Mr. Speaker, we have been reminded that this is a place of passionate debate and partisanship. My comments today are going to be very partisan. I wish to make it very clear for the readers of Hansard that I am going to attempt to do this in a totally dispassionate way. I think it is important that I do it in a dispassionate way because this is a very passionate issue.
I would like to refocus this debate in the direction that my colleague from Vegreville was just pointing. We are presently debating the Liberal amendment to the Reform motion. The Liberal's first excuse for gutting our motion is that voting for the motion decides before examination that the member is guilty.
These are the facts. Voting for the motion means what the motion says, that the House view the action as seditious and a contempt, and it should be examined by a committee. Just like any other court you are charged before the trial. Without that charge we would not be debating the motion. It would not have been given privilege.
The Speaker said "the House today is being faced with one of the more serious matters we have been faced with in this 35th Parliament. I believe that the charges are so grave against one of our own members that the House should deal with this accusation forthwith".
I also quote Beauchesne's citation 50 which says:
In any case where the propriety of a Member's actions is brought into question, a specific charge must be made.
That is very clear. The wording we have in the initial motion is the correct wording. It was thought out wording. It was wording that as put forward by the leader of the Reform Party in a very clear call to action by this House of Commons. I charge that the Liberals are attempting to gut our motion.
They have an old excuse. The old excuse for inaction is that sedition is something for the courts to decide. That was the very weak-kneed answer to my colleague from Vegreville. They say let somebody else do it, they do not want to rock the boat. Here are the facts. If the courts want to deal with a charge, they do what courts do. Parliament does whatever it wants in the context of a contempt of Parliament. Citation 28 of Beauchesne's sixth edition states:
Parliament is a court with respect to its own privileges and dignity and the privileges of its Members.
Citation 49:
It is not necessary for the courts to come to a decision before the House acts. In 1891 charges were laid in the House against Thomas McGreevy relating to scandals in the Public Works Department. The Committee on Privileges and Elections examined the evidence and concluded that the charges were amply proven.
I parenthesize and point out that the House judged Mr. McGreevy to be guilty of a contempt of the House as well as certain of the charges and ordered his expulsion.
Other references to support the right of Parliament to charge a member with whatever it wants to charge a member with are in Joseph Maingot's Parliamentary Privilege in Canada , page 100-