Mr. Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. When the hon. member who just spoke quoted Standing Order 73, she was thoroughly accurate.
The purpose of sending bills to committee prior to second reading is to give the committee an opportunity to look into a bill thoroughly and to improve it before it comes back to the House for second reading. In that way, a lot of valuable time of the House is not tied up. There is no question that that is the intent, the scope and the purpose of that standing order.
However, when you look at this bill and the other one we will be debating later today, what has to be pointed out is that the general principle of the measures contained in the budget have been adopted by the budgetary process.
The details of the principles of these measures were adopted when the ways and means motion was passed. Why is the bill being sent to committee prior to second reading when, in principle, in scope, in containment, in its content it is a fait accompli?
Puis parce que nous avons-I do not have very good French-to send it. Not to make light of this, how can we proceed to consider these bills in committee before second reading when the principle of the bill has already been fixed and determined? What is the Standing Committee on Finance going to do? What is it going to amend? What principle is it going to change? What scope is it
going to go back to? Will it spend less somewhere? Will it recommend cuts elsewhere? Will it change the amount of money, the $800 million, that is given to the foundation of innovation for science?
This is a misuse of the standing order, plain and simple. The argument that we are trying to put forward is that neither this bill nor the other bill we will be debating today, Bill C-93, should be sent to committee prior to second reading.
The very same point that the member from the Liberal Party, the former whip like myself, made about the purpose of Standing Order 73 is accurate and true. I support her when she makes that claim.
When the rules of Standing Order 73 are applied, any good lawyer-I see one sitting beside her now-will say that this is just smoke and mirrors and that the purpose of the government is to get it out of the House so that debate is limited. When it comes back the rule states that debate is limited. We do not have the number of hours to debate the bill after it comes back from committee if we send it to committee prior to second reading.
They are using a double whammy on the opposition members. It is another example of limiting the democratic rights and principles of the opposition parties. Our job here is to go through legislation, to go through ways and means motions, to decide whether it is in the best interests of the Canadian public to either support them or, if not to give them our full endorsement, then to make recommendations through amendments either here in the House, in committee or at report stage, then come back and work on them.
There was an agreement at the start of the 35th Parliament. A lot of bills come here at second reading, prior to going to committee and we make a lot of amendments. It ends up being a big waste of time. For certain legislation, for complicated bills, there are advantages in sending them to committee where the job of the committee is then to thoroughly go through the bill. Sometimes the committee has done it but sometimes it has not.
Agricultural bills have been sent to committee prior to second reading and the members in the committee just ram through clause by clause. They limit debate. We know all about the complaints we have had. They have misused their majority in committee. That is one thing.
However on this one, there will not be any debate on scope. There will not be any debate on principle. It has already been adopted. It is the law of the land. It is a done deal.
I submit very humbly that this point of order be considered, Mr. Speaker, and that you rule that this bill not be sent to committee prior to second reading for the very reasons that I have outlined. To summarize, it is unnecessary. It is just a way that the government has figured out to once again stifle and limit freedom of speech and the time that is supposed to be allocated in the giving of opinions on bills.
This legislation will pass. We all know that. We all know how important the budget is to the nation. We all know it is necessary for the budget implementation act to pass, so money can be borrowed and that kind of thing. But what we object to is limiting the time that we can discuss the bills.
I believe this bill should not be sent to committee prior to second reading because the principle and the scope are clearly established. Nothing will be changed. It should just remain in the House for second reading.