Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this debate today.
Yesterday we had the Speaker's ruling. Today we have an opposition motion which among other things serves, in a way which is not totally wholesome, as a mechanism to appeal the Speaker's ruling. This is something that has been disallowed for the last 30 years in this Parliament.
Our flag is an important national symbol. As I pronounce these words there are two flags beside Mr. Speaker. There are two flags outside the door of the House of Commons. Every MP can have one beside his or her desk; I do in my office just a few feet away from the door. I usually wear one as a lapel pin. There is one on a flagpole in my yard at home. As well I have one in my office in my residence.
The question before us today is not whether or not Canadian members of Parliament are in favour of the Canadian flag. I do not believe any of us on this side of the House need lectures from the official opposition on the Canadian flag and its value. It was a Liberal government that gave us the maple leaf flag in 1965. It was just three years ago that we introduced flag day, our national celebration of the maple leaf.
It was this government that encouraged Canadians to show their patriotism by distributing a million flags from coast to coast to coast. Which party objected to that? Which party told us not to fly the Canadian flag from coast to coast to coast the way the Minister of Canadian Heritage asked us to do? It was the Reform Party.
In 1995 on that day in October many of us went to Montreal when our country was calling. Our country was asking us to show our patriotism, real patriotism, not the kind of phoney stuff I have been hearing over recent days. All federalist MPs except one group went to Montreal. Two thousand of my constituents went with me to Montreal. Canadians from all over the country went to Montreal. We all stood there beside that great big flag of the Jaycees of Windsor to support the Canadian flag and Canadian unity. Who was missing? The Reform Party. The Reform Party boycotted Canada when Canada came calling. That is the reality. Everyone in this House knows it.
Of course the separatists have a different point of view. They want to separate from Canada. I disagree with their point of view but at the very least they did not do as those people across the way and pretend that they were in favour of Canada today while making gestures that were the opposite only yesterday.
We are talking about respect for the rules and respect for the House. What have we seen over recent days? Challenges of this great institution, challenges of the Chair, challenges of everything we stand for. Taking a Canadian flag, wrapping it around oneself and driving around Parliament Hill in an old jalopy in the name of patriotism is the kind of thing we have seen from hon. members opposite. Is that patriotism? No. That is making a mockery of our institution. We all know that is what it is. We know what it stands for.
We are talking about respect for the rules. We had grown up people, so-called adults, wearing Mexican hats and dancing in front of the Chamber of this parliament. In 1993 the then leader of the third party, today the Leader of the Opposition, snubbed the governor general on the opening of parliament. That is what we had in the name of respect, in the name of democracy and in the name of our rules? No, that is not patriotism.
I have often quoted in this House and elsewhere the words of a great Canadian, a person who did not have the word “reform” as part of his title but as part of his ideology, and this great Canadian was none other than Mr. Diefenbaker. He once told us there is no greater honour for a Canadian than that of serving the people of his or her country in the highest court of the land, the Parliament of Canada.
This is the honour that rests on our shoulders. We must show respect for this institution by respecting its rules. We must not let parliamentarians throw flags at other members, as has been done in this House.
A few days ago, I saw with my own eyes a member of this House take a flag off his desk, which, in itself, is against the rules, and throw it in the direction of the Chair.
Was this done out of respect for the flag, for democracy and for Parliament? No, that is not patriotism either.
Hon. members across the way say today that they are sincere in their motion. They produced a motion yesterday, added a word by hand to it and then produced an amendment today to remove the word they had pencilled in by hand to stop the House from amending the motion, if the House so wished.