Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 30th, 2019

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I had been trading up to get my first hour and then hoping that someone would literally give me the second hour so that I would be able to bring it to a vote, but this was a work in motion, and through these processes and changes, that's how my mix-up in the timing came about. I did not have any commitment to a second hour yet. I was in discussions with some people, but it's a big ask. I'm basically asking that they not speak and let me speak a second time.

It would truly be my preferred route anyway to have this committee say to our fellow colleagues, “This is something you can vote on”. I always was hoping for this anyway.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

It kind of begs the question. Would it have been preferable in the first place that your motion in the House be a motion for PROC to study? I don't want anyone to go on a fool's errand by working on one thing and being pre-empted by something else. You discussed, I think in iPolitics, that you were considering amendments within the House.

It's always challenging when we're going down two separate routes. We're studying one thing, and the House is studying something different but on a similar topic. I'm just wondering if it was preferable in the first place to have done it through PROC rather than trying to do these two separate—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

If there was time, absolutely. The issue we've always had.... Even now I've not actually lost my hour; I'm just going to have it some time at the end of June or the beginning of July, when it won't happen.

My problem was always that I wouldn't have enough time. Why won't I have enough time? Because the luck of the draw when I got my PMB was such that it came at the end of the schedule. At least I got an hour. This is why, if these changes were in place, I wouldn't have had to do that.

How I came to the number of hours necessary was by calculating the last 20 years of, on average, how many PMBs got closure, which is either voted for, abandoned or defeated, and I made the calculation backwards.

Absolutely, about having time, you're right. That's the right way to do it, but I was racing against time.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

We did have a private conversation in the House of Commons. I'm not going to reveal that, but we did talk about the idea of consensus, so I would offer you this opportunity. What's your viewpoint on the consensus of changes to the Standing Orders? It's something that I think we should be—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I think Ms. Kusie proposed at the beginning, after Mr. Christopherson brought this forward, that it should be unanimous. I mentioned to her that I was very grateful. I would point out, by the way, that I had discussions with people like David de Burgh Graham. He was of the mindset that the way we should do it is as a group. We should try—I know it's very hard—to take the politics out of this. We should try to say that we're doing the right things for the right reasons, and we should respect the issues such as how we treat ourselves.

We ask a lot, when we come up here, of our families, for example, but some things we're doing for no reason. We should respect them and say, “Can we make ourselves better so that we are better for our citizens?” We would get to see our citizens and our families more, and we would be working properly.

All those things led me to this process, but why I had to have two horses.... As you well know, I came in, and I spoke to every single one of you individually, and I asked the same thing: Please look at it. I was very grateful, and I think that's the first thing I stated here. I'm very, very grateful that you agreed to do so, and I agree with your approach.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Great.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Now we'll go to Mr. Christopherson.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you both for being here. I appreciate it.

I want to pick up on the last item about the private member's bill, just to close that circle.

I was one of those who was kind of taken aback when I heard. I'll be straight up that my first thought was that they got to him. They got to him. The election's coming and they said to him if he wants to even see anything from the central campaign, he'd better be dropping this PDQ. We were having a little discussion in the backbenches, where I reside, and we weren't sure how to read it.

I have to say that I was very pleased when my motion, M-170, was up last night. It speaks to the issue of the executive—the cabinet—still controlling the hiring process for Parliament's agents and recognizes that Parliament is supreme. Government is not Parliament; government is secondary to Parliament. I'm sure it didn't escape anybody's notice that I didn't even lose it by a close one. I lost it by a country mile.

That speaks to a couple of things. The first thing it speaks to is the fact that both our presenters stood up and voted for it. In particular, Frank, I turned to my colleagues the second you did that and said that this puts paid to the issue of whether this was a mistake or whether they got to him because nobody's that stupid to cave on the one hand and then stand up and get himself in trouble on the other.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Can I say thank you?

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Yes.

I have absolutely no doubt that that's the case. Again, I had the benefit of speaking to you before, a number of months ago. I was impressed by the fact that you were using your private member's spot to improve Parliament.

It was one thing for me to do it, but I'm not running for re-election. If I were running for re-election, make no mistake, I would have been looking at how I could use it to make sure that I was messaging to my constituents that I have their backs, that I'd be a good choice to stay here for them. However, you are going to run again, and you gave that up because you believed in the importance of this.

Mr. Chair, it also speaks to the challenge.

I have to tell you, colleagues, that I thought—and it's not the fact that it was mine—the notion of our taking back control was pretty straightforward and was motherhood. Do you know what stopped it? The very power structure that I was trying to break through.

I wasn't surprised. It just indicated that I failed. To me, that also means that there will likely, and I would hope—hope springs eternal—be another colleague who runs and comes into Parliament, or a veteran who has been around and has a vested interest in this, who would grab it and run with it. I have to tell you that, in terms of the low-lying fruit for democratic reform, taking back control of what is already ours is as easy as it gets. We don't need to pass a new law. We don't need to amend the Constitution. All we have to do is say, “Yes, we will take control of this process.” That's it.

I lost. I got maybe five—I'm being generous to myself—non-New Democrats on the main motion, which really wasn't even as effective as the amendment because it spoke to the vacancy that's now created by the untimely death of Michael Ferguson. I'll be honest: I thought I could play on the idea that if I couldn't play to the respect that members should have for themselves as parliamentarians, maybe I could play to their heartstrings—that we could do this in Michael's memory. There are documents that aren't that old—from over the last few years—that have been signed by every agent of Parliament saying, “Take back control, Parliament, please.”

And yet, the power structure that.... The reason that I'm tying this in, Mr. Chair—I know that you know why—is that the challenge of what's in front of my colleagues is enormous. If anybody has any doubt, just look at the vote result last night. I don't believe that there's a single parliamentarian in the House who gets up every day and says, “How can I give away my relevancy today just a bit more?” In fact, I think most parliamentarians get up thinking, “I'm going to try to make the world a better place. I'll start by making sure that Parliament is a better place.”

However, the power of the current whip-House leader structure is such that I couldn't break through except for a very small handful of courageous members who felt strongly enough that they were going to take their stand.

I was very pleased to move the motion. Like you, I appreciate the gratitude of my colleagues for allowing this to be aired and talked about. Oftentimes what happens with these kinds of things is that they don't even see the light of day. You snuff it out early so that you don't have to deal with it. It's now getting an airing. Again, I'm an optimist. I do believe that, over time, we'll get there.

This is a major challenge. If the motherhood issue of hiring our own agents isn't enough to do it, I'm not sure about the good arguments that are here. It's going to take a political shift of enough parliamentarians who don't just want to talk the talk of reform, but are actually prepared to put their asses on the line to defend that principle. That's easier said then done—just go look at the recorded vote last night.

I see Madam May squirming in her seat, anxious to join in this discussion. I would just invite her thoughts. I've done a good job of saying how difficult it is, so it's not so much to do that, but to maybe affirm that it exists.

Give us your thoughts, Elizabeth, on why you remain optimistic. You're running again, and I think there's a really good chance that you're going to come back.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Well, hey, I don't have to be as partisan as I used to be. That's the beauty of having those things unleashed. You get the chains off. You can state what you actually think. I think you have a very good chance of getting re-elected. How radical.

Given that, what are your thoughts on all this, at the tail end of this Parliament as we head into the next one?

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Number one, I just want to say that even though we may not get this motion.... I mean, with getting those first-hour and second-hour debates, I'm fighting to try to find a second hour for getting Bill S-203 through, for example—which is widely supported—on ending the keeping of whales in captivity.

The goal of what we all worked on here, as far as I was concerned, was to get a good chance at procedure and House affairs committee to talk about it and work on it and to try to do it together. I'm happy about that. That's one reason for optimism: We're talking about it here.

The other is that Canadians want it, but I don't think.... When I'm knocking on doors, people don't say, how is it that the Speaker doesn't have control over who gets recognized in question period? It doesn't come up. They do say, how can you stand it when people all around you are yelling all the time and banging on their desks? That doesn't look right. I know we've all had this experience of school groups coming in, and they took the kids out because they they didn't want them to see that. They were horrified.

We want high voter turnout. We want a healthy democracy. We want respect for the institution. We would also rather that people didn't think the fact that we are politicians means we were a subclass of human beings, somewhere below—I don't know—the paparazzi. I mean, I was a lawyer and now I'm a politician. It just doesn't get worse. Where do I go from here?

It would be nice to feel we have done something that our voters wanted us to do to elevate the discourse and make them proud of what they see, as Canadians, happening in Parliament.

We know the mechanics that can make that happen, so I think if we work for our constituents in the way that they would like to have the House be more respectful, have our work be more productive.... And for me, the single biggest issue—and there are a number of places that aren't even in this motion where I'd love to see the change—is to reduce the power of the back room over the conduct of what happens on the floor.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Thank you.

Now we'll go to Mr. Simms.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Thank you, Chair. Thanks everybody.

Thank you to our guests.

I will go on a bit of a rant.

Obviously I'll put my bias on the table. I'm co-author or partial author of this particular motion. I hope to get a chance to talk about my aspect of it. I know it was brought up earlier.

I'll answer your question when I get to there I guess, Madame Lapointe.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

I will ask the question again.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

I don't doubt it.

I want to talk about catching the Speaker's eye. This goes to Ms. May's thing, but before I get to a question, there comes a point when it becomes so obvious that something is wrong here that it behooves us to actually look at this and say, “Come on; this is a bit much.”

I spoke about this when we had a press conference about what Frank is doing here.

Frank, thank you for being here.

I'll give you one example in the day, which is called S.O. 31s. We all call them S.O. 31s. People come me and they say, “Oh, you mean members' statements.” No, I mean party statements, because that's what they are, right?

Now, I have no problem with any recognized party or non-recognized party stating it's where we're all in the House. Obviously the party mechanism is really what controls the functions of government and it's how we relate to each other. It's even a part of my proposal on committee chairs. But for 15 minutes of a day, can we not have the freedom by which I get to say, “I represent my constituents, and here's what I have to say”? The retort to that from the office is this, “But we balance it: we do this, we do that”, and I can say congratulations, but that's not the point.

The point is this. If Ms. Kusie wants to do a one-minute statement about carbon pricing and anti-government, then that should be her choice. If somebody comes to Ms. Kusie and says, “I want you to do this nasty little bit of work toward the government”, and she says no, that slot goes to Mr. Nater or Mr. Reid or Mr. Chong or whoever's next. That's not a member's statement, is it? Not at all. Ms. Kusie has every right to stand up and hammer the government in a one-minute statement. She also has the right to talk about a local charity in her riding, and so on and so forth.

That's 15 minutes of the day. This goes to what Ms. May said about the proliferation of control from a centre that exists within this Parliament more so than any other parliament around. We can't even get 15 minutes.

In saying that, let me go back to catching the Speaker's eye. There's also another side to that as well. Let's say you catch the Speaker's eye for members' statements, question period, government debates. There comes a point where there's going to be a little bit of chaos in there because you do have this dilatory motion that a member be now heard. You've heard that before. We've had motions where, when someone gets up to speak, someone gets up, moves a motion that someone else be heard, the whole thing shuts down, we vote. It's a delay tactic, but it happens.

If we had the entire day, do you think that would happen?

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

“Let the member now be heard”, “that this House do now adjourn”—dilatory motions of that type are not the individual member's choice. Again, it's the party whips deciding, “This is warfare. This is not Parliament. We want to get the other guy. We want to catch them off guard. We want to waste time, mess up the government's agenda.”

I would say another piece that isn't in this package but I would like to mention is not in our rules—actually, it's against our rules—is to read a speech in the House. People read speeches in the House.

By the way, we're the only country in the Commonwealth that has this notion of “recognized party”. In other parliaments in other democracies, you don't have to have a minimum number of seats, but never mind. Because of that rule that was created in 1963, which was about giving larger parties money that they voted for themselves and smaller parties wouldn't get the money, over time these other rights accrued to those who were in parties with more than 12 seats.

It means I'm not in the House leaders' meetings, so this is massive speculation. What I assume is going on in the House leaders' meetings, when the House doesn't function very well and we are able to spend five or six hours debating Canada-Latin friendship week or month—what was it we were debating for five hours one night, not long ago? It was Canada-Latin friendship month. People were down to reflecting on how much they like sombreros and tacos. They had nothing to say. But there was no time for bills that really matter. The House leaders in the back rooms are able to say, “Well, we can put up any number of speakers, but we won't tell you.” If we didn't have that, if we updated our rules that you had to actually speak without notes, only people super-knowledgeable on that issue would take the chance to rise to speak and try to fill 10 minutes.

To your question if it would happen, as long as the party whips, in the back rooms of political parties, are able to dictate what happens on the floor of the House, it would still happen, but it's a modest step toward recreating our real system. Sir John A. Macdonald used to refer to the members of his own caucus as loose fish. He never knew where they were going to go. Our fish are really nailed down—sorry about that, Scott.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Yes, it's an endangered species sort of thing.

I agree with many aspects of it. I'm just trying to find.... I don't want drastic changes as part of this; I want modest changes. My goodness, the example I gave at the top of my question is just a modest one.

I also agree with you on the speech part. I believe that in other chambers, the members take it upon themselves to heckle people if they start reading from notes exclusively. I've always said, if you can't stand in the House of Commons and talk without notes for 10 minutes, you shouldn't be there, but that's a whole other issue.

How much time do I have?

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

None.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Oh, I thought you said “some”.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

No.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Catch his eye.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Can I propose a motion by unanimous consent to give Scott some more time? I'm sure what he's going to do next will be really good.