Mike Lake

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, well, I will point out, just because this summarizes exactly what the situation has been today, that an hon. Liberal member just said, in his heckle to the group about his colleague from Kingston and the Islands, that he is doing a good job, that he is doing a good job because he is pissing all of us off. That is what he just said in his heckle across the way. This is the dynamic we have seen in the House for the last few days of debate.

The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands will forgive me if I do not take the time to read every single word that he says, every single point of order that he has raised over the last few days. I have got other things to do in serving my constituents.

I will point this out, in regard to the Prime Minister. The defence has been that the Prime Minister did not know. I think it is relevant to ask why the Prime Minister did not know. What kind of government is the Prime Minister leading, where a foreign diplomat can be running around the country for two years, and the public service all knows, but the Prime Minister and nobody in his government knows?

What kind of government is that Prime Minister leading?

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I am just curious if the Liberals are done chirping over there. Okay—

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, the hope is that tomorrow, when people have had some more time maybe on the government side to think about what we are debating today, we will see some Liberal speakers stand up and share their own thoughts and share what they are hearing from constituents on the specifics of the motion.

Again, I will remind the House that we had the motion today, and the Liberals voted against it. The Liberals voted against creating a foreign agent registry, establishing a national public inquiry, closing down the People's Republic of China-run police stations operating in Canada and expelling all of the People's Republic of China diplomats responsible. They voted against that today.

Now we are discussing something very specific to the member of Parliament for Wellington—Halton Hills: “That the prima facie contempt concerning the intimidation campaign orchestrated by Wei Zhao against the member for Wellington—Halton Hills and other members be referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.” I hope that when it comes to the debate on that issue tomorrow, we will get a chance to hear what Liberal members of Parliament think about this violation of parliamentary privilege.

I will remind Liberal members, all members of the House and Canadians that when we are talking about parliamentary privilege, when we are talking about the privileges of a member being contravened in the way we are talking about here, we are not just talking about a member of Parliament from one political party, or even members of Parliament from all political parties. When the privileges of members of Parliament are contravened in that way, we are talking about the roots of our democracy. We are talking about the ability of that particular member of Parliament to serve his constituents.

We can all, obviously, understand the importance of our constituents and our ability to serve democracy, serve our country, by coming here and debating important issues like this on behalf of our constituents. For doing that, the member for Wellington—Halton Hills was clearly threatened and intimidated and had his family threatened and intimidated. I would hope that all members of the House, regardless of party affiliation, can understand that, come to the House and debate that passionately, and hopefully vote in favour of ensuring that this gets a proper hearing at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I am pretty confident that none of the points of order were actually rules points of order—

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I am being heckled that if the end result is that the Liberals won three elections, I guess it is all good. The member's heckle was that they won three elections, so it does not matter.

One other common thread in the debate today has been the Liberals going back eight years. I know that the member for Winnipeg North takes issue with anybody rounding up to eight. He says they have only been destroying the country for seven years, but it is into the eighth year right now, and they seem continuously obsessed with Stephen Harper.

The Prime Minister, who was not prime minister at the time, in his answer to the question, “which nation's administration do you most admire”, went on to say, “I mean there is a flexibility that I know Stephen Harper must dream about, of having a dictatorship that he can do everything he wanted”. Even back then, Liberals were obsessed with Stephen Harper.

In referencing this, I wanted to make sure I got the quotes right, so I went back and watched the video of this and the video of a news story at the time. First of all, I wanted to make sure I had the words right, but, secondly, it gave me a bit of an idea of the tone of the day.

It was interesting to read the comments because the comments in this CBC article from 2013 could be comments that are made today as Canadians are watching the debate, as they are watching the actions of the government, as they are questioning the judgment of the Prime Minister. There were several Chinese Canadians who commented in this article in 2013 directly on the Prime Minister's use of words, who was not the prime minister at the time but the then leader of the Liberal Party, in his choice of China as the basic dictatorship that he admires the most. One commented, “Can I use the word 'foolish'?” I think there are a lot of people that this would resonate with today.

There was another comment, which we could hear in every riding in the country: “A Chinese Canadian would say every one of us is the victim of the Chinese dictatorship.” That was said in response to that conversation from 2013. A quote from a man identified as having been imprisoned and tortured was: “My case was only the tip of the iceberg.” These are not new issues. These are issues that go back a long time. These are issues that most of us would be aware of, although it is fair to say that we are more aware of them today. Then there is a final comment I wrote down by someone based on that interview. This could probably apply to all of us in this place. Maybe not all of us, but most of us in this place. The quote is, “It seems to be that he's not well-informed.”

That was the summary of the comments back in 2013 after the Prime Minister made the comment that the nation's administration he most admired was China because its basic dictatorship is allowing it to actually turn its economy around on a dime.

That is the context we come here today with. We are debating late into the night tonight. I believe the House is going to pick this up tomorrow and members of Parliament will have the opportunity to debate the issue tomorrow. I hope that as members debate, they will be able to express their opinions, their thoughts, the thoughts of their constituents and contemplate where we ought to go from here without having a constant parade of Liberals standing up on bogus points of order, as we have seen today. I hope we will be able to move forward and have that conversation.

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot reference who is in the chamber and who is not in the chamber. All I know is that as I am speaking tonight I am getting a lot of echoing coming back from the other side.

I will say this. The approach on Thursday was to sow chaos, and not just Thursday, by the way. We have seen this in question period from ministers who were answering as well. The approach on Thursday was to blame the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. There is no question.

The approach today seems to be to throw accusations of politicization. That seems to be the theme of the day. After the approach on Thursday of sowing chaos and blaming the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, the approach today, as we heard the member for Winnipeg North reference multiple times today, was to use the phrase “throwing stones at glass houses”. He over and over again used that phrase of “throwing stones at glass houses”. At one point he actually, when asked about it, attributed the phrase to the legislature in Manitoba. He said that phrase originated in the legislature in Manitoba. That is the approach that was taken there and then we got into a debate. These are almost all of the times that Liberal members have stood up to take part in the debate today. That was the entirety of their argument, to then talk about unparliamentary language.

As we have been having conversation, I think it is fair to say that members, not only in this party but maybe in other parties in the House, have a luck of trust in the Prime Minister and in the government. That is fair to say, right? We can say that. I mean this is something that we hear from our constituents. This is something that more and more Canadians are talking about, a lack of trust in what is said, a lack of trust in the competence of the government to lead during tumultuous times like this. I think that is fair to say.

We have talked about chaos, politicization and trust. There are the accusations thrown out by the government. There are questions about loyalty. Answers are not given to legitimate questions from all parties in the House about what is happening. We asked about holding a public inquiry so that Canadians can get to the bottom of what is actually happening in our democracy with some very important questions.

Ministers during question period stand up and ask how any opposition party could possibly question the loyalty of the Prime Minister. Let me be very clear. No one is questioning the loyalty of the Prime Minister. There are significant questions, very relevant questions about the judgment of the Prime Minister, the competence of the Prime Minister. I think there are very relevant questions about the competence of the entire leadership organization of the party in power right now, based on what we have seen in the last two days of debate on this really important issue.

It is not political to reference facts. It is not political when we take a look at judgment. It is not political in the context of the conversation to quote the Prime Minister himself, so I will do that. A lot of reference has been made, over the course of the debate in the House of Commons, to the 2013 interview that the Prime Minister did. It was an event that he was speaking at. The question he was actually asked at the event was which nation's administration did he most admire. Remember, this is at a time when President Obama was leading the U.S., so the answer to that question could have been “Well, of course, it's the U.S. I have a lot of admiration for President Obama” and then he could have explained why.

In answer to the question, without hesitation, he answered, “there’s a level of admiration I actually have for China because their basic dictatorship is allowing them to actually turn their economy around on a dime.”

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, he is still heckling me right now.

Anyone can watch the tape now. We have another member coming in.

I cannot reference that. I withdraw—

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, he is asking me to say the two words. The words he apologized for saying were said when he referred to the member for Wellington—Halton Hills as being “supposedly affected”. He apologized for those words. I was not going to read those words, but he is heckling me, asking me to read them.

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, multiple times, probably a dozen times now, Speakers have ruled that the member's point is not a point of order. I have the two words he did say and withdrew. I have them. I was not referring to those, the ones he apologized for. I think he apologized twice on the day, but—

[Privilege, May 8th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to take part in this debate tonight. I will start, as I did on Thursday, with an expression of solidarity with and admiration for our colleague in the House. I say “our colleague” and not “our Conservative colleague”. Our colleague is a member of Parliament, the member of Parliament for Wellington—Halton Hills, who has done great work representing his constituents and standing up for our country in the House for almost 20 years, so it is important to start there.

Right now, and it might be lost on folks tuning in and wondering what we are talking about at this late hour, we are debating a motion that states, “That the prima facie contempt concerning the intimidation campaign orchestrated by Wei Zhao against the Member for Wellington—Halton Hills and other Members be referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.” The Speaker ruled today, in his ruling on parliamentary privilege, that there was a contempt of Parliament.

Now we are debating whether the House committee that studies these things would take this up. That is what we are debating today. I find it really interesting that almost no Liberals have actually spoken in the debate today, and when they have spoken, we have not known what their position is. No one has signalled what their individual position is or what the party position is. For the most part, when Liberals have gotten up and spoken, it has been to sow chaos, quite frankly, to raise random points of order and to weigh in in that way, not to contribute to the conversation in any way or to stand up for the privileges of a member, and therefore for the privileges of all members of the House of Commons.

Today, as has been referenced several times in the House, we voted on a Conservative motion that we debated last Thursday. Interestingly, in a rare show of agreement, Conservative, Bloc, NDP and Green members voted together on what seemed like a very straightforward motion; it was very much common sense if people have been following what is going on. There is some preamble that lays out the situation. It is not overly political, and there are four main points.

The motion is calling on the government to “(a) create a foreign agent registry similar to Australia and the United States of America”. That seems pretty reasonable right now. It continues with “(b) establish a national public inquiry on the matter of foreign election interference”. We have been talking about foreign election interference for some time, for months now, in the House. Next, it states, “(c) close down the People's Republic of China run police stations operating in Canada”. For most Canadians, hearing me say that will be alarming, because they would wonder how in the world any government would allow that to happen. The motion ends with “d) expel all of the People's Republic of China diplomats responsible for and involved in these affronts to Canadian democracy”. That is something that most Canadians would think would be common sense, and most Canadians, again, would be surprised to understand that the first such diplomat was expelled only today. That is what has led us to this point in the House.

Thursday was interesting, because, as I mentioned, it would be surprising to most people that those were the four points that we passionately debated in the House. The government, like all members, was given notice that there was going to be a debate, so parties and individual members could get prepared for that debate and understand what their individual and party positions might be. I certainly came to the House expecting to have a passionate debate about something really important, but I expected that all members would rally together to understand the gravity of what we were talking about. Then we got to the House, and it was very clear that most of the members from most of the parties of the House came expecting to have that reasonable debate in the interest of Canadians, understanding the gravity of the situation. However, Liberal members came to the House with what seemed to be a coordinated strategy. There is no other explanation, because it seemed like a deliberate strategy to just cause chaos in the House.

The Liberals have two parliamentary secretaries to the House leader. They are both very well known to members of the House, and both of them undertook a strategy, and it was a very clear strategy, to actually call into question the credibility of the member for Wellington—Halton Hills.