Mr. Speaker, I will be using the entire 20 minute period. I am sure members opposite will be delighted to hear that.
This is an interesting debate. In some of the speeches people are positioning themselves in one sense to be great defenders of the democratic process in this place. They are saying that they are not attacking you for partisan reasons to perhaps go at the government in a different way. That is what I have been hearing all day. I find that quite remarkable. It is a subterfuge; that is probably the best way I can think of it.
The motion of non-confidence in the Speaker comes from the party that just lost all its amendments in relation to Bill C-20, the clarity bill, and the fact that it is upset about that is probably why we are even having this debate. Mr. Speaker, instead of debating the issue of the status of health care in the country that the fifth party wanted to put forward today on an opposition day, we have found ourselves through negotiations with the House leaders coming to an agreement that we should somehow put that off for a day and debate this motion and talk about how you are doing your job. To then hear people say that it is not partisan makes me laugh. It is clearly and purely partisan beyond a doubt.
In preparing for this job I sat with some excellent Speakers in the provincial legislature. You will, sir, remember Speaker Edighoffer, a fine gentleman who served the province of Ontario in an exceptional way as Speaker. There was Speaker Warner. Speaker Edighoffer was a member of the Liberal caucus when he was elected and then he became Speaker. Of course one must then withdraw from all those caucus and partisan activities, as one should. Speaker Warner was a member of the New Democratic Party when he was elected under Premier Rae. He too withdrew from caucus participation because no Speaker can be involved in even knowing what the government is thinking in terms of the policies or platforms it is going to put forward.
We expect an awful lot of our Speakers in this place and in the provincial legislatures and so we should. I thought about how I could define what it is that we expect of the Speaker. Rather than reinvent the wheel, I did some homework and came up with something which I thought said it all. In 1986 the then Leader of the Opposition, the Right Hon. John Turner, said:
You know what we demand of you, Mr. Speaker. Perfection! We want fairness, independence, decisiveness, patience, common sense, good humour, upholding the traditions of the House, knowledge of the rules and an intuition for the changing mood and tone of the House as we move through our days.
That is a fair definition of what the House expects of its Speaker.
The other aspect of this is that you, sir, do not make the rules. We do. Through the process that is put in place, the House of Commons sets the rules down. We have a process whereby they are approved by the House of Commons. I know you would agree that in addition to all the issues of fairness, independence, common sense and good humour, that you are in fact a servant of the House of Commons. As a result you have to do a job in as impartial a way as you possibly can and not get caught into any kind of personal partisan feelings that would take away the rights of anyone in a minority position.
The reason I say that is I find it really interesting that members opposite who have spoken here have begun their speeches by saying that the government is heavy handed, that the reason we are having this debate is that we have had too many motions of time allocation and that they do not like the way the government is operating and doing business. Mr. Speaker, what in the world has that to do with you?
I would say it proves to me the point that this is nothing but subterfuge and a way to say that they are mad that they lost a bill, a vote, a motion, 400 amendments or whatever it is. They cannot get at the government any more, and there is an interesting reason for that by the way, so they will attack the Speaker.
One of the Reform members said that the government only got 38% of the vote. When I was elected in 1987 in the David Peterson government that was about the percentage of vote we had in Ontario. When there are five parties it is not the government's fault opposition members cannot get their act together. It is not the government's fault that they do not seem to be able to agree on policies. We have what some refer to as a pizza parliament with five different parties opposite. The standings are that out of 301 seats we have 157 and that is a majority. The next closest party has 58.
I can understand the frustration of the opposition because the mandate was given to us, not by you, Mr. Speaker, not by your office and not by the table officers or the staff. I want to touch on that because not only is this subterfuge of attacking you a way of getting to the government, but what they have actually done by this motion of non-confidence in the Speaker is to attack our staff and our table officers. I find that particularly offensive and absolutely uncalled for.
I must admit I am surprised to see it coming from the Bloc. One of the things I have been impressed with and surprised about in this place is that if we take away the issue of Quebec separatism, the members of the Bloc whom I have worked with on committee are compassionate, caring, hardworking, dedicated members of parliament. In fact I have travelled with some of them to other places in the world. I have not found that they foisted their particular brand of separatism on the people in Strasbourg, France where I attended the Council of Europe. I have found them to be very good MPs who contribute to the process and the work in this place.
The Bloc members in a fit, a temper tantrum, and it can be described as nothing else because they were out of ideas, they were out of tools with which to try to shove wrenches into the machinery of government, said “We cannot get those guys over there, so we had better go after the staff”. How did they do that?
The concern of the member for Rimouski—Mitis was that some 700 motions had been submitted quite properly, although there were two the Bloc claim were never really submitted properly, and they were rejected. There were well over a thousand. We would still be here voting.
I would like somebody in this place, you, Mr. Speaker, or anybody else, to tell me that the Canadian public sent any one of us from any one of the parties her to stand up between 6 o'clock at night and 6 o'clock in the morning and then 6 o'clock in the morning to 6 o'clock at night three days running, 24 hours a day, and have our names called to vote on a motion that would change a comma to a semicolon.
That cannot be called democracy. That can have no basis in governing this land. Lord knows it is difficult enough in your job, Mr. Speaker, to try to govern 301 of us who can be unruly because of the partisanship. This is a blood sport and we all know that. This is a tough business. There is some truth in that old saying “If you can make it here you can make it anywhere”.
You have a job that is really a thankless job. You try to keep order, to keep direction and to find ways to ensure that. It is not to direct anyone, not to direct government, not to direct opposition. Members of this place have more freedom than any institution in the world.
Bloc members have said that their privileges have been violated because their amendments were not accepted. There is something that goes with privileges in this country. It is called responsibilities. Bill C-20 has three clauses and is one and a half pages long. I understand their fervour, their passion, their desire to lead their province out of Confederation. All Canadians understand that. They also understand that is a minority position in the province of Quebec today.
All the polls indicate that the desire for and the interest in separatism are at historic lows, but I understand it probably more than I did three years ago when I arrived in this place. As I said before, I respect them for many of the things they do in an effort to be members of this place. However, I would suggest it is not responsible to submit over 1,000 amendments to a three clause bill that is a page and a half long. Most of them, the vast majority of them, were either redundant or simply not substantive.
Without a doubt that is a clear message which says “we cannot win this so how can we make it as uncomfortable as possible”. I do not know what it costs to run this place. In some ways I find that argument irrelevant. We are sent here and if it costs it costs, but it is just such a waste.
We went through it with the Reform Party that took the same approach to the Nisga'a treaty. I understood its passion. It is not your fault, Mr. Speaker, that Reformers had 471 amendments and it is not your fault that they lost them all. Lord knows I have never been terribly supportive of the policies of the Reform Party, but I did not see Reformers pull a tantrum and file a motion of non-confidence in the Speaker just because they lost the 471 amendments. They took their lumps. They went home to western Canada, British Columbia, or wherever they are from, and fought the battle at the local level.
That is what democracy in this place is about. This is an abuse in my view. It is an abuse of you, Sir. It is an abuse of your deputies. It is an abuse of the staff.
There are three types of members in this place. Members opposite might find this hard to believe, but I am actually not a government member in those terms. I am a member in support of the government. There is a difference. Government members are the cabinet. The Prime Minister and his cabinet are indeed the government. The rest of us who were elected as Liberals choose whether or not to be in support of the government. That is the role we play.
We hear members opposite calling for free votes for people in this place, that there are not enough free votes. I have never been involved with a government where there is more opportunity for free votes, more opportunity within the caucus system and within the committee system to make changes.
The democratic process around here frankly is quite remarkable. I say that from the backbenches where some would say on a clear day I might have trouble seeing the Speaker. The reality is that the process is in place for members, and I might add it is in place for members opposite to have input.
It is just past 4 o'clock. I am told that at 3.30 p.m. today a press conference was held in this precinct where the critic for citizenship and immigration released a yet to be finalized and yet to be approved report of the citizenship and immigration committee on the immigration and illegal migrant issue.
I find that incomprehensible and despicable. It shows a lack of respect in you, Sir; a lack of respect in the committee; a lack of respect in the traditions of this place, of every person who has gone before us in this place. He is simply saying he does not like this report. Do you know why? It is because he never showed up at the meetings to help us write it. He released it and accused the committee of not listening to him. It is fundamentally wrong and childish. Yet that is happening.
I hear members stand in their places to talk to you about this issue. They say that things have deteriorated around here. It is quite interesting. We have members in opposition. We have members in support of the government and we have members who are the government. It has always been thus. We all have a role to play.
I served for five years in opposition to what I thought was an arrogant government. I thought it was a government that was not listening, that got in by accident. It was the New Democratic government that was in Ontario for five years. I can remember thinking that if the people had a chance to vote again the morning after the election they would never have put those guys in power. They did not believe that was going to happen.