Debates of Nov. 26th, 2001

Points of Order

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

When on Friday was that?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I see I woke up the right hon. member for Calgary Centre.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Were you here Friday?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

No. Actually it was one better than that. As a matter of fact on Thursday we gave the extension for both Friday and Saturday.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Just another little error.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I thank the right hon. member for correcting that because in fact I actually had given him more than was asked for. I was tempted to forget about it but I thank him for reminding not just me but the entire House for the generosity it showed toward him.

Additionally the member referred to the minister's word being kept secret. The minister's statement was made publicly, was published and is available. Then of course the entire thing, including her speech, was televised.

I do not know about you, Mr. Speaker, but secret televised meetings are very hard to organize, especially when they are published nationwide. A secret, nationwide, televised meeting is in fact what the hon. member alleges. How many of us would actually believe that as a concoction?

Those charges are inappropriate and the member knows it. We want to get this bill passed for the benefit of Canadians not only by the House but the House and the Senate and so that the royal assent process takes place before Christmas. That is our duty.

I believe that all of us, if we look at it responsibly, know that it is our duty. To pretend that because all the minutes of the committee have not been published publicly it prevents the legislative process is inaccurate and the hon. member knows it.

It is not that long ago that we even published these minutes when the House was in recess. We did not even do it when the House was sitting. There was, when I came here only a few years back, three weeks' delay to publish committee minutes. Now it is something like three or four days before we get published minutes.

The hon. member knows that. He knows that has nothing to do with when the report stage of a bill commences. Surely the hon. member knows that. We all know that around here. To say that we should not be doing our jobs as MPs because we do not have the minutes of a committee, particularly of a committee that was televised nationwide, for which the footage is available to anybody who cares to see it, even if all these things did not even exist it would not be a proper proposition.

It is time we got to the business of what is probably the most serious bill I will have passed in my political career, one dealing with the security of Canadians. It is a serious bill.

Some members might argue that the bill could be stronger. I understand that some of them are making that argument. Others are saying it goes too far and would perhaps infringe on rights. I know I am partisan when I say this but the truth is probably somewhere in between. That is exactly where the bill is. However that is a matter for the debate when it starts. Let us get on with debating the content of the bill.

[Vic Toews, Canadian Alliance, Provencher, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I will be brief on the issue but I too am concerned about what has happened. As I understand it, the time for submitting amendments was extended until Saturday afternoon.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Three times.

[Vic Toews, Canadian Alliance, Provencher, MB]

The minister opposite indicates it was extended three times. It was extended to Saturday afternoon. The minister well knows that most MPs are gone for the weekend to attend to riding and constituency business.

The first time I had an opportunity to review the amendments was this morning. When I received the amendments I spent time with my assistant working through a copy of the old bill. I did not yet have the bill as amended so it was difficult to understand the significance of the amendments. I had some hint given the involvement I have had in the bill, but it was difficult for me as a member who has been intimately involved in the development of the bill.

I have been supportive of the government's initiative generally and I understand the need for haste. However we must understand that we need to do the job properly. Having been given the amendments this morning and the bill an hour or so after that, I and many members in the House have not had the opportunity to carefully review the amendments. I would like to do the job properly. In view of the circumstances it would not be untoward to allow an extension for consideration of the amendments before we debate them.

I can support some of the amendments by my colleague from the Canadian Alliance and others from the PC/DRC. There are others I cannot support. I would like the opportunity to consider all the amendments carefully before I recommend to my caucus how to proceed on them.

We are hearing from all members. I do not know what is reasonable but a short delay of at least another day would not harm the national interest. It would go a long way toward protecting the national interest in terms of getting an appropriate security bill and protecting the civil liberties of Canadians.

[Michel Bellehumeur, Bloc, Berthier—Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would greatly appreciate it if the Chair were to rule immediately. A decision cannot be left until later, since we are about to begin discussing the issue.

What I mean to say, is that you must decide as to whether or not the point raised by the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party is acceptable or not. I think that he has raised some very good points.

However, we must look at the entire context of this bill. Everything has been done very quickly. Since it was not done in committee, we must take the time to think about the amendments proposed for Bill C-36.

It is not true that the bill was considered properly. When one studies a bill clause by clause for eleven hours in a row, with no opportunity pause and reflect on the amendments that the government is moving, thereby being forced to react immediately, that is hardly what I would describe as proper consideration.

Furthermore, the government is proceeding without providing us with a reprint of the bill with the government's amendments. Let me remind the House that the government proposed 91 amendments. This is no mean feat, in a bill.

It is all well and good to tell us that we have until Saturday to submit amendments, but quite frankly, that is a joke. Earlier, there was a request made to suspend the sitting for ten minutes.

Mr. Speaker, if you need time to think about this issue before we begin debate, in order for the debate to truly be a proper one, please take ten minutes to consider the arguments or review what was said before you arrived, in order to rule properly and in order that the debate begin on the right note.

In closing, I would like to say that this bill is important, and our goal here is to establish a balance between national security and individual and collective rights. I fear that if we proceed at the current speed, in the drafting stage, as the government said, and in consideration by the committee, and with amendments being proposed on a weekend, and now today moving on to report stage, that we will never strike this balance. There are mistakes being made right now.

Mr. Speaker, I invite you to rule, examine the matter as you always do, and decide whether or not the member's point of order is valid and whether or not we should do this before moving on to report stage of this bill.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I just have two things to add. The first is to the effect that this is a ruling the Speaker cannot delay, because we must decide immediately if we proceed directly to consideration of the bill or if we must take the time to enable other members, who did not have the opportunity to consider the testimony, to prepare interventions.

The other point I want to raise is a personal matter, but it concerns my situation and that of the member for Lanark—Carleton as well as that of my colleague from Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough. As it happens, we were here over the weekend, and, by chance, we were able to take advantage of the slight changes in the Standing Orders and prepare our amendments ahead of the deadline. It is not proper, in democratic terms, that the right to introduce amendments in parliament on something as serious as this is determined as a matter of chance. It is quite unacceptable.

As the government House leader has just said, it is a very serious bill. He has said this bill is the most serious he has ever met as the leader of the government. If it is serious, it requires serious consideration, and that is not possible if the members do not have at their disposal all of the testimony that could influence their contribution or their amendments.

I hope that the Speaker, in the interest of having a well thought out bill, in the interest of the rights of parliament, may decide to delay debate, not only for the sake of delaying it, but to enable parliamentarians to be well enough informed as to properly do our duty here in the House.

[Scott Reid, Canadian Alliance, Lanark—Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, to emphasize my right hon. colleague's points, he is quite correct that the reason I was able to get amendments on where others were not was due to the fact that I am an Ottawa member of parliament. I am here and my staff is here. We were able to pool our resources and work on this thing in a way that was not available to other members of parliament.

It is striking that much of the most forceful and thoughtful opposition to the bill has come from Canadian Alliance MPs who, not being in the Ottawa area, were unable to add their amendments to the bill. It is striking as well that much thoughtful consideration had been given in earlier debates by members of the New Democratic Party. They had a party convention and were unable to be present during the period of time under consideration.

I got a copy of the final version of the bill this morning. Until that time it was difficult to ascertain how to word our amendments because the pages have changed, section numbers have changed and so on. This handicapped us in our ability to provide the kinds of thoughtful amendments that are suitable for this stage.

Something else is striking in the same vein and has not been mentioned so far in this discussion. My office went to the clerk of the relevant committee and asked to see the various amendments proposed for the bill. We were told they had all been destroyed.

When we are trying to work on amendments to get a sense of what has been discussed and what has been proposed and discover that we do not have access to them, it is impossible as members of parliament to carry out our job in the appropriate manner. Committees can do as they see fit in their own affairs, but when it starts to affect the operations of the House, to which they are subservient, I suggest that it effectively hamstrings the House in its responsibilities. That certainly cannot be something that is in order.

I would ask Your Honour to give consideration to these factors as well in rendering your judgment and in considering whether to extend the deadline.

[The Speaker]

The Chair appreciates the interventions of all hon. members who have had something to say on this important issue.

It is not the first time that members in the House have criticized the government for the speed with which it proceeds with a bill. I am sure this will happen again.

Even allowing for that, I think hon. members have to recognize, as the hon. member for Pictou--Antigonish--Guysborough did in his point of order, that he was raising not a point of order. He was raising a request to the government to consider deferring the matter.

The government House leader has in effect given his answer. As I understand it he is not prepared to defer it. Now the suggestion seems to be that perhaps the Speaker is somehow able to be involved in the matter and ought to take some steps to defer the matter and prevent the House from considering the business the government has chosen to bring before the House today.

I do not think it is for the Chair to make that decision. I respectfully draw the attention of all hon. members to the words of Mr. Speaker MacNaughton on March 17, 1965, as reported on page 12479 of Hansard of that day, when he said:

The basic question is whether or not a bill in the House of Commons can be discussed, assuming that the evidence has not been completely finished in its English and French printing. I have made a search of the records since confederation, and there is no case that says that a bill in the House of Commons which is up for discussion cannot be proceeded with until the evidence has been filed. If we were to accept the suggestion of the hon. member for Lapointe...emotionally pleasing as it may be, nevertheless procedurally in my opinion it would be completely wrong, and would establish a very bad precedent.

I could quote Mr. Speaker Francis from page 4631 of Hansard dated June 13, 1984, when he said:

I really do feel uncomfortable when Hon. Members do not have the transcripts. However, I am guided by the precedent of Mr. Speaker MacNaughton. I am guided by the fact that the rules are silent as to the form of printing.

I realize hon. members are uncomfortable with the fact that certain of the transcripts of committee proceedings in relation to this bill are not available or, if they are, have only just become available, whatever the case may be. However, in spite of that, I believe it is the right of the government that sets the business of the House in compliance with the rules of the House itself to proceed with this bill without those transcripts.

As the hon. Leader of the Government in the House said, when he was first elected the minutes of the committees were not available for at least three weeks after the end of the committee meetings. I clearly remember that myself. When I first came here, 13 years ago, the committee minutes were not available the same week that the meetings had been held.

To look back at our history and our practice, I believe the ruling I have cited from Speaker MacNaughton in 1965 is entirely in accordance with that practice. However inconvenient it may be to proceed with the bill at this time, if the government's choice is to do exactly that, I do not believe it is a case where the Speaker ought to be intervening in this matter, either to delay the matter further or to make any changes in the process, which has been agreed to by the House unanimously, in extending the time for filing those amendments and in dealing with the amendments as they have been brought forward.

I therefore now proceed to orders of the day.

[Lorne Nystrom, NDP, Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK]

I rise on a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, arising out of the comments that have just been made.

I am sure you are aware, Mr. Speaker, that the final bill was only available on Saturday and there was a deadline of 6 p.m. Saturday to file amendments.

Part of the problem in terms of my privileges is that the NDP caucus was not here. We had a national convention in Winnipeg and the House recognized that by taking Friday off. Therefore none of the NDP members were around to see the final copy of the bill nor to meet the deadline to file amendments by 6 p.m. on Saturday. We did not have that available to us and I feel that affects my privileges as a member of parliament.

The House recognized the importance of a national convention by adjourning on Friday, which it does for all national parties when they have a national convention.

It affects my privileges and it affects the privileges of the other 12 members of my caucus. I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that is a genuine question of privilege.

[The Speaker]

I have trouble finding it to be such a question of privilege. All hon. members have obligations that take them away from Ottawa at one time or another. Sometimes it is mid-week and sometimes it is on weekends. However, when the House is sitting, as it has been and will continue to do until December 14, and we know legislation will be proceeded with day by day, it is difficult for the Chair to imagine that the hon. member's privileges have somehow been violated by the fact that he was tied up at another meeting over the course of the weekend and could not file amendments.

I know he has tremendous powers of persuasion and I am sure he will meet with the other House leaders to see if there could be some arrangement for the introduction of amendments that he might want to put to the House on a consent basis. I know this happens from time to time. If that happens, the Chair would be more than happy to put any such question to the House once the House has agreed by consent to allow that to happen.

I think it is safest at the moment to proceed with orders of the day.

[Peter MacKay, Progressive Conservative, Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough, NS]

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the question of privilege put forward by the hon. member for Regina--Qu'Appelle, I believe you have referred him back to House leaders, including the government House leader. I am wondering, given the government House leader's presence in the House, if there is some willingness to accept amendments from those members of parliament who were not able to access either transcripts or the amended bill on such an important issue.

[The Speaker]

I suggest that negotiations of this kind are best carried on off the floor of the House in accordance with our usual practice. I am sure the hon. member for Pictou--Antigonish--Guysborough will have an opportunity to meet with the government House leader in due course.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-36, an act to amend the Criminal Code, the Official Secrets Act, the Canada Evidence Act, the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) Act and other acts, and to enact measures respecting the registration of charities, in order to combat terrorism, as reported (with amendments) from the committee.

Anti-terrorism Act

[The Speaker]

There are 13 motions on the notice paper relating to the report stage of Bill C–36.

In accordance with House of Commons practice, Motion No. 5 will not be selected by the Chair as it requires a royal recommendation.

Motions Nos. 11 and 12 will not be selected as they are similar to motions proposed in committee.

All remaining motions have been examined by the Chair and the Chair is satisfied that they meet the guidelines expressed in the note to Standing Order 76.1(5) regarding the selection of motions in amendment at the report stage.

The motions will be grouped for debate as follows:

Group No. 1, Motions Nos. 1 to 4.

Group No. 2, Motion No. 6.

Group No. 3, Motions Nos. 7 to 9.

Group No. 4, Motions Nos. 10 and 13.

The voting patterns for the motions within each group are available at the table. The Chair will remind the House of each pattern at the time of voting.

I shall now propose Motions. Nos. 1 to 4 to the House.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would appreciate elaboration on the ruling that Motions Nos. 11 and 12 are not allowable for discussion here because they were introduced in committee. My understanding is--

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Order, please.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

I wonder if the hon. House leader would restrain himself and show some of the courtesies that he so often requests of other members. If he wants to speak he could perhaps indicate whether he is prepared to entertain amendments from other members in House leader meetings.

However, I would like elaboration as to why the amendments appearing in my name, which I did not move in committee and which are highly germane to any democratic and honest hearing of this bill, are precluded from consideration here. They were introduced by another member. We do not believe that in the circumstances they had the adequacy of consideration either in the public or in this full Chamber that they require. I would require elaboration as to why this decision has been taken to further limit debate on this matter where amendments that might have been presented have been precluded by the fast footwork of the government which does not want to hear a full debate on this very serious issue so deeply affecting the civil liberties of Canadians.

[The Speaker]

I appreciate the right hon. member's intervention but the practice has been for the Chair not to give any reason whatsoever for the selection that has been made. I made that clear in the ruling I gave in respect of this whole issue some months ago after the adoption of the change in the standing orders in the House.

I elected to state in my ruling today, at my insistence, that I was ruling the two motions out or at least not selecting them because they were very similar to other motions that had been dealt with in the committee. I maintained that and I do not feel that I can assist the right hon. member further on that matter. He can have a look at the amendments that were moved in the committee, compare them with his own and discuss this matter with the clerk of the committee. I am sure he will be satisfied that the similarities are obvious and, accordingly, I declined to select them today.

[Scott Reid, Canadian Alliance, Lanark—Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I am just a bit confused. One of those motions is my own, Motion No. 5. In your earlier comments you said that it was because of a concern regarding the constitutional requirement for a royal recommendation. As we know, a royal recommendation is required for any bill that goes forward in which money will be spent. However, in reference to the right hon. member's comments, you said that it was because it was similar to a motion that had come up in committee. I am just a little unsure as to which is relevant. If it is the prior reference, I actually do have a point of order on that, but I would like to get clarification first, if I could.

[The Speaker]

I have stated that the hon. member's amendment required a royal recommendation and, accordingly, would not be proceeded with as that has been the practice of this House in relation to amendments to bills at report stage that do require a royal recommendation.