Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Dec. 3rd, 2024

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I have a point of order, Chair. I'm still struggling to understand the relevance. Relevance is a point of order. I think we're all aware of that point of order.

The motion that Mr. Cooper has moved at this committee essentially says that we shouldn't move to clause-by-clause until we've dispensed with his previous motion, so what's his argument here? How is this relevant to that particular motion? It doesn't seem to fit.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Relevance is a legitimate point of order.

Mr. Cooper, you're about to get the floor back. Perhaps you want to take a couple of seconds to address the question of relevance raised by Mr. Turnbull. I'm going to allow you to continue, but we'll keep a close ear to the ground on how far you may be veering away from the relevance to the motion.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

The fact is, this was a cynical, dishonest attempt by the Liberals and the NDP to pad their pockets with pensions. They sold it as an elections bill—

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

—and Canadians are outraged about this. Canadians deserve answers.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Turnbull, go ahead on a point of order.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I believe there's a standing order that talks about impugning the motives of another member of Parliament. I think Mrs. Romanado knows that's Standing Order 18.

I would suggest that Mr. Cooper's claims are not only false but impugn the motives of other members of Parliament, and I think he should retract those statements. I encourage you to ask him to do so as our devoted chair, sir.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

It's always nice to be recognized for devotion to a shared cause, so thank you for that, Mr. Turnbull.

I will keep a close ear to whether there's been a violation of Standing Order 18.

Mr. Cooper, you're an experienced parliamentarian who is surely aware of where that line exists. I am going to turn the floor back over to you. I am not going to ask for a retraction at this point, but per Mr. Turnbull's point of order, if we can stay relevant and be careful about the skirting of that standing order, that would be appreciated.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I can appreciate that Mr. Turnbull doesn't want to be reminded of the many Canadians who have expressed outrage at this cynical attempt to secure pensions for soon-to-be-defeated Liberal and NDP MPs under the guise of an elections bill, but I want the voices of Canadians who have expressed their outrage to be heard, including some of those who wrote to me and provided their views on the matter to be read into the record.

In that regard, I will continue.

Another Canadian wrote to me and said:

It takes the average person 40+ years of working before they can get a company pension. Same amount if they want to get a decent cpp or oas pension.

2 million Canadians survive because they have other Canadians providing to the food bank so they can survive.

The government wants to change [the] election date so politicians can get an early pension. How many years have these politicians actually worked to get these pensions? 40 years I think not.

That's other than Louis Plamondon. That's my editorial to that. He has been here for 40 years, since before I was born in 1984.

He also said, “Do the right thing [and] leave the federal election as is and make those politicians earn their pensions like the rest of Canadians have to.”

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

That's exactly what we're trying to do here with the amendments to Bill C-65. That's what we were here to do. That's what we were scheduled to do today. That's what witnesses have given up their time to do. It would be nice if Mr. Cooper would let us amend the bill to take out the very issue that he's referring to.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Mr. Turnbull, but that was not a legitimate point of order.

I will ask members to ensure that they—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Colleagues, can we keep our crosstalk down, please, for the benefit of our interpreters?

That was not a legitimate point of order, Mr. Turnbull. I'd ask that you reflect prior to raising your hand for a point of order.

Mr. Cooper, the floor is yours.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Another Canadian wrote, “Please stop political pensions and the week delay in voting. A great majority of Canadians are struggling to survive, please help us! Justin T. must go! Bring common sense back.”

Another said:

It's bad enough that the NDP Liberal coalition is continuing to prop up this unwanted government. Do not allow the due process of mandatory elections delay an extra week just to enable MPs to illegally get their pensions.

If these same politicians were honoring their mandate and governing in the best interest of their constituents, we would have had an election by now.

Let them run on their political record and see if the people of Canada want these folks re-elected. My thoughts are that they have absolutely no chance of that.

Stop election interference and do not delay our long overdue elections.

I could go on, because my office has received thousands and thousands of emails from Canadians. I suspect my colleagues across the way on the Liberal side and in the NDP have also heard from many Canadians who have made their voices heard.

Mr. Turnbull has asked why we don't just get on to amending the bill. I would like to amend the bill. Conservatives have put forward a number of amendments to amend this very bad bill, including with respect to the date of the next election, but Mr. Turnbull is perhaps missing the point of the motion.

Now that the NDP and the Liberals have been caught with this pension grab, they have said it's one big misunderstanding. Even though they drafted a bill that by no coincidence just happens to be the date on which soon-to-be defeated NDP and Liberal MPs get their pensions, they now say that, actually, they don't support having the election change to that specific date; they're not interested in their pensions anymore. Now that they've been caught, that's what they've been saying. I'm not so sure that's what the Liberals have been saying, but that's what Jagmeet Singh has been saying—that it's all one big misunderstanding.

If that's the case, then there are amendments the Conservatives have put forward that I would hope the NDP will support. They would support their rather convenient assertion that it's all one big misunderstanding, which up until now no one believes. Simply to say that now that we've been caught—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Go ahead on a point of order, Mr. Turnbull.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Not to give Mr. Cooper a break or anything, but I wonder if we could release the witnesses given that Mr. Cooper has been filibustering for about an hour and a half. I'm not very confident we're going to get to use their valuable time today and their expertise, so perhaps we should let our witnesses go. Mr. Cooper intends to continue this until the end of the meeting, I'm sure.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

I appreciate your sentiment, Mr. Turnbull. I did speak to the witnesses prior to the beginning of the meeting and subsequently once we began. Although I am sympathetic, there could be a change in the direction. We have so few meetings to deal with this legislation that I'm not prepared to let them go at the moment.

Witnesses, I apologize, but I am going to ask you to stay in the event that we do move forward with clause-by-clause.

Thank you, Mr. Turnbull.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

For the Liberals to say that we should just move to clause-by-clause misses the point of this motion. What this motion demands is that there be a level of accountability for the cynical and dishonest attempt to secure pensions for soon-to-be-defeated Liberal and NDP MPs.

It's important to note the history of the drafting of this elections bill. It really is a pension bill in disguise, because we know that the NDP was heavily involved in drafting it, for all intents and purposes.

NDP critic and former member of Parliament Daniel Blaikie was the co-author of this bill. Mr. Blaikie was quoted in a CTV news article on January 27, 2024, as saying that “a fair amount of work [was] done” towards drafting what is now Bill C-65. The headline was “Trudeau and Singh's teams quietly planning electoral reform legislation”. Mr. Blaikie stood side by side with Minister LeBlanc after Minister LeBlanc tabled the bill at a press conference that Minister LeBlanc convened to try to sell to Canadians that the date of the election had been changed to avoid conflicting with a cultural holiday. Mr. Blaikie and the NDP were in on it. They were working hand in glove with the Liberals and with Minister LeBlanc, and that's not speculation. It was obvious when Daniel Blaikie said that a fair amount of work had been done towards drafting this bill and then showed up and stood side by side with Minister LeBlanc.

We also have learned, as a result of the appearances of Mr. Sutherland from the Privy Council Office and of the Chief Electoral Officer, Mr. Perrault, that secret meetings were held between the Liberal government, the NDP and the Chief Electoral Officer specifically about the drafting of this bill. Based on the submission of the Chief Electoral Officer, there were two meetings involving the Liberal government, the NDP and the Chief Electoral Officer. One meeting was on January 25, which just happened to be two days before Daniel Blaikie was quoted as saying that “a fair amount of work [was] done” towards drafting the bill. At that January 25 meeting with the Chief Electoral Officer were staff from the Prime Minister's Office, staff from the minister's office, staff from the Prime Minister's department, the PCO, and staff from Elections Canada. That was the first meeting.

At the second meeting, held on March 30, in addition to the Chief Electoral Officer being present, there was Minister Dominic LeBlanc; the co-author of this bill, NDP MP Daniel Blaikie; the parliamentary secretary to Minister LeBlanc, Jennifer O'Connell; staff from the minister's office; staff from the PCO; and staff from MP Blaikie's office. My note says staff from the MP's office, so I presume that is in reference to Daniel Blaikie's staff being present. There was also staff from Elections Canada.

These are, I must say, unusual meetings to have with the Chief Electoral Officer, the minister, officials from the Prime Minister's Office and the PCO meeting with Daniel Blaikie, an NDP MP, except that perhaps it's not a surprise, as Daniel Blaikie and the NDP were working hand in hand with the Liberals in drafting this bill, this elections bill that is really a pensions bill. It's even more unusual to see that there was a meeting involving the Chief Electoral Officer; staff from the Prime Minister's Office, the minister's office, the PCO and Elections Canada; and the national director of the NDP, Anne McGrath, specifically relating to the drafting of this elections bill that is really a pensions bill.

I can assure you that I had no such meetings with the Chief Electoral Officer. I've met with the Chief Electoral Officer. We've had courtesy meetings. We discussed his report on the 2019 and 2021 election. We've talked about the pilot project in Nunavut. We've talked about a number of issues in my capacity as the shadow minister for democratic reform, but I can assure you that I was not invited as the shadow minister for democratic reform to sit down with Minister LeBlanc, his officials, staff in the Prime Minister's Office, officials in the PCO and the Chief Electoral Officer in relation to the drafting of this bill. That invitation was not given to me. I am certain it was not given to Madame Gaudreau.

There we have it. There were at least two meetings involving the minister, the Prime Minister's staff, the Chief Electoral Officer, Daniel Blaikie from the NDP and the national director of the NDP. Jagmeet Singh acts as if he knew nothing about this pension grab, that it was all one big misunderstanding, but there was his critic Mr. Blaikie, along with the national director of the NDP, in the thick of it working hand in glove with the Prime Minister's Office and the minister's office.

These two meetings were with only the Chief Electoral Officer. There were clearly many more meetings between the Liberals and the NDP, because, after all, the first meeting with the Chief Electoral Officer with the two was on January 25. On January 27, Mr. Blaikie was quoted as saying that “a fair amount of work [was] done”, so obviously there were many meetings and communications prior to the meeting with the Chief Electoral Officer.

Canadians deserve to know what those communications were. How many meetings did the NDP have with the minister, the minister's staff and the Prime Minister's Office in drafting this bill. The bill includes a pension grab that is going to put taxpayers on the hook in the amount of tens of millions of dollars to pad the pockets of soon-to-be defeated Liberal and NDP MPs.

That is what this motion gets to. It gets to transparency, so that Canadians can have a clearer picture about what happened in the lead-up to the drafting of this pension bill.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Berthold, you have the floor.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

I've been listening to my colleague for a few minutes, and it seems clear that one of the items requested in the motion he's talking about is that Daniel Blaikie be called to appear before the committee as a witness.

Standing Order 122 of the House of Commons defines an old rule of procedure as follows: “If any member files a certificate with the Chair of a committee of the House, stating that the evidence to be obtained from a particular person is, in his or her opinion, material and important, the Chair shall apprise the committee thereof.” That is Standing Order 122—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Berthold, that is a point of debate.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

No, Mr. Chair, it's—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Yes, it is debate.

Mr. Cooper, the floor is yours, but you have to be in your chair.

Mr. Berthold, that leaves you 10 seconds to present me with something that actually constitutes a point of order.

Mr. Cooper has returned to his seat, so he can continue.