Mr. Speaker, marriage is the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others. Our critics are trying their best to confuse what is a simple fundamental understanding that has existed for thousands of years. It is not about equality, a woman's right to vote, lifestyles, the charter or any other unrelated excuse that is intended to confuse Canadians.
This is about one thing. This is about protecting the institution of marriage. This is about our opponents making this a nasty fight. It distresses us all when certain individuals use the marriage debate to divide Canadians. They are using this debate as an all out attack on people who only wish to uphold family values.
While in the past people of faith have been prepared to pray in silence as our opponents shape their anti-religious attacks, the rallies held on Parliament Hill on April 9 and in various communities throughout the country were a signal that Canadians reject the desperation tactics of a minority Prime Minister who has lost any moral right to govern.
Let us be clear that this is not a charter issue. Section 15 of the Charter of Rights protects minorities from discrimination. Nowhere do the words “sexual orientation” appear. Sexual orientation was read into the charter by some activist Supreme Court judges.
The definition of marriage should never have gone to the courts. The issue is too large and too fundamental for seven appointed individuals locked away in a room in isolation to decide. This issue must be decided by the people's democratically elected representatives in Parliament and all members of the chamber with the freedom to vote their conscience and the will of the people.
A free vote is a free vote. By forcing certain members of Parliament to vote how he orders, the Prime Minister has ensured that the marriage debate will continue long after the vote, and a tainted vote is worse than no vote. This debate has been one of betrayal and deception.
In June 1999, when Parliament voted 215 to 55 in favour of the sanctity of marriage as being the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others, the current Deputy Prime Minister stated:
--the definition of marriage is already clear in law. It is not found in a statute, but then not all law exists in statutes, and the law is no less binding and no less the law because it is found in the common law instead of in a statute.
The definition of marriage, which has been consistently applied in Canada, comes from an 1866 British case which holds that marriage is “the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others”. That case and that definition are considered clear law by ordinary Canadians, by academics and by the courts
Let me state again for the record that the government has no intention of changing the definition of marriage or of legislating same sex marriages.
Those were the exact words of the justice minister during the 1999 debate. Another promise made, promise broken. That was the position of the current Prime Minister and the Liberal Party in 1999. The government sets the agenda.
People tell me all the time that they were promised by the government that the marriage debate was settled in 1999. They say that we should be talking about the shortage of doctors, child poverty, the environment and the heavy tax burden. I remind them that changing the traditional definition of marriage is the agenda of the government, not the majority of Canadians who are represented by other political parties in the House of Commons.
It is very evident in Ottawa that the fear is that if Canadians are not talking about changing the definition of marriage, they will start talking more about the startling testimony of the Gomery commission into government corruption.
On February 11 of this year I asked a question for the Treasury Board president regarding another multi-billion dollar government reorganization. I was surprised, as were all Canadians, to see that the question is now linked to the Gomery commission on the fraudulent misappropriation of taxpayer dollars. It is not difficult to understand why the government wants to use Bill C-38 to divert attention away from this scandal ridden government.
Canadians know that it was the Prime Minister, as the right-hand man to the former prime minister, Jean Chrétien, who presided over the loss of tens of billions of dollars to such programs as the $2 billion gun registry and the missing millions from the defence department.
Canadians understand that when the Prime Minister chooses to take credit for being in control of Canada's finances on matters of Canadian deficit, he is in effect taking credit for the loss of tens of millions of dollars as the one in control of the financial decisions. In control means total control, just like being in control of the agenda to hijack the definition of marriage that we find right now. Being in total control means taking credit for the deficit and taking credit for all the decisions regarding the waste of taxpayer dollars.
While Canadians are preoccupied with the debate over changing the definition of marriage, they are less apt to recall famous fiascos such as Jane Stewart's HRDC scandal and the current Deputy Prime Minister's role in the thoroughly discredited Liberal gun registry, a program she stated would cost $2 million and we are now told by the government-funded CBC that we are looking at $2 billion.
The gun registry has also been implicated in the sponsorship scandal. It is so unworkable that the Liberals bought advertisements in an attempt to confuse the public that the gun registry would curb crime. Those advertising dollars were funnelled through the same companies that now stand accused of providing the Liberal Party of Canada with kickbacks. The gun registry advertisements, which were meant to save the political lives of Liberals, have turned out to be just as ineffective as the ad scam funds were.
The majority of Canadians do not want the traditional definition of marriage to change and they fear that the only lesson the Prime Minister has learned from the Gomery inquiry into Liberal Party corruption is the consequence of getting caught.
The terrible record of poorly conceived and administered politically motivated government programs, like the gun registry and the sponsorship program, frightens Canadians. Canadians also fear the long term effects of tinkering with the actual definition of marriage.
In responding to a question I posed to the President of the Treasury Board, he stated that most of the missing million dollars in the defence department had been recovered. What was missing from that comment, and what Canadians deserved to hear in more detail, was how much and from whom.
The debate over changing the definition of marriage has been an effective diversion from the scandal of mismanagement so appropriately detailed by the Auditor General. Many people have forgotten about the missing million dollars from DND, which was front and centre at that time, and that internal government sources stated that there was evidence that it was a multi-million fraud ring involving at least two departments, National Defence and Public Works, and that for $146 million or $168 million to have been stolen others had to have been involved.
What happened to that story? Why is there no public inquiry into the amounts of money greater than what was defrauded from taxpayers in the sponsorship program? Only one person has been identified in that scandal and that person, the government claims single-handedly masterminded the fraud, is now living in the Caribbean. I am informed that he is being sued by the computer company Hewlett-Packard which got stuck with the $100 million bill for this, which is $46 million to $68 million less than what the government tells us was stolen. Who received the $46 million or $68 million that is not in the lawsuit?
Only a public inquiry with full disclosure, similar to the Gomery commission into government corruption, will provide those answers. I look forward to a government announcement of a public inquiry into what is really behind the missing millions from the Department of National Defence.
Even with the diversion of the marriage issue, Canadians are still talking about the second billion dollars that is being spent on the hated gun registry and the crisis among our beef producers, many of whom face financial ruin.
Without the marriage debate, the government has had no plan or any program to present to Canadians and certainly none to Parliament.
The challenge for us is to keep up the struggles against this systematic, gross, managerial incompetence by the government while defending family institutions. Marriage is too important for politicians or judges to decide.