Yes, I would, simply to introduce the debate, Mr. Chairman. As you say, it's irrelevant to me where in the order of routine motions this would find itself, should it succeed.
The reason I felt compelled to introduce this motion today, Mr. Chairman, is that it has come to my attention, through careful observation over the last three or four years, that there's been a gradual diminishing and deterioration of the conventional ways in which we've conducted ourselves, both in the House and in committee.
Notwithstanding what happens in the House of Commons, House of Commons standing committees were for a long time maybe the last bastion of some semblance of inter-party, non-partisan cooperation. Members of Parliament left their political baggage at the door, if you will, when they came into a parliamentary committee and we conducted ourselves in such a way that we were acting in the best interests of the country and in the best interests of making the best legislation that we possibly could.
That notion finds its origins in the premise that no one has a monopoly on good ideas. All of us, as members of Parliament, whether we're on government side or on opposition side, have a contribution to make on behalf of the people we represent, and that many bills that come before the House of Commons benefit not only from robust analysis and debate in the House of Commons, but also benefit from the amendments made at parliamentary committees. In fact, you could even point out, and it's worth putting on the record, that the opposition members in this particular Parliament represent more Canadians than the government side represents. We represent the majority of Canadians, if you will, in that the majority government, as legitimate as it is, won with 39% of the vote.
It's offensive to the sensibilities of anyone who calls themselves a democrat to deny the opportunity for those of us who represent Canadians who did not vote for the Conservative government, and by extension did not give a mandate to a certain legislative agenda to the Conservative government, to have their legitimate concerns heard and, in fact, debated and voted on in public—not in camera, in public.
I've been here for 16 years. I was a member of Parliament during Liberal majority governments. I was a member of Parliament during Liberal minority governments. I was here during a Conservative minority government. And now I represent my constituency here in a Conservative majority government. I can tell you, it was never this way.
I don't want ordinary Canadians to think this is the new normal, that parliamentary committees go slamming behind the shroud of secrecy every time anything of any controversy comes up and, in fact, not even when anything controversial comes up. Whenever it's convenient for the government side to go behind closed doors, they invoke the in camera rule which, as you know as an experienced chairman, Mr. Chairman, is non-debatable. As soon as a member on the other side doesn't like the tone or doesn't like the content of what's being said by a member on the opposition side, they get the floor, they move the in camera rule, everyone has to leave the room, the cameras get turned off, and whatever else happens is done in complete secrecy.
There's simply no justification for secrecy to be the default position of a standing committee of the House of Commons, yet that's become gradually, incrementally, the norm. I won't say the accepted norm, because those of us on this side of the benches do not accept it as desirable or normal. In fact, we will do all we can to try and turn this back to the way it used to be, to the more conservative approach where openness is the default position, not secrecy.
Mr. Chairman, it's more in sadness than in anger that I have to move this motion today.
In my tenure as a member of Parliament, and remembering back to those times when it was a Liberal majority government—and I'm not trying to blow any smoke up the kilt of the Liberals here—I'm just saying that I used to be the lone member, the lone NDP member, sitting where Gerry is sitting now. I would sometimes—not always, and maybe not often—but sometimes I would move an amendment to a piece of legislation, and if that amendment had merits, and I could defend the idea, it would succeed. But I think you're aware that not a single amendment to a single piece of legislation has been allowed in the entire 41st Parliament. Not one.
Is it possible that one party has a monopoly on everything that's good and true, and the rest of us, who represent the majority of Canadians, don't have a single idea of any merit whatsoever? I don't think anyone here would try to maintain that position. Why, then, is it impossible to get an amendment through and why, then, does every debate and every issue of any substance have to go behind closed doors?
Now I may, in fact, add one thing to this motion that I recommended here today, if that would be in order. I may wait until others have spoken. There's an argument for allowing one more category where I believe it would be justifiable to go in camera, and that would be for technical briefings.
There are times when this committee or others invite Treasury Board Secretariat officials to give us an explanation or to have a Q and A, if you will, for committee members. Nobody wants to look dumb on television, so we should be free to ask the simplest of questions. For that example of Treasury Board officials, perhaps it would be justified to go in camera when we have one of these tutorials, one of these educational sessions with officials from Treasury Board or any of the agencies or institutions that report to this committee. I'd certainly entertain that as a friendly amendment or be inclined to argue the same point myself.
But you can see the purpose of my intervention here today, Mr. Chairman. Things have changed very dramatically since the Conservatives won their majority government. Never, never before in the history of Parliament have we seen omnibus bills, for instance, used the way they are today. It used to be that when there was a piece of legislation that had consequential impact on other pieces of legislation, you'd cluster those together into one bill. Essentially, it was the same point you were trying to make, it was just spread over a number of different departmental jurisdictions. That was the accepted usage that you'd find in the House of Commons Procedure and Practice, whether it's O'Brien and Bosc or Marleau or going back throughout the years. Now we have omnibus bills that include everything and the kitchen sink thrown all together, with no opportunity to give a thorough, robust analysis, due diligence, or debate on any one of the important things that come up in there, and then they'll move closure.
Again, I don't want anybody in Canada to ever think that it's normal. That is not normal. It's an affront to everything good and decent about our Westminster parliamentary system, but yet it's imposed on us again and again. By extension, that same omnibus piece of legislation, which may seek to amend 70 pieces of legislation at once, comes before parliamentary committees with very, very limited opportunity for witnesses. Then, any time it gets even remotely controversial or an opposition member tries to do their obligation to scrutinize and examine it in any thorough way, down comes the black shroud of secrecy again, and we're forced to work behind closed doors. Not only are we forced to conduct our business behind closed doors, but we're never allowed to talk about it again or we'd find ourselves called before the bar and facing sanctions from the Speaker for violating the in camera rule.
So if you have any respect at all for the in camera rule, you should be one of those people who opposes abusing that rule for their own self-interest, Mr. Chairman.
I'm optimistic that enough fellow members of the committee agree that the in camera rule should be used as an exception, not as a rule, in rare circumstances where we can justify it and defend it. I've listed five here and I'm open to the possibility of adding, as I say, the technical advisers, when we have that sort of a meeting, to do it behind closed doors as well.
Having said that, I'd be interested in hearing whatever other MPs have to say, so if you have a speakers list I will yield the floor.
Thank you.