Bill C-14

Preserving Provincial Representation in the House of Commons Act

An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 (electoral representation)

This enactment amends section 51 of the Constitution Act, 1867 to provide that, when the number of members of the House of Commons and the representation of the provinces in that House are readjusted on the completion of each decennial census, a province will not have fewer members assigned to it than were assigned during the 43rd Parliament. It also includes transitional measures providing for the application of that amendment to the readjustment of electoral boundaries under the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act following the 2021 decennial census.

[Sarah Andrews, Director, Government and Media Relations, Friends of Canadian Media]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, committee members.

Friends of Canadian Media is a non-partisan citizens' movement that stands up for Canadian voices in Canadian media. From public broadcasting to news, culture and online civil discourse, we represent hundreds of thousands of everyday citizens from across the country who want to protect and defend Canada's rich cultural sovereignty and the healthy democracy it sustains.

I would like to start by acknowledging Parliament's most recent actions. Bills C‑11 and C‑18 triggered considerable debate, but together these policies represent a necessary and vital impulse to do something, to act rather than to acquiesce, and to react to the eroding impact that foreign tech companies are having on our news, our culture and even our democratic health.

When it comes to the news crisis, many shrug their shoulders and suggest there is nothing to be done, that this crisis represents the irresistible march of time and technology, that we are powerless to act, and that the public doesn't even care, but that is wrong. Every day, our supporters tell us how much they do care and how deeply concerned they are about the future of the news sector. They feel what's being lost, and they want better.

They're not alone. Recent polling we commissioned shows that for all the downsizing and derision, Canadians still turn to so-called traditional media to get their news. Seventy-three percent of adults said they deemed news from television, radio and newspapers to be trustworthy and reliable. By contrast, social media was trusted by only 30% of Canadians. Sadly, nearly 80% of Canadians felt that it's getting more and more difficult to know what is true and what is not.

This last statistic should come as no surprise. With the relentless pace of news layoffs, editorially rigorous and trusted journalism is increasingly being replaced by misinformation and disinformation. Some of it is just sloppy. Some of it is ideological. Some of it is predatory trolling for profit. Some of it is outright malicious and even dangerous.

Here we are, knee-deep in a Canadian news crisis, but perhaps it's time to focus less on the result and more on the cause, because if we follow the money, it is clear that advertising revenues have fuelled this crisis in the news.

Over the past decade, GAFAMs—digital giants like Meta and Google—have made their way into our daily lives. These platforms are increasingly coveted and have used their global reach and unfettered market advantage to cannibalize advertising revenues. Not only have we enabled them to do this, we've encouraged it.

Currently, in Canada, advertising purchased on foreign digital platforms is considered a tax-deductible expense. In 2018, when our organization published our study “Close the Loophole! The Deductibility of Foreign Internet Advertising”, we estimated that $5 billion in advertising was being extracted from our economy. We need to close the gap and encourage Canadian advertisers to choose homegrown platforms.

However, we can't stop there. Programmatic advertising has spawned a veritable misinformation and disinformation economy in which toxic content is fuelled by a near-constant flow of advertising dollars. This disinformation economy is worth several billion dollars, most of which ends up in Google's pockets. The company systematically ignores its own standards and practices designed to ensure that digital ads are not placed on sites offering extreme content and ideas.

We can act by imposing transparency and accountability requirements that would help redirect advertising dollars to trusted sources of information, away from those whose business models allow them to profit from amplifying violence, hatred and disinformation.

We must also provide CBC/Radio-Canada with a sustainable funding model. It is the only broadcaster required by law to produce news in all regions. Unfortunately, however, it is crumbling under the weight of chronic underfunding, compounded by a freeze in the last federal budget. As private broadcasters continue to withdraw from news production, particularly local news, our national public broadcaster must have the resources to fill the void and fulfil its mandate. What's more, if CBC/Radio-Canada were better funded, this could reduce its dependence on advertising.

Before we wrap up and address any questions you may have, we want to answer this committee's central question about whether there is a need for a wider study of the Canadian news ecosystem. Our answer is a definite yes.

However, while that study is taking place, we do encourage Parliament to turn its focus to the advertising economy and its tremendous impact on our news, our culture and our democracy. Canadians are looking to you to take up this task, and we urge you to move swiftly and to take a big swing, because half measures have brought us here, to a news crisis that may quickly become a democratic one, and that would be unacceptable.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today.

Sitting Resumed

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Salaberry—Suroît, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise and speak this evening—although I must say the hour is late, almost 9 p.m.—to join the debate on Bill C‑47.

Before I start, I would like to take a few minutes to voice my heartfelt support for residents of the north shore and Abitibi who have been fighting severe forest fires for several days now. This is a disastrous situation.

I know that the member for Manicouagan and the member for Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou are on site. They are there for their constituents and represent them well. They have been visiting emergency shelters and showing their solidarity by being actively involved with their constituents and the authorities. The teamwork has been outstanding. Our hearts go out to the people of the north shore and Abitibi.

Tonight, my colleague from Abitibi-Témiscamingue will rise to speak during the emergency debate on forest fires. He will then travel back home to be with his constituents as well, so he can offer them his full support and be there for them in these difficult times.

Of course, I also offer my condolences to the family grieving the loss of loved ones who drowned during a fishing accident in Portneuf‑sur‑Mer. This is yet another tragedy for north shore residents. My heart goes out to the family, the children's parents and those who perished.

Before talking specifically about Bill C-47, I would like to say how impressive the House's work record is. A small headline in the newspapers caught my eye last week. It said that the opposition was toxic and that nothing was getting done in the House. I found that amusing, because I was thinking that we have been working very hard and many government bills have been passed. I think it is worth listing them very quickly to demonstrate that, when it comes right down to it, if parliamentarians work together and respect all the legislative stages, they succeed in getting important bills passed.

I am only going to mention the government's bills. Since the 44th Parliament began, the two Houses have passed bills C‑2, C‑3, C‑4, C‑5, C‑6, C‑8 and C‑10, as well as Bill C‑11, the online streaming bill. My colleague from Drummond's work on this bill earned the government's praise. We worked hard to pass this bill, which is so important to Quebec and to our broadcasting artists and technicians.

We also passed bills C‑12, C‑14, C‑15, C‑16, C‑19, C‑24, C‑25, C‑28, C‑30, C‑31, C‑32, C‑36 and C‑39, which is the important act on medical assistance in dying, and bills C‑43, C‑44 and C‑46.

We are currently awaiting royal assent for Bill C‑9. Bill C‑22 will soon return to the House as well. This is an important bill on the disability benefit.

We are also examining Bill C‑13, currently in the Senate and soon expected to return to the House. Bill C‑18, on which my colleague from Drummond worked exceedingly hard, is also in the Senate. Lastly, I would mention bills C‑21, C‑29 and C‑45.

I do not know whether my colleagues agree with me, but I think that Parliament has been busy and that the government has gotten many of its bills passed by the House of Commons. Before the Liberals say that the opposition is toxic, they should remember that many of those bills were passed by the majority of members in the House.

I wanted to point that out because I was rather insulted to be told that my behaviour, as a member of the opposition, was toxic and was preventing the work of the House from moving forward. In my opinion, that is completely false. We have the government's record when it comes to getting its bills passed. The government is doing quite well in that regard.

We have now come to Bill C-47. We began this huge debate on the budget implementation bill this morning and will continue to debate it until Wednesday. It is a very large, very long bill that sets out a lot of budgetary measures that will be implemented after the bill is passed.

I have no doubt that, by the end of the sitting on June 23, the House will pass Bill C‑47 in time for the summer break.

What could this bill have included that is not in there? For three years, the Bloc Québécois and several other members in the House have been saying that there is nothing for seniors. I was saying earlier to my assistant that, in my riding of Salaberry—Suroît, we speak at every meeting about the decline in seniors' purchasing power. I am constantly being approached by seniors who tell me—

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I have a letter here, and I think all committee members had this sent to them. As we've been doing these hearings—and they've taken a few meetings—members of the public have sent us information. Some of it is very helpful because it comes from Immigration Canada, so it has some content information.

This one is from the executive director, Denise Mildner, who is from Saskatchewan, the Evermore Centre. It provides data on the back end. I want to read it into the record and make reference to it, because it feeds into my next question. It says:

The voices of many parents have gone unheard. Since 2010, 13,791 children were born abroad and adopted by Canadian parents since bills C-14...and C-37...were passed.

That's going as far back as 2007.

Of these, 63% or 8,632 children were adopted through the Citizenship Stream. Unknowingly, by choosing this route, however, these children do not have the same rights as other Canadians and cannot pass on their citizenship. Regardless of which route was chosen, there should not exist any discriminatory laws against an internationally adopted child.

Does this amendment fix this particular situation, or does it address a different issue of just passing it on and the treatment of the children as Canadian children for the first-generation limit?

Criminal Code

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

moved that Bill C-314, an act to amend the Criminal Code (medical assistance in dying), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to my private member's bill, Bill C-314, the mental health protection act.

In its very essence, this bill is about reaffirming the dignity and worth of each and every human life. It is about recognizing that it is the most vulnerable among us, the disabled and the mentally ill, to whom we owe the greatest duty: to defend and protect their lives and to provide them with every possible opportunity to live life to the fullest.

Medically assisted suicide was legalized in Canada in 2015 by the Supreme Court's Carter decision and later under the Liberal government's Bill C-14. Under this legislation, medical assistance in dying, or MAID, as it is commonly called, was strictly limited to those consenting adults who had an incurable disease that caused enduring, intolerable suffering that could not be alleviated, and where natural death was reasonably foreseeable, which they call the foreseeability test.

At the time, the government and its supportive stakeholders assured Canadians that this was not a slippery slope, where the scope of MAID would continually be expanded to include more and more vulnerable Canadians. However, not surprisingly, in the intervening eight years since the Carter decision, the government has begun to expand Canada's MAID regime to include more and more defenceless Canadians, most particularly those living with disabilities.

In late 2019, a Quebec lower court judge in the Truchon case ruled that the foreseeability test I just mentioned was unconstitutional, requiring Parliament to respond with additional legislation. Sadly, the Liberal government chose not to appeal the Truchon case to the Supreme Court of Canada, presumably because the decision lined up with the Prime Minister's intent to dramatically expand assisted suicide to other vulnerable Canadians. This leaves us with the perverse situation in which the Supreme Court of Canada, the highest court in the country, has never been allowed to opine on whether the reasonable foreseeability test is constitutional.

In any event, the Liberal government responded to Truchon by tabling Bill C-7, which initially eliminated the foreseeability test but expressly excluded mentally ill persons from being caught up in its MAID regime. Here is what the justice minister said at the time:

The fact that there would be risk of ending the life of a person whose symptoms would have improved...is, in part, why we are of the view that it is safest not to permit MAID on the sole basis of mental illness.... There is also ongoing uncertainty and disagreement as to the potential impact on suicide prevention if MAID were made available to this group.

He went on to say:

...there is no consensus among experts on whether and how to proceed with MAID on the basis of mental illness alone. On a question of such importance and with so much uncertainty and expert disagreement, it is incumbent upon us to proceed with caution and prudence.

Those were our justice minister’s views until the unelected Senate suddenly introduced an amendment that expanded MAID to those Canadians whose sole underlying condition is mental illness. Sadly, the justice minister and the government accepted the amendment without protest and, overnight, became zealous proponents of assisted death for the mentally ill. What happened to the caution and prudence the minister was preaching? What about the impact on suicide prevention the minister was so concerned about? What happened to his view that it was safest not to permit MAID on the sole basis of mental illness?

I agree with the Minister of Justice on one thing, which is that, as he has said, this is indeed a complex issue and is deeply personal. It is deeply personal because it involves life, a precious human life.

I would remind the minister and his government that the issue is also profoundly simple; that is, the principle that all life, all human life is precious and worthy of defence and protection, especially for those who do not have the ability to speak for themselves and have no one to speak for them.

One of the primary functions of government is to protect its citizens, to protect life. In fact, the right to life is expressly enshrined in section 7 of our Charter of Rights. Sadly, the government's Bill C-7 fails to protect the lives of our most vulnerable. It removes the critical safeguards that the original euthanasia legislation included in response to the Carter decision. Removing those safeguards will have irreversible consequences for those who suffer from mental illnesses like depression.

What is equally disturbing is that the Liberal government has also signalled its intention to extend the so-called “treatment option” to minor children. That would arguably make Canada the most expansive, most liberal, assisted suicide jurisdiction in the world. Clearly we are on the slippery slope many of us warned about. Canadians have a right to conclude that the Liberal government has gone too far and too fast in its zeal to implement and expand the scope of assisted death.

My bill will reverse this momentum and repeal the government's decision to extend MAID to the mentally ill. It will put a full stop to the expansion of assisted suicide to mentally disordered persons. Let me be clear. My bill does not in any way reverse the rest of Canada’s MAID regime. Assisted death will remain available for those suffering from irremediable, incurable and intolerable illnesses and diseases. My bill is simply focused on reversing the government’s actions in expanding assisted suicide to include the mentally ill. It would arrest Canada’s slide into normalizing assisted death as an alternative treatment option, something so many of us had predicted would happen.

The evidence from mental health experts is very clear. Contrary to what our justice minister is now saying, there is absolutely no consensus in Canada that the mentally ill should be covered by Canada’s medically assisted death regime. In fact, here is what experts and other stakeholders in the mental health community are saying. John Maher, psychiatrist with Canadian Mental Health Association, states that:

Inducement to suicide while simultaneously denying mental health care to two-thirds of Canadians who urgently need it is an unconscionable failing.

Directly undermining suicide prevention efforts is an insidious and ablest perversion of our mental health care duty.

Drs. Ramona Coelho and Catherine Ferrier, co-founders of Physicians Together with Vulnerable Canadian, penned a statement that was endorsed by over 1,000 physicians. This is part of what it said, “Given that there is no medical evidence to reliably predict which patients with a mental illness will not get better, MAID for mental illness will end the lives of patients who would have recovered…Medicine …would fail in its mission if it were to deliberately end the lives of patients living with mental illness… Legislators must work towards safeguarding the lives of the most vulnerable including those placed at a greater disadvantage because of mental illness.”

Dr. Sonu Gaind, chief of the Department of Psychiatry at Sunnybrook Hospital, Toronto, stated, “The Ministers have provided false reassurances that we can somehow separate people who are suicidal from those who are seeking psychiatric euthanasia. That is simply not true. In my opinion, that is dangerous misinformation coming from our federal Minister of Justice and our federal Minister of Mental Health and Addictions providing a false sense of safety that does not exist.”

Trudo Lemmens, professor and chair in health law at the University of Toronto, said, “I urge Parliament to take very seriously how offering MAID for mental illness deprives disabled persons, particularly those with mental illness, from equal protection against premature death. Persons experiencing mental illness deserve to be protected against premature death by an unreserved focus on ensuring access to all required health care and social support services. Facilitating their death does exactly the opposite.”

Finally, Sephora Tang, psychiatrist and assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry at University of Ottawa, said, “One cannot prevent suicide while at the same time facilitating it. Placing expectations upon mental health professionals to do both undermines the effective delivery of recovery-oriented mental health care. Canadians deserve to live in a country that is committed to safeguarding the right to life and security of every person. Current MAID legislation fails to achieve this overarching social good.”

Even Canada's justice minister has publicly acknowledged the fact that issues such as irremediability, competency and suicidality are not anywhere close to being resolved to justify such a major policy shift in favour of death. Furthermore, medically assisted death flies in the face of the government’s own promotion of suicide prevention programs, including the recent creation of a national 988 suicide hotline.

It cannot be both ways. It cannot claim, as the Liberal government has, that it wants to prevent suicide deaths on the one hand, when it actively promotes assisted suicide for the mentally ill on the other. Over the last eight years, many of us have expressed our concern and expectation that the Carter decision and BillC-14 would be expanded by future court decisions, and that these decisions would leave more and more vulnerable populations exposed to the reach of medically assisted suicide.

Our concerns were pooh-poohed. We were accused of fearmongering and of misrepresenting the intentions of this Liberal government. Yet, today, the Truchon decision and the travesty of Bill C-7 bear out our concerns. That is why more and more disability groups have set the alarm bells ringing and are vehemently opposing this legislation. They argue that this legislation amounts to a deadly form of discrimination, making it easier for persons with disabilities to die than to live.

We are hearing more and more reports of the poor and homeless approaching food banks to ask for assisted death, not because they are suffering from a grievous illness but because they do not want to go hungry and homeless. The headline in the British magazine The Spectator asked last year, “Why is Canada euthanising the poor?”

The response from some bioethicists appears to be, “Well, why not?” In fact, a new paper by two bioethicists at the University of Toronto makes the case that euthanizing the poor should be socially acceptable. That is indicative of the path on which our country finds itself. It is terrifying.

We also have verified reports of veterans suffering from PTSD who are being counselled by the Liberal government to consider medical assistance in dying rather than being provided with the treatment and supports they need to recover.

These are the vulnerable that the Liberal government promised to protect. Canadians have the right to ask whether this government is exercising the requisite caution and care to avoid unnecessary overreach and ensure that MAID is not abused or misapplied.

Let me conclude. My private member's bill, Bill C-314 gives all of us parliamentarians an opportunity to take a deep breath and reconsider the perilous road we have embarked upon. As I mentioned, my bill simply reverses the expansion of Canada’s assisted death laws to the mentally ill. At the very least, I would ask my colleagues to allow my bill, at second reading, to go to committee where there could be more discussion.

Have we gone too far and too fast with Canada's assisted suicide program? Will we evolve into a culture of death as the preferred option for those who suffer from mental illness or will we choose life?

I implore my colleagues to choose life. I wish them much wisdom as they make that choice.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to stand to give my thoughts on Bill C-39. For those who are watching the debate today, this is the bill to amend the Criminal Code to delay, until March 17 of next year, the repeal of the exclusion from eligibility for receiving medical assistance in dying in circumstances where the sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness.

It has to be stated very clearly, because of the timeline with which we are dealing, that if this bill is not passed, the original sunset clause that was put in place by the old Bill C-7 will come into effect on March 17, which is just over a month away. It is for that reason that I will support the bill and will work with all parties to get the bill passed quickly.

Today's conversation has to happen within the context of the mental health crisis in Canada. We know and have heard, and this is not just from members of Parliament, from many advocates and stakeholders that there is an extreme lack of funding and resources. Clearly, there absolutely must be parity between physical and mental health in funding.

The Minister of Mental Health and Addictions has stated in the House that Canadians should have access to timely evidence-based, culturally appropriate and trauma-informed mental health and substance use services to support their well-being. With that I agree wholeheartedly, but words are not enough. We need to see the requisite resources and funding to follow through those words.

We know that beyond the Canada mental health transfer many advocates have long been calling for legislation to enshrine in law parity between mental and physical health. I am very glad today that I am giving my speech beside the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni, who is our mental health and addictions critic and who has himself tabled Motion No. 67, which calls on the government to develop that legislation and to urgently fulfill its promise to establish that Canada mental health transfer.

In my own riding of Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, many of my fellow citizens are going through extreme struggles with the opioid crisis. They are dealing with trauma. They are dealing with underlying mental health challenges that are simply not being addressed. That is an extreme gap and the cause of an extreme amount of shame for a country as wealthy as Canada to be still having these conversations about the resources that need to be brought to bear in communities like mine.

I have been a member in the House since 2015, so this is now my third Parliament. I have been here for the entirety of the legislative journey of medical assistance in dying. I can remember Bill C-14 and the sometimes difficult debates we had in the House. That legislation was in response to the Carter decision in the Supreme Court, which basically said that to deny people this right was contrary to our charter. It therefore gave the government a timeline to address it with the appropriate legislation.

What is not often talked about with Bill C-14 is that there was a legislative requirement in that act when it received royal assent. There was a five-year statutory review of medical assistance in dying. Unfortunately, that never occurred before the government went ahead in the previous Parliament and introduced Bill C-7, which established a second track for people whose death was not reasonably foreseeable.

The context of today's speech and C-39 is the fact that we have a story here of the government in several instances putting the cart before the horse. It not only introduced Bill C-7 before a statutory review occurred, which was a requirement of Bill C-14, but it then went ahead and accepted a Senate amendment to the bill that ran contrary to its own charter statement. It did that pretty massive expansion to the law without establishing a special joint committee that was a requirement of Bill C-7.

I am intimately familiar with what this process has been because I have not only been a member of the House since 2015, I have not only participated in debate on Bill C-14 and on Bill C-7, but I have also been a member of the special joint committee, both in the previous Parliament and in this Parliament.

The message all along has been that this kind of a review should have occurred before we were dealing with a timeline crunch. It became quite obvious during the special joint committee that too many Canadians, too many professionals in our country had apprehension about mental disorders as the sole underlying medical condition for being able to access medical assistance in dying as early as next month. Hence, we have Bill C-39.

I want to go back to the original charter statement that the government released as a part of Bill C-7. That includes a number of important statements as to why the government felt, originally, that mental disorders should be excluded from accessing MAID. It did say in that charter statement that the exclusion was not based on the assumption that individuals who suffered from mental illness lacked decision-making capacity. It also said that the exclusion was also not based on a failure to appreciate the severity of the suffering that mental illness could produce. Rather, it was based on the inherent risks and complexity that the availability of MAID would present to those individuals.

First, that charter statement identified that the evidence suggested that screening for decision-making capacity was particularly difficult. It could be subject to a high degree of error. Second, the statement identified that mental illness was generally less predictable than physical illness with respect to the course that the illness may take over time. Finally, it highlighted the experience that a few of the countries that permitted MAID, namely Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg, for the sole underlying medical condition of mental illness had and some of the concerns relating to the increasing number of these cases and the wide range of mental illnesses in respect to which MAID could be provided.

Again, it really highlighted the fact that precaution was the necessary mode that was required before we embarked on this path. However, the government in its wisdom decided to accept a late stage Senate amendment to the bill after the House, full of its duly elected members, had given a final vote on Bill C-7. As a member at that time, I could not bring myself to accept that Senate amendment. Therefore, I ended up voting against the final version of Bill C-7 because of that.

It also needs to be said, when we are going over the history, that the special joint committee that was a requirement of Bill C-7 got a very late start. It was first brought into being just before the summer recess in 2021. We only had a few meetings before the summer of 2021 and we had the unnecessary election, launched solely at the request of the Prime Minister, in August of that year. This completely wiped out anything that was happening during the 43rd Parliament. That Parliament ceased to exist, and all of the committees that were a part of it did as well.

The new Parliament, the 44th, reconvened later that year, but it was not until around April or May of 2022 that serious discussions started coming together and we could actually get the special joint committee reformed. Again, we have to put that in the context of the impending deadline of March 17, 2023.

An incredible amount of time was wasted, not only from an unnecessary election but also from the delays of getting that committee up and running. We had to twice request an extension of our mandate from both houses of Parliament because the timelines we had been given were completely unrealistic, not only in hearing from as wide a range as possible of witnesses but also in producing a report that would reflect the gravity of the subject matter with which we were entrusted. That has to be highlighted in the debate today on Bill C-39.

I also think it is important because there have been a few narratives around this legislation. It is important to go back to understand what the Criminal Code actually says, and also to put that in the context of the definition of irremediability.

It is important that, in order to be eligible for medical assistance in dying, a person has to meet all of the following criteria: they have to make sure that they are in fact eligible for health services in the province they reside in, they have to be at least 18 years of age and capable of making decisions with respect to their own health, they have to have a grievous and irremediable medical condition, and they have to have made a voluntary request. All these conditions must be satisfied. A person must also give informed consent to receive medical assistance in dying, after having been informed of the means available to relieve their suffering, including palliative care.

Now we get to the definition of a grievous and irremediable medical condition as outlined in the Criminal Code. A person has to meet the following criteria for that definition: it has to be a serious and incurable illness, disease or disability; they have to be in an advanced state of irreversible decline in capability; and that illness, disease or disability, or that state of decline, has to be causing them enduring physical or psychological suffering that is intolerable to them and that cannot be relieved under conditions that they consider acceptable.

Those are the definitions in the Criminal Code, so despite the narratives we hear out there, those conditions must be met or the person administering MAID will have committed a crime. They will be in violation of the Criminal Code of Canada and will get the appropriate punishment as a result.

One of the difficulties is the fact that the term “irremediable” is not a medical or scientific term. It is a term that finds its definition within the Criminal Code. If we go to scientific or medical literature, it is a difficult term to define, and that, I think, is why we are seeing a lot of the apprehension around accessing MAID for mental disorders where the sole underlying medical condition is a mental disorder.

Some witnesses who appeared before our committee expressed the opinion that this should not be permitted, because there cannot be any certainty with respect to the incurability of a mental disorder. However, other witnesses told us that certainty is not required and that there are ways to consider irremediability, for example by looking at the years of treatment that people have had and whether any responses of the patient have actually been positive.

We also have to understand that the respect for personal autonomy in all of this is paramount, and it is has to be a treatment that is acceptable to the individual receiving it. They not only have to express informed consent, but it has to be something acceptable to them as a person.

I now want to talk a little about the special joint committee, which I have had the honour of being a member of, as I previously mentioned.

I think it is important to underline that our committee has struggled with the question of how to balance individual autonomy with protections for the vulnerable. We were tasked with looking at five themes through the passage of Bill C-7 and the motion that guided our work from both the House of Commons and the Senate: how we institute protections for persons with disabilities; the state of palliative care in Canada; advance requests; mature minors; and, of course, the subject of today, mental disorders as a sole underlying medical condition and their eligibility with respect to applying for medical assistance in dying.

Our final report is due to be tabled in the House this Friday, February 17. We wrapped up our committee meetings last week and finally approved a draft report. That draft report, as I speak, is going to translation services so that it can be ready for tabling here in the House, and so we will be able to meet the deadline that was given to us.

Before we did that work, we had others who did some important work ahead of us. We had the expert panel that was established. They also wrestled with major concerns, such as incurability, irreversibility, capacity and suicidality, and of course the intersection between structural vulnerability, mental disorder and medical assistance in dying.

That panel report, an important precursor to our work as a special joint committee, did state that assessors in medical assistance in dying should be able to establish incurability and irreversibility with reference to treatment attempts made; the impacts of those treatments; and the severity of the illness, disease or disability. The incurability of a mental disorder cannot be established in the absence of extensive attempts at interventions with therapeutic aims.

This means that someone who has not had access to adequate care would not be eligible for MAID. Therefore, MAID could never be used as a substitute for good psychiatric care. I think that is an important thing we have to realize. There will be safeguards in place, not only with the Criminal Code, but also, we hope, with the standards of practice.

For patients who are considering this, we want to make sure that there has been a long track record of attempts to deal with their illnesses. At the same time, we have heard very clearly that there are many Canadians and many professionals who feel that additional time is needed to make sure we get this right.

One of the witnesses before our special joint committee was the chair of the Government of Quebec's Select Committee on the Evolution of the Act respecting end-of-life care. She explained that Quebec had decided that MAID for mental disorders as a sole underlying medical condition should not be permitted at this time because of the challenges of determining irremediability, as well as the lack of social consensus. Another level of government, this time the Province of Quebec, is also underlining the concerns that many members of Parliament are expressing here today.

I mentioned the final report that will be tabled in the House, but our committee did release an interim report. That interim report was specifically on this subject matter. I will read from our conclusion. It states:

We must have standards of practice, clear guidelines, adequate training for practitioners, comprehensive patient assessments and meaningful oversight in place for the case of [medical assistance in dying for mental disorders as the sole underlying medical condition]. This task will require the efforts and collaboration of regulators, professional associations, institutional committees and all levels of governments and these actors need to be engaged and supported in this important work.

Although some work is already underway to implement the recommendations of the Expert panel, there is concern that more remains to be done to ensure that all necessary steps have been taken to be ready by the March 2023 deadline...

Again, in our interim report, our special joint committee was already, at that time, expressing concern with the upcoming deadline, and I think it is a smart move that we are moving ahead with Bill C-39. If we back that up with the testimony we heard at committee, we had a number of different witnesses who clearly expressed that they had troubles with this deadline and that those standards of practice were not yet ready.

It needs to be underlined again that, if Bill C-39 is not passed, the original sunset clause of March 17 will come into effect. My vote for this bill is occurring because of that very fact. This is aside from the broader conversation we need to have about medical assistance in dying in general. It is support for a bill that is going to extend the deadline by one year so we can make sure that we get these standards of practice right, so we have the necessary time to engage with the broader community.

Motion That Debate Be Not Further Adjourned

[Alain Therrien, Bloc, La Prairie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I learned something today.

According to tradition, Quebec’s national holiday is celebrated on June 23 and 24. It is true that Parliament usually does not sit on June 23 except in the case of an emergency, which has only ever happened a few times. June 23 is set aside for emergencies.

This motion could easily have been moved sooner, since the government had all the time it needed. The Bloc Québécois has always been ready to collaborate, especially in the case of Bill C-14, for which it set aside two days to allow Parliament to adjourn on Wednesday and Quebec members in the Bloc Québécois and other parties to celebrate with their constituents.

Our request was legitimate. The government vehemently rejected the fact that Quebecers have a national holiday to celebrate this evening and tomorrow. We asked either not to sit on Thursday or to sit with a Friday schedule so that we could leave the House earlier to celebrate Quebec’s national holiday with our people back home. The government refused. Would the same thing have happened if we had to work on June 30?

Order Respecting the Business of the House and its Committees

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

moved:

That, notwithstanding any standing order, special order or usual practice of the House, beginning on Friday, June 24, 2022, and ending on Friday, June 23, 2023:

(a) members may participate in proceedings of the House either in person or by videoconference, provided that members participating remotely be in Canada;

(b) members who participate remotely in a sitting of the House be counted for the purpose of quorum;

(c) provisions in the Standing Orders to the need for members to rise or to be in their place, as well as any reference to the chair, the table or the chamber shall be interpreted in a manner consistent with the virtual and hybrid nature of the proceedings;

(d) the application of Standing Order 17 shall be suspended;

(e) in Standing Orders 26(2), 53(4), 56.1(3), and 56.2(2), the reference to the number of members required to rise be replaced with the word “five”;

(f) the application of Standing Order 62 shall be suspended for any member participating remotely;

(g) documents may be laid before the House or presented to the House electronically, provided that:

(i) documents deposited pursuant to Standing Order 32(1) shall be deposited with the Clerk of the House electronically,

(ii) documents shall be transmitted to the clerk by members prior to their intervention,

(iii) any petition presented pursuant to Standing Order 36(5) may be filed with the clerk electronically,

(iv) responses to questions on the Order Paper deposited pursuant to Standing Order 39 may be tabled electronically;

(h) should the House resolve itself in a committee of the whole, the Chair may preside from the Speaker’s chair;

(i) when a question that could lead to a recorded division is put to the House, in lieu of calling for the yeas and nays, one representative of a recognized party can rise to request a recorded vote or to indicate that the motion is adopted on division, provided that a request for a recorded division has precedence;

(j) when a recorded division is requested in respect of a debatable motion, or a motion to concur in a bill at report stage on a Friday, including any division arising as a consequence of the application of Standing Order 78, but excluding any division in relation to the budget debate, pursuant to Standing Order 84, or the business of supply occurring on the last supply day of a period, other than as provided in Standing Orders 81(17) and 81(18)(b), or arising as a consequence of an order made pursuant to Standing Order 57,

(i) before 2:00 p.m. on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, it shall stand deferred until the conclusion of Oral Questions at that day’s sitting, or

(ii) after 2:00 p.m. on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, or at any time on a Friday, it shall stand deferred until the conclusion of Oral Questions at the next sitting day that is not a Friday,

provided that any extension of time pursuant to Standing Order 45(7.1) shall not exceed 90 minutes;

(k) if a motion for the previous question under Standing Order 61 is adopted without a recorded division, the vote on the main question may be deferred under the provisions of paragraph (j), however if a recorded division is requested on the previous question, and such division is deferred and the previous question subsequently adopted, the vote on the original question shall not be deferred;

(l) when a recorded division, which would have ordinarily been deemed deferred to immediately before the time provided for Private Members’ Business on a Wednesday governed by this order, is requested, the said division is deemed to have been deferred until the conclusion of Oral Questions on the same Wednesday, provided that such recorded divisions be taken after the other recorded divisions deferred at that time;

(m) for greater certainty, this order shall not limit the application of Standing Order 45(7);

(n) when a recorded division is to be held, the bells to call in the members shall be sounded for not more than 30 minutes, except recorded divisions deferred to the conclusion of Oral Questions, when the bells shall be sounded for not more than 15 minutes;

(o) recorded divisions shall take place in the usual way for members participating in person or by electronic means through the House of Commons electronic voting application for all other members, provided that:

(i) electronic votes shall be cast from within Canada using the member’s House-managed mobile device and the member’s personal House of Commons account, and that each vote require visual identity validation,

(ii) the period allowed for voting electronically on a motion shall be 10 minutes, to begin after the Chair has read the motion to the House, and members voting electronically may change their vote until the electronic voting period has closed,

(iii) in the event a member casts their vote both in person and electronically, a vote cast in person take precedence,

(iv) any member unable to vote via the electronic voting system during the 10-minute period due to technical issues may connect to the virtual sitting to indicate to the Chair their voting intention by the House videoconferencing system,

(v) following any concern, identified by the electronic voting system, which is raised by a House officer of a recognized party regarding the visual identity of a member using the electronic voting system, the member in question shall respond immediately to confirm their vote, either in person or by the House videoconferencing system, failing which the vote shall not be recorded,

(vi) the whip of each recognized party have access to a tool to confirm the visual identity of each member voting by electronic means, and that the votes of members voting by electronic means be made available to the public during the period allowed for the vote,

(vii) the process for votes in committees of the whole take place in a manner similar to the process for votes during sittings of the House with the exception of the requirement to call in the members,

(viii) any question to be resolved by secret ballot be excluded from this order,

(ix) during the taking of a recorded division on a private members’ business, when the sponsor of the item is the first to vote and present at the beginning of the vote, the member be called first, whether participating in person or remotely;

(p) during meetings of standing, standing joint, special, special joint, except the Special Joint Committee on the Declaration of Emergency, and legislative committees and the Liaison Committee, as well as their subcommittees, where applicable, members may participate either in person or by videoconference, and provided that priority use of House resources for meetings shall be established by an agreement of the whips and, for virtual or hybrid meetings, the following provisions shall apply:

(i) members who participate remotely shall be counted for the purpose of quorum,

(ii) except for those decided unanimously or on division, all questions shall be decided by a recorded vote,

(iii) when more than one motion is proposed for the election of a chair or a vice-chair of a committee, any motion received after the initial one shall be taken as a notice of motion and such motions shall be put to the committee seriatim until one is adopted,

(iv) public proceedings shall be made available to the public via the House of Commons website,

(v) in camera proceedings may be conducted in a manner that takes into account the potential risks to confidentiality inherent in meetings with remote participants,

(vi) notices of membership substitutions pursuant to Standing Order 114(2) and requests pursuant to Standing Order 106(4) may be filed with the clerk of each committee by email; and

(q) notwithstanding the order adopted on Wednesday, March 2, 2022, regarding the Special Joint Committee on the Declaration of Emergency, until the committee ceases to exist and where applicable,

(i) the committee shall hold meetings in person only should this be necessary to consider any matter referred to it pursuant to subsection 61(2) of the act,

(ii) members who participate remotely shall be counted for the purpose of quorum,

(iii) except for those decided unanimously or on division, all questions shall be decided by a recorded vote,

(iv) in camera proceedings may be conducted in a manner that takes into account the potential risks to confidentiality inherent in meetings with remote participants,

(v) when more than one motion is proposed for the election of the House vice-chairs, any motion received after the initial one shall be taken as a notice of motion and such motions shall be put to the committee seriatim until one is adopted;

that a message be sent to the Senate to acquaint Their Honours that this House has passed this order; and

that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs be instructed to undertake a study on hybrid proceedings and the aforementioned changes to the Standing Orders and the usual practice of the House.

Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise on this motion and talk about the extension of hybrid provisions for one year and the opportunity for the procedure and House affairs committee members to study the issue of either the use or the non-use of those provisions as they deem through their process and their recommendations thereafter.

I will take us back for a moment to March 2020. As the whole business of the pandemic was unfolding, it was about a week before this House shut down when I had a conversation with the House administration at that time asking what the pandemic plan was and what we had on the books. Of course, those who wrote it had put something together, but it became apparent very quickly upon looking at it that the intersection of what was planned with what happened in real life meant that the plan, frankly, was not of much use.

We then began a process, and I want to thank members from all parties, reflecting back on those early days in March 2020, as we attempted to find a way for Canada's Parliament to continue to do its business and to make sure that, notwithstanding the fact that we had this incredible public health emergency that sent people to their homes, Canadians knew that the seat of their democracy continued to function, continued to get bills passed and continued to put supports out there for them.

Before I talk about some of those supports, I want to take a moment to thank the House administration and officials who worked with us to create these tools and innovations to allow our democracy to continue to function. In an incredibly short period of time, an ability was developed to participate and vote virtually. This eventually led to a voting app and other refinements that have enabled members, whether or not they are sick, whether or not they are unable to be at the House for medical or other reasons, to continue to participate in the proceedings of the House and to make sure they are not disenfranchised and their constituents continue to be represented.

Members would remember that Canadians and businesses were reeling in those early days of COVID, and some three million jobs were lost. There was a real state of folks not knowing where things were going to go. Small businesses were left unable to serve their customers and wondering what their future would be. It was specifically because of the provisions we put in place, which all parties worked on with the House administration, that we were able to still get those supports adopted and make historic support available to make sure that businesses and individuals did not fall through the cracks.

Now we see the economy roaring back, and 115% of jobs lost during the pandemic have come back, compared to below 100% for the United States. We see us being a world leader in economic growth, number two in the G7 and trending towards being number one next year. It is absolutely evident that the supports that were put in place to make sure that Canadians did not fall through the cracks were what got us there.

When we think of the bravery of people opening a small business, taking a chance and putting themselves out in the world, putting their shingle out and hoping to survive, there are a lot of things they have to prepare for, such as the possibility that their product may not be as popular as they had hoped, or the long hours that they, and the people they employ, will have to put in to try to make the business successful. Of course, it is not reasonable for folks to expect that a global pandemic will be the thing that shuts them down. It was, in fact, those hybrid provisions that enabled people to get that work done.

The pandemic continues, but before I talk about the continuing pandemic, I will take a moment to talk about all the things that we got done, and not just those historic supports.

As the pandemic came and went, as we thought it was over last November and we thought that things might be returning to a sense of normalcy but we got hit by omicron, the flexibility of Parliament meant that we were able to continue to get the job of the nation done. We can take a look at how much Parliament was able to accomplish from January to June: 14 bills, not including supply, were presented, and we introduced seven bills in the Senate on a range of important issues. Many of the bills that we are passing now or that have just passed through the House are going to the Senate, and it is our hope and expectation, particularly with the great work that was just done on Bill C-28, that the Senate will be able to get that done as well before it rises for the summer. This was all done using the hybrid provisions.

Let us take a look at some of those bills.

Bill C-19 is critical to grow our economy, foster clean technology, strengthen our health care system and make life more affordable for Canadians in areas such as housing and child care.

Bill C-18 would make sure that media and journalists in Canadian digital news receive fair compensation for their work in an incredibly challenged digital environment.

Bill C-11 would require online streaming services to contribute to the creation and availability of Canadian stories and music to better support Canadian artists.

Bill C-21 would protect Canadians from the dangers of firearms in our communities, making sure that we freeze the market on handguns, attack smuggling at the border and implement red flag provisions to address domestic violence.

Bill C-22 was brought forward to reduce poverty among persons with disabilities in Canada and is part of a broader strategy that has seen more than one million Canadians lifted out of poverty. That is particularly remarkable when we think that it was this government that set the first targets ever for poverty reduction. After we set those goals, we have been exceeding them every step of the way, and Bill C-22 is a big part of that strategy.

Bill C-28, which I talked about a minute ago, deals with the extreme intoxication defence. It is a great example of Parliament in a hybrid environment being able to work collaboratively to ensure that we close an important loophole to make sure that the extreme intoxication defence is not used when murder has been committed.

These are just some of the bills that we have been able to put forward, and we have been able to do so in a way that empowered all members of Parliament to be able to participate, whether they had COVID or not.

To give members a sense of the challenges, not only was all of this done using the hybrid system and during the middle of a pandemic, but it was done while dealing with obstruction. We saw all the times the Conservatives obstructed government legislation. In fact, 17 times over the past 14 weeks, the Conservatives used obstruction tactics, using concurrence motions and other tactics to block and obstruct, in many cases, legislation that was supported by three out of the four official parties here. They took the opportunity to obstruct, yet despite that, we have been able to make great progress.

The Conservatives support Bill C-14, yet we ended up spending a night because they were moving motions to hear their own speakers. At the MAID committee looking at medical assistance in dying, where there was incredibly sensitive testimony, witnesses were not able to testify because of the tactics and games that were happening here in this place. However, despite all that, in a hybrid environment we have been able to move forward.

Let us look at last week. Last week there were five members of the Liberal caucus who had COVID, and one of these people was the Prime Minister. I do not know how many members there were in other caucuses, but all were still able to participate in these proceedings. Every day, unfortunately, thousands of Canadians across the country continue to get COVID. Sadly, many of them are in hospitals and, even more tragically, many of them are dying. This pandemic is still very much a reality.

What we have seen over the last two years is that every time we try to start a parliamentary session, we spend weeks debating whether we should or should not continue using the hybrid system. Parliament deserves stability. People are still getting COVID. They have the right to be able to participate in this place, and as has been demonstrated by the incredible amount of work we have been able to get done during the pandemic, from historic supports in the deepest, darkest time of the pandemic to the more recent times dealing with a whole range of legislation that is absolutely critical to Canadians, these provisions allow us to continue to do the work of this nation in extraordinary times.

I do not think we should be in a position such that every time we start Parliament, we continue to have this debate. Canadians need predictability, as we do not know where this pandemic or public health circumstances are going. Canadians need predictability until the House of Commons, through a committee process, can evaluate the utility and usefulness of the provisions outside of a pandemic reality to see if they should be extended or used. We need to have a proper, thorough debate in that venue, hearing from witnesses, hearing from parliamentarians, taking a look at what was accomplished and at what could be done better or differently.

We are already seeing big improvements in everything, from the services that are being delivered to interpretation. I look forward to PROC's work to see whether or not these provisions have utility, but until then, this measure would give us the stability for PROC to do its report and for Parliament to continue to function in incredibly challenging times.

That is why I think it is only prudent to pass this measure now. It is so that Parliament will have the stability to do its work, so Canadians will know this work will not be interrupted, and so we can focus instead on the business of the nation.

Judges Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the member made reference to other legislation, Bill C-5, which is on minimum sentences, and he is very offended by the fact that that legislation was brought forward. Getting rid of minimum sentences does not mean someone who commits an act would get off scot-free. What it does mean is we would be providing more opportunity for judges to use their discretion. Judges, in vast majority, are very well educated and have a very good understanding of the system. They can take a look at the circumstances and are in a better position to be able to give a disposition. I would not want him to give a false impression that, because we are getting rid of minimum sentences, people would get off scot-free. That is just not accurate.

My final thought is regarding the calling of the legislation. Surely to goodness the member would realize that, even though it was introduced and had first reading in December, there are many other legislative agendas. The Conservative Party never approached the government to call for Bill C-9 either. It is here today because the Bill C-14 debate collapsed last night. Bill C-14 was another piece of legislation that was extended because of the Conservative filibuster.

[Tako Van Popta, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would just underline that this is important legislation. This goes to the very foundation of what Canadian society is. We are a nation that is built on the rule of law. For us to feel that we need to hurry this very important piece of legislation through Parliament just because we are all in agreement is something I disagree with.

I was ready to speak to Bill C-14 today. I did not realize that this was so important to the Liberal government that it wanted to have it on the agenda today. It was introduced months ago. Why was it not here earlier? Why are the Liberals now suggesting that we are the ones who are stalling things? This is important legislation. I want it to be fully debated.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was actually up in my office and I came down, because I was listening to the member for Kingston and the Islands speak as though there were some dirty little secret around here as to the way things operate. In fact, last night, through a unanimous consent motion, we actually moved Bill C-14 through the process.

It is the government that actually sets the legislative agenda in this place, and it is the government that put Bill C-9 on the Order Paper today as a matter of business in this House. This bill was introduced in October. These are the first hours of debate, and there are 338 members in this House, who represent millions of voices of Canadians across this country, who have things to say on this bill, maybe to make it a little better.

I am sorry if this taxes the patience of the member for Kingston and the Islands. Perhaps if he does not want to be a member of Parliament, he could go be the president of the local soccer association in his riding. We debate things in this place. This is Parliament.

Does the hon. member believe that the voices of Canadians are important in this place and that debate matters?

Motions in Amendment

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the speech by my colleague from Saanich—Gulf Islands.

I would like her to explain something. On March 2, the Bloc Québécois moved a motion that my colleague supported. The motion sought to maintain Quebec's political weight and not have it lose a seat. The Bloc Québécois then presented Bill C‑246, which was along the same lines as the motion that my colleague supported, but she voted against it.

Today, the government is trying to salvage the situation with Bill C‑14. This bill seeks to preserve the number of seats, but not the political weight, because other seats could be added for other provinces outside Quebec.

I would like my colleague to explain why she voted for the Bloc Québécois motion and then voted against the Bloc Québécois bill.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Mr. Speaker, does the member believe British Columbia should have equal representation in the House of Commons? The band-aid solution we are applying here to Bill C-14 is really just avoiding the big questions our country is facing. Also, I would love to hear some more comments from the member on her interaction with the electoral commission about effective representation in rural Canada.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise this evening to debate Bill C-14.

For those who might just be catching up on what Bill C-14 is, it deals with an updating of the grandfather clause of the Constitution from 1867, as reset in 1985. I think at some point in this place we should put forward a grandmother clause. I was just looking at some of my other female colleague MPs in this place.

The grandfather clause says that this is what it is and we are going to keep it the way it was. What we are doing with this bill is saying that the composition of Parliament will not drop below the seat count of the 43rd Parliament. That is basically what we have now: 338 MPs, of which 78 are from Quebec and 121 are from Ontario. My home province of British Columbia will have no fewer than 42 seats going forward under the new, as I rename it, “grandmother clause”.

There are a number of issues to unpack in this bill. The primary one is that the bill is making sure that Quebec does not lose any seats in the current decennial review of representation by population and that we are more or less representing the same numbers of people across the country.

This is no easy effort. This is very difficult. I just attended the public hearing in Victoria, B.C., and the Electoral Boundaries Commission for British Columbia was just proposing to add another seat because population redistribution is adding relatively more people to British Columbia than to some other provinces. The commission is proposing to add the new seat in interior British Columbia, which would have a big effect on the members forKamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon and Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola. It would have very little impact on my own riding, but going through that process of staring at the riding map and speaking about representation by population put me very much in mind of some other ideas.

In fact, when I spoke at the public hearing in Victoria about the riding boundaries and the proposals of the Electoral Boundaries Commission, I asked them whether, in the interests of democracy, it is really in the interests of our constituents to add more MPs to the House of Commons year on year? I said to them that when I was first elected to this place in 2011, in the Parliament that I joined and in which I had the honour to stand in Centre Block for the first time, we had 308 members; now we have 338. Does that increase in numbers add to the representation of our constituents, or does it dilute it? Is the notion of adding an MP here and there really effective in representation?

As has come up recently in this debate tonight, I think about our colleagues who represent vast territories. The member of Parliament for Skeena—Bulkley Valley has a territory that I think is two times the size of Germany, but I may be wrong. I remember his predecessor, Nathan Cullen, saying something like that fairly often. When a riding is two times the size of Germany, it is very hard to get around.

Our colleague from Nunavut has an electoral district that takes in three time zones. It is an enormous territory, and commercial aircraft will not get people from one end to the other. They have to either hire private planes or fly from Iqaluit to Ottawa and then go up to Inuvik. It is not easy, and given current demographic trends, the population of Nunavut is not going to be the equivalent of my riding of Saanich—Gulf Islands, which, under the current proposal from the Electoral Boundaries Commission, would represent 122,000 people, or more than four times the population of Nunavut.

Let us think about what we could do to be creative. I said to the Electoral Boundaries Commission that much more important for democracy and representation by population would be fair voting, proportional representation, so that every voter knows that their vote is going to count. At that point, the very professional, hard-working team that is the Electoral Boundaries Commission for British Columbia said that this is beyond their area.

I take it to my colleagues here because it is specifically our area.

What is in the interest of democracy in the 21st century? Is it that we continue to add MPs to pile into this place? I suggest that when we look at the House of Westminster and the Commons chamber there, there are no desks because there is no room. If every MP showed up, they would not fit in the room because 650 MPs would be trying to squeeze into a chamber that would be perfect for about half that number. If we constantly add more MPs, we add to the cost of this place.

Would average Canadians feel they are better served by continually adding to the cost of the House of Commons or by my alternate proposal? It would be less costly to the taxpayer and I believe more efficient in properly representing our constituents if, depending on population, what is called the member's office budget, or MOB, was expanded. It would mean that we would not add more MPs, but MPs who represented higher population areas would be able to have more constituency staff to handle the casework, to make sure that the level of representation we give our constituents is beyond gold standard.

That is what we want to do. We want to be able to respond to the constituents who say they have been on the phone with Service Canada for nine hours, only to be hung up on and the call dropped. We do not have enough people in my office to deal with every single case that comes up, but we try.

What I would propose is that we look at the job of a member of Parliament. We do two things in this place. As our opening prayer by the Speaker suggests, we pass laws and make wise decisions, or at least we try. We debate public policy, as we are doing tonight. We also serve, in a completely different way, our constituents in a non-partisan way. We help them with their pensions, their passports, their unemployment insurance, their disabilities, the CRA, their need for help. We all have our issues. We work really hard to help our constituents.

Would we not have better representation if we did not just add to the number of members of Parliament in this place, but expanded the resources for those who are challenged by large population numbers or huge distances? A member of Parliament with a huge terrain to cover would have the budget to have offices in more locations to be more convenient for constituents. Representation by population may not be the most democratic way to ensure that Canadian democracy thrives.

Regardless of political stripe, we should all be troubled by what just happened in Ontario. Almost 60% of eligible voters did not turn out to vote. There are a number of theories for why that happened. That means a majority government that got 40% of the vote of the 43% of people who showed up elected a majority without the majority of public support. In fact, the Doug Ford government in Ontario has the active support, as measured by who went out to vote for him, of 18% of the Ontario public.

I am not blaming Doug Ford. The first-past-the-post voting system does not encourage voting. It is the minority of countries, by the way, that use first past the post. Countries with fair voting see people interested in turning out to vote.

Voter turnout in countries that use a proportional voting system is higher than in countries like ours, with our current voting system.

We could make a really big difference if we revived the Prime Minister's 2015 election campaign promise that 2015 would be the last election under first past the post. It is hard to revive that because we had elections in 2019 and 2021, but we could. We could and we should ask what is in the interest of democracy today. Is it adding more MPs to this place, increasing the cogs in the wheels of large political machines where people show up here and are told how to vote by their party whips, or is it making it more democratic by ensuring that everyone here and that Parliament as a whole represent accurately the way Canadians actually voted?

It is not too late to make this change. It is urgent.

I want to close the discussion on Bill C-14 by bringing us back to more fundamental questions: Can we improve the services we provide to our constituents? Can we ensure this place does not just expand forever as we have more population? Can we deliver real democracy that inspires Canadians?

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, I also have a chance to speak to Bill C-14 later tonight, but as the conversation has been unfolding tonight, new ideas come to mind, and I would like to try some out on the member for Elmwood—Transcona.

When we think about our friend, the member for Nunavut, who is a spectacular member of Parliament, we know that one cannot get from Iqaluit to Inuvik without flying to southern Canada first, unless one hires a private plane. The population is sparse, but the job is enormous. What would the hon. member think about us changing representation by population to something that includes funding for individual MPs reflective of what their actual costs are from serving the people of their riding? This would apply to people in about half of the country. If we cut it off, about half of the territory of this enormous country is represented by 12 MPs. Their jobs are very different from those of the people who represent more concentrated, southern Canadian populations.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise this evening to participate in the debate on Bill C‑14.

The NDP has long supported the principle that Quebec should maintain a consistent proportion of the seats in the House of Commons. That is not what Bill C‑14 would do, but we think that this bill is nevertheless important, to ensure that no ground is lost while we hold a broader debate on the proportion of seats. That is why this bill is worthwhile, and it is urgent, in light of the pending electoral distribution.

We must choose to ensure that the new seats reflect the number of seats that we want Quebec to have at the end of this process. Time is of the essence and we must make a decision. It is not a perfect one, but it is the right decision under the circumstances.

This has been an interesting debate. We have heard a lot about representation and some of the important principles that undergird the Canadian electoral system. We know that already in the House of Commons, representation by population is not the only consideration. Just as an example, provinces cannot have fewer seats in the House of Commons than they have in the Senate. That is already a departure from representation by population. We also know that rural areas tend to be weighted differently in order to ensure that there continues to be a strong role representation in the House of Commons, beyond what representation by population would dictate. Those are just a couple of examples of the way in which representation by population is not the only way that we determine representation in Canada, so there are certainly precedents for looking at other departures from representation by population.

Sometimes people get quite animated in this place during those debates. We just saw an example of that, and we have seen examples from folks in other parties as well who get pretty animated. We have seen some very spirited defences of representation by population, particularly from some of the western Conservative members. That is fair enough. We come here to represent our constituents and the points of view that people have on these matters, and they are rightly an object of concern.

I do think it is important to try to have these debates with a bit of humility, though, because they are very important and foundational debates. For instance, I look at the current Conservative leadership race, and I note with interest that, in their own system, representation by population is not the rule. That is fair enough. Different parties do that differently. In the NDP, we have a one member, one vote system. We do not have any kind of weighting.

In the Conservative Party, they have chosen to have a weighting. That is something that defies representation by population, presumably for good reason. I am not saying the Conservatives should not do that, and I am not saying that they should. What I am saying is that they have made a choice to forego strict representation by population because, presumably, they think it matters to have a proportionate weighting of voices from across the country in the selection of their leader.

Also, when we talk about representation in this place, we sometimes talk about the voting system we have. I have heard Conservatives take very strong positions on that, defending the balloting system that we have and defending the first-past-the-post system that we have. Folks can correct me during questions and comments if I am wrong, but I note with interest that I believe the Conservatives are going to have a preferential ballot in the Conservative leadership race. That is something the Conservatives are very much against in other contexts, but they have seen it to be appropriate for their leadership. Not only are they going to have a preferential ballot, but they are also going to have a preferential ballot that informs a proportional system because leadership candidates will get a number of votes within their riding association proportionate to the percentage of votes they got out of that system. Then, presumably, based on the alternative ballot, as some people fall off, those votes will be successively redistributed within that riding through the points system until they elect a leader.

I note also that the Conservatives are doing this uniquely by mail-in ballot, which is something I listened to many Conservatives talk about in a filibuster at the procedure and House affairs committee in the last Parliament. They were very clear then that they felt mail-in ballots led to fraudulent electoral outcomes. Here we are.

We have a Conservative Party that is using a preferential ballot in a non-representation-by-population system to have proportionate outcomes in a mail-in process, which is why I encourage us to speak to these issues here in the House with some humility, because I think that, in fact, depending on the context, various members do support different kinds of electoral principles.

That is why I think we should be able to have this conversation in a responsible way, in the way I think Canadians would expect mature adults to try to have those conversations: not demonize each other because of the kinds of positions we are putting forward, but try to hear what is important and of value in the other person's position and then try to hammer out a compromise, as was the case originally in 1867. There were compromises made that did not satisfy everyone at the time but that managed to move the Canadian project forward, and there have been many compromises since that have not been perfect and certainly have not pleased everyone. However, Canada has been a constant activity and a constant project of trying to seek consensus and agreement. As difficult as that is, I think it is actually Canada's strength.

We live in a world right now that is rife with conflict. We live in a world right now where people are choosing to end conversation and negotiation in favour of polarization and violence. One of the things that I think have been great about Canada, for all its many faults, because it is not a perfect place, has been its ability to find a way, even among very different peoples, languages, cultures and histories, to take on these important questions of political representation and find a path toward compromise.

We have a lot more work to do. We have work to do in the case of Quebec, which continues to see its proportion of seats decline in the House of Commons, despite its special status within Confederation with its own language, culture, history and contributions. We are also reckoning now, in a much more vigorous way, and appropriately so, with indigenous peoples, and there are questions of political representation that come up with respect to indigenous peoples as well, which is something we have not done a good job of at all in Canada in so many ways over the years. We have had no formal representation of indigenous peoples in this place, and there are no seats set aside. That is a conversation for another day, too.

What I think is important about Bill C-14 is that it is bringing people together from all sides of the chamber to recognize that while we have these larger debates, which are important debates and I do hope we will find good ways of having those debates where we treat each other well and work together on this project of constant negotiation that is Canada, we can at least agree that we should not be taking any steps backwards. I think that, at the very least, this law, if it should pass, would prevent us from taking steps backwards, even as we try to find our way forward.

We are not there yet. I think the debate around this bill has shown the extent to which we are not there in certain regards. However, I think it has been a positive exercise for this place to have occasion to talk about representation in Canada, what it does mean now and what it can mean in the future, and to have been able to do it in the context of a bill that, for all its imperfections and for all the legitimate criticism there is of it, has largely brought people together, because I think it has allowed for a better and a more responsible conversation than we sometimes have in this place.

I am thankful for that, and I am anxious to see this bill pass quickly, because of the time constraints we are under with the boundary redistribution process already taking place. As we head further into the 21st century and face many great challenges, both large challenges that are planetary, in terms of climate change, and also real political challenges here at home, I hope this is a down payment on a better debate for how we find new and better ways of ensuring that all the voices of Canadians are represented in their right proportion here in the House of Commons to build a prosperous future for all of us.