Debates of June 17th, 2010

Paul Szabo Mississauga South, ON

Mr. Speaker, for my constituents, accountability is the principle issue.

There is this view that the government has used the prorogation instrument to duck accountability. As a further example, in my own committee, the ethics committee, we have a situation where people have been summoned to appear before the committee by actual summonses because they refused to appear on invitation. The government has put forward in a ministerial statement that ministers are accountable and should be answerable and therefore they will appear at committees in place of those people.

When the law clerk appeared before our committee yesterday, he made it very clear that is correct on matters of policy, and sometimes on matters of administration. However, when it comes to accountability of persons and the government and to ducking accountability, when some person other than a minister is involved in an allegation of wrongdoing of the laws, that is the person whom the committee has to see. That person would be the only one who would know the facts and the only one who would be able to help the committee do its work.

Scott Reid Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON

Mr. Speaker, I had the honour of sitting as a member of the ethics committee under the member's chairmanship in the summer of 2008 when the committee had special hearings into the in-and-out scandal, a scandal of profound proportions, one that was going to destroy Canadian democracy because the Conservative Party had illegally spent over its limit.

Those members wanted to bring forward witnesses. Witnesses were abused. The chairman refused to allow any witness to come forward from the Conservative side, anybody suggested by the Conservatives, but allowed every single witness on the Liberal list. As far as I could see, he certainly stretched the rules to the breaking point.

Then, as it turns out in court, a real court, not the kangaroo court the member was conducting, the Conservative Party was not only cleared, but in fact costs were awarded to it from the Elections Canada side that was involved in the litigation against the Conservative Party.

The point I want to make in responding to the member is that I sat in on those meetings. If anybody wants to find out what I think of that chairman's role in chairing that committee, it is a matter of public record and is in the committee Hansard.

Colin Carrie Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member not only for his excellent speech but for how he has been answering the questions. He has been very clear. His knowledge is always something that adds to these debates. I want to take this opportunity to thank him.

Are there any situations in the past, historically perhaps, with the Liberal Party where prorogation was used that he might want to bring forward and explain its relevance to the House?

Scott Reid Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON

Mr. Speaker, I think the references being made here are to a couple of prorogations by former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien. I cannot remember the exact dates, but he certainly prorogued Parliament in order to achieve other policy goals.

The fact is that prorogation in this country has evolved in a somewhat different direction from the way it has evolved in some other Commonwealth countries. That does not make our use of the system any better or worse. It is very healthy to have a discussion thereon to determine what the conventions ought to be here as opposed to elsewhere.

I will make the obvious point about prorogation in the context of minority governments. If we are talking about prorogation, for example, in the context of an ethics committee that wants to continue operating during the summer months, where the goal is to drag in government members or supporters to humiliate and embarrass them and ask them atrocious questions and deny them of all normal procedural restraints, this never occurs in a majority government. It was never faced by any of the previous majority governments under Prime Minister Chrétien, Prime Minister Trudeau, and others, because they were effectively elected dictators and they controlled the committees.

We should keep the perspective here that the abuse of power that has existed in the past with the Liberals, and I am willing to concede with the Conservatives as well, has taken place normally in the context of majority governments. In this case, the tyranny of the majority is being exercised by opposition committees, led in some cases by members who are present in the House at this very moment.

Michael Savage Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to this issue.

Prorogation became a bit of a household word in Canada this year. It was not a term that was familiar to a great many Canadians, but this year it became familiar to them. They made a point of understanding what was going on.

My colleague, who just spoke, mentioned two prorogations in the last two years. In fact, we have had three in three years. However, the one in 2007 was what one might call a normal prorogation, where toward the end of the summer, the government decided that instead of coming back in September, we would come back in October. Oppositions do not like that, but they understand that this happens on occasion. However, this year and last year, there were two very controversial uses of this blunt instrument. Canadians were outraged. There was a positive side effect to this, which was that Canadians became engaged.

I am splitting my time, Mr. Speaker, with the member for York West.

Canadians became very outraged and that is a good thing. They became involved. We had rallies around the country. I can recall a very cold day in Halifax, being at a rally with other members of Parliament, labour unions and people who were interested. There was a huge crowd that came out to express their concerns. It generated a lot of interest and a lot of anger. This is an issue about democracy.

Canadians may not love their politicians. We know, in general, they do not, but they do expect them to go to work both at home and in Ottawa. We all know there is work to be done at home. There is no question about that, but we follow a schedule that demands that members of Parliament be in Ottawa. This is where the elected voice of Canadians have a chance to impact on public policy, on the comings and goings of the nation, and it is important.

We had heard from some people on the government's side that the prorogation was a normal course of events. We know it was not. I have already referenced Nelson Wiseman from the University of Toronto, who has said that no Canadian prime minister had abused this prorogation power to the extent that the current Prime Minister has. He quoted Senator Eugene Forsey, whom I quoted earlier, who had said:

—an unwanted and uncalled-for prorogation a usurpation of the rights of the House of Commons, a travesty of democracy and a subversion of the constitution.

Another great Canadian, whom I do not always agree with but I always read, is Jeffrey Simpson, and he wrote, on January 25:

A prime minister has his forums, of which Parliament is only one. He has cabinet, caucus, and a public platform each and every time he speaks, here and abroad. Parliament, however, is the platform of every point of view from those who have been elected, and the place where, however imperfectly, the government is held to account.

That makes a lot of sense.

There is no question of why Parliament was prorogued. It was a difficult time for the government. The issue of the Afghan detainees was to be studied in committees and the government wanted to shut it down. We know that.

Arthur Kent, who is the brother of a member of the Prime Minister's cabinet, was quoted as saying:

—there has been an unwritten fatwa maintained by the Prime Minister’s Office against discussion of any and all controversial aspects of the Afghan debacle...if [the Prime Minister] is uncomfortable with democracy, he should quit his job.

That is good advice and his brother ought to listen to him.

Tom Flanagan, a former campaign manager, said on TV, “Everybody knows that Parliament was prorogued in order to shut down the Afghan inquiry”.

The reason this was done this year was to shut down something that was uncomfortable for the government. The year before, it was to avoid a vote of non-confidence. Canadians have voiced their concerns about that.

Why does it really matter? It matters because it is about democracy. It is about a country like Canada, the traditions that make Canada great, that listens to opposition. I contend that the government not only does not want to listen to them, but does not want them to even speak, to even have a voice.

The Prime Minister has been compared on occasion to former president George Bush. I do not think that is accurate. He is more likely and favourably compared to Richard Nixon, where politics trumps everywhere and politics is all that matters. Richard Nixon had his famous enemies list. Dangerous people such as Paul Newman and Mickey Mouse were put on this enemies list and other people had their taxes audited and everything else. In Canada we have an enemies list too of the Prime Minister. I could name all the people who have been shut out by the government, but I only have 10, so I will mention a couple of them.

I want to talk about KAIROS, CCIC and CCL. KAIROS and CCIC are two great voices of international development that for many years have represented a Canadian view on international development, sometimes agreeing with governments, sometimes not.

KAIROS and the rebel organizations that are affiliated with it, like the Catholic Church and Presbyterian Church, were defunded in December, totally caught off guard for no reason whatsoever. CCIC and Gerry Barr, who was very highly regarded nationally as well as internationally, have been told they are also in peril.

The Canadian Council on Learning was set up in 2004 to be the voice of Canada when it came to evaluating how we were doing on educating our citizens, a five year program, easily renewable. The government and the Minister of Human Resources have even indicated in committee and in a letter to CCL that CCL is doing great work. The minister speaks often about the need for us to do an inventory of skills in Canada.

How are we doing on post-secondary education? How are we doing on early learning and child care? How are we doing on adult literacy and workplace training? These are very important issues. This was what CCL did. CCL did this with all of the provinces in Canada. CCL had the respect of all international partners. It had the respect of the universities, the community colleges, the students groups, the professors and the researchers in Canada. It was told its funding would not continue. It makes no sense whatsoever.

The government has said that it needs more information, yet it has shut down an organization that provides the very information it says it needs and has left nothing in its place. It said that it would get rid of CCL because it made two mistakes. It was originally funded by a Liberal government and it was doing good work, which is unacceptable to the government. It shut it down, but said that it needed the work CCL had done, but it needed a bit of time to get it going. Does that make any sense? I do not think so. It could not even continue the funding that it had.

Prime ministers leave legacies whether they want to or not. Pierre Trudeau brought us the Constitution Act of 1982. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms brought Canada to a very important place internationally. We are respected in this world and understood for the values we project abroad.

Brian Mulroney did work on apartheid in South Africa. He brought us free trade and the GST. Some may like it and some may not, but in many ways, it transformed the Canadian economy. Mr. Mulroney was a respected international leader.

Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin got the books of Canada in order after a generation or more of them being out of order. They brought Canadians together. They made commitments to Africa. The G20 exists today in large part because of Paul Martin, supported Jean Chrétien.

Those are legacies that people leave.

The current Prime Minister is working on his legacy. When we look back on the work of the government, we will say that the government took one of the world's great democracies and ripped it apart. It is dismantling our social infrastructure, shutting out dissent, shutting out voices and shutting down Parliament.

I think it was Winston Churchill who said, “Democracy is the worst form of government in the world, except for all the rest”. It is a messy process. When we encourage people to come in and when we listen to people, that is important and that is democracy. Governments in the past, whether it was Mr. Mulroney's or Mr. Chrétien's, had all kinds of non-governmental organizations and lots of civil society organizations who they did not agree with and who spoke out loud and clear against government policy.

We did not defund them or shut them down. Whether one agrees with a government or not, those voices need to be heard. Democracy is about those voices. This is part of the same continuum that allows the Prime Minister to shut down Parliament when it becomes inconvenient. In many ways, it is the Prime Minister's inconvenient truth that he does not like democracy. He loves power, but he hates government.

In order to have government and democracy, we need voices. We need voices outside Parliament and inside Parliament. When we shut down those voices, we shut down the ability of Canadians to have input into their government. In my view, what the government has done is wrong and it needs to be fixed.

Siobhan Coady St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL

Mr. Speaker, I thought it was interesting how my hon. colleague used former prime ministers and their legacies in his speech. He talked a lot about democracy. This morning in committee, a witness was before us, Mr. Jaffer, who chastised the government on that very same thing. He was a former caucus cheerer of the Conservative government. He, again, admonished the government for being undemocratic.

I thought it was very interesting that my colleague wove within his speech evidence of how undemocratic the government had been and the serious challenges to Canada that this had caused.

Could my hon. colleague elaborate a bit more on what he thinks the legacy of the Conservative government will be? Clearly, he thinks it will be proven to be the most undemocratic government in terms of prorogation and closing down debate on things. What else would he like to add to that?

Michael Savage Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from St. John's South—Mount Pearl mentioned Mr. Jaffer who was part of the government's legacy. I believe the biggest legacy will be how we have changed Canada in a way that Canadians do not want it to be changed and hopefully we will test that at the next election.

The member talked about Mr. Jaffer. Some of his former colleagues have said some interesting things. The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism was quoted as saying about prorogation, “As a minister, I often get more done when the House is not in session”. That tells us something about what listening is done when the government is here.

I like another quote from one of the government members who said, “If we are sitting, how do MPs get to...the Olympic games. It makes sense that we are not sitting”. If there is one thing every Canadian from coast to coast to coast can agree with, is the last thing we need at the Olympics is more politicians. We did not need to be prorogued so we could go to the Olympics or so the government could recalibrate. We needed to be prorogued so the government could shut down voices of dissent with which it disagreed.

David Sweet Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON

Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for my colleague from Dartmouth—Cole Harbour. Since he had all the quotes close at hand of other members, when he rises to answer my question, could he quote either himself or other members on how they vehemently objected in the House when the prime ministers he sat under repeatedly prorogued the House? Could he share some of those comments so we could see some continuity in their righteous indignation regarding this?

Michael Savage Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS

Mr. Speaker, I was not in the House or in the gallery when that may have happened. The government said that this was always happening under the former government. However, all the constitutional experts like Nelson Wiseman have said that no Canadian prime minister has abused the prorogation power to the extent the current Prime Minister has.

We already indicated there was a prorogation in 2007, before 2008 and 2009. We had three in three years. The first though was what might be called a normal prorogation. There are certain times when the House prorogues and everyone says that makes sense. The government may need to recalibrate because it has new ministers, or maybe there is a meeting the prime minister has to attend. Those are normal in the course of events.

What happened in the last two years were attempts to divert attention away from the government or to deliberately contravene democracy in the House. That is a very different use of prorogation than has been used in the past.

Brian Murphy Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB

Mr. Speaker, I want to render homage to the member's father who was a premier of Nova Scotia and who stood up to the public and listened to the people in some very hard times, but he never ignored them. The Prime Minister is the prime minister of prorogation, but he is also the Prime Minister of fake public events, which bar the public from getting access to be in front of their Prime Minister when announcements are made.

How fake is it for a prime minister to avoid the public? The member's father did not.

Michael Savage Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS

Mr. Speaker, that is one of the greatest questions I have heard in my short time in the House. I agree with him completely and I look forward to discussing it with him when the CFL plays its first ever regular season football game in Moncton in the fall.

He is entirely right and I commend him on the questions he asked yesterday about how the government was playing politics with announcements in New Brunswick.

Judy Sgro York West, ON

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join this debate and to follow my very esteemed colleague from Dartmouth who has proven himself so very well here in the House of Commons.

I thank the House for the opportunity to speak today in favour of the motion which would, if enacted, help to restore an element of democracy clearly missing here in the House.

I have had the privilege of sitting in the House now for more than a decade but the past four years have shown me just how fragile democracy really is, especially when placed in the hands of someone who has little regard for the will of the people or for alternative points of view.

Despite being elected on platform of openness and transparency, the Conservatives have proven themselves to be anything but open and transparent. They have also proven that they will shamelessly use every trick or tactic possible to press through their agenda, regardless of the consequences for the nation as a whole.

The government has fired independent officers of Parliament for simply disagreeing with its policies. It has dismissed Canada's nuclear safety watchdog for suggesting that there might be some safety issues that need to be addressed. It has manipulated G8 and G20 summit budgets for obvious partisan purposes to the tune of more than a billion dollars. The billion dollar boondoggle is what it will go down as in our history books.

Now we have learned from within the Conservative caucus that key ministers might be blocking certain public projects in the Maritimes because improving them might not serve their own narrow political interests. I say shame on that kind of action.

Those are but a few examples but they do not speak to the larger my way or the highway approach to public administration that has been clearly adopted by the Conservatives. It is my way or the highway until the walls start to close in, and then, whenever the heat becomes unbearable or whenever the opposition parties have been pushed to the brink or whenever the systemic safeguards begin to react, the Prime Minister scurries to Rideau Hall and demands prorogation.

Prorogation is a process that, when used in this manner, is tantamount to the schoolyard bully hiding behind the teacher's coattails, begging for an intervention after angry classmates have finally had enough.

While prorogation allows the Prime Minister to sidestep Parliament, the one group of people he cannot fire, the Canadian people, have been busy watching with an ever-deteriorating level of patience.

This was made very clear during the Prime Minister's most recent recalibration, as he called it, during the first few weeks of 2010. Canadians saw his actions for what they really were and they sent the Prime Minister a strong and undeniable signal: stop abusing the authority vested in the PMO and get to work.

Unlike how it is currently being used, prorogation is a parliamentary tool that has historically been used to clear the desks, refocus the government's agenda and even to respond to looming national issues that arise without prior warning.

The Prime Minister's most recent parliamentary shutdown lasted 63 days after a session of 128 days in length. Since 1964, prorogations have lasted 12 days on average and parliamentary sessions have averaged 187 days. I would submit that prorogation is a valid parliamentary mechanism that has served a purpose in the past but I would suggest that the current Prime Minister missed that day when he was learning through the orientation.

Because of these facts, I have no hesitation in saying that I support this motion and that from time to time governments of all stripes have needed to use prorogation for these legitimate purposes. However, since the current Prime Minister has sat upon his throne, prorogation has morphed into a mechanism of suppression, not only for members of Parliament but for all Canadians.

To find a precedent for such abuses of power, we have to reach all the way back to 1873 when John A. Macdonald tried to stop Parliament from probing his railway scandal. To me, it seems as though, whenever the current government finds itself in a tight spot, it pulls the plug on the people's House so as to avoid the oversight that can and should be provided by Parliament.

At first I wondered if the flagrant misuse of prorogation was the result of the total lack of understanding as to the traditions of Parliament, the practice and procedures normally used in a parliamentary system of government. However, as the obfuscation and democratic disregard continued to grow, it became apparent that the government knew quite well that it was violating the spirit of democracy that it had previously so vigorously promised to uphold.

It is for those very reasons that I am now in the category of people who believe that, due to the repeated abuse of prorogation by the Prime Minister, controls must be implemented if unfettered democracy is to again appear in this wonderful chamber of ours. The Liberal motion before the House today strives to do just that.

The motion would permit the Prime Minister to use prorogation subject to the House's oversight for the purpose for which it was intended but would impose real controls against abuse of power.

For example, the motion would impose “a requirement that the Prime Minister give Parliament written notice in advance of any request to prorogue, together with his/her reasons therefore”. Who could possibly object to that? It sounds like a normal practice that should happen. If all members felt Parliament should prorogue, then we would all vote in favour of it.

All that is being asked is that the Prime Minister not pull the rug out from under the House without a valid reason. Imagine what the real impact would be? Had Parliament not been closed down for two months at the beginning of 2010, we could have actually given thoughtful consideration to the pardons bill that the government has now demanded we pass immediately with no discussion and, if we do not pass it, we will be criticized for not doing so.

I understand that the parties have now reached a deal on this matter but that is only because the opposition parties were willing to collaborate on behalf of all Canadians. The deal certainly says nothing to the government's ability to plan ahead, as we have clearly seen in the boondoggle with the G8-G20 summit, and to proactively manage the nation's business or co-operate with other elected officials.

The Acting Speaker Barry Devolin

It being 2 o'clock, I need to interrupt the member. She will have three minutes remaining when the House returns to this matter.