Debates of March 9th, 1998

Privilege

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, while recognizing the efforts made by the government leader and by the Reform whip, I would like to come back to the substance of the point raised by the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party in this House, which is an extremely serious one, in fact the most serious matter that has been raised in this Parliament since I, and many others I am sure, have been sitting in this place.

Here is what this is about. You have very clearly stated, to the satisfaction of all members of this House, that you would be ruling on the disturbance at question period the other day, which was brought to your attention.

What is serious about this matter is that members were named in the item and their remarks were quoted. They have threatened the Chair. Never in any Parliament—I do not know if this will get through—does anyone, even the Reformers, have the right to threaten the Speaker. To threaten the President is to threaten the Chair. And the Chair in any Parliament is the institution that ensures that all democratically elected parliamentarians can speak. To threaten the person in charge of protecting the right of parliamentarians to speak is to threaten Parliament itself.

Members of Parliament, including the Reform members for Edmonton East, Yorkton—Melville and Elk Island, clearly said the Speaker better watch himself because they would replace him. Such a threat cannot be tolerated.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Reformers had better listen up. At this rate, their beloved Parliament is threatened to disappear. There are also Liberal members involved, who, like the members for Timiskaming—Cochrane and Pickering—Ajax—Uxbridge, simply said “We will challenge the Speaker”.

Never will the Speaker of the House of Commons or the Speaker of a Parliament accept that members of Parliament, whose right to speak he is in charge of protecting, tell him through the papers to do as they please or face the consequences. That is a threat.

[An hon. member]

That is intimidation.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

That is unacceptable. That is appalling. That is intimidation, and those Reformers who are laughing probably do not understand what they are doing, because the best way to destroy a country is to destroy its Parliament. By destroying the Chair—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

—they are destroying Parliament and their country.

[The Speaker]

I would like to hear what hon. members have to say on this matter. This is our parliament. It deals with our parliament. I hope we will extend to each other the courtesy of listening when one of us has to speak.

I am going to return to the hon. member for Roberval.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, surprisingly, this is the second time in two weeks that I am obliged to rise in this House to explain to the great saviours of Canada, to those who want to preserve it at all costs, that they themselves are destroying their own country. It is totally ridiculous.

We are advocating a political option that threatens the existence of Canada in its current form. However, the members of the Bloc Quebecois could never be criticized for failing to respect this country's institutions and the Chair.

We do not have the right, you do not have the right and no one here has the right to threaten the Chair, whoever may occupy it. You, Mr. Speaker, have always had the confidence of this House. We elected you. You the full respect of the government, of the Bloc—as we have said—of the Conservative Party, which is rightly concerned by events here, and of the New Democratic Party, most certainly.

The political parties in this House cannot allow individuals, who, obviously, do not know where they are headed when they make such serious accusations as this against the Chair, to destroy the institution of Parliament.

The best way to destroy a country is to destroy Parliament. We do not want to destroy Canada, we want to rework it and to make a Canada that functions well in partnership with a Quebec that functions well. We do not, however, want to destroy the institutions. They do.

I close by saying that your role, Mr. Speaker, is to protect the right of speech of parliamentarians and not to protect partisanship, which is what these people want you to do.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Wentworth—Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to submit that this is certainly not a case of contempt of parliament because the comments and questions attack individuals and not parliament as a whole.

As it happens we in the House are always subject to criticisms and attacks. The Prime Minister is subject to it on a daily basis in question period. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that you should be subject to it from time to time as well, if MPs so choose to make these comments.

The very essence of free speech in a democracy is that every member of Parliament has the opportunity and the right to express his views no matter how unpalatable they are to the rest of us. It is the very essence of a democracy that the newspapers have a right to seek and report those views.

In this case there was no threat. There was merely speculation that you, Mr. Speaker, would be subject to extreme criticism from within this parliament because of whatever decision you might bring down in this instance.

I remind you, Mr. Speaker, you are an elected person. I can remember at the end of the last parliament there was a great deal of newspaper speculation about whether you would be re-elected in the next parliament as a result of some of the decisions that you made. This is normal. This is the kind of fair comment that should exist in a democracy.

We cannot stop MPs from expressing themselves even though the majority of us may disagree with what they say. It is a threat to free speech if in any way, Mr. Speaker, you rule that this is a case of contempt.

[Ben Serré, Liberal, Timiskaming—Cochrane, ON]

Mr. Speaker, you know the respect I have for you and for the role you perform in the House.

[Yvan Loubier, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

You do not have any respect, saying things like that.

[Ben Serré, Liberal, Timiskaming—Cochrane, ON]

I will not get up on my high horse, like the member for Roberval. I will try to keep my remarks calm and rational.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[The Speaker]

The member for Timiskaming—Cochrane.

[Ben Serré, Liberal, Timiskaming—Cochrane, ON]

I was going to say that you know the respect I have for you, for the role you perform in the House and for this institution.

The Ottawa Sun has attributed comments to me. You know that journalists take a half-hour conversation and boil it down to one sentence.

[Yvan Loubier, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

No, no. It is a quote.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[Ben Serré, Liberal, Timiskaming—Cochrane, ON]

I would ask the separatist members to have the respect to listen, as they asked us to do earlier. We were quiet and listened to the member for Roberval. We ask that you show the same respect.

The comments I made to the journalists amounted to one thing: the position I took was that, as a Canadian citizen, elected by Canadians to sit in the Parliament of Canada, I felt—

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Verchères, QC]

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

[The Speaker]

I am going to hear what the member for Timiskaming—Cochrane has to say. Then I will come back to the point of order. We are now talking about a point of privilege.

[Ben Serré, Liberal, Timiskaming—Cochrane, ON]

Mr. Speaker, what I was going to say is that, as a Canadian citizen elected by Canadians to sit in the Parliament of Canada, it is not only my right but my duty to promote the Canadian flag and all it represents.

If my comments are perceived by anyone as an attack against or a lack of respect to the Chair, I withdraw them and apologize. The point I wanted to make, is that I, as the member for Timiskaming—Cochrane, have taken the position that I have a right and a duty to show the Canadian flag in the House, in the Canadian Parliament, and that, regardless of the Speaker's decision on this, I am prepared to carry the flag and to face up to the consequences of the Speaker's ruling like a man.

[Yvan Loubier, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

And he is sexist to boot.

[Nelson Riis, NDP, Kamloops, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I participate in this question of privilege on behalf of my party with a great deal of reluctance. However, having listened to what has been said, this is not a debate about the appropriateness of the flag or whatever.

Mr. Speaker, we made the arguments in the House of Commons in the usual thoughtful and eloquent way before we recessed. We asked that you make a decision on the appropriateness of what happened. That is the issue and you are weighing that decision now.

However, while you were making that decision and presumably looking at the Debates and contemplating the comments that were made, some members of this House—I do not want to identify them—made comments such as “he will demand the Speaker's removal if he rules in favour of the BQ”. Another person said “if he rules any other way I am most offended and I think we will have to call for the election of a new Speaker”. Somebody else went on to say “there will be grave consequences if he does not rule in favour of our position”. Another warned that the Speaker would face demands for his resignation.

Mr. Speaker, those are threats to you. People are going to demand your resignation. They are going to call for a vote if your decision does not go in their favour.

How many of us have listened to your decisions time and time again and the automatic reaction, whether or not we agree personally, is to accept those decisions and move on. We have to accept whatever decision you take as our representative elected by the House.

[An hon. member]

He hasn't made a decision.