Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Nov. 21st, 2006

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

You also raised a pertinent question. I did not run for Speaker, I withdrew my name, so my comment here is very disinterested. It is my opinion, like Mr. Proulx, that the Speaker has—and I am not referring specifically to the current Speaker, Mr. Milliken—under the current Rules, all the necessary latitude to act.

I am very critical of Speakers who do not use the Rules enough.

However, you raised an interesting point, that there should be collaboration from the House leaders and whips, because they are responsible for discipline in the House, and collaboration from the party leaders. There should be complicity.

I remember raising the issue of repeated applause at the meeting of leaders and whips. In the end, because time is a variable that cannot stretched or compressed, the small parties, the third and fourth parties, lose their opportunity to ask questions. I brought this up at the meeting of leaders and whips. The next day the situation was even worse. They stood up 11 times. It’s as if raising the issue aggravates the situation.

What I learned from that is that achieving the collaboration that is needed is an exercise that requires a commitment from everyone.

[Robert Marleau]

May I make a comment? Perhaps Madam Champagne would like to add a few words, because she has more experience in the Chair than I do.

The matter of applause and ovations that replaced the thumping of desks, once the debates began to be broadcast, is another problem. This problem can be resolved quite easily by means of the Rules. If the government makes an excessive use of applause, you add time to Question Period. If the opposition is excessive, you cut time from Question Period. That is a technique rather than the Speaker’s authority. The Speaker cannot make 150 members who are all standing and shouting sit down. He must wait for them to calm down before acting.

However, I am not here to defend the Speaker. Madam Champagne, who has first-hand experience, will perhaps want to add something.

[Senator the Hon. Andrée Champagne]

With regard to the various tools available to a Speaker, I was thinking of one thing. A long time ago, I found myself in a situation where it had been decided to not recognize someone until he apologized for using improper language. It was at the end of the second reading of a Bill, late in the afternoon. Everyone was getting ready to vote. It was the question and comments period, to be followed by the resumption of the debate. The only person to stand up was the person who could not speak.

“Is the House ready for the question?”

The points of order then began. Someone had stood, and I could scarcely say that I had not seen anyone. The Speaker must be given another tool than having to say that he or she has seen no one, when everyone watching on television could see the person standing. There is a problem. What is a poor Speaker to do? I experienced it, and I remember that I was quite uncomfortable.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you very much.

Monsieur Godin, seven minutes, please.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair

I think that if I had been Speaker and the only person to stand up had been the one being punished, I would have continued and called for a vote, since all the other political parties could stand up. This means you did not have the support of the other political parties. Parliament was challenging the Speaker.

The current situation has become untenable: Canadians, and as well as teachers who come from everywhere to visit Parliament, say they no longer want to take children there. We have reached that point.

Mr. Marleau, I must say that I disagree with you. I will tell you on what point. You say that the Speaker has a list of names of the people who will make interventions and does not have the power—because of the list of political parties—to refuse anyone the right to speak.

In the meanwhile, in terms of statements, if a member stands in the House of Commons—he has not committed a crime, because he has not been sexist or done anything of the sort—and says he wants to recognize the presence of John Smith in the gallery, he is punished for 30 days. Yet, the political party gives the Speaker a list setting out who will make a statement in the House of Commons.

So how can the Speaker say that he has the power to prevent a member from making a statement for 30 days, but that during Question Period, because of a list provided by the political parties, he can’t do so, and he has the same list?

[Robert Marleau]

I will refer to the decision made by Madam Sauvé in the early 1980s. She had said that she would accept a list for Question Period, but not for members’ statements. This is a technical detail. With regard to the specific situation you bring up, I don’t know.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

So we should be prudent is what you’re saying. I’m sorry, but the story of Mr. Jay Hill’s vote is a problem for me. If the person who calls someone else by any name wants to vote, he or she should stand up and apologize. If this person makes the government lose the vote, it’s up to the Prime Minister to reprimand him. He’ll do his work after the fact. That way, we could perhaps do our work. It’s that simple. We can’t start insulting people and being impolite. The whip would have the power to suggest to a member that he or she go back to the House before the vote, call for a question of order and apologize, because his or her vote will be needed that night.

We believe the member should apologize. If he does, he can continue to carry out his duties. But if he says he will not apologize, because he wants to appear on television newscasts, in my opinion, let him. It doesn’t mean that everyone in his riding will agree him and he may have to pay a political price.

If he gets his name on the national news every week because he is unable to conduct himself properly and he insults people, he will pay the political price.

We keep passing the buck by saying we don’t have the power, while the Speaker says it’s the responsibility of the political parties to discipline their members. We are not the speakers of the House of Commons.

I have been president of a union. I had 1,000 people in a room, and if someone did not want to abide by the rules of the meeting, I would ask the sergeant-at-arms to throw him out, because the meeting had to go on. After being expelled once or twice, they did not want to get thrown out, they wanted to participate.

Being too polite is a crutch. It’s reached a point where the people who come here wonder what kind of organization the Parliament is. We are supposed to be the leaders of our country, and people can’t even bring students in to watch us. We’ve reached this point because we’re too polite and we don’t want to take action.

Madam Champagne, I have to say that when that person stood up, it was up to the other political parties to stand up. So you should have continued and put the question to the vote.

[Andrée Champagne]

That’s what we did.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Perfect, there was nothing wrong with that.

[Andrée Champagne]

There were questions of order for a few minutes; there was nothing we could do.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

That’s not serious. If we decide to continue acting in this way, I assure you that Canadians won’t accept it for long, because we are not running our Parliament properly. We have to get past the tempest of quarrels and fights in Parliament. I believe that in this way, we will be able to restore order.

[Andrée Champagne]

Mr. Godin, you say it’s not serious that there were questions of order for 20 minutes in a row? If you’re ever in the Speaker’s Chair at some point, you will see that it may not be serious, but it’s not pleasant, either for the Speaker or for the people who are trying to get something done in Parliament.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

But in that case, don’t you think, Madam Champagne, that this type of situation could force the political party to speak to its members and call them to order? It will become necessary if the political party wants to stop wasting time. Now it’s too easy.

[Robert Marleau]

Mr. Chair, I would say to Mr. Godinthat we are not in complete disagreement.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you.

[Robert Marleau]

I’d say that you are using much more specific language than I am. I’m not criticizing you for adopting this position. On the contrary, I agree with you.

In the beginning, I believed it was a partnership between the Speaker and the leadership, and that if the Speaker made a decision about a political faction, the other political factions should support the Speaker’s authority, instead of joining together, so that the Speaker—

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

But at the time, wasn’t the Speaker in question appointed by the Prime Minister of Canada?

[Robert Marleau]

It was a vote of the House, a secret vote.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Let us imagine, for example, that the political parties abide by the Rules and the Speaker is given a list. If the latter has imposed disciplinary measures against a member and the latter is removed from the list, the Speaker can no longer say that the list is a problem.

[Robert Marleau]

It would be very easy to make a small change to the Rules and express that very idea as the will of the House.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

: Do you think it would improve things?

[Robert Marleau]

I think it wouldn’t hurt, but I must repeat: think twice about it before writing the rule.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

If we have to think twice about everything that goes on in the House, nothing would get done.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Okay.

Thank you very much, colleagues. That ends our first round.

We're going to move to the second round, which is five minutes. Again, just a reminder to keep your comments short; you'll get better answers.

Madame Jennings first, and then Mr. Lukiwski.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

Monsieur Marleau, in response to some of the questions, you said on the one hand that you believe the Speaker has more or less sufficient authority to deal with almost all situations of misconduct, but that in some instances there are no consequences to the authority exercised by the Speaker. You gave the U.K. as an example. When the Speaker expels a member of Parliament from the chamber of the House of Commons there, that member of Parliament is excluded from the entire parliamentary precinct. Is that something you think this committee should think seriously about--the wisdom of possibly adding that as a consequence to expulsion from the chamber?