The member opposite just said that some are. I find this incredible because we have had supply day motions that have passed but which the government has chosen to ignore.
I think for example of the vote that we held after debate and after due consideration on dividing foreign affairs and international trade into two separate departments. We talked with a number of different individuals on that issue and there were a number of them, including people within the department, who said that it was not a good idea because foreign affairs and international trade were intricately intertwined.
As a result, after listening to those debates, the majority of the members in this House came to the reasoned conclusion that it was not a good idea to separate those departments and the motion was defeated. The government members said that they did not care because they were going to do it anyway.
Why should we ask our citizens to become involved? Why should they go to the work of being involved in elections, in campaigns, in raising funds to buy signs, in doing the literature, in helping on the phone banks and in making literature drops when after the candidate they are working for gets elected, comes here, debates and thinks through the issues, votes in accordance with the conclusions logically reached, and the government says “nyah-nyah, nyah-nyah, we are not going to do it anyway”. I do not know how they are going to put that into Hansard . I guess they could show that the member spoke with some sarcasm.
However it is really very disconcerting to the people who are watching this and it is disconcerting to me as an MP. If we have a debate and a vote and we lose it, so be it, as long as it is a free and open debate. Too often in this place and in committees I have been involved in debates and have put forward a solid argument. I taught for 31 years and I know body language. I knew when students understood what I was teaching and I knew when they were confused without having to ask them. If they were confused I would try a different approach and explain it in a different way.
It happened on more than one occasion in committees when we had the majority Liberal government where I know that I persuaded other members of the committee to my point of view because I had a logical and defensible position. However when it came to vote they voted against my amendment to the bill. I asked one member why he had voted against my amendment and he shrugged his shoulders and said that he really did not have a choice. That is despicable. It is a great deterioration of democracy and we ought not to tolerate it. Why not have a free vote? If the majority came to the conclusion that this was better, we would end up with better laws in this country on behalf of the citizens who sent us here.
I find it very troubling that people who make these decisions on how they are going to vote are very often making those decisions in isolation and often were not present to hear the debate. I cannot imagine that they have time to read all the blues from all the committees, let alone the Hansard from this House. They did not even hear the arguments and they stand their ground and we end up with laws that are less than the best on behalf of our citizens.
I think of other examples where we voted in the House contrariwise, for example, on the appointment of Mr. Murray from Winnipeg to the environment position. We voted to set up a trust fund to receive in trust, as lawyers receive money in trust, tainted money that was inadvertently received by the Liberal Party. There is a lot of evidence for that. I do not think the government will set up such a trust fund. We have basically been told that.
There has to be a mechanism also in Parliament for us to defeat bills and motions without it being a confidence vote.
I was the founding chairman of a school board of a private school. The board members were thoughtful, hardworking people. We all worked long hours for no pay. When we were setting up the school, there were more meetings that lasted from seven or eight at night until midnight to the point where some of us had to be reintroduced to our families because they did not recognize us.
Many motions were put forward. Often the motion sounded good, but then one person would say, “Ah, but think about this”, and another one would say, “Yes, and what if we pass this motion and this happens?” After a while the chair would say “Okay, all those in favour should raise their hands”. It happened on several occasions where even the person moving the motion did not vote for it in the end because he was enlightened by the input from other people present who were thinking about these issues. Then we defeated the motion. We did not say, “Oh, no, now we are in such trouble. We will have to have an election now to see whether we can be re-elected because we defeated a motion”.
One of the huge flaws in this place is that we do not have the right as members of Parliament to defeat in a free vote a bad bill, a bad motion, a bad amendment. We would actually be doing the citizens of this country a service by not putting into law a bad idea. We would then have many good ideas. That is what I would like to see happen.
There should be a rule in the House that says no minority government or whatever would be defeated, except by a specific motion of non-confidence, which could be made at any time by any member of the House. It would not be used frivolously. When would we say that we have lost confidence in the government? Only when the majority of the members of the House would agree.
I could really go on for another hour or two but I know that the rules will not permit it and I do want to be cognizant of the rules and obey them. I hope that someone has some good questions for me.