Bill C-38 (Historical)

Civil Marriage Act

An Act respecting certain aspects of legal capacity for marriage for civil purposes

This enactment extends the legal capacity for marriage for civil purposes to same-sex couples in order to reflect values of tolerance, respect and equality, consistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts to ensure equal access for same-sex couples to the civil effects of marriage and divorce.

Civil Marriage Act

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

moved:

Motion No. 8

That Bill C-38 be amended by deleting Clause 7.

Motion No. 10

That Bill C-38 be amended by deleting Clause 15.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 1

That Bill C-38 be amended by deleting Clause 1.

Motion No. 2

That Bill C-38 be amended by deleting Clause 2.

[The Speaker]

There are 11 motions in amendment standing on the notice paper for the report stage of Bill C-38.

Before I address the issues relating to the selection and grouping of these motions for debate, I would like to mention that I have received several submissions pertaining to the admissibility of motions submitted for report stage. These motions of course are not printed on the notice paper and are returned in confidence to the author with reasons why they are procedurally inadmissible. I must state that this has been the normal practice of the House since 1994 when the Standing Orders were amended to provide that only those motions which are considered admissible by the Speaker are to be printed on the notice paper.

It is extraordinary for the Speaker to address admissibility issues in the House. Standing Order 76.1(2) states: “If the Speaker decides that an amendment is out of order, it shall be returned to the Member without having appeared on the Notice Paper.”

In this instance, the Chair will take certain liberties and explain the three basic reasons why certain report stage motions for Bill C-38 are inadmissible and have been returned to their sponsors.

First, a preamble to a bill can only be amended if it is made necessary due to an amendment to a clause of a bill, or for reasons of clarification. That is why, for example, preambles are considered at the end of clause by clause examination of the bill by the committee.

Second, an amendment to a bill cannot modify a statute or a section of a statute which is not contained in the bill. This is commonly known as the parent act rule. Its primary purpose is to keep amendments focused to the precise provision of the act which is being modified by the bill.

Third, amendments to the clauses of a bill after second reading must respect the scope of the bill, as “Amending Bills at Committee and Report Stages” states on page 5, “The scope of a bill means the schemes or ways by which the principles of the bill are achieved”. Thus, all amendments must fit within the four corners of the bill to be admissible. They cannot import matters which are not addressed in the bill. They can only refine what is already there.

Regrettably, many report stage motions address matters which are considered beyond the scope of the bill and hence are inadmissible. Many of these procedural issues also arose in committee and were ruled upon by the chair of the legislative committee, the Deputy Chair of Committees of the Whole House.

The Chair understands the concerns of members but assures them that the amendments judged to be inadmissible were given close attention and that decisions were exercised based on well-established rules and precedents.

Now, I will proceed with my ruling on the selection and grouping of motions for report stage of Bill C-38.

Motion No. 6 will not be selected by the Chair as it was defeated in committee. Motions Nos. 7, 9 and 11 will not be selected by the Chair as they could have been presented in committee.

All remaining motions have been examined and the Chair is satisfied that they meet the guidelines expressed in the note to Standing Order 76.1(5) regarding the selection of motions in amendment at the report stage. The motions will be grouped for debate as follows:

Group No. 1 will include Motions Nos. 1 to 3, 8 and 10. Group No. 2 will include Motions Nos. 4 and 5.

The voting patterns for the motions within each group are available at the Table. The Chair will remind the House of each pattern at the time of voting.

I shall now propose Motions Nos. 1 to 3, 8 and 10 in Group No. 1 to the House.

An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to make Certain Payments

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member had connected it to Bill C-48 already. Liberals do not want to hear about this, but they are going to hear about this.

These 30 Liberal MPs will not, because they do not have the courage, vote against Bill C-48 and defeat the government, so we can go to an election and through an election decide the outcome of the marriage bill. Because they do not have the courage, Bill C-38 will certainly pass. Many members of the government will not even have a free vote on the issue. There are 30 MPs who will not take a stand for their constituents. They will be responsible for same sex marriage coming into place in this country in spite of them saying exactly the opposite.

Then we have the whole two front rows in the government who do not have a free vote. They are not allowed to represent their constituents. For these reasons, Bill C-38 will pass. It is on their heads.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. We have been debating Bill C-48 for a week and that is what we are on now. We are not on Bill C-38.

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have been a member of Parliament for 12 years and I have worked very hard to represent my constituents in those 12 years. Today is the saddest day that I have ever experienced in the House of Commons. One hour of debate will be allowed for a bill worth $4.5 billion of my children's money and other people's children's hard earned money.

That is important, but what is most important about Bill C-48 and the third reading vote that we are about to take is that if the bill is not defeated then Bill C-38, the same sex bill, will certainly pass in this House.

We have had 30 members of the Liberal Party who have said they would do everything they could to defeat Bill C-38, the marriage bill. They are the member for Scarborough—Guildwood, the member for Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, the member for Mississauga South, the member for Huron—Bruce, and the member for Pickering—Scarborough East. They are 30 in total--

Extension of Sitting Period

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Madam Speaker, I definitely was not calling the hon. member opposite who just rose by that name, nor was I calling you by that name, Madam Speaker. Let us make the record clear that I was calling neither the member nor you “Charlie”.

In any case, let me continue. There is the issue of Bill C-38, which the hon. members across say they do not want to vote on. Maybe I should remind members of something that appeared in today's Quorum , I believe, and definitely in a number of newspapers. It is an article written by columnist Don Martin, who gave some advice to the hon. members across about that issue. He said that for their own political good maybe what they should consider is getting the vote over with before they embarrass themselves even further, not only on that issue but on many others.

I say for the hon. members across that whether they agree or disagree with the content of the bill, this issue has been in the public domain for three years. Sixty-two witnesses have been listened to by the legislative committee. The bill has about four clauses. The members across have all spoken at second reading, every single one of them who wanted to, and every single one of them on the amendment as well, and on the subamendment and so on.

We have listened to what they had to say. It is not a matter of the House needing more pearls of wisdom in that regard. In any case, if I listen to what the opposition House leader says, it is not that they want more time. It is that they do not want to do that particular work at all because they do not like it.

I know that Madam Speaker is a teacher by training. Do people have a choice in doing their homework based on whether or not they like it? That is not the criteria.

Let us hear what the opposition House leader said today, June 23, after question period in the foyer of the House of Commons:

We've been consistent in saying right from the beginning that we are strongly opposed to these two bills.

That is all right. They can vote against them. He stated further:

There's not a Canadian left out there in the real world that doesn't understand that.

Of course: they have all spoken two or three times each so every one of us understands what their position is. It does not need to be clarified much further.

I will continue to quote the opposition House leader:

We have no intention and it's not our role, frankly, to make things easy for the government to pass bills that we're opposed to.

There we are. They do not like Bill C-38. They do not like Bill C-48. They do not like the fact that we are going to give more money to social housing. They do not like more money going to the Canadian International Development Agency to help the world's poor.

What is their solution? Is it to vote against that which they do not like? No, it is to not want to do the work. Not wanting to work is the way in which they solve their problems.

Now, not wanting to work just does not cut it with Canadians. Their constituents and mine will not put up with that. They sent us here to do the work.

Let us do the work. The hon. members say they want to go home. Of course they do. Their House leader said that on their behalf and their House leader always says it the way it is, or generally. In any case, if their House leader says they want to go home, I am not opposed to that.

We are going to vote on this motion tonight. We have from now until midnight. Let us vote on the two bills and go home. Canadians will say, “You did your work, Mr. or Ms. MP”. We will all have done our work and we can go home to do all the things that the opposition House leader said we should be doing.

I agree with him that we should be going home, but we should do our work first because when we do not do our work we have to stay in class at recess or after hours to get the work done. We are supposed to do the work before we go away. Those are the rules.

I say this in the presence of a teacher, namely our Acting Speaker, because I know she used to teach for a living and she will know these things in the truly objective manner in which I am sure she sees these matters.

I ask all my colleagues to join together and vote for this motion. After the motion, let us join together again and vote for the bills. Let us get the work done and then we can go home, in that order. That is the way it should be done.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I am glad the hon. member across said that the House had lots of time. I sat on the legislative committee dealing with Bill C-38. It is a legislative committee and that committee of course was supposed to deal with technical witnesses. The hon. member for Provencher and others across the way insisted that we hear some 62 witnesses on a bill that has about four clauses.

Why did they do that? It is obvious. They wanted to delay the passage of the bill. They did not want to vote against the bill. They wanted to delay its passage. They did not want to vote at all.

That is not the way it works. The government has a duty, a constitutional responsibility to this nation, and that is exactly what it is going to do. It is going to proceed and get its legislative programs through because that is why governments are there: to get things done. That is quite normal.

If the opposition delays, and I am not saying this of everybody, but if the Conservative opposition delays the government in completing its work, then obviously the government has only one or two choices. It can either curtail debate, that is, move time allocation on individual bills, or it can extend the sitting in order to get the legislation through, or possibly both, which the government may well have to do now.

That is not because the government House leader and the government were not totally efficient in their way of doing their business. That is because the opposition does not know what it is doing.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Hidden agenda? There are hidden agendas here and there. The Liberals are going to keep us here to get Bill C-48 through, which is the NDP budget, the tail wagging the dog.

I see nothing about Bill C-48 in budget plan 2005. I can go through all the documents. I can go through the budget speech by the Minister of Finance. I can do a full review of the budget and move toward a green economy in the budget. I can move on to securing our social foundations in the budget. I can see achieving a productive and sustainable economy in the budget. I see a new deal for Canadian communities in the budget. I can see meeting our global responsibilities, the budget in brief, in the budget. However I do not see a word about Bill C-48.

How did this conversion on the road to socialism become all of a sudden such a big deal, this two page budget spending $4.5 billion with no programming whatsoever? The Liberals are just saying that we should spend the cash, blow it out the door without having a program by which to deliver it.

They talk about more money for housing. We do not disagree with more money for housing but all it says is:

for affordable housing, including housing for aboriginal Canadians, an amount not exceeding $1.6 billion;

In the province of Alberta and right across this country we are going to build more than 200,000 housing units this year. For the fourth year in a row we are now going to exceed 200,000. The building industry is going flat out. Construction workers are working at the maximum. I am thinking about putting an addition on my house and I cannot even get people to do it because they are all working so hard. How are we going to be able to put another $1.6 billion into housing, apart from just creating an inflationary environment in the housing market? The Liberals do not think about that. They just say that if this is what it takes to get the NDP, that is what it takes.

It also talks about the energy efficient retrofit program for low income housing. We have a program for retrofit of energy inefficient houses. We are building the industry. We cannot just expand it in an explosive way overnight because that does not work. I am surprised the members of the NDP agreed to this but I am not surprise that the Liberals promised them anything.

However this budget will not work. A year from now the Auditor General will be saying that things are falling off the rails.

I am opposed to Motion No. 17 that would allow us to continue to debate Bill C-48 and Bill C-38 because both of those bills should have been in the trash can. If that were to happen then we could get on with doing the real business of Canada.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Madam Speaker, in any event, budget plan 2005 does not even mention anything that is in Bill C-48. This just appeared magically, all of a sudden.

Bill C-48 does talk about putting $900 million into the environment. The government says this is important, but let us take a look back to the springtime when the government tabled the budget. It was going to put $5 billion into the environment over the next five years, $1 billion for the innovative clean air fund, $225 million to expand the successful EnerGuide for houses retrofit incentive program, $200 million for this and $200 million for that. That was a budget that the Conservative Party supported.

All of a sudden the government said, “We want to bring in the NDP as our friends and we are going to spend another $900 million on the environment just to buy their love”. Bill C-48 is not urgent. it is not dollars that are needed. Bill C-48 is for the Liberal Party. This is not for the people of Canada.

Then we go on to things like education and support for training. What does the big document say? Education, investment in Canadian capabilities, investing in people, $5 billion over five years to start building a framework for learning, and $120 million over five years for first nations children, $398 million for integration, supported by the Conservative Party no less. That is not enough for the NDP members. They need more.

What about housing? The Minister of Finance is going to deal with first nations housing. He is going to deal with development assistance abroad. On page 206 there is an increase of $3.4 billion over the next five years so we can meet our international obligations for the poor in Africa and the poor elsewhere around the world. That is important. The NDP wants to squeeze another $500 million out of the Canadian taxpayer, even though we as the Conservative Party supported this budget of $3.4 billion in extra foreign aid. This is generous. Now there is another $500 million to buy the support of the NDP. This is not about public policy. This is not about helping Canadians. This is about helping the Liberals stay in power with the support of the NDP.

There are only 308 members in the House, half on that side and half on this side. The House is evenly divided as everyone knows. We have had too many tied votes around here recently.

That is the price of buying the NDP, $4.5 billion, out of the pockets of Canadian taxpayers. It is rather unfortunate.

Then we have Bill C-38, the same sex marriage bill. The Supreme Court brought down its reference response last December, as I recall. That is more than six months ago. All of a sudden there is a great urgency to get this bill out of the way. Two weeks ago the Prime Minister gave the indication that we could deal with this in the fall, but he has had a change of heart. He wants it done now. We wonder why he wants it done now and he wants to keep us around here to get it done, even though many Canadians, perhaps even a majority of Canadians have said, “We don't want this legislation”.

Everyone acknowledges and has agreed and given to same sex couples the same benefits that any other couple enjoys. But the word “marriage” is a hallowed name, a word that has come to us down through the centuries. The government is going to change the definition of every dictionary in the land and even around the world because it wants to capitulate and give the definition of marriage to same sex couples.

We disagree with that and half of people in the country, or more, disagree with that.

I think the Liberals have found out that the polls are moving against them on this issue. On that basis, they wanted to get this issue out of the way so that in the summertime it would not fester. They wanted to have smooth sailing, hopefully, into the next election. Well, it will not be smooth sailing into the next election because we will ensure that the people who are opposed to this will show up at on polling day and register their concern and their absolute disgust at what the government has done.

I was talking to a friend of mine who is in the polling business and he told me that this was intergenerational, that the younger people tend to support same sex marriage and the older generation say “no way”. It is interesting that the people who say “yes, there is nothing wrong with same sex marriage” when they are young, tend to change their mind when their children arrive. Their children, of course, come from a heterosexual relationship and no other kind of relationship that I am aware of. When their children arrive they are the ones changing diapers, raising them and doing everything that parents do. I know this as I am also a proud parent. However we realize that perhaps the heterosexual relationship is not only the normal way but the right way and the way that has to be endorsed by society and that is what marriage is all about.

The question we have to ask is why the big rush.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to congratulate the member on his engagement to Melissa Craig of Yukon. I noted that while he was supporting Bill C-38, which is the same sex marriage bill, he is opting for the more traditional form of marriage, so we would like to congratulate him on that as well.

New love is always something to behold. I say new, not young, because the member for Yukon is past the teenybopper stage, but I would just like to ask him this question since he is supporting the motion to stay here in Ottawa for a few more weeks, perhaps, rather than returning to Yukon. He is obviously more committed to the Liberal Party than to his new-found love. How is he going to be able to explain all this when he goes back home?

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Yes, especially me. However, we have important things to do here. I will be speaking in favour of this, in spite of the fact I would like to be at home with my fiancée.

It was suggested by the opposition that there is no public interest, that it is not urgent that we stay here. It depends on how one sees Bill C-38. I do not think there is anyone in the House who would deny that same sex marriage is a passionately debated issue in the country. There are very strong feelings on both sides of this issue. I do not think there are any members of Parliament who would suggest that they do not have constituents on both sides of this issue and constituents who feel very passionately about this.

We have had a lengthy debate in the House. We have all received a great deal of correspondence and discussion over the last year from our constituents. In fact, the Conservatives and the independent member on the other side explained this afternoon the huge number of witnesses we have had and the lengthy debate in committee.

Now that we have had all this, I do not think there is any member of Parliament who would really want to maintain the nation in this state of divisiveness. Everyone has had input. Members have talked to the people they want to and they can now make a decision. We should set the country at rest and allow everyone to vote with their conscience on what they have gleaned from the debate.

The second reason why I do not think we should wait is that court decisions have led to a situation where there are certain people in the nation who are not treated equally. We have a situation that this bill would remedy, where all the people in Canada would be treated the same.

It may not be important to persons that it does not apply to, but it is to persons who have been caught up by the court decisions and feel that they are not equal. I think it is a very important principle in this country. I cannot believe that the opposition would not agree with me that all Canadians should be treated equally and to be in that position as quickly as possible. We have had an exhaustive debate, we are ready to vote, and we should go ahead with it.

I suggest that I am not the only person saying this. In today's Ottawa Citizen it states:

Tories are only hurting themselves. Are they nuts? The Conservatives should be clamouring to dispense with same-sex marriage legislation quickly, the better to hit the barbecues pronto and put this albatross issue at the greatest possible distance from an election call. They should shut up and state their political opposition in classic democratic form--by defiantly voting against the bill at the earliest opportunity,

I would like to turn now to Bill C-48. This is probably the first bill that Motion No. 17 would lead us to in the House. In fact, when we finish this debate, we will be going back to Bill C-48.

I want to ensure that the public has no illusion that we have not had exhaustive discussion about this particular bill. There are four items in the bill including extra money for urban transit. The Liberals, as the House knows, have always contributed toward urban transit, foreign aid, housing and post-secondary education. More money will be added which is only 1% of the budget. It is a small percentage of the budget.

We have had an exhaustive debate on this. We should not let the public think that we have not and that we should bring this to a conclusion. We have had a lot of debate. I would suggest that any similar four lines in any of our budgets, and the budget that the Conservatives voted on already, Bill C-43, would not exceed 1%. I think the hours of debate we have had are as much as there has ever been over 1% of a budget.

The biggest loser in this, and I think this is a bit sad, and I am not sure of the reason for it, is the Bloc Québécois. How can the Bloc members vote against things that they used to be in favour of? How can they join the Conservatives and say they cannot spend on things that they used to spend on?

How can they campaign in the next election and go from house to house saying that there is going to be more smog? How can they say to people that they have to take an old bus and pay higher rates because Ottawa had some money for transit in Quebec but they wanted Ottawa to keep it? How can they not vote for it? How can they say to people that they were very generous during the Tsunami, but now the Bloc does not want to give foreign aid from the Canadian government? How can they join with the Conservatives and not spend this kind of money on foreign aid?

What about when Bloc members are in a shelter or a rental apartment and a family wants to get a home of their own? How can they tell that family that Ottawa wanted to give more money to affordable housing, but, sorry, they had to vote with the Conservatives, and they cannot have that money in Quebec.

When they go to another house and there are a couple of teenagers there who want to go to college, the Bloc members will say that the fees could have been lower. They will say that the government offered to provide more money for that in Bill C-48 and lower tuition fees, but they could not support that. They had to vote with the Conservatives not to spend money on post-secondary education.

Wisely, during the debate on Bill C-48 so far, the Bloc members have not tried to defend why they are voting against those items. They have left the Conservatives at the shooting gallery, but today its House leader, for whom I have great respect and who is a great orator, one of the best if not the best speaker in the House, was squirming. He was trying to come up with johnny-come-lately reasons as to why the Bloc was voting against these measures.

The Conservatives and the NDP had at least tried to make agreements or vote with our party to get a budget through, but the Bloc johnny-come-latelies had no influence on it and they tried to make up reasons at the eleventh hour as to why they might vote against these measures.

I encourage the Bloc to go back to the principles for which many Quebeckers voted for them and were at one time proud of them. I say again, it is not just me saying this. The premier of Quebec and many mayors in Quebec have asked the Bloc Québécois to vote for Bill C-48 for what it would do for Quebec.

I would like to read from a Quebec newspaper. Montreal's The Gazette stated:

Bloc opposes bill giving money to Quebec - why? The problem is that the Bloc Québécois has joined with the Conservative Party to oppose part of this funding. It's bizarre: Cash-strapped Quebec desperately needs this money, and yet a party whose exclusive reason for being is to serve Quebecers' interests is resisting the funding tooth and nail. Yet, if the Bloc's Gilles Duceppe has his way, this extra funding would not materialize. The Bloc's logic escapes me. If passed, C-48 would give money to many causes that the Bloc supports besides public transit - among them affordable housing and foreign aid. Yet the Bloc opposes the bill. A call to Duceppe's office--

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I thank members for their congratulations on my engagement to Melissa Craig of Yukon. Unfortunately, that is probably the last time members will clap for me tonight.

First, I want to answer a couple of questions the last member raised. One of the question was on affordable housing. He suggested we were do nothing on that file. However, we have invested $1.9 billion a year to support 640,000 families in existing social housing units.

In 2001 we added $680 million over five years to help increase the supply of affordable rental housing. I would not say that is nothing. It was so successful that in 2003 that we added another $320 million. We also put $128 million into renovations programs, which I know are very popular in my riding. We have been active since 2000, with almost $3 billion, in affordable housing.

The other point he made was related to farming. I am glad he raised that. Opposition members a number of times have gone off topic when we have talked about farming. I am sure a number of them come from farming territory. They should understand the programs that the Government of Canada has available for farmers.

However, some of those members have suggested that there are absolutely no programs. The member of Ontario suggested that. I do not know if they were not here the day that we announced $1 billion, shortly after the budget, for the farm community in the member's riding of Ontario.

In 2005 we made a farm income payment of $144 million. In 2004 we had the transitional industry support of $137 million. In 2003-04 we had the agricultural application program of $192 million in production insurance. In 2004 we expected $45 million to go to producers. In 2004 we had the spring credit advance payments of $236 million in interest free advances. March 2 and 3 this year producers had funds in CAIS above the third deposit and were able to withdraw money. We assume that is another $160 million for farmers. We put $53.6 million in the tobacco assistance program.

On April 1, the environmental stewardship activities was announced in the amount of $57 million. The annual research in agriculture was $70 million. We just announced another $9.4 million in sciences innovation in five years over the APF program. That is just for one province. They also have access nationally to Canada's $488 million repositioning strategy and also $50 million to the Canadian Cattlemen's Association.

If they want to be viewed as credible, they should at least acknowledge what is there for their constituents and ensure they can access them. Then they can start on that base to criticize and suggest improvements.

We are here to debate Motion No. 17 which extends the sitting of the House so we can carry on its business. It does not specify which motions, but it means we will be back next week, if it passes, sitting until midnight every night, as we have been this week, to get important work done.

The House leader and our whip have made it quite clear that two of our priorities are Bill C-38 and Bill C-48. We have had much discussion about that this afternoon and before.

I just want to make a brief comment on the results of passing the motion tonight. As opposed to going home, and I know all of us would like to be in our constituency where we have important things to do--

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the member opposite spent $250 million per vote to stay in power, to cling to power. It is nothing more or less than that.

As far as the corporate portion of it, I will refer to his own finance minister when Bill C-43 was before the House. This is not what we are debating today. We are debating a motion that is closing debate upon whether we should extend this House or not, which is a slap in the face for democracy. There is nothing that urgent or is of the public interest to the degree where we should try to ram through the two bills, Bill C-48 and Bill C-38, when there is absolutely no reason for it.

Bill C-48 will not be implemented until August 2006. Where is the urgency in that? The only urgency is that the Liberals are trying to tie that bill into somehow justifying a public interest, when they really want to ram through Bill C-38, the same sex marriage bill, which nobody in Canada wants in particular. They simply want to live up to their deal with the NDP, a deal cooked up in the middle of the night to stay in power.

Let me read the response that was made by the finance minister. He said, “You can't do anything to this budget”, when the NDP leader went fishing. The NDP leader then asked if he would change his mind. The finance minister replied that he would make technical changes but nothing substantive.

The NDP went fishing a little further and asked the finance minister if he would consider doing something further. They talked about the corporate tax break that would create jobs and allow for investment.

Here is what the finance minister said:

Mr. Speaker, that is really like asking whether I would be prepared to buy a pig in a poke. Quite frankly, no minister of finance, acting responsibly, would answer that type of question.

If the hon. gentleman has a serious proposition, please bring it forward and I will give it the consideration it deserves. I would point out to him, however, that the changes in corporate taxation are intended to ensure that jobs, jobs, jobs stay in Canada.

What do they have against jobs? No one has anything against jobs, jobs, jobs.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Mr. Speaker, as we look at the Standing Orders presently, there is no question that the calendar of this House is a fairly significant event that is agreed to, according to the Standing Orders, by the House leaders.

According to the Standing Orders, during the adjourned period when members of Parliament are in their constituencies, the House does not get called back unless there is need for royal assent on something that is of some urgency. If that is the case, the House can be called back for a short period.

The Standing Order 28(4) reads:

The House shall meet at the specified time for those purposes only; and immediately thereafter the Speaker shall adjourn the House to the time to which it had formerly been adjourned.

When we have a calendar it ought to be respected and, if it needs to be interrupted, then after the particular business is done the House needs to go back into adjournment. There needs to be a reason for the House to reconvene that is of substance.

This House could probably be guided by Standing Order 28(3) which talks about the Speaker utilizing his or her discretion to recall the House. It states:

Whenever the House stands adjourned, if the Speaker is satisfied, after consultation with the Government, that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time, the Speaker may give notice that being so satisfied the House shall meet....

Therefore there needs to be some evidence that would satisfy the Speaker. There has to be some public interest that requires an interruption of the House calendar.

I would think this House would at least have to satisfy those same principles before this House could put forward a motion that would require this House to extend itself for a further period. What is the public interest?

We have heard discussion about Bill C-48. It does not get implemented until next year. In fact, when we look at the budget implementation portion of it, it talks about the moneys actually being requisitioned or looked at in the next year. What is the urgency? This is not in the public interest. This could be debated in the fall sitting. In fact one could argue that perhaps there is something to Bill C-43 passing.

Bill C-43 has cleared this particular House and is now in the Senate chamber for approval. We have a senator saying that the Conservative senators were prepared to expedite the passage of Bill C-43, the budget legislation bill, which includes the Atlantic accord, but that the Liberal senators were refusing to pass it. He also said that they agreed to waive certain procedural steps in order to speed the passage of Bill C-43.

He goes on to say:

Two other government bills are receiving clause-by-clause consideration immediately following testimony by witnesses in Senate Committees today. The Liberal government will not permit the same procedure to be followed for Bill C-43, thus putting the bill at risk should Bill C-48, the NDP budget bill, be defeated in the House of Commons in the next few days.

We just received notice that those two bills are here for royal assent.

How is it that the Liberal government, on one hand, says that it wants the bill to go forward so the funds can start rolling on that particular bill, but on the other hand, refuses to have it passed expeditiously, as it could have? I think it is playing games with this House.

Let us look at the marriage bill, Bill C-38. Is there a public interest to have it passed or at least a public interest sufficient to call the House back to order when it ought to be adjourned? What is the public interest in that bill? In fact, a large percentage of the Canadian public do not want that bill to pass. Therefore it is definitely not in the public interest to call Parliament back for that purpose and that purpose alone.

What has the government done? It has attempted to lump and link Bill C-48 with Bill C-38, the marriage bill, in an attempt to justify, on some kind of national basis, that it is in the public interest to reconvene the House. However this is not in the public interest. It is all subterfuge. It is all playing with the rules to get their ends.

The House leader stated earlier in the press that he was prepared to not have Bill C-38 pass if Bill C-48 passed, but then he changed his mind, dug in his heels and decided to connect the two and call Parliament back for that purpose.

What is the rush? Bill C-38 is fundamentally changing the definition of marriage. It is fundamentally changing society as we know it. It deserves the time that is needed to discuss it and the public need an opportunity to participate. What we had at report stage was a sham.

During question period today the member for London—Fanshawe asked whether limiting the witnesses at the committee was really doing the job it ought to be doing. Is it appropriate to give witnesses 24 hours or 48 hours notice to appear? Is changing members of the committee appropriate? Is setting up a separate committee to ram through the committee hearings appropriate? Those hearings should have been the widest possible hearings across the country in every city with every member of the public having an opportunity to address the government before that bill completed report stage.

However the Liberals are ramming it through, despite the concerns of Canadians, despite public interest and despite our nation's interest, because they want to. They have confused national agenda and public interest with their own interest. They have confused the House of Commons calendar, which should not be interfered with easily, with their own ends and their own desires.

I think it is appalling. It is appalling to democracy and it is appalling to this institution for the government to go further and put a motion in the House that would limit debate on whether the hours and sittings of this House should be extended. How can it be in this free and democratic country that we cannot have every member in the House speak to whether the preconditions exist for the House to be extended?

We have to justify the pre-conditions of the House. That is why the Standing Order is there. That is why there are safeguards. We cannot, just on a notion, say that we will pass a motion that will change the Standing Orders and call the House back because we want to. There must be some basis for that and that basis is the public interest, because that is the basis, Mr. Speaker, that you might have to contend with.

The Liberals chose not to allow every member in the House to speak. Since when does a government decide that closure is the way to go on an issue so important as whether or not this House should sit in the summer to deal with the marriage bill, Bill C-38.

This is not a national crisis. This is not a national public interest that requires us to do it. The Prime Minister and the government confuse their own interests with the interests of the nation.

When the Prime Minister appeared on television I thought he was going to speak to something that was of national interest or of some national crisis, or even perhaps proroguing Parliament or calling an election.

What was the purpose of that particular television address? At great expense to this nation and every taxpayer of Canada, the purpose of that television appearance was to protect the hide of the Prime Minister and his government because they were on the ropes of losing in a possible election. He used the media and the resources of government to bolster public opinion and that is shameful.

Even the NDP leader acknowledged that. In question period he said, “First, let me add my voice to those who are concerned about the televised address this evening. This is a Liberal crisis; it is definitely not a national crisis.” The government is confusing its own interests with those of the nation.

In the next question, the hon. leader went fishing to see if he could change the government's budget. He said, “Putting aside the issue of corruption, let me see if I can be bought”. How could he do that? He was speaking about the sponsorship scandal and the things that have happened. People were paid for doing little or nothing with Canadian taxpayer dollars for which many people worked very hard to put in the coffers of the government. Some people work 12 hours a day, six days a week, only to lose half of their money to the government to spend on projects and programs.

However we find the government using and abusing those funds to pay ad agencies for little or no work and then having some of that money filter back to the party to fund an election. It was buying votes at $250 million per member to get another party's support to cling to power and giving people positions to cross the floor. Those are the kinds of things that should not happen in the House but it gets worse than that.

The House raised a motion of confidence, if not directly, certainly indirectly. At that point, constitutionally, the Prime Minister and his government had an obligation to Canadians and to the House to raise the issue of confidence themselves and they did not have confidence. They did not have confidence for a week.

The House should have been closed shut. There should not have been one order of business happening until that issue of confidence was settled. For that week we were without a government because it should not have been exercising the powers of government, the levers of government, the position of government to advance its own interests.

However all the while we had ministers and the Prime Minister travelling across Canada signing deals, committing money, spending money, campaigning at public expense and doing the kinds of things that would be shameful in a third world country that is run by a dictatorship.

We should have closed the House down and went to the wall to prevent that from happening because it was an injustice. It was illegitimately trying to legitimize government. It waited until it had the numbers and then it put forward an issue of confidence, and that is wrong.

What is wrong with the government is that it confuses its own interests with the interests of Canada.

We expect far better. We expect to have a government with vision. We expect to have a government that is prepared to take a loss, prepared to sacrifice on behalf of the country and one that puts the country's interest above its own, above its own greed and its own temptations, not a government that tries to shove a bill through the House when the public of Canada does not want it.

We need a government with backbone and a government with the courage to lose if it has to. An election should have been called and that confidence vote should have been respected. The public would have made a decision on Bill C-38.

Now the Liberals are trying to ram it through. It would not surprise me if they would put closure on Bill C-38 and Bill C-48 to get their will, despite the will of the people of Canada. That is wrong and the people of Canada will pass judgment. Believe me, it will not end in this session and it will not end in the summer.

I am prepared to stay here in July, all of August and into September to preserve the democratic right of the people of the country to express their views through members of Parliament on Bill C-38 because what is happening here is wrong.

One could ask whether I was looking at this objectively. I would like to make reference to an article in the Toronto Sun . Chantal Hébert said, “One thing we have learned from the tape affair is that precious little stands between the Prime Minister and a repeat of the sponsorship scandal. It is a culture that's wrong. It is what permeates government that's wrong. It is the thing that says the end justifies the means. It doesn't matter how we get there, it just matters that we get there. Our objective is to stay in power and we'll do whatever we have to, twist and bend every rule we have to stay in power”.

Supply day motions happen once a week every week and it was during that time that a confidence motion could have been put by any one of the parties, including our party. The Liberals took those supply days away and the ability to make a confidence motion until the end of May.

Why was that? To me, that was something I expected to happen every week. It was tradition. It was something the House had as a constitutional kind of arrangement that happened week after week. The Liberals took it away for the sole purpose of preventing confidence because they knew they would lose. They then put them at the end of May. Why? So any election would take place in the middle of summer.

They wanted to have the opportunity to continue to buy, pay, promise, and get to the position where they could win and then call it. There is something fundamentally wrong with that. There is something very wrong with that. That is why the country is going astray. It needs some direction. It needs some commitment. It needs someone with some backbone who says there is a right, there is a wrong, that this is right and we will do it, regardless of whether it costs us or not, and not what we see here.