

This is not simply about one bill or one party's ambitions or one idea. This is about the fundamental idea under which we operate. If there is anything we can agree on, it should be that. We come here with the powers we have, as legislators, because people voted for us. That is where we draw our power from, not from the party, not from the prime minister, not from the leaders of the parties, but from the people who sent us here. That is our authority to guide and craft laws, to spend taxpayer money.

That is not the case in the Senate. It is the opposite. Their loyalties, as was quoted, come directly from one source: the prime minister who appointed them. We are all diminished by this.

Today the Conservatives might celebrate because there is still no action on climate change. This is a shame in and of itself, but the other shoe drops. That is the nature and work of politics. We must all be concerned by this, and this House must respond.

The Conservatives initiated and orchestrated this. They more than tolerated it. They enabled it, and they must stop.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my question was more to the Liberal member for Random—Burin—St. George's. During her presentation, she made some suggestions and allegations that the provinces had not yet been consulted in the process.

I wanted to remind her that the Manitoba government passed legislation on June 13, 2006, over four years ago. The legislation came about as the result of an all-party committee, which is a tradition in Manitoba, and there was Liberal representation on that committee. In fact, the Liberal member is their candidate in the Winnipeg North by-election.

I guess he is not informing his leader. When his leader has been out there for the last four visits, I guess he has not told him what has happened in Manitoba. This committee met and had a number of meetings. It had representation and 51 presentations. It had 32 written submissions, including one from Senator Terry Stratton himself. It even had a sitting senator give a written presentation. What this committee did was come up with a number of recommendations.

By the way, on the term limits, it tended to agree with what the government wants to do. But in respect of its recommendations, supported by Liberal, Conservative, and NDP members, they decided that they would have first past the post elections, that they would have three seats in Winnipeg, two seats in southern Manitoba, and one in the north. That is how they proceeded with this all-party committee.

Where does the member get off saying that the provinces have not been consulted in the process? That is totally untrue.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals do not like to hear consultation that disagrees with what they want. The consultation that has come back, if we ask their constituents, is that an unelected, appointed Senate is a good thing and it serves democracy.

One of the Liberals making a speech earlier today said that the Senate enables and encourages democracy. I do not know how one could write those words down in a speech and then say them out loud and keep a straight face. It is offensive to suggest that a place filled with bagmen and cronies, as the current Prime Minister and others have said, enables and encourages the democratic spirit.

Try to imagine this taking place in Washington. Imagine a room in Washington filled with people who were appointed by the President and who could strike down legislation. Can we imagine the Americans, the Germans, or the French going for something like that? They have done away with these things. Modern democracies face this challenge, be they constitutional or otherwise, and they know when enough is enough.

This is from an old age. The Prime Minister was right when he said that this is a relic. It is a relic. It cannot be fixed this way. It must be done away with, and the reason members oppose this notion of abolishment is that they hope they might be next in line. That is why. Vested interests? Give me a break. Enough is enough. That is $90 million down the toilet every year, funding a Senate that does nothing for accountability, transparency, or the benefit of this country.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, Copyright; the hon. member for Laurentides—Labelle, Mont Tremblant International Airport.

At this point, we have passed the five-hour mark, which means speeches will now be 10 minutes instead of 20. Resuming debate, we have the hon. member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to have the opportunity to debate this bill today, this bill that addresses a certain type of reform of the Senate, the second chamber of Parliament.

I have always thought that the Senate should be reformed. The Senate has served a useful purpose over time since Confederation. There are ways that it should be reformed, and I still believe that it needs to be reformed. But I do not think this bill would solve that or would affect it in a significant way. We need sensible reform of the Senate. I have always felt that way, and I continue to do so now.

As an elected member of Parliament, one thing that surprised me a little was just how important I found the work of the Senate to be. I do not have to go through chapter and verse on that. People in the chamber know the work that was done by Senator Mike Kirby on health, as well as his significant work on mental health in his report titled, “Out of the Shadows at Last” , which led to the Mental Health Commission and his appointment there.

There has been some significant work done by senators individually and collectively. In some ways, the Senate has traditionally taken a bit of the bite out of the partisanship of the House of Commons. It has become more partisan in recent days and months, but that work was important. More recently, we have seen some fabulous work done by a Senate committee on poverty co-chaired by Liberal and Conservative senators, Senators Art Eggleton and Hugh Segal. It shows the kind of quality, bipartisan work that can exist in the Senate.

Today I am delighted that in the chamber the chair of the human resources standing committee tabled a report by the committee on poverty and developing an anti-poverty plan for Canada. Some of the recommendations will be similar to those in the Senate report, but some are not. Both studies are well worth looking at. Some significant work has been done in the Senate that I think has added to public discourse and led to better policy in this country, such as the work by Senator Segal, Senator Eggleton, and Senator Kirby.

I come from a province that has a rich tradition of senators providing valuable input. A good friend of mine, Senator Cowan, is the leader of the opposition in the Senate. Senators Mercer and Moore do fabulous work on many issues, one of which is post-secondary education. My co-parliamentarian from Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, Senator Jane Cordy, and one of my all-time favourites, Senator Al Graham, who retired some six years ago, have done a tremendous amount of work on behalf of Canadians as well as all citizens of the world. It shows that significant work is done in the Senate, and Canadians can be proud of that.

I think we need to take a serious look at Senate reform. Clearly, when the Senate was devised, it was in large part meant to balance regional input in Canada. In 1867, we had the provinces of Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. There were 24 senators from Quebec, 24 from Ontario, and 24 divided equally between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. As other provinces came into Confederation, senators were added. The most recent was the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, which entered in 1949 with six senators. The tradition of the Senate there has been very strong as well.

It is not just Liberal senators. We have Senators Oliver and Comeau from Nova Scotia, and this strong tradition has existed across Canada. We have had some good senators and some bad ones. We have had some good members of Parliament in the House of Commons, and we have had some bad ones as well.

When we look at Senate reform, we need to look at it sensibly. The government of the day has turned the Senate into a bad guy on everything, and it has done this in a way that is very disingenuous.

I want to quote the leader of the opposition in the Senate, Senator Cowan, when he spoke about the idea of Senate reform being introduced by the Conservative government. I am going to quote directly from his speech in the Senate. He stated, “I begin by stating the obvious—that real democratic reform cannot be imposed, not even by a prime minister. The result of a unilateral action can never be enhanced democracy. A healthy democracy requires a leader to listen to the views of others and, in some circumstances, to accept those views even if the leader disagrees with them”.

He goes on to state:

A constitution, by its nature, is the antithesis of unilateral action. Constitutions are the product of discussion and compromise. The Canadian Constitution contains a detailed amending formula meticulously negotiated over many years. [...] The government refuses to discuss the proposals with the provinces. It insists, notwithstanding the views of numerous experts, that the Parliament of Canada possesses the authority to pass the proposed constitutional amendments on its own.

People come here with their own points of view. We have heard some very strong positions from members of the New Democratic Party who believe that there is no place at all for the Senate. I do not believe that. We have heard from others who believe that perhaps there should not be any change at all to the formulation of the Senate. I do not believe that either. I think we need to look at this sensibly and reasonably.

A colleague from Manitoba speaks about some discussions that happened in Manitoba, but other provinces have very clearly stated that they do not intend to just go along willy-nilly with a change in the Constitution. That is a very important thing that affects their interests and their region and they do not want to see it imposed upon them by the Prime Minister.

What we have often heard from the Prime Minister and the government was that the Senate was holding things up. In fact, while the House was prorogued earlier this year, the Minister of Justice suggested that the Senate was holding up the crime bills.

There is a very good letter, which I commend to everybody's attention, from Senator Cowan to the Minister of Justice dated February 4. The letter reads:

Your Government introduced 19 justice-related bills in the House of Commons. Of these, 14 were still in the House of Commons at prorogation. Of the five justice bills that passed the House of Commons and came to the Senate:

two passed the Senate without amendment;

one (the so-called Serious Time for the Most Serious Crime bill) was tabled by your Government in November in the Senate but not brought forward for further action after that;

one was passed with four amendments and returned to the House of Commons which did not deal with it before Parliament was prorogued; and

one was being studied in committee when Parliament was prorogued and all committee work shut down.

There were a further two justice bills that your Government chose to initiate in the Senate. One was passed by the Senate after 14 days, sent to the House of Commons, passed and given Royal Assent. The other was tabled in the Senate on April 1, but has not been brought forward by your Government for any further action since then.

Very clearly, the Senate has been set up incorrectly as the entity that has been slowing down the government agenda. We all know that what slowed down the government agenda was its proclivity to prorogue Parliament, not just twice in the last couple of years but in fact three times if we go back to 2007. Therefore, It is not fair to say that the Senate has held up the agenda of the government.

What we saw last night was a bill that had been passed by the House of Commons in Parliament and sent to the Senate. For the first time in the history of our country, the first time since Confederation, a bill that was passed by the House of Commons was killed by the Senate without even going to committee.

I believe what we have is an abuse of the democratic process, consistent with a government that has chosen to prorogue Parliament, that has chosen to ignore the will of Parliament on a number of occasions and that is now using the Senate as the set-up bad guy when the government has to take responsibility for not being able to get its own agenda through.

That is just simply how it is. We do have a bicameral legislative body. We have had a system in Canada over many generations, going back to Confederation, that has two bodies. It has the House of Commons where members are elected. The Senate has members who are appointed. Should the senators be elected and how long should their terms be, are things that are open to debate.

What is not open to debate, though, is that the government has set up the Senate in an incorrect way, politicizing the Senate, beyond what it ever has been before, to suggest that the Senate is slowing down the will of Parliament. On top of all of that, last night we clearly had the Conservative-dominated Senate killing the will of Parliament on a piece of legislation for the first time in our history.

I say that we need to reform the Senate. We need to look at it seriously but we must not forget the good work that can be done by the Senate. We need to en sure that we enhance democracy as we go through this process and not further damage it.