Mr. Speaker, we are now debating Bill C-69 for the last time in the House. The bill is consequential of Bill C-18 from some time ago and the perceived need to redraw the act which allowed the commissions to redistribute the ridings in various provinces.
The bill is a result of the Liberal fiasco of interrupting the boundary redistribution with Bill C-18. The fiasco was started because Liberal members did not like the new maps produced by the commissions. Making a show out of calling for a fundamental review of the redistribution process, the government ordered new boundary maps drawn under new rules, costing Canadian taxpayers more than $5 million in wasted commission reports.
Although there have been some minor improvements to the process of selecting boundary commissioners and publicizing the process, no substantial change to the composition of the boundary readjustment commissions, no substantial change to their powers and no substantial change to the method of drawing boundaries are proposed by Bill C-69. All the changes made to the redistribution act could have been made without throwing out the maps produced at great cost.
This whole exercise was a crass political manoeuvre on the part of the Liberals hoping to have boundary lines redrawn closer to their liking. There was no requirement for the redistribution process to be suspended and for the expensive work to be thrown out in order to examine the process.
Notwithstanding the minor technical improvements made to the act, the bill should be defeated by the House for two major reasons. Bill C-69 fails to address the problem of a rapidly growing House of Commons and it lays suspect the concept of equality of vote as a guiding principle in the redistribution process. The bill does not move the House of Commons any closer to respecting the mandate of representation by population, the cornerstone principle for a lower House in a bicameral system.
What is interesting about these two failures is that the Liberal members of the procedure and House affairs committee were initially in favour of tighter variances and a capped or reduced number of seats in the House of Commons. Capping or reducing the number was a major part of the mandate the House gave to the procedure and House affairs committee.
Witnesses were brought in from all over the country to discuss this issue with us. Many of the Liberals on the committee agreed that the restrictions on the size of the House were a good idea.
Allow me to give members a few examples. Going back to our procedure and House affairs committee meetings of last summer, on July 7 the member for Scarborough-Rouge River, a very active member during this entire process, said: "I have always been in favour of the view that the House should be taking control of its numbers. We ought to, by formula or in another way, be capping the size of the House of Commons. I am in favour of capping, whether it is 250, 300 or something over 300. It is not a big problem".
It seems pretty clear the member for Scarborough-Rouge River was in favour of dealing with the issue of the growth of the House. He was not alone on the Liberal side of the table. At the same meeting the member for Ontario said: "I too support any initiative that might have the effect of limiting or capping the number of seats".
The member for Vancouver Quadra, very experienced in matters of riding redistribution and constitutional considerations, added: "I have no problem at all with capping". He was clear we had to recognize some of the difficulties in doing it.
The Reform members on the committee were able to satisfactorily answer those concerns. The pattern of support for the idea of a smaller or capped House continued into the fall. In our meeting on October 20 the member for Scarborough-Rouge River again indicated his support for the concept: "I oppose further growth in the House without any restrictions. I tend to be in favour of a capping arrangement at some point and I very much want to see that issue addressed".
It is very strange the member has spoken in favour of and has supported the bill at all stages even though that issue is not addressed at all.
The chairman of the procedure and House affairs committee, the member for Kingston and the Islands, wanted to shirk all responsibility for capping the House and leave the problem to a future Parliament.
The Liberal dominated 51st report from the committee says: "Many members of the committee reluctantly came to the conclusion that a cap or reduction in the size of the House of Commons is not feasible at this time".
I got a very different impression from many of the Liberal members during the committee hearings. Reformers demonstrated that a House based on 265 members plus a few more to account for senatorial limitations is workable. We included this in our minority opinion, an opinion the Liberal brass ordered defeated.
On October 20 the member for Vancouver Quadra added: "I think many of us would like a more compact House. This House certainly architecturally has been stretched to the breaking point".
This is all very interesting but when faced with a vote on the issue in that very meeting, all Liberal members voted against a reduced House or a House frozen at 295 members. They all
voted for a House that grows to 301, the status quo formula for continued growth.
Their personal support for capping the House continued. As late as November 1 the member for Scarborough-Rouge River said in committee: "We should be addressing the size of the House in our report. I do not think as a committee we have nailed that one down yet". He added at a later meeting of the committee on November 22: "It would be naive to leave this issue without discussing the size of the House".
It was at this point that the chair, speaking for the government, indicated that it would be better to leave the problem of a growing House to some future Parliament. This comment seemed to concern the Liberal members who thought that capping or reducing was a good idea.
The member for Mississauga West who also participated in our deliberations wondered why the next Parliament should be asked to investigate the problem: "Is there any good reason why we cannot do it?"
The answer to that is a very loud and resounding no, there is no good reason the bill could not have contained provisions to cap or reduce the size of the House of Commons, other than a lack of political will on the part of the government to deal with a controversial issue that would be acceding to the wishes of Canadians.
Her comments that day were reinforced by her colleague from Vancouver Quadra when he agreed with her that the work on the problem of size should start now. All of these comments are in the committee transcripts.
There was a very real level of non-partisan agreement that capping and reducing the House was in order. The Liberal members of the committee wanted it and the Reform members of the committee wanted it. My friend from Mississauga West was absolutely right when she said: "I think the Canadian public wants us to limit the size of the House". It seems that the only people who do not want it are those in the government inner circle who really call the shots.
It is always interesting to hear what any given government member thinks about a particular issue and then compare their response after a caucus meeting or after the whip has had a chance to talk to them. Time after time we see them mysteriously changing their minds about what is in the public interest.
I noted with interest that the hon. member for Bellechasse was surprised that the Liberals had changed their minds. I do not understand that. Liberals have been changing their minds ever since this country was established in 1867. There is nothing they stand for and there is everything they stand for; it is whatever is convenient at the time.
It is time that the House and the government acted on principle, on what is right and on what is in the best interests of the Canadian public. It should consult with the Canadian public rather than flim-flamming around from one position to another, depending on the whims of the inner circle of the Liberal Party.
There seemed to be a pretty clear consensus among Liberals that capping and reducing the size of the House was a good idea. Why then was the issue suddenly and strangely dropped from the committee report, the bill which the government introduced, and all subsequent comments from those Liberal members? Suddenly, it was not an issue any more.
The answer is quite clear. They were whipped into line by the party brass. The red book promises of giving ordinary members of Parliament more autonomy and control over committee and House business is demonstrably dead. It is one more example that the red book promises of open government and restoring integrity were nothing more than tricks designed to win support from a public weary of unethical politicians. How else can the Liberals explain the practice of standing firm on an opinion one day and then voting it down on the next?
It was the same with the back to work legislation which the House dealt with last week. Many government members spoke in favour of designing legislation that would prevent costly strikes which damage the economy. Then they voted against the bill introduced by the hon. member for Lethbridge which would have done just that. Then within 24 hours the same members stood in support of the bill legislating an end to the crippling rail strike. It just does not make sense. It is pure partisan politics at its worst.
It is exactly the kind of top-down decision making Canadians from coast to coast are sick of. It is the Charlottetown accord approach to making decisions. They are trying to impose their will on Canadians. The Liberals are demonstrating that they hold a very low opinion of the thoughts of their own backbenchers. They expect them to act like trained seals, to always toe the party line and to vote when and how they are told to.
We saw exactly the same thing when we were discussing the allowable variance from the provincial population quotient, which is also a part of Bill C-69. Several government members expressed support for the idea of making constituencies, as close as possible, equal in population.
The member for Mississauga West went so far as to vote in favour of a Reform suggestion to move to a 15 per cent variance in population quotient. In our committee meeting on October 20 she admitted: "I voted with you on that, if you recall, and got into big trouble". Big trouble for expressing her own opinion in a committee meeting of this House. The member admitted that
she was censured for voting contrary to party wisdom. That is not open government; it is authoritarian top-down government.
I know the Liberal member for Vancouver Quadra will agree with me when I say that the monarch in Parliament is sovereign and MPs share in that sovereignty. Members of Parliament should not merely be puppets to their party brass. It is bad policy, it is bad for Parliament, and it is bad for Canada.
Canadians elect MPs to represent their interests in Parliament. It is a shame that the government would not allow its members to exercise that responsibility. The support was there to create a redistribution bill that would meet the needs and wants of the majority of Canadians, but the government brass whipped its members into line to enforce its own agenda.
The Parliament of Canada should not be run in an authoritarian top-down decision making process. Every vote and every committee should not be considered a matter of confidence. Every member should not be forced by the inner circle to toe the line. That kind of practice reduces the House of Commons to nothing more than a grand rubber stamp for what the cabinet has already decided behind closed doors.
I doubt the government had an open caucus debate on these issues before it determined to add seats to the House of Commons and allow the vast population variance differences that are included in Bill C-69. I doubt very much there was a very open debate in the Liberal caucus about this issue. I suspect the decision was made and members of the Liberal caucus were told that they would support Bill C-69. They were probably given four or five talking points to back them up as they were sent out to sell the government agenda.
There was a rare opportunity here to make a positive change to our redistribution system. The government did not allow its members to make those changes in the area of a capped or reduced House to protect the equality of Canadian votes with a tighter variance.
I want to briefly reflect on some of the observations made by the hon. member for Bellechasse. He took it upon himself to give Reformers a lesson in Canadian history. I want to assure the hon. member that Reformers are very aware of the history of our country. We are very proud of our past. We are very proud of all of those from the past who contributed to this country to make it the great country it is.
I would like to remind the hon. member for Bellechasse and others who might share his concern about our understanding of Canadian history there are reasons that people came to this country. They came particularly to my part of the country, the west, and I believe they came to the province of Quebec, Ontario and Atlantic Canada because they wanted to get away from some things in their country of origin. They wanted to escape repressive regimes. They wanted to escape governments that imposed undemocratic principles upon them.
I am a bit concerned about the Bloc members' position on Bill C-69. They want to impose a principle that in my opinion and the opinion of my Reform colleagues is undemocratic. That is, we would put on the floor of the House of Commons 25 per cent of the seats for one province in this country, regardless of changes in population.
That is why a lot of people left their country, to escape those types of oppressive laws and come to a place where the democratic principles of representation by population were adhered to. I believe that is the principle the people of Quebec adhere to as well. I also believe that is one of the reasons many people in the province of Quebec voted against the Charlottetown accord.
Canadians, both within and outside of Quebec, find it abhorrent that we would call for special status for anyone in this country. It is not a principle that was accepted in the Charlottetown accord. It was repugnant back then and it is repugnant to Canadians today.
We have to ask: Why would they want special status? Why would they want to be guaranteed 25 per cent of the seats of the House of Commons whether their population justified it or not?
I think of two or three arguments that might be put forward. One argument might be that somehow their representatives are not as good as the representatives from other parts of the country and they need that floor and need that protection. I do not accept that argument. Quebecers can send qualified and able members to this House who can represent them adequately, just like we can in the rest of the country. I challenge that argument.
Another argument might be that they are superior to other Canadians and deserve to have 25 per cent of the seats in this House. I reject that argument as well. It is a false argument. We need to look upon each other as equals in this country, equal citizens with equal responsibilities, equal privileges and a law that affects us all in the same manner.
There is one other argument that might be put forth. They might say that they are one of two founding races and somehow that bestows some special privilege upon us. All of us know that the native people were here before those of English or French origin.
This past weekend I was at a breakfast where a Metis leader spoke to us. He brought the point home to us again that in most of this country Canadians do not view Canada as being the home of two founding nations. In particular, if they are one of the first people or of Metis origin, they very much doubt that concept.
I want to close by saying I appreciate the opportunity to make my final remarks on Bill C-69. For all of the reasons I have put forward in my speech at third reading, I urge the House not to pass Bill C-69. We are not getting the job done. If we are not prepared to face the issue square on and if we keep wanting to put off the tough decisions into the future, those decisions will become even tougher to make.
If we let this House expand to 320 members, some 20 more people will have a vested interest in maintaining their seats in this House of Commons and not seeing the size of this House reduced. It is going to have a negative snowball effect which is not good for the country. Unfortunately there are too many politicians in this place who have a vested interest and are not able to put the well-being of the country ahead of their own self-interests.
I urge all members of this House to do the right thing, the thing even Liberals argued for in committee, to cap the size of the House, to respect representation by population, and to vote against Bill C-69.