Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 22nd, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

The motion is to adjourn the debate.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Oh, I'm sorry. I misunderstood. It's just to adjourn the debate? Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I'm okay with it that way.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

All right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Since there's no debate on that....

Do you have a point of order too, Mr. Lamoureux?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

No, I thought you just said there's no debate on it. Does that mean...?

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I mean on the tabling.

All those in favour of tabling?

[Some hon. members]

Could we have a recorded vote?

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Well why don't we do it that way then, because we have all the time.

(Motion negatived: nays 6; yeas 5)

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

So we are still on debate of the amended motion.

I have Mr. Julian next, on the amendment.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Chair, again through you, I'd like to consult the clerk regarding adding an amendment that would assure independent members that this does not in any way impact their report-stage rights that exist now.

I'd like to work through you, Mr. Chair, with the clerk to get wording that would clearly indicate to House members that this in no way—

—and that of course also applies to the Speaker of the House of Commons—affects the current rights of independent members at report stage.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

So you are looking to make a subamendment on the amendment? We are on the amendment at the moment, Mr. Julian, and you're trying to go further than that. So you are looking to make a subamendment?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I'm signalling this through you, Mr. Chair, to the clerk so that she can perhaps develop language while we're debating the current amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I'll give her the freedom to look at it.

Go ahead. I take it this is a point of order, Mr. Reid, because I have others on the list.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

While members no doubt have very time-consuming thoughts they want to bring forward and it's their right to do so, I just think in this particular case it's out of order to introduce, in the middle of a debate on one subject, drafting instructions to the clerk as part of the debate. If that is to be done it should be done privately and not as part of the debate.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I recognize what you're saying. We'll certainly be careful that the clerk helps me with what we're already working on before she continues to work on something new.

Mr. Lamoureux, you are next on the speaking list on the amended motion.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chair, again I want to respond to Tom's comments. When I moved the amendment, it was an attempt to ensure that there would be opportunities for all members to be treated equally in a process that I think is very important. If we're saying to some members of the House that we want them to provide amendments, or be afforded the opportunity to be provided amendments at the committee stage, I really do believe that it would be a mistake for us not to acknowledge all members of the House not having that same opportunity.

If you want to look at it, for every bill that comes before the House of Commons, an independent member could say, “Well, I would like to give an amendment on these eight or nine bills after going through them”. You're denying that same opportunity to members who happen to belong to a caucus. You can say, “Well, you can go through your caucus infrastructure”, but quite frankly I think that you would get members from all political parties who would say that it is still not fair, it won't work.

At least it's the principle that we're talking about here. Whether or not party members choose to use that, or some individual members who belong to caucuses choose to use it, is completely up to them. They might prefer to go through the caucus infrastructure, if I could put it that way.

I just don't believe fundamentally, in principle, that we should be singling out a half-dozen, or ten, or whatever that number of independents is, and saying, “Look you have the right to introduce amendments,” when in fact there are others who do not have that right. I can recall a speech that was given inside the House by a member who indicated very clearly that he had been punished and told that he would not be able to issue any sort of statement going forward.

It would be great to have this discussion after we've all been afforded the opportunity to have some dialogue with some of our caucus members or other members, to even to reflect on it, to talk with the clerk's office, or get a better understanding of the eventual outcome of a rule change of this nature. That would be wonderful. If we're not going to be given that opportunity, I do believe that in order to make this a better, more universal rule that the motion itself, or the amendment that I'm suggesting, is worth supporting.

I'll leave it at that, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you, Mr. Lamoureux.

Mr. Cullen, Mr. Christopherson, and Mr. Lukiwski.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Chair, I shared your hopes and expectations after your successful election win, although it did sound like “Well, that pitcher has a no-hitter going into the ninth inning” sort of comment, where you worry about what the consequences could be, because here we are. I hope you can appreciate our reluctance, and in fact frustration, about getting a motion that has implications for all members of Parliament.

There are two things we haven't heard yet from the government. I listened to Tom, and I listened to Scott as well, very carefully. We raised two concerns. One is on the implications and whether we understand them—and we don't. No one on the Conservative side does, even though they seem to be willing to vote for something they don't understand, which is curious. The second is that there was a question about urgency. Why the panic, right now, today? That hasn't been answered at all in either Tom's or Scott's questions.

My colleague, Mr. Christopherson, made some comments with regard to Mr. Reid's reputation. I share those feelings, just with respect to Scott's tendency to seek the proper ground, and for sustaining a parliament that works and works for everybody, and from my experience is extremely evidence-based—in looking at other Commonwealth countries, in looking at other experiences, and understanding the impacts of everything we do. He's very consistent, and I quite admire him for that.

This runs completely counter to that experience for me.

We had intended to introduce a motion today talking about in camera meetings, with some rules so that MPs couldn't stuff themselves in camera and away from the public if they just didn't like the conversation. They are rules that guide school boards and municipalities, for goodness' sake. You'd think they could help us here at the House of Commons.

This is my comment on this motion and the amendments we are talking about. It is more than ironic—I would use the term “cynical”—that in the effort to talk about greater accountability and transparency, to improve democracy, the government is choosing a path that seems to run exactly counter to democratic values, in saying that we're going to push a motion through without evidence and in a rush, with no argument or reason for it, out of the blue.

While my expectations were like yours, Chair, coming into this meeting today, to get through some routine proceedings, it is impossible in good conscience for members of this committee to vote for a motion when they don't understand the implications. While my friend Mr. Lamoureux has attempted to improve this on the fly, which is always a noble effort, it remains true that we still don't actually understand the implications of even the amended motion. We have asked the clerk twice if we can have an understanding of how this would change the way we do business, how this relates to the two rulings of the Speaker that we had last session. We have no evidence of that. It seems the height of arrogance to suggest that without that information committee members can divine what this is going to mean for the House of Commons and for the health of our democracy, which, as we can all freely admit, has been under some duress for the last number of months and years. To go out to the public and say we are improving things, without evidence, without knowledge, and in a rush, to say that this is the right way to do things seems like more than playing with fire.

I go back to Mr. Christopherson's comment, that it begs the question about what the intention was of all this.

To be fair, Chair, both to the original motion from Mr. Reid and to the amendment from Mr. Lamoureux, I took them on good faith. I thought, well, okay, what does this mean? Does this help our work in the House? Does it help our work at committees, as committee members, because we're trying to improve legislation all the time and trying to make the House work better? Particularly for members who don't have the advantage of a recognized official party in the House of Commons, how do we counterbalance the effects of that?

It's an increasing number, by the way, particularly as MPs leave caucuses and join the growing independence movement, either by choice or by being forced.

The suggestion that committee members around this table will be able to go back to their constituents and say “I always vote with my conscience and I always vote with full information made available to me” is simply not true here.

I look forward to comments from Conservatives.

We have asked two very specific questions. In defence of the motion that Mr. Reid moved today, one very specific question is, what is the rush? Why are we so determined not to hear the evidence from the House of Commons? How can committee members even pretend that they're doing their jobs as members of Parliament when they're voting on things they don't understand at all?

Secondly, what evidence do we have to this point to suggest that this is an improvement? Do members of the government somehow suggest they know more than the Speaker of the House and the able people who assist him in figuring out the rules of the House of Commons? I look to them for the governance of this place, for recommendations and suggestions. We've heard none from the government, only their suppositions.

If we were expecting a good start to this session, as I was, Mr. Chair, and some effort towards building greater democratic institutions within our Parliament, which is the motion that we were suggesting today about changing in camera rules and the study we're trying to conduct on the way MPs spend money, those were the two things we were meant to be looking at today. Instead we have a motion that government members themselves don't understand, and now it's being suggested that there's somehow a panic button that has been pressed and that we need to decide this today or else bad things will happen.

Like what? What happens between now and Thursday that's so grave for the government? One is only left to make suppositions because we hear nothing but silence or distractions about whether sitting caucuses can bring amendments or not, and how the whip works. I would be very careful if I were the government to suggest that their members are seized with democratic intent and are able to freely speak in the House of Commons, when we know that's absolutely not the case. So be careful with the sanctimony about who has an overwrought sense of discipline in the House of Commons, when Mr. Warawa and others have attempted to do such radical things as speak for 60 seconds in the House on something they want to talk about. Let's be careful.

So with regards to the amendment, again to my friend Mr. Lamoureux, it's interesting and maybe it improves this motion, but we don't know the actual intent or effect of this motion. To suggest that we simply can't wait 48 hours until we deliberate and then vote on it as members of Parliament is ridiculous and insulting.

I can only question what the intention of this is. I have the highest regard for Mr. Reid and the work he does at this committee. This certainly would diminish that, for whatever that's worth, because if the intention is to improve the place, then certainly waiting 48 hours at a minimum doesn't cause any of us any harm. It would let us all sleep a little better not having voted blindly on things, which should be a practice all MPs should resist regardless of political orientation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you, Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Christopherson, you're next.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the opportunity to speak.

I can't express how really disappointed I am. We know who the government is. We know who has the numbers. Quite frankly this is supposed to be the grown-up committee. When the House and the Speaker finds themselves in one heck of a mess and things need to be unpackaged, thought through, and given serious reflection, they send it to this committee. There's a reason for that, because the rest of us in the House look to this committee to play that role.

At the end of the day, whatever the government wants to do, the government is going to be able to do because it has the numbers. But the name of this committee is the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. This is about procedure.

Mr. Chair, I'm really getting angrier by the moment as I think not so much about the substance at this point, but the process and the procedure and how undemocratic this is. I'm not going to dwell on this, but will say it once more just to get it off my chest, that clearly Mr. Reid is playing the role of a stalking horse for the government on this. I'm really disappointed that it would be him, or anybody at all, but particularly him personally. I have to believe that at the end of this he is going reflect on this and ask if it were really worth spending some of his political capital on, some of his hard-earned reputation. But that remains to be seen and that's not the focus here, and I shan't refer to it again unless I feel I need to. Since I have lots of time, you never know.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Settle in, we're going to be here a while. You're going to hear it again and again.

The fact of the matter is that this is about the procedure of law-making. This isn't about a ten percenter that was sent into somebody's riding. As important as that is, this is not that. This is not some one-off little thing that happened in the House, or a little procedural matter that we just need to straighten out a bit and everything will be fine. This is serious stuff. This is the law-making procedure of a G-7 country. It doesn't get much bigger than that, and all we're asking for as the opposition parties is an opportunity to table this for two days to allow us an opportunity to get answers to very valid questions about the implications both for the procedure of law-making in Canada, and also the rights of individual members of Parliament. That's how serious this is.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Mr. Julian.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I'm hearing an awful lot of noise from the government side and I think it's really inappropriate. If folks are having conversations they should be having them outside.