Mr. Speaker, it is a great honour to speak to the motion tonight. For purposes of public edification I repeat what it is:
That section (5) of Standing Order 76 and section (5) of Standing Order 76.1 be amended by adding at the conclusion of the notes thereto the following: For greater clarity, the Speaker will not select for debate a motion or series of motions of a repetitive, frivolous or vexatious nature or of a nature that would serve merely to prolong unnecessarily proceedings at the report stage and, in exercising this power of selection, the Speaker shall be guided by the practice followed in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom.
I wish to say first and foremost that to listen to the member for Surrey Central is really outrageous. I will tell hon. members why. He raised every grievance, perceived or real, and tried to somehow work it into the example of how we will make parliament work better.
This institution, I can tell members from my time in this great House, came about as a result of the founding fathers getting together in 1867 and providing a framework, a template that works well along the lines of the British parliamentary democracy. It is a template that has evolved over the time we have been here. It has worked well in a democratic fashion, to the benefit of all Canadians as a result.
To hear members opposite, in particular the one prior to my speaking and others too for that matter, talking in terms of how this is tearing down the pillars of democracy in Canada and denigrating parliament is not only outrageous but pathetic in its intent. I will tell the House why.
What we have here is something we have honed over time. We have put in place the very pillars of democracy that we now see bearing fruit. I believe it is something to behold and should be something of great pride to all parliamentarians.
It hurts me to hear members, especially those of the reform alliance, tear away at this institution. That is what they are good at. They are good at being negative. They are good at always trying to rip at the very fabric of this great country. It is a shameful spectacle. It is not something we do not expect from them because, after all, that is who they are: people who would rather tear down than build up and people who would rather rip it apart than make sure it works properly.
The purpose of the motion is straightforward. It is to reconfirm the authority of the Speaker. That is you, Madam Speaker and your colleagues. It is to reassert your ability to select motions for debate at report stage in the manner in which they are intended when they are presented in a legislative process in the House.
We can follow the string all the way back to 1867. More important, I believe our parliamentary procedure and what we are capable of doing in the House go back 32 years as the direct result of a committee that looked at these kinds of things.
For the benefit of the public, fearing that members would take advantage of report stage to move similar amendments of little importance or which were dilatory in nature, the special committee on procedure recommended in its report in 1968 that a rule be adopted to permit the Speaker “to select and combine the amendments of which notice had been given”. Such a rule was then adopted.
Why was that done? It was done to enable the business of the House to get done in a democratically elected fashion to the benefit of Canadians. We have committees where we listen to witnesses. We take amendments. We massage the legislation in front of us. With the benefit of the experience of all the members present, at the end of the day we are able then to come out with a piece of legislation that is workable and to the benefit to all Canadians.
When it comes back at report stage we should not have to be hornswoggled, that is a farmer's term I am used to saying from time to time, by the reform alliance or the Bloc. They should not be tying our hands and doing all kinds of outrageous things when it comes to amendments: frivolous, vexatious and downright terrible things to tie the hands of parliamentarians and to tie up the workings of this great House of Commons.
The Speaker has the power to select or group motions in amendment to be proposed at report stage. That is what we are trying to get back to. That is exactly what was adopted 32 years ago, and that is the way it should be. We would like the Speaker's decision on the grouping of these motions in amendment at report stage to be in a manner consistent with the values of parliament.
In doing that the Speaker would address two matters. The first would be the grouping for debate and the second would be the voting arrangement. These are very important. The motions are grouped according to two factors. The first is the content and the second is the place where they would be inserted in the bill.
Motions would be grouped according to content if they could form the subject of a simple debate. Once adopted, they would have the same effect in different places of the bill or if they relate to the same provision or similar provisions in the same bill.
That is straightforward. That is common sense. That is simply making parliament work effectively in the way it was intended to work. Motions in amendment are continued according to the place where they are to be inserted in the bill when they relate to the same line or lines. These motions in amendment would be part of a single scheme for voting patterns.
That seems to be something Speakers have had over time. It is certainly something that was developed and evolved in the 1970s and beyond. It is important that we reassert the Speaker's ability to make those kinds of rulings.
It is fair at this stage to point out that in recent years successive Speakers have felt less and less inclined to exercise their authority in this matter, with the consequence that report stage has been rendered vulnerable to unsatisfactory and unintended use.
For example, in December 1999 the House was obliged to spend more than 42 consecutive hours voting on 469 report stage motions, most of which were concocted at the last minute or in consultation with the reform alliance people and whatever shenanigans they had in mind to hijack the House in a way that was not only unprofessional and undemocratic but downright silly. At the end of the day we spent enormous amounts of time doing things that should not have been done. The reform alliance people proceeded in a very undemocratic way.
In March 2000 the Bloc followed a similar exercise. Having watched the reform alliance people act out their hijinks and their shenanigans, members of the Bloc decided to get in on the act. This was over another bill and it was an exercise that simply spun out of control. There is no other way of putting it.
We were faced in September 2000 with having to deal with 3,000 frivolous and vexatious motions of little intent, motions that were simply silly and downright ridiculous. The Bloc was trying to emulate the reform alliance. I thank the opposition for not doing its job. Its job is to oppose. It is to be constructive. It is to do things in a manner consistent with our great democratic principles. Those shenanigans are not in keeping with that. Rather, they are simply to be silly for the sake of being silly. If that was what they tried to accomplish, they succeeded.
In the last parliament we had to vote for days on report stage motions because of the abuse of the loophole in the standing orders at report stage. That is exactly and precisely the loophole we are looking to close tonight. It is one that should not be subject to the kind of abuse we saw in 1999.