Evidence of meeting #119 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was hear.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
That would be a Scott courtesy, a Reid courtesy.
Liberal
Scott Simms Liberal Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL
The protocol was that if you had a point of clarification or if you had a question on something that was said, you ask the permission of the person who has the floor. They cede the floor to you for a reasonable amount of time and then it goes back to the person who had the floor.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
I'll say yes to that. I'd still like a quick question under the protocol.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
On the official opposition side, we have a mixture of members who were here last time and who are feeling somewhat sheepish about what was done with the unfair elections act. We have new members who don't have direct blood on their hands as a result of the last Parliament and are doing their very best to try to get over with the angels on the side of democracy. It seems to me, and I would seek your opinion, that as long as these new members, who I have great respect for, continue down this road of delay for no other reason than delay, they run the risk of being lumped in with those who have to carry the baggage of C-23. The political reality is they have this opportunity to draw a line in the sand and say, “That was them. That's not me. That's not what I believe in. My view of democracy is very different from that of C-23, and I'm going to use this opportunity with my vote, my decision and my interjections to make it clear that, while I respect my colleagues, I completely disagree. I accept that we need to take some of this ugliness out of there and get back to making our democracy and our process more democratic.”
Would you agree, Ms. Sahota, that some of our colleagues are maybe running that risk of losing that opportunity and that they may, if they don't play this right, end up having to carry C-23 on their back for the rest of their career when they do have this opportunity to make that line of demarcation? What are your thoughts on that?
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Thank you for that question, Mr. Christopherson. I really appreciate that.
I have been thinking a lot about that because we pointed out last time that Mr. Reid and Blake Richards were on that committee. That's not to say they're not wonderful members and have not been working with this new committee for quite some time as well, but we have new members. We have Mr. John Nater and we have Ms. Kusie, who is the shadow minister. Is that what it's called?
Calgary Midnapore, CPC
I've heard both shadow minister and shadow cabinet minister.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
She does not seem to be all that mysterious. She came in, and after her victory speech, when being elected as vice-chair, she spoke quite clearly about her work as a bureaucrat, as a non-partisan for so many years, being able to get work done, and being able to do so in some not-so-friendly climates, in many places in the world where democracy is still struggling. It seems to me that democracy still struggles here a little bit, too, as we can see right now, but we're trying our best. When we have unjustifiable delays like this, and I would say that in this case they are definitely becoming unjustifiable, then I think they will be wearing it. They will be.
That fresh new attitude that I thought the new members were going to bring, they may not be living up to those expectations. Now some are newer than others, so I still have some hope that we're going to see a change, a willingness to co-operate when it comes to this piece of legislation. As I've said before, we've had 56 witnesses just on this piece of legislation. About 200 were put on witness lists, mostly from the Conservatives. Having called so many witnesses before this committee, it's interesting that when we had those witnesses here, they really did not show a desire to ask the hard-hitting questions. This leads me to think that perhaps there wasn't a serious intention behind calling all those witnesses to committee.
I would say, having seen that type of behaviour, that it's not a genuine use of this committee's time. We're wasting valuable resources. All the people who have to be here and the wonderful food that's provided to us, meeting after meeting, that all adds up.
Yes, Mr. Christopherson, I don't think we need to give the new members too much more time to prove themselves, to show that they're coming with a new attitude and a new spirit.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Yes. We want to see some action, and now is the time. I'm really hoping we can move forward with a start date for clause-by-clause today. We need to have something today. We should have been moving forward with this piece of legislation on Tuesday. Enough is enough. The minister will be appearing.
Quite honestly, I'm starting to think we shouldn't have any of that if we're not willing to move on with this piece of legislation. We have no stones left to turn over. I'm sure you'll find some, but I would request that you make sure we're not making a mockery out of the whole process and that it is coming from a place of genuine interest and concern. I've seen from the previous witnesses—and I think this is what Chris was alluding to—that at times it seemed like we were making a little bit of a mockery of this place.
As a new member of Parliament, you quickly start learning what this place is all about, and I do feel that we waste a lot of time up here. We do. There is a lot of learning that happens here. I think it's the most wonderful position, and I'm very fortunate to have it. I learned from the people who have been here longer than me, from various other resources that were provided and from the witnesses who come forward. I'd never have gained so much knowledge without this opportunity, but enough is enough. There's gaining knowledge and there's doing the work required of you as a parliamentarian, but there's also the disguise of doing good work while actually playing partisan games. I think right now we are in that territory, we're pretending not to stall, but all we're really doing is stalling for the sake of stalling.
Thank you.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Thank you.
Okay, next is Mr. Christopherson. You'll remember that in June we agreed the minister would come to start clause-by-clause, so we only have 10 minutes to sort things out. You're up.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
Do you know what? My intervention basically allowed me to express myself. I don't want to slow it down any more than I need to in terms of the time I take. My position has been very clear, publicly and privately, to ministers, government members and opposition members. The entire world knows—anybody who cares—where the NDP, and me in particular as a member of this committee, are on this business.
I made it very clear from the outset of the Parliament. Just to get a little off my chest, I'm a little concerned. The government has to wear a little bit of the fact that we're so late in the day and something this important is still in front of us. I'll signal ahead of time because I don't play games—I'm not smart enough.
The minister is coming in and what I want to hear from the minister is that iron-clad guarantee from the government. I don't want to hear any nonsense about, well, it's up to the House leader. No, this is a government representative. I want to hear crystal clearly that this government is absolutely 100% committed to making sure that no matter what, with their majority government, this bill gets passed and we have an election that's a lot closer to the history and the proud traditions of Canada than the ugliness of C-23.
I've made it clear that I will support the government in getting that ugliness out. I will support them on any new progressive things and improvements they want to make. We will advocate for things that we care about, but at the end of the day the priority is to get a lot of the ugliness out of there. I will make a personal campaign commitment, since I'm going to be freed up, to do everything I can to make sure this country knows, if you fail to get this passed. This is big. We all, when we were on the opposition benches, got up and hollered from the rooftops that this is wrong. We had major reforms to our electoral process and the government of the day didn't even consult the Chief Electoral Officer.
I find it a bit rich when the current crop of official opposition members are slowing things down—why?—because they insist on hearing from a provincial chief electoral officer. That is rich. I understand the importance of that. I get that. I made it clear to the government members and people like Scott Reid who I have the utmost respect for, one of the people I respect the most in this entire Parliament, that my goal was not to drag them through the last election and the last Parliament.
However, there is a limit. When Mr. Reid or anybody else on the official opposition side get up on their hind legs and try to use the rhetoric of democracy and caring about voting as an excuse to slow down this process, which is meant to clean up that mess and that ugliness, I've reached my limit.
Very soon, it will be time for the official opposition to give themselves a serious shake and decide where they want to be on democracy. Do they really want to carry over the tradition and the reputation of the last Parliament? That's where they're heading. Or do they want to be able to put that behind them and maybe even say they were wrong and now see it differently? That's fine. We all understand politics, and those of us who want to get that through will let you get away with that.
What I am not going to do is sit here and quietly let the government continue to mishandle the timing and the process of this and so many democratic files. I have to say, you've been an absolute abysmal disappointment on this whole file. It's very disappointing with the promise that came in, and so many of you were so keen to do the right thing, and I know you were legitimate. We talked about these things in the beginning, and here we are a year out from the next election and one of the government's weakest files is on democratic reform.
The government has its share of responsibility for the mess we're in, trying to get this through in the dying months of this Parliament. Having said that, if the official opposition continues to do nothing but try to slow this down, to preserve the vote suppressing and anti-democratic clauses that were in C-23, then they are far more guilty than the government.
At some point very soon, we all need to live up to our rhetoric. There's a lot of it around this table in terms of the holy grail of democracy, a lot of rhetoric and a lot of talk, but not a lot of action. Canadians expect this to be cleaned up for the next election. Things need to move more quickly here, so I am going to be calling on the government. If you have to use the heavyweight power of going to the House, then do it, but I say this as officially as I can and on a personal basis as a parliamentarian: Please do not, under any circumstance, allow this Parliament to expire without fixing our election system. It's broken.
We do a disservice to our international reputation. Many of you know that I do some democracy-building work internationally, and I am so proud to be able to be a Canadian, where we have one of the finest, most mature, fair democracies in the world. Bill C-23 hurt that. It damaged it and stained that. This is an opportunity to fix it, but it can't be missed.
I don't intend to have a lot of interventions along the way. There are progressive things that I want, but I am not going to hold up this process to fight for those. At the end of the day, I support the bill that the government has put forward. I do believe their heart is in the right place. I just wish they'd get their brain engaged and move the bill more properly through. It's shameful that something this important is still sitting here undone.
I just want to tie into Ruby's comments, and I truly will close with this. Most of the time, we do try to work together, and I enjoy this committee and the members who are on it. After you've been around long enough, yelling at the government and getting a headline loses its thrill. What's far more thrilling is to take all of us who are fighting in different corners and find a way in which we can come together. After a while, you find that this is really valuable and it gives you such fulfillment.
Carrot and stick, let's work together. We're all saying we want to make democracy better, so let's all try to work together. We're not doing that at this moment to get this through. That's the carrot. The stick is that, if this doesn't happen, there's going to be holy hell to pay and both the government and the official opposition are going to be held to account, not that we're all that pure but we don't have enough power to have an influence on this. I don't pretend we do, but I do have a big voice, a big mouth, and another year to go, and I'd much rather be using that to compliment the government and compliment the official opposition, especially new members such as Mr. Nater who I respect, who I think will be an excellent parliamentarian. I hope he's around for a long time. I want to be able to continue to say those things and say, “You know what? We were in the ditch, but we got out.”
I want to give you that credit. Conversely, if that credit is not deserved, I'm not that far from Sarnia. I can go visit that riding and I'll tell them what you did. I'll tell them the difference between your rhetoric and how you voted. I would much rather continue to say, “Mr. Nater is an example of how I feel good about the Canadian Parliament”, even though you're not of my party, as I step aside off the public stage.
I want to say that. I truly do, sir, but give me a reason. Don't continue playing this game. The time has come to stop and it's time to start acting like grown-ups.
Thank you, Chair.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Do you want him to go to the wrong place? You'd better correct your riding there.
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
There's only one minute left in our scheduled time. I'll leave the last word to Mr. Nater.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
Thank you, Chair.
I appreciate the comments from Mr. Christopherson. I do. I appreciate where he comes from.
Very briefly, on his comment about timing, Bill C-33 was introduced in the House on November 24, 2016, almost 24 months ago. The government had time. A four-year mandate is a lot of time in which to move legislation forward. Here we are, literally in the last 12 months, or even less, because when we adjourn at the end of June, we are done until the election. We are literally in the last eight to 10 months of sitting, and we are dealing with a substantial piece of legislation.
That's unfortunate. It's a big bill. It has things we will support, and it has challenges we won't support. They are hills that we don't need to die on. We recognize that. We recognize that this is a bill that the government has introduced and that you have the numbers to go forward with it.
Mr. Chair, I will leave my comments there for now. I don't know what the protocol is, but I'll leave it to your good graces.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
On a point of order, Chair, this is for you or the clerk.
When we meet later this afternoon with the minister, by unanimous consent, could we still put this motion in front of us and pass it today?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Yes. The minister is supposed to begin the clause-by-clause. That was the agreement.
