Mr. Speaker, the amendment in question refers to conferring on the legislature or the Government of Quebec new executive powers, propriety rights and so on. It also refers to privileges not conferred on the legislature or the government of any province; in other words, provinces including Quebec but possibly other provinces as well.
Our parliamentary precedents, Beauchesne's sixth edition, page 176, citation 579 says:
(1) An amendment setting forth a proposition dealing with a matter which is foreign to the proposition involved in the main motion is not relevant and cannot be moved.
(2) An amendment may not raise a new question which can only be considered in a distinct motion after proper notice.
It is on those two points that I believe the amendment is irreceivable. I have indicated that it introduces two new concepts in subsection (i) which are not referred to in the original motion.
Mr. Speaker will also be guided by the decision of 1923 when the Speaker of the House decided that the report of a parliamentary committee as a prerequisite to accepting a particular initiative was a new concept because it was not in the main motion and was therefore out of order. Similarly, subsection (i) of this amendment is out of order.
Second, I want to point out that, on October 16, 1970, Mr. Baldwin moved the following motion: That the motion be amended by striking out all the words after "that" and adding the following: "the government should forthwith introduce legislative proposals to meet the conditions referred to in the motion".
That was a totally new element which was not in the original proposal. Consequently, it was out of order.
For these two reasons, I argue that, when you make your ruling tomorrow morning, it will be to the effect that the amendment proposed by the leader of the Reform Party is out of order.