Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to speak in the debate on Bill C-210 and consider certain aspects of this bill.
Speaking on behalf of the Bloc Quebecois, I would like to start by saying that the essence of the act to provide for the recall of members of the House of Commons may be expressed as follows: "any elector ordinarily resident in an electoral district who wishes to seek the recall of the members for that district may file with the Clerk an application for the recall of the member in a prescribed form". The recall procedure which exists in 15 American States, allows for the dismissal of a member of Parliament or public servant.
I would like to provide some historical background. A similar system exists in four swiss cantons. Significantly, the procedure exists only with a very restricted socio-political framework, and even at that level, its use is extremely limited. In the United States, for instance, the system only operates at the municipal level. At a higher level, we have only the case of a Governor of the State of Oregon who was recalled in 1921.
To define more clearly the position of the Bloc Quebecois on this question and to explain the political background of the recall concept, I think it is important to go back in history, and I intend to go back a little further than the hon. member from Vancouver Quadra, in fact, to the end of the 18th century. It was the Age of Reason in Europe, a philosophical movement that dominated the world of ideas and gave birth to the broad democratic principles that would guide western societies and still do. In continental Europe, the principle of sovereignty was transferred from the absolute monarch to the people. Although this movement started two centuries ago in England, France and Germany, it has gained in depth and acquired a more universal dimension.
For Jean-Jacques Rousseau, for instance, sovereignty is the "general will" which is always fair and equitable and thus a very effective concept. We see the idea of democracy emerging, where the people decide. But is democracy, in the sense of power to the people, the best form of government? And by the same token, is the right to recall based on the concept of power to the people a good way to control the actions of politicians? If this right to recall existed, would politicians be more likely to answer to constituents for their actions?
As for the foundation of government legitimacy, after royal authority was abolished at the end of the 18th century, in Rousseau's opinion, the people became the ultimate holders of the decision-making power. That is why he rejects the idea of representative democracy whereby the people can only wield their influence at regular intervals. About the English people, he said this: "The people think they are free, they are sorely mistaken; they are only free during elections. As soon as the members of Parliament are elected, the people revert to being slaves, to being nothing". That is why Rousseau wanted to give people the right to recall their representatives on a daily basis.
So, as we can see, recalling elected representatives is not a new idea. I think the main flaws of representative democracy, in particular the principle that citizens can only exercise their right to vote once every four or five years, deeply troubles all democrats since the beginning of universal suffrage.
The question raised at the dawn of representative democracy can still be raised today: "How can the sovereign power exercised by a few parliamentary dignitaries result from people's sovereignty?" The notion of democracy expressed through people's sovereignty, through the idea that every citizen of a sovereign state can influence the decision-making process, that everyone wields political power, will quickly take the form of state sovereignty with the application of democracy.
Throughout the 19th century, especially with the advent of universal suffrage, we see that the people's will expressed through the election process does not coincide with the general will. This is important: it does not coincide with the general will. As we move away from the great revolutionary movements that swept Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries, the notion of people's sovereignty gradually gives way to the more absolutist concept of parliamentary sovereignty.
Given what I just said, the Bloc Quebecois considers this bill to be fully justified and symptomatic of people's misgivings about their representatives and of the massive failure of the Canadian political system. Actually, this bill would be impossible to enforce, but it shows a democratic conscience deeply disillusioned by over 100 years of a system that simply does not work. Parliamentary sovereignty has lost all credibility, and making members of Parliament subject to recall will not restore its credibility.
Clause 4( d ) of Bill C-210 says that a statement of 200 words or less would be sufficient to trigger the recall process. This provision would necessarily lead to anarchy in many ridings. Further on, clause 6( b ) mentions the requirement to have a petition signed by a majority of the constituents of a riding in order to recall a member. Such a procedure would make the democratic process too costly and completely uncontrollable. I
note what the hon. member for Vancouver Quadra said about this.
This bill is not practical throughout a country whose population numbers in the millions. It results from a nostalgic feeling about the democratic idealism which arose in 18th-century Europe. That is why the Bloc Quebecois is opposed to this bill and prefers, along with some of our fellow members, like the hon. member for Vancouver Quadra, to take the option of developing within the institution of Parliament itself all the mechanisms for recalling members who are unable to do their job and represent their constituents democratically.