Canadian Heritage Committee on March 4th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

I'm going to call this meeting to order.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair. The members of this committee would be in possession of a notice of motion that the clerk circulated on my behalf. I would like that motion dealt with at the beginning of the committee because I want it dealt with today. I think that's reasonable. I would be happy to remain at committee for additional time to make sure that all the witnesses get their full hour.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Do I have unanimous consent?

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

No, you don't have it.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

You don't have to have unanimous consent.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Well, you can vote if you want.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

It's up to the chair.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

You can go in camera and ask everybody to vote.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

You don't have to go in camera for a motion.

[Carole Lavallée, Bloc, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I do not understand the motion brought forward by my colleague, Mr. Del Mastro. Is it the one about extremists, or the other one that deals with the committee's future business?

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I'm happy to read the motion for the benefit of the committee.

[Carole Lavallée, Bloc, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

No, just tell me what the subject is.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

I'm going to make a decision. Let's deal with the motion. We have witnesses here. Let's deal with the motion and we can dispose of the motion.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Would you like to read the motion?

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I'd like to read the motion. The motion reads:

That the Committee condemns extremists, financed by the Bloc, for their threats of violence against Quebecers; that the Committee condemns the racism and violence promoted by Pierre Falardeau, Patrick Bourgeois, and other extremists, whom the Bloc has financed; that the House of Commons find a way to ban extremist groups like these, which advocate violence and racism, from receiving funds from the Parliament of Canada.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Okay, we've heard the motion.

Mr. Rodriguez.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I think it's a shame we have to debate this kind of motion now, particularly since our witnesses are already here. We will do what the Parliamentary Secretary wants and hope that it doesn't take too long.

The Liberal Party is against this motion. The Conservatives are engaging in precisely the kind of behaviour that they attribute to the Bloc Québécois—namely, extremism. If the Conservative Party is having so much trouble in Quebec, it is certainly because of motions like this one. I personally believe that the Bloc Québécois was not quick enough to distance itself from some of the more extremist elements. But to then say that the Bloc supports extremism and racism, as the Conservative motion suggests, is a whole other matter. They are going too far; they have crossed the line. That is why Quebeckers won't have anything to do with them. This motion is utterly futile and useless, and the Liberal Party will not support it. I hope we can quickly put it to a vote.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Mr. Angus.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I find that the motion to me is very ugly mischief. It's an attempt to stir up discord in our committee when we have important business to do. I think there's absolutely no merit to it. I'm actually surprised that the parliamentary secretary would speak like that. I find it fundamentally offensive, so I'd rather just vote and get it over with so we can get back to the important business of our committee.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I'd like to respond to the comments by Mr. Angus. Mr. Angus wasn't present for the meetings where Mr. Juneau provided testimony to this committee. Over 80% of the advertising revenue for the newspaper Le Québécois came from the PQ and the BQ. There were specific statements made in that paper that were offensive. They were offensive to minority communities within Canada and certainly within Quebec, and there were articles written that specifically incited or encouraged acts of violence around the Quebec battlefields and the events that were scheduled to commemorate the Battle of the Plains of Abraham.

Frankly, I think the members of this committee would be well served to support this motion. I think it's based on Parliament holding up the values that I believe we espouse as parliamentarians.

Call the question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Thank you.

Madame Lavallée, go ahead. Your name was on the list.

[Carole Lavallée, Bloc, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

In my opinion, this motion is perfectly ridiculous. Everyone knows that committing acts of violence, advocating violence and associating with extremists is just not part of the Bloc's DNA. We have been around since 1990, and have never made comments such as this. Mr. Poilievre is the one who tabled this motion a week ago. And I thought to myself that this was just the sort of thing that he would do. I saw him move similar motions in the Ethics Committee. He would take shortcuts around some of the facts. He was good at what is known as sophistry. So I said to myself that it had to have come from him.

At the same time, I have to say I was even more astonished and disappointed to see that Mr. Del Mastro was resurrecting this motion. I was that much more disappointed when I saw that you were withdrawing that motion to draft and move another one. Those three steps in the process seem even more ridiculous than actually thinking of moving a motion like this.

I want to come back to a couple of points. Last week, Mr. Poilievre made a number of false statements. First of all, he referred to the newspaper Le Québécois. You can have a look at it. You will see that it is not radioactive. You won't be in any way contaminated. You can even read it. As a general rule, Mr. Poilievre has a very good command of French but, in this case, some of the subtleties escaped him. I believe he mistranslated some of the sentences in Mr. Falardeau's text. He said that Mr. Falardeau had compared Mr. Obama to Lassie. That is utterly untrue. I think you should read what he wrote and see how it is written, in order to understand its subtleties. He said that it was full of racist comments, but that is not the case. Unless he considers Mario Dumont to be a racist. In fact, the sentence he quoted…

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, unfortunately we do have a number of witnesses here who've had to travel across the country to give testimony today. I think it would probably be wise, in light of their attendance here, to call the question on this and dispose of it so that we can proceed with our witnesses. This motion is clearly stalling them--