Actually, I think that's a really good way to describe it. The British term “guillotine” says it all. We cut off debate, whether or not that will have catastrophic results. I think that is very imprudent, so that's an issue. I just can't see how we would deal with this.
I want to cite some of the things that this reminds me of, and then I will turn to some other issues.
There are three items this reminds me of. The first and perhaps the most obvious is government motion number six from May of last year. Government motion number six would have...on a temporary basis. I believe it was for one year, if memory serves.
Actually, I could check that. I have a copy of motion number six here. It was going to impose certain limits on the ability of opposition parties to do their work. It was going to limit their ability to use the procedures of the House to slow down and sometimes, procedurally, to stop government business until some form of compromise is achieved. The motion would have remained in effect, as I understand it, for a year.
It was met with astonishment by the other parties. It was presented in a very interesting way. At the time, I was deputy opposition House leader, a position which, both on the opposition and government sides, I had had in one form or another for a decade. Motion number six was the first occasion where I had seen a motion presented in this manner without first being vetted and discussed. It was only a temporary suspension of the rules, but it was nevertheless a change to the rules without consensus and without consent. It was met with very considerable anger.
At first, the government was going to tough its way through. The opposition to doing things this way included efforts on the part of the opposition parties to slow things down. The New Democrats took their time taking their seats in the House of Commons, and as we all recall, the Prime Minister, angered by this, thrust his way across the floor of the House of Commons and grabbed the opposition whip, my colleague, Gord Brown, by the lapels, and dragged him through some New Democrat MPs, elbowing one of them as he went through. This led to the the name “Elbowgate” as the description for this event.
That was all caused by the resistance that the opposition was trying to put up within what is permitted under the rules, in order not to see the government engage in a further suspension of opposition powers and the opposition's ability to do its job. That unfortunate episode led—wisely, I think—to the then government House leader, Dominic LeBlanc withdrawing the motion. I'm afraid I don't have the exact quote in front of me, but what he said at the time was that the government had heard the concerns of the opposition parties and was withdrawing the motion in favour of looking for a more consensual approach.
By the way, I think I should tell you that I had the impression from the start that motion number six was not Dominic LeBlanc's own initiative, though as House leader he introduced it. Everybody knows he's a pretty easygoing guy, and that kind of draconian thing is just not, in my view, something he would have designed independently in any way. No House leader designs the rules to change the House without getting the approval of the Prime Minister.
I don't think I have to demonstrate my case for that, but Mr. Christopherson was in government at one time and he may have seen his House leader act without telling Premier Rae—