Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
This motion says:
That this House instruct the Legislative Committee on Bill C-20, an Act to give effect to the requirement for clarity as set out in the opinion of the Supreme Court of Canada in the Quebec secession Reference, to hold public hearings in all regions of Quebec and Canada so as to hear as many witnesses having an interest in the Bill as possible, that the hearings be broadcast and that the Committee be given sufficient resources to hold such hearings, all in accordance with the rules and practices of the House.
Contrary to Bill C-20, the motion proposed by the Bloc today is very clear.
I would like to talk about some of the comments we heard earlier from the hon. parliamentary secretary to the minister. He spoke quite eloquently and quite passionately about his concern about what the law addressed when it came to pulling the country apart. He felt that his party was standing in the House defending democracy, while the Bloc on the other hand was not, and in the process of dealing with this law was adding clarity to something he felt was very important.
However on reading this motion it seems that the Bloc is very concerned about pushing ahead with the idea of democracy in the House and extending it to a very important part of the committee procedure of the House of Commons.
One of the fears many of us have had in dealing with this important legislation, as my hon. colleague mentioned, is that we are not giving enough time to deal with an issue that affects all of us in Canada, no matter what the result would be of a potential referendum to secede from the country.
Dealing with the issue does not only apply to one region. My colleagues in the Bloc have said that as well. If the law sets a precedent we know that in the future there could be other regions of the country that may well go through the same process of referendums to secede from the country. I hope not, but in the event that it happens we need to hear from Canadians across the country about what they might feel should be added to the law or what they might feel is missing from the law.
How can we get as many Canadians as possible involved in this issue which, as my colleague mentioned, is one of the most important issues that we face in the country? In speaking passionately about the hon. member's feelings for democracy and about democracy in this place, I was very shocked to hear him disagree with the motion and say that the committee should not be allowed to travel.
I sat on the committee with two of my colleagues in the official opposition. So far we have unfortunately seen a very disorganized committee. We have seen the committee propose to hear from 45 witnesses in the span of a week. Because of the time allowed to notify the witnesses to come to Ottawa, some of them will not have a chance to make it. How is that participation in democracy? How is that including Canadians from across the country?
If the hon. member were serious about his comments on democracy and serious about his love for this country, he would not be scared to have Canadians from coast to coast join in debating a particular law as I aforementioned that is of paramount importance to almost all Canadians. This is the irony of the government.
We heard from the parliamentary secretary his belief in democracy and his commitment to democracy. We have seen in the House the most time allocation motions put forward by any government in our history. We have had restrictions on debate. We have had restrictions on trying to allow democracy to unfold in the country. The government is at the root of the problem.
The parliamentary secretary flatly rejects the idea of putting forward a simple motion on an issue that is so important to Canadians, that of giving the committee the ability to travel and hear from Canadians across the country. Where is his commitment to democracy?
As members know, the root of the motion today comes from Bill C-20 which is supposed to add clarity to the idea of a question being formed on the issue of a referendum but also clarity surrounding majority as it pertains to a referendum. When I talk to my colleagues across the country I know many of them feel they would like to see some issues addressed in the bill that have not been addressed thus far.
We have continuously raised one of these issues. My colleague, the parliamentary secretary, correctly pointed out that the official opposition wants to know what will constitute a clear majority in the bill. We have proposed our solution. We have discussed the idea of 50 plus one, a standard in democracy that is accepted around the world in other modern democracies. We know there are some concerns in that regard.
We would like the government to make clear where it plans to go on the important question of what it will respect in the event of a referendum vote. Will it change the bar halfway through the game? Will it alienate various Canadians in the process of making a decision on whether they want to stay in this country? These are important questions to which we still have no answers. There is not the clarity we would like to see in this bill.
As my hon. colleague from Macleod has said, we support the bill in principle. The Reform Party has been calling for clarity surrounding this issue far longer than the government. We would like to see these things outlined clearly. We hope the committee process will be able to deal with some amendments to the bill.