Mr. Speaker, I am inspired to stand to debate and discuss the issue of prorogation itself, because I am concerned about the execution of it in the past and am deeply worried about how Parliament should behave.
As a parliamentarian, I think I should defend the supremacy of Parliament. It is my responsibility to defend the institution. We bring laws in here. We certainly feel that given the supremacy of Parliament, it is a place where we should all behave. That way, any divisive issue, any issue that is used as a wedge to gain better poll positions or political points, should not be used through this particular procedure.
Prorogation has certainly become a hot issue over the past two years. The first time it happened, it seemed to slip under the radar somewhat. The second time it occurred, the Conservatives thought the execution of it was so silky smooth that they were going to get away with it and that the general public would actually forget over time.
However, we found ourselves in a grassroots campaign, compliments, for the most part, of social networking on the Internet, which brought this issue to the fore. We finally felt that the government recognized that the people of this country recognize the importance of their democratic institutions, primarily of course, in this particular situation of prorogation.
I am glad that this motion is in the House today and that we are going through this procedure.
In the meantime, we find ourselves at least trying to defend the institutions of Parliament, to the point where sometimes we get bogged down in the minutiae of day-to-day mudslinging, certainly when it comes to question period. I hope that the decorum will come back to the House so that we can show people that we are making a concerted effort to make this a truly democratic institution. My goodness, if we tried that, we would be heroes all.
I want to point out some of the comments that have been made about the latest round of prorogation. I do not even have to explain it any more, because now everybody knows what prorogation is. Unfortunately, people know about prorogation because of the way we have been abusing it. That, in and of itself, is certainly sad when it comes to the House of Commons, which we hold in such high esteem.
Nelson Wiseman is an esteemed professor whose opinions we rely on quite a bit around here. In an article, he writes:
Responding to public revulsion, the director of communications for the Minister of Finance rhetorically asked in The Hill Times, “where was the outrage toward the previous 104 instances”?
He went on to state:
The answer is simple: no prime minister has so abused the power to prorogue. Harper’s former chief of staff Tom Flanagan understood the obvious: the purpose of prorogation —