Yes, that's actually true.
So they put in this rule that you can't prevent members from attending the House. Obviously, those days are past. But that's where the rules come from. You can see that. They have a long history.
I don't know if, through that entire history, standing order changes were always adopted by unanimous consent. I only know the latter part of the history and the odd colourful items from the very early days. But there's been a general trend in our parliamentary system—it is the predominant trend in our parliamentary system—that we constantly improve over time based on the criteria that are the most important to us. These criteria can change from one generation to the next in some particulars, but in general the criteria could be summarized as the importance of freedom of speech. This is why in the House, on the one hand, no member can ever say another member has lied, and you can't say through the back door what you're not allowed to say through the front door. You can't say indirectly what you can't say directly. You can't say or imply that another member has lied or deliberately misled the House.
But on the other hand, if you actually do mislead the House, that is a really serious offence. That's a contempt of Parliament. You do so at your peril. It's interesting the degree to which members, ministers, and others, will avoid actually telling a known untruth. They may dissemble, hint, lead, misdirect, but actually outright lying, it's amazing how rare it is, and not because of the severity of our sanctions, but because of the skill with which we have matched minimal penalties: the loss of prestige, essentially, in the eyes of your colleagues, in a world where prestige in the eyes of your colleagues and constituents is everything for your continued parliamentary career.
I mentioned that we had a discussion when Mr. Simms was here earlier about the appropriate use of the word “guillotine”. Looking at literal guillotines, the kind that were used during the French Revolution, Alexis de Tocqueville, the great French scholar—