Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Châteauguay.
It is a real pleasure to speak to the motion moved by my colleague, which reads as follows:
That, in the opinion of this House, government appointments of ambassadors, consuls general and heads of regulatory bodies and Crown corporations should automatically be referred to the appropriate committee of the House of Commons for consideration, and that the relevant Standing Orders of the House of Commons should be amended accordingly.
Earlier my colleague, the member for Mercier, moved an amendment that you ruled in order, to have consideration of appointments take place, naturally, before they are confirmed.
I believe it is normal for a new government, that was elected on a given platform, to appoint people who are of the same political persuasion so as to implement the said platform.
For my part, I do not see much wrong with the Liberal government trying to appoint Liberals or the Conservative government seeking to appoint Conservatives, but on one condition: that the appointees have beyond any doubt the competence necessary to carry out the duties they are being considered for.
Last week I read in a paper that the Prime Minister in answer to a journalist said, “The first question I asked the member from Prince Edward Island was: Do you have brothers and sisters? And he said: no.” And he added that since he had no brothers or sisters, he was qualified to be a minister.
It is somewhat ridiculous to limit someone's skills to whether or not this individual has siblings. However, this is what the Prime Minister said. As long as he had no brothers or sisters, there would be no problem in terms of ethics. Therefore, he could be appointed minister.
If the Prime Minister is that flippant about appointing ministers, we can only guess how he proceeds when it comes to low-ranking officials. He must appoint around 3,500 people. They will necessarily be of the same political stripe as his party since they will owe their appointment to a minister who will have recommended them to the Prime Minister.
In this area, there is a lot of work to do to make sure we have more democracy in Canada, not less.
According to the hon. member for York West, just now, this motion was not necessary because there were already standing orders stipulating exactly the same thing. Standing Order 111(1) reads as follows:
The committee specified pursuant to Standing Orders 32(6) and 110, during the period of thirty sitting days provided...shall if it deems it appropriate, call—
The important words here are “shall if it deems it appropriate”. This is of vital importance.
First, the committee needs to deem it appropriate. If this is the case, it means that the majority of the government, which comprises the majority of all committees, must deem it appropriate. Thus, even if all members of the opposition were to deem it appropriate to meet the person whose appointment is contemplated, for example to the position of Commissioner of Official Languages or head of the CBC or the CRTC, or whatever, if the government majority did not deem this appropriate, the committee would never meet that individual.
What our proposal does is make this automatic before the appointment takes place. The important word here is “before”. It is to be done before the appointment is confirmed. There may well be prospects but these should be submitted for consideration by the committee members.
There is reference to examining candidates. This is another important term in our proposal. It must be possible to have nominees undergo a kind of oral examination to determine whether he or she has the necessary qualifications.
When Mr. Gagliano was posted as ambassador to Denmark, the committee members were denied the opportunity of examining his qualifications. Yet he appears to have had such qualifications, because the Prime Minister had selected him as ambassador. It was not sufficient to be a Liberal and to need to be distanced from possible problems related to some sponsorships. The government made sure that he was far away and could not tell us too much. But that was not what we wanted to examine him on. We wanted to examine him on his qualifications to occupy a position as ambassador and we were denied that opportunity.
Let us review Standing Order 111(2). My hon. colleague from Charlesbourg—Jacques-Cartier mentioned it earlier to the hon. member for York West. It reads as follows:
The committee, if it should call an appointee or nominee to appear pursuant to section (1) of this Standing Order, shall examine the qualifications and competence of the appointee or nominee to perform the duties of the post to which he or she has been appointed or nominated.
Very little would need to changed in this section to bring it into conformity with the motion we have put forward. It could read “The committee shall call a government nominee to appear pursuant to section (1) of this Standing Order, and shall examine the qualifications and competence of this person to perform the duties of the post to which he or she has been nominated”.
This would make things automatic. We could really look seriously into whether the government nominee meets more than just the qualification requirements. We can always assume that the qualification requirements are met. We are all pretty much good material. People who are not normally do not hold important positions in society. Any person considered by the government for an ambassador's position for instance would automatically appear before the committee. The government could include others, if it saw fit, but we would first be allowed to meet them to examine their competence to perform the duties awaiting them in their posting.
There are democracies, such as the United States, that have a specific system. I have no desire to imitate them. But this morning, I watched the news and saw that Lula, the new president of Brazil, was today going to appoint 50 people to put together the transition government that will take office on January 1. There are indeed other approaches besides the ones we have here, which are very obscure. There are new approaches which could, in all transparency and legitimacy, provide the public with a better picture of who is being entrusted with running important organizations that represent us, such as embassies and consulates, or chairing crown corporations, which are also important in our society.
I do hope that the government will take the time to consider the real impact of the absolutely terrific motion put forward by my colleague. We will see later this afternoon whether of not this government supports transparency.