Yes, I'm sorry, Mario Silva. I do that all the time.
We didn't give Mr. Silva the opportunity to come before the subcommittee because no provision was made for that in the rules. I'm not so sure that as we move forward we should not give serious consideration to some kind of change perhaps to the Standing Orders, or perhaps simply the practices of the subcommittees when dealing with these matters.
Looking back to the previous Parliament, I had a motion that had gone before the subcommittee. I was selected high enough in the order that my motion got dealt with and it was brought before the subcommittee. They had questions, not on whether it was similar to a previous motion on the order paper, but on the subject of whether it was unconstitutional, that is to say, outside of federal jurisdiction. I learned about this because the subcommittee sought additional information from the researchers at the Library of Parliament. Therefore, there was a second meeting specifically on the subject of my motion.
I was alarmed by this, unnecessarily, as it turned out. I thought that perhaps they weren't going to give it a fair hearing, and I felt, incorrectly, at the time that this might be like a closed court of star chamber where I would not have a chance to defend my motion. So I actually came to the meeting and sat in on it. As it turned out, it was a very brief meeting. They just dealt with it. They had a report back to the library that said they thought this was constitutional. They then said to let it go forward.
So there's no provision that says you can't come and sit in. I'm not sure I could have sat in and asked to be a witness. That might have gone too far. But that is what has happened because we've gone in camera.
What used to happen with the subcommittee, under the old rules--this is going back to the 37th Parliament--was a very different process. At that time, you had to convince them to make your bill or motion votable. They were all automatically non-votable, something the Canadian Alliance, of which I was then a member, did not support. I think Mr. Godin actually recalls this with some accuracy. I don't know if we wanted to make everything votable under all circumstances; we certainly wanted to narrow the criteria by which something could be designated non-votable, and of course we wanted to reverse the onus. It would be votable unless deemed otherwise.
But at that time there were five criteria, one of which was, effectively, that this item might bring the House into disrepute by its very consideration. That, of course--we're turning now to the theme that Madam Redman was discussing earlier--is where you can see the danger that's involved if you start having a subsidiary body, in this case a subcommittee, effectively determining.... The very consideration of this would lead our parent body to fall into disrepute.
I think we can, in a mature manner, deal with any question whatsoever without falling into disrepute. It's the manner in which we deal with it that could cause us to fall into disrepute; it's not the actual fact that a question was brought before the House of Commons. We are a sovereign body, and in this country we have chosen to hedge ourselves around with a written Constitution that prohibits us from passing certain pieces of legislation that might be unconstitutional, or rather, forbids those pieces of legislation from standing. They could be struck down as being without force or effect. We've also limited the items we've split our sovereignty under. It's classic federalist theory. The provinces are sovereign bodies over many important issues--health care and so on.
Nonetheless, we are a sovereign body. We come from a body, the House of Commons at Westminster, or more correctly, the whole Parliament at Westminster, which is itself an absolute body with absolute authority without any constraints whatsoever other than its own functions. And that body has ruled in that capacity and without any restrictions on it, at the very least, since the glorious revolution of 1689. And it has given the longest period of stability, quite literally, of any country in the world. That suggests that it's a pretty good model.
Other countries, like ours, have put some limits on themselves, but not all countries. New Zealand has governed itself with an absolutely sovereign parliament and has shown itself able to do so.
So it's the manner in which we deal with the questions rather than the questions themselves that is the area that could be potentially problematic. But I don't think there's any need for us to worry about any mandate to be excessively deferential to any subcommittee.
I would suggest here that we could have people come to present their cases to the subcommittee. It might actually give additional authority to the subcommittee's hearings. It also has the advantage that the individual could come, then--if we stuck with the current rules--as Mr. Silva did, before the full committee and represent the case. It might actually be helpful to them to have a sense from the earlier meeting as to what the objections were. I remember that Mr. Silva had, I thought, a perfectly valid point when he said that he didn't really know what the charges against him were. This had been dealt with at a subcommittee and he hadn't been at that subcommittee. Its meetings were held in camera, so he hadn't been able to review the minutes.
I'm not actually sure. It would be an interesting question as to whether Mr. Silva, who is not a member of that subcommittee, could have gone and examined the minutes of the subcommittee meeting in the manner that a member of a committee that has been in camera can examine them after the fact. It would seem to me to be logical that such a right be given in the future so that individuals can come and make a more fulsome presentation before the whole committee of their case.
That's something perhaps for future consideration for this committee; we could consider making a report back to the House on that particular subject as we go through the process of making this process into a more perfect process, to borrow the words from the American constitution, which talks about making its own constitution amendable in order to create a more perfect union in the future. The same rule can apply to how we govern ourselves. That's very important.
The whole process we have here means we go from the subcommittee, in which we meet by one process in camera, to an open meeting of the committee as a whole, which deals with things by a majority vote. We then go to a very different process. We go to the House of Commons. It indicates just how solicitous the previous Parliament that changed these rules was trying to be of the rights of individual members. We go to a vote in the House of Commons, assuming we can get the support of members of at least, in our case, three parties--a majority of the parties in the House of Commons. You have to have at least five MPs sign on, not to show that there's there's a massive level of support, but that there is some support. These are people who are willing to publicly identify themselves with...not necessarily the bill, but with the merits of the consideration of the relevant bill, based on the Standing Orders.
The chairman was just pointing out relevance, and I'm just trying to indicate the nature of the discussion here. It deals not so much at this point with Bill C-415, but with the admissibility of Bill C-415.
I think you're right, and that I've gone a bit roundabout in my discussion, but the whole question of admissibility and what we do here is not necessarily the final decision. I think that indicates the degree to which one can vote in this committee with complete confidence that the vote you're making is on the merits of the bill itself--or rather, of the process; it's not on the merits of the bill, but whether or not it conforms with the rules we are forced to deal with and contend with, which in this case mean its similarity to other bills.
That process can actually be appealed from here. We are not the final word. It then goes to the House. It goes in a way that is very respectful of Mr. Silva's rights. He can then go to other members, if he can get five members from three parties; the committee's ruling is then effectively and automatically challenged in a very particular way. It's going to be challenged by means of a secret ballot vote in the House of Commons, which means there can be no pressure from whips, no party pressures, and none of the pressures that would tend to focus on whether it's policy the government approves of, or that the Liberals, the NDP, or the Bloc approve of. It is purely based on the considerations that individual members are making.
I suspect that the logic of that ruling--and this is very important to the point I've been driving at, Mr. Chairman--is that here in the subcommittee, and again in the full committee, we are trying to decide specifically and exclusively whether this matter violates any of the four conditions of charter compliance or is intra vires as opposed to ultra vires. The one that's relevant to us, of course, is whether it's similar to a previous bill or one under consideration. Those are the considerations we are looking at, and that's all we should be looking at.
When you get to the House, I think it's not illegitimate for people to say at that point that yes, it's similar to something that was before us at a previous point in time, but I don't regard it as a waste of our time, which is the real reason for objecting to having consideration of similar items. I'm using this special procedure of a secret ballot vote to say that notwithstanding the fact that this item is similar to a previous bill, I think it deserves consideration again, because I think it's a good piece of legislation, as many members might say, and at that point the ruling.... That would apply if it was something else--even if it were a piece of legislation that was ultra vires, let's say.
I think it's so important that we need to deal with it, even though strictly speaking it is outside the jurisdiction of the House of Commons and is really within provincial jurisdiction. I'm aware of the consequences: we might deal with it in the House, and then it might be struck down in the courts. Then it will, in a sense, have been a waste of the House's time, but it will have been an important process in, let us say--to follow that analogy--trying to demonstrate that the federal government has a legitimate role in legislating in this particular area. That might start the process of leading to a further amendment to the Constitution, for example, that would expand federal powers. These are legitimate things.
I think the process on the whole, which was designed in the 37th Parliament, is just an excellent process. I encourage all people on this committee to keep in mind the whole picture, if you're looking at it, and not to make that internal decision, which I worry that some people may have made, of looking at the bill and saying, I think it's a pretty good piece of legislation, I'd like to see it go forward, I think it's a more nuanced piece of legislation than the previous piece of legislation. All of these are considerations that are important from a policy point of view, but not important from a procedural point of view.
Really, Mr. Chair, I've gone on at some length to make this point, but I think it is critical to our understanding to perceive to what degree the policy considerations are protected and also that the rights of private members like Mr. Silva are protected by this process. I think the other thing is to indicate the degree to which it is possible to appeal our decision on other grounds if this decision is found, for policy reasons, to not be appropriate. I think, certainly for procedural reasons, it's pretty good.
Mr. Chair, I appreciate the fact that everybody has given me so much attention. I'll complete my comments there. Thank you.