Debates of Oct. 22nd, 2013

Employment

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Employment and Social Development and Minister for Multiculturalism]

Mr. Speaker, every single industry organization, every business I have met with in this country from coast to coast, says that the number one emerging issue they are facing is one of skills shortages. There is no doubt we need better labour market information to identify exactly where, in what regions, and in what industries.

I find it peculiar coming from that particular member, since she has actually raised with me skills shortages for particular employers in her constituency. She should know better. She should talk to the employers in her own constituency.

Justice

[Royal Galipeau, Conservative, Ottawa—Orléans, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Justice Marc Nadon is an exceptional candidate for the Supreme Court of Canada. He is a dedicated lawyer with over 20 years of experience in the Barreau du Québec, followed by a 20-year career as a judge.

Mr. Justice Nadon, who has served with distinction, makes one of the finest appointments to the Supreme Court of Canada. Could the Attorney General of Canada please update this House on the status of his appointment?

[Peter MacKay, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, our government firmly believes in the right of Quebeckers to serve on Canada's highest court.

Today, in addition to the declaratory provisions to clarify the Supreme Court Act tabled in this House, I am announcing, as well, that I have authorized the filing of the reference to the Supreme Court of Canada to expedite the challenge of Justice Nadon's appointment.

Our government will fervently defend the eligibility of long-standing members of the bar in all provinces and territories to serve on the highest court of our country.

Science and Technology

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, middle-class Canadians expect the government to ensure safe and healthy communities in which to raise their children. However, in a report released yesterday, half of federal scientists report being aware of actual cases in which the health and safety of Canadians has been compromised because of political interference with their scientific work in which their department or agency suppressed information.

How could we possibly entrust the health and safety of our kids to the Conservative government?

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Minister of State (Science and Technology]

Mr. Speaker, Canada is ranked number one in the G7 for our support for scientific research and development in our colleges, universities and institutions.

It is just another reason why Canadians are excited because of the signing of the free trade agreement with Europe, which will create access to more than 800 million consumers. This agreement will make Canada an even more attractive place for investors and manufacturers. Science, research and innovation will help drive that process.

Government Accountability

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to read to the Prime Minister from his own message to ministers in his “Accountable Government: A Guide for Ministers”, 2011.

As a Minister, you are individually accountable to Parliament for the discharge of all responsibilities vested in you. You must answer all questions pertaining to your areas of responsibility, correcting any inadvertent errors at the earliest opportunity.

Does he even pretend to believe those words anymore?

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and for Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, it is clear that this is the government that brought in the Accountability Act. After years of corrupt Liberal government, Canadians demanded a more accountable, open government. That is what they are getting from this government.

The President of the Treasury Board has undertaken an open government initiative that is seeing millions of documents put on the table that were never there before. We have shone the light of information on 70 different departments of the government that were previously not open to the freedom of information process.

When it comes to accountability, when it comes to honesty, when it comes to democratic reform, it is this government that Canadians can count on to get the job done, all the time.

Elections Canada

[Mark Adler, Conservative, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of State for Democratic Reform.

Elections Canada has found that Liberal leadership candidates who have large debts dating back to 2006 are not in compliance with the law. Ken Dryden's lawyer is now bragging publicly that the former Liberal MP will not even try to pay the money back. This constitutes mounting evidence that he wilfully used loans to circumvent donation limits, an offence under section 497 of the existing act.

What can Elections Canada do under the existing law to combat such law-breaking?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Minister of State (Democratic Reform)]

Investigate, Mr. Speaker. Under the present law, the Commissioner of Canada Elections has the power to investigate whether anyone has used loans to circumvent donation limits, a clear offence under section 497 of the existing Canada Elections Act.

Elections Canada is right to point out that non-repayment of political loans, while illegal, is not enough to deem that an offence has occurred. More evidence of wilfulness would be required. That takes an investigation, and there is nothing under the existing law to stop such an investigation from starting right now.

Employment Insurance

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, a directive disclosed this past June by Le Devoir concerning access to employment insurance records has recently become official.

Advocacy groups for unemployed workers are concerned, since claimants will no longer have access to records in their own file when submitting an application for review. Unemployed workers must now make their submissions without even knowing why their claim was denied.

The Mouvement autonome et solidaire des sans-emploi has written the Minister to demand an explanation. How will he respond?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Employment and Social Development and Minister for Multiculturalism]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer when I receive the letter.

Finance

[Brent Rathgeber, Independent, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Mr. Speaker, last week's Speech from the Throne made a vague reference to balanced budgets and reducing the cost of government. It stated that the government will introduce balanced budget legislation, but only during normal economic times and with timelines for returning to balance in the event of an economic crisis.

My questions are for the Minister of Finance. Does the government intend to pass balanced budget legislation or merely to introduce it? Who gets to define normal economic times and economic crisis? If it is him, Canadians would like to know what those definitions would look like.

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the first question was whether the government intends to introduce balanced budget legislation and the answer is yes.

The other question was to the effect of what it would mean. Normal times are times when the government is not in deficit. This government is getting back to normal times after the great recession, the largest recession since the 1930s. We will be back in balance in 2015 and then we will keep it balanced. Governments will be expected to keep it balanced in Canada.

The House resumed consideration of the motion.

Opposition Motion—Senate Accountability

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to turn to this very interesting motion put before us by the member for Toronto—Danforth. His motion reads:

That, in the opinion of this House, urgent steps must be taken to improve accountability in the Senate, and, therefore, this House call for the introduction of immediate measures to end Senators' partisan activities, including participation in Caucus meetings, and to limit Senators' travel allowances to those activities clearly and directly related to parliamentary business.

When I read the motion, I was put in mind of a very good book with which the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth will be familiar. Albert Venn Dicey's book Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution in which one does not figure out what it is about until one gets to the last word of the giant title. That is a bit of what is going on here. When we actually go through this very long motion, we are really talking about, first, senators should not, according to the motion, participate in caucus meetings; and second, senators' travel allowances should be limited to activities clearly and directly related to parliamentary business.

This is a small part of a larger question relating to the whole issue of Senate reform, or potentially Senate abolition as the New Democrats would favour. I want to deal with it in that context. Let me start by dealing with the travel issue that is proposed in part of the motion. Then I will deal with the suggestion about participation in caucus meetings, which, whether it was intended or not, does have the unavoidable consequence of involving some significant institutional/constitutional questions. Perhaps that was not the intention of the member, but that is the consequence of what he has done. I think those larger implications have to be addressed intelligently before we vote on this issue.

Starting with the whole travel allowance issue, the reason it was initially suggested that I participate in this debate is the fact that I am notorious for my very limited travel. In the last decade or so, I have repeatedly been either the bottom or the second from the bottom in terms of travel expenses. I was 308 out of 308 last year and this is something that happens year after year. I did a good annual report to my constituents, by the way, in which I outlined my expenses. My travel budget in 2006-07 was substantially below the average. My travel outside the constituency was $1,100 versus an $85,000 average. In 2008 my travel outside the constituency was $5,300 versus an $83,000 average. In 2009 my travel was $5,900 versus a $107,000 average.

Of course part of the reason for that is that my riding is fairly local. Another reason is that I take care to have my staff look for the least expensive flights when I do have to travel to keep things under control that way.

I also make it a habit of trying to keep my entertainment expenses as low as possible. This year they were $0, also making me 308 out of 308 in the House of Commons. As a result Terry Milewski referred to me as the “king of the skinflints”. He also complained that the Prime Minister only spent $29, so it takes work to be the king of the skinflints with a prime minister who is as frugal as that.

One of the things I would point out is that the issue of travel expenses is really not a Senate issue. It is an issue that relates to us in our function as parliamentarians. The report that is made about me and all MPs is made in our capacity as members of Parliament and is made to the House of Commons, and as Speaker of the House of Commons, to you. Therefore, I am not sure we are in a position here to probe too deeply into the internal rules that govern the Senate in this regard.

If we were to do so, sooner or later we would probably find ourselves bumping up against this document, the Senators' Travel Policy, which was adopted by the Senate Standing Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration on May 10 of last year. It is about a 30-page document with several appendices, including forms to fill out. It explains the rules on the purposes of travel. There is a 64-point travel system, which should sound familiar to members of Parliament, in section 2.7 of this manual. This includes a variety of different subsections, including a travel expense claim form that must be filled out. A senator who is travelling has to list the purpose of his or her travel on that form.

It states at section 2.7.3 that:

Senate resources shall not be used to fund travel that is incurred to pursue the private business or personal interests of a senator or alternate.

Therefore, to some degree the rules already exist. It may well be that there is a need for change to improve them. I am fully willing to accept that, and I gather the Senate is too, because there have been several tweaks to that policy since it was adopted in May 2012. However, the rules already exist in some form or another.

We examined somewhat and discussed what is happening in the Senate in the case of certain senators. We were discussing whether or not the rules were simply violated, and perhaps even egregiously, but not whether there is an absence of a rule that effectively states that senators' travel allowances be limited to, as the motion states, “those activities clearly and directly related to parliamentary business.” I think the rules already contain a version of that requirement, so I am not sure we are crossing some great divide in what we do here.

However, these are Senate rules. They pertain to the Senate and were adopted by the Senate. I suppose we can give them advice on what to do, but in the strictest sense it is beyond our jurisdiction. That is something I wanted to draw attention to.

I want to talk a bit about the broader issue of Senate reform. The reason I want to do this is because there are two substantive parts to the motion, the travel allowances part and, as it states here, a part that proposes to end the participation of senators in caucus meetings. Here we are moving into something else, which is a very substantial constitutional question of whether Senators should be non-partisan or outside of the partisan structure and, if so, how we enforce that, if we can enforce it.

Let me dwell on that a bit. The debate that has occurred in many countries that have senates is that an upper house in a federal system tends to be a senate that is seen in some respect as being a states' house, a cantons' house, a house of the Länders, to use the German term, or a provinces' house. In Canada we discussed that as a possibility, but it was not fully the model adopted here. It was the model that was adopted fully, overtly, and deliberately in both the United States in the 1780s and in Australia when it adopted its Constitution in 1901. Although that model was tied down with a large number of formal rules designed to prevent partisanship from creeping in, in both cases they became partisan houses.

This is particularly striking in the case of the Australian Senate, where the structure of the ballot for Senate elections is effectively a party list ballot. That has the effect of making the upper house more partisan, if anything, and less a voice of independent reasoning and thought than the lower house is. That was not the intention in either the Australian Senate or the American Senate, but a history of those Senates suggests that it is very difficult to reconcile having an upper house in which members are independent with restrictions on how they use that independence so as to ensure they merely represent some other set of interests. They merely represent geographical or provincial interests, religious or sectarian interests, or whatever the interests are that the founders seek to entrench in the constitution.

In the end, senators tend, just like people in this House, to resolve themselves into partisan groupings, and if individuals fail to do so, the tendency is that they are replaced by people who are more partisan. That seems to happen regardless of the type of system.

The system for appointments that we adopted in 1867 seems to have been adopted with the intention of ending the partisanship we had prior, in the elected upper house of the Province of Canada. We did not succeed.

My sense is that if we vote for an elected upper house, we probably also would not succeed in preventing people from becoming partisan representatives to some degree. That is the nature of the way electoral politics works, unless we want to adopt something really radical, such as abolishing the Senate and replacing it with some kind of referendum, which they have done to some degree in Switzerland, for example. Unless we try to do something that is really a radical departure, I suspect that we will not get away from some level of partisanship.

Now we are left with the question of how we actually go around enforcing something like this. In the case of participation in caucus meetings, does it mean we simply cannot go into the caucus meeting when it occurs? Caucuses are not creatures of the House of Commons; they are meetings that occur outside the House of Commons and are entirely conventional in their nature. How exactly would we enforce this ostensible expression of the will of the House of Commons? I do not think we could. I suppose one could design some kind of law, an actual statute, but I suspect that we would run into a fundamental problem of freedom of association. Freedom of association means we get to choose who goes into our caucuses, and each of the different parties does so. I do not see how one overcomes that fundamental constitutional flaw with this particular suggestion, so it fails at that level as well as at the level of utility. I cannot determine what public good is being achieved by doing that.

The fact is that some level of coordination between the upper and lower houses is of value. We all know from watching it that the upper house is very much not controlled by the lower house. Some people think that is a good thing and perhaps some think it is a bad thing, but it is a statement of reality.

Let me turn now to pointing out the fundamental problem that exists when we are talking about Senate reform, including the suggestions made by my colleague from Toronto—Danforth.

The problem is that the Senate is dysfunctional in several ways at several levels, and it is unclear which kind of constitutional formula or amending formula is required to make which change. The changes that are the most important are perhaps not the ones that are the easiest or the hardest to make. There is almost a random relationship between different aspects of the Senate and the amending formula that has been used.

This government is attempting to ask the Supreme Court to assign an amending formula to each of the different proposed changes that either are being proposed by the government, such as elections to the Senate, or that could be proposed by the government, such as the abolition of the Senate, because it is very unclear what rules apply.

One of the questions that has to be resolved, for example, if we try to move to an arrangement with elected senators, is the term of office for those elected senators, unless we make a term election for life, which I do not think anybody supports. At what point does the term become too short to allow the senator to be independent? Something we are told has a constitutional weight is the independence of senators, the assumption being that a senator elected for a one-year term would be unable to be fully independent.

The Supreme Court is being asked the following question:

In relation to each of the following proposed limits on the tenure of Senators, is it within the legislative authority of the Parliament of Canada, acting pursuant to section 44 of the Constitution Act, 1982,

—which is another way of saying “under a certain section of the amending formula that lets the Parliament of Canada act unilaterally”—

to make amendments to section 29 of the Constitution Act, 1867, providing for

a. a fixed term of nine years for Senators [...];

b. a fixed term of ten years or more for Senators;

c. a fixed term of eight years or less for Senators;

Then it goes on to give

d. a fixed term of the life of two or three Parliaments for Senators;

as an alternative.

Further on it speaks of a renewable term for Senators, as opposed to a non-renewable term, and then:

(f) limits to the terms for Senators appointed after October 14, 2008 [...];

That refers, of course, to senators appointed by the present government or under the term of the present government.

The final one is:

g. retrospective limits to the terms for Senators appointed before October 14, 2008.

The reason for asking all of these questions is that in the past the Supreme Court indicated that a term that is too short or too limited is problematic in terms of the independence of senators, but it never specified what it meant by that statement. It said to ask it a specific question and it would give the answer.

The assumption then was to make the Supreme Court a proposal, try to enact a piece of legislation, and see what happened. However, when that was tried by the current government in 2006, the opposition said that if it did that, it would have constitutional issues because it would be unclear whether senators who have been elected to fixed terms are really elected to those fixed terms or if the terms could be extended in practice because the government would be unable to limit them. The government says it is electing senators for a term of x years, but within that term the senators could plausibly say they refuse to retire at the end of the term as they had to be appointed for a longer period, because it is unconstitutional to change the law to limit their terms to the length given.

That is the reason for this kind of question. We are simply listing all the different possible considerations that need to be taken into account so that there is no legal or constitutional limbo. That is just on the issue of Senate terms.

There were also questions—and I mentioned there were many dysfunctions in the Senate—relating to how consultations take place, questions on whether the kind of advisory elections proposed by the government would be constitutional, and questions on the abolition of the property qualification. Senators have to own or lease property worth about $4,000 within the province that they represent; can that be abolished unilaterally, or do we need to get the consent of seven provinces and half the population? Could we abolish the Senate? Of course we could abolish the Senate with the consent of all provinces—nobody questions that—but could we do so with the 7/50 formula or unilaterally, just through parliamentary action? That has to be established.

In the question asking the Supreme Court about that, there are three separate subquestions to deal with the different possible ways of abolishing the Senate. Those subquestions are there to make sure that we do not start down some constitutional road and then realize that we have in fact acted in a manner that, in the judgment of the Supreme Court, is unconstitutional.

Those are some of the issues that relate to the Senate. They are important issues and I think reflect the spirit that the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth was trying to get at in putting forward this motion. However, I have to say that despite his good intentions, I think he missed the mark. He has a proposal here that is outside of our jurisdiction; he is addressing major points in a roundabout way, which is unwise on something as complex as this; finally, if taken too seriously, it might potentially put us in a position where we would be violating the freedom of association protection in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That is to say nothing of the fact that I think all of this would actually be unenforceable in the end.

Those are some pretty significant objections, and some reasons that members should probably vote against this motion.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to my colleague across the way. While I disagreed with the arguments he used, I noticed that he consistently tried to back up his arguments with evidence, as he saw it, as proof of why one would be swayed this way and of the consequences of adopting the New Democratic motion to try to help fix the mess in the Senate, which is what we are attempting to do. The government seems very loath to move any significant legislative agenda to do something about the Senate and the fiasco that it has created, but I noticed very consistently in his speech that there was an argument and some proof behind it.

I contrast this with what happened at the procedure and House affairs meeting this morning. It was not in camera and was in the full light of day, and there he moved a motion, which I suspect he perhaps did not draft, to fundamentally change the way that we make law in Parliament, affecting the Standing Orders of the House of Commons, with no witnesses, no proof, and no argument, but ramming the change through. A fundamental value that I know the member holds dear is to respect Parliament and try to make the place better. He was completely silent. All the Conservatives were.

My question is this: why, in defence of his presentation here today on the potential reforms to the Senate that we are proposing, does he believe that making arguments and providing proof are important, yet when he proposed this morning to change the very rules of how we generate and amend legislation and create new law in this country, he thought it sufficient simply to drop the motion on the table and force a vote on the other members of the House of Commons? I do not understand the inconsistency.

As a last thing, I hold the member in high regard for his dedication to this place. It seems to me that today the contrast and hypocrisy from what happened this morning over something so grave is stark. I am wondering if he could reflect on these two very different versions of his presentation as a member of Parliament.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, contained in the question was the following comment: that the government seemed so loath to move legislation relating to Senate reform. I will look back at the legislative history of this government's attempts to cause the Senate to be reformed.

Bill S-4, An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 (Senate tenure) was tabled in 2006. As members can tell from the date, in 2006, the first year of this government, it sought to introduce limits to Senate tenure, which would limit the term of senators, but the opposition blocked it.

In all fairness, that was in the Senate, and I think my colleague is pointing out these were not the New Democrats, and I accept that. However, the fact is the opposition held the majority in the Senate at the time and the government did move. The concern the member had was that the government had not taken action on the Senate.

Bill C-20, the Senate appointment consultations act, which was also moved by the government when it was in minority and opposed by the opposition, would have had the effect of setting in place a national electoral process with a preferential ballot designed to actually avoid some of the pitfalls that created a highly partisan nature in the Australian Senate. We would have ensured that there was none of what they call “above the line” voting that occurs in Australia that causes people to vote for parties instead of individual senators. We did that legislation.

Bill C-7, the Senate reform act, was also put forward by this government.

There are three pieces of legislation, all of which were opposed by the opposition. I cannot remember the details of when the NDP opposed, or which ones were opposed to others, but the general trend has been that NDP members oppose everything because they favour abolishing the Senate, which is a legitimate point of view. However, I do not think it is legitimate to go from that to say the government has not been trying very hard and consistently over the past few years.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is important to pick up on this whole issue. We hear this a lot in terms of the Conservatives saying “reform” or “abolish”.

I am from the Prairies where there was a great movement at one time known as the “Reform Party” which talked about reforming the Senate, the triple-E Senate, and so forth. Now the government has had the reigns of power for the last number of years. It does not take much to understand that to achieve the type of changes that are necessary with respect to Senate, one has to consult and work with the provinces. Without the support of the provinces, one would not be able to achieve the type of changes that many people would like to see. The desire to see change has been there for many years.

Could the member indicate very clearly to the House today how many premiers the Prime Minister has sat down with or picked up the phone and talked to about the issue of Senate reform?

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am envisioning the nature of the telephone call that would have to occur under the present circumstances, before we get back answers to our Senate reference question, in which we try to figure out how much provincial consent is needed. If he said, “Hello Mr. Premier, it is the Prime Minister here. I am seeking your consent on an amendment, but I don't know whether I need it or not because we don't know which amending formula applies to the particular amendment I am proposing”, he would look pretty foolish.

What the Prime Minister and the government have done is submit a series of questions that would allow us to determine. These six questions to the Supreme Court, one of which I just read a moment ago, ask the Supreme Court to determine which amending formula applies to which kind of Senate change: electing senators; choosing the length of terms of senators so they do not stay until age 75 but serve some fixed term; whether we want to pass legislation that makes terms renewable or non-renewable; how much consent we need from how many provinces, should it be all of them, 7/50, or none at all, because it will be none at all in certain cases; removing property qualifications and so on.

These are question on which we need to resolve what the process would be for making the changes before we can actually make those changes.

The Supreme Court starts its hearings on these questions next month. It has been receiving factums from the various participants, including the federal government and various provinces, over the past several months. They are available online and I encourage the member to read them. They are interesting, but we will not know what the Supreme Court thinks until it makes its ruling.

Unfortunately, the answer to the member's question of what that conversation should be between the Prime Minister and premiers will not happen until we have the answers about the questions he should ask.

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the time taken and the speech just given by my hon. colleague. I thought I would try to respond as well as I could on his two main points.

On the travel rules issue, with respect to the idea that travel for parliamentary business that is only directly and clearly connected to parliamentary business is already covered by the current Senate rules, unfortunately it is not to the extent that parliamentary business at the moment is defined throughout, at least under the administrative rules, and even the existing travel rules still, as including partisan trips.

The only thing that is excluded from the travel rules is travel for purposes of elections, going to elections. However, so many other things are still left open.

On the caucus front, yes, indeed, as someone with some constitutional law background, I have considered the constitutional issues. The first part is that the privilege within the House certainly is of equal force to the freedom of association norms in the charter. However, even if we do apply those norms, as I think we should, section 1 of the charter allows for demonstrable limits in a free and democratic society. As long as barring access to caucus is tied in the way I believe it is to the problem of partisanship in the Senate, then there is a rational connection it would be minimal infringement. There would be no constitutional violation.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I respectfully disagree with my colleague with regard to the use of section 1 to override other sections.

He is quite right that the Supreme Court can always accept an argument that a limit on freedom of association, freedom of religion, freedom of speech and other vital freedoms, including the freedom of life, can be suspended when the court deems this is compatible with the norms of a free and democratic society.

I actually think that is a very problematic part of our Constitution, to be honest. This is a good example. Are we really going to say that it is constitutionally permissible to limit freedom of association so that elected legislators are unable to participate in the kinds of meetings that would allow them to fully fulfill, by their own judgment, their roles as legislators. That would be very problematic.

With regard to the travel expenses, I take his point. It is a good one.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Before we resume debate, I do see that our next two speakers will be proposing to divide their time.

Just as a comment, I know it has been a few weeks since we have been in this place. Hon. members may realize, especially when we are going into a split time, there are five minutes permitted for questions and comments. The Chair typically looks to see how many members, for example, may be standing to participate in the questions and comments and based on the numbers that are standing, will kind of gauge how much time to permit.

Generally speaking, we would ask members, not knowing how many others may wish to participate, to try to limit their time to about a one minute question and perhaps a one minute response, thereby giving more time for other hon. members to pose questions to the member who had just spoken, just as a general rule of thumb.

I will be watching for that a little more carefully. Questions and comments time is not a time to extend one's speech. There are other opportunities to do that.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Chambly—Borduas.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am now sitting closer to you than I was when we parted in June. I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Trois-Rivières.

This is my first speech this fall, and the topic is particularly relevant given the feedback we received all summer about senators' scandals. This is not just about senators. It is about the mindset and attitudes that surround that institution. During today's question period, we witnessed a clear lack of courage and thoroughness. Today's opposition motion, put forward by the NDP and especially the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth, seeks to solve all these problems.

Everyone knows that the NDP wants to abolish the Senate, but we know that it will take a lot of work to get that done. We are not blind to that fact, and I believe we can be proud of that, if I say so myself. After all, as politicians, whether we work in the Senate or elsewhere, we need to show the will and courage to do the work if we really want to make things better, which is our aim in seeking to abolish the Senate. In the meantime, we are looking for concrete ways to solve some of the problems that have plagued that institution throughout its history, especially during the last few months.

The sponsor of the motion proposes two specific measures. First, he wants to end senators' participation in caucus meetings, the partisan gatherings in which we participate in the House. It is an important measure given that, originally, when it was created under the Constitution, the Senate was meant to be a chamber of sober second thought. I very much like that expression. It is a chamber whose members are almost supposed to be better, intellectually speaking, than the members of the House of Commons. They are not supposed to stoop to populist tendencies like MPs do because they need to be re-elected every few years. Senators are not supposed to have such tendencies.

When they participate in the partisan process and attend caucus meetings, they become virtually indistinguishable from MPs. It then becomes harder to distinguish between the two chambers which, in turn, leads us to wonder why the Senate exists in the first place. Indeed, if senators perform the same functions as MPs while remaining unelected and unaccountable to Canadians, their very purpose is called into question.

That said, until we can abolish the Senate, this is a worthwhile measure inasmuch as it will compel senators to work strictly as legislators. They should not concern themselves with the somewhat more partisan activities we participate in as MPs, given that we are elected under the banner of a political party—there is no denying it.

The second measure goes to the core of the scandals we have been dealing with in the House, specifically these past few months, regarding travel expenses and secondary residences. Unfortunately, the questions we have asked on these issues remain unanswered. The motion speaks specifically to expenses related to partisan activities.

It is clear that the Senate absenteeism rate is extremely high. This is nothing new; it has always been like that. My first political science teacher at CEGEP described the Senate as a “glorified retirement home”. In this instance, it is a place for friends of certain political parties in power. Those were the words of my teacher. I do not wish to show any disrespect.

In view of the circumstances, he added that senators rarely showed up for work. For an institution whose role is supposed to be to rigorously analyze legislative work done by members of Parliament, one might well ask why senators should be allowed to travel around the country engaging in partisan activities when their role is to be in the Senate and in committee doing careful legislative work in connection with our tasks in the House of Commons as elected members.

These are the two measures we are proposing.

I feel that they are extremely important measures.

I will now return to the points I raised at the outset. I spoke about what I heard over the summer. Several of the members here, particularly those of us who were newly elected in 2011 and were about halfway through our term, based on the date that was set for the next elections, took advantage of the summer to try to find out what people thought about our work, given that we had reached the halfway point in our term.

In my riding of Chambly—Borduas, I was frequently told us that we should not give up, that we were doing good work, but that we were surrounded by corrupt people.

It hurts to hear things like that. I can understand how people feel, particularly my fellow Quebeckers, because the messy situations that frequently arise tar all politicians with the same brush.

I am a young 25-year-old member of Parliament who has been in politics for only two and a half years, not counting my previous time as a party member. Even we, the young MPs who definitely have no skeletons in the closet, are tainted by the poor behaviour of the people next door. How nice.

I am speaking about—alluding to—my own experience because the Senate, according to the Constitution, as well as academic and even philosophical definitions, is supposed to be an institution, as I mentioned at the outset, that is above all that.

We, as elected representatives, come here to make a difference. Early on, people legitimately wondered how hard the young members would work. If I may make a very humble suggestion, it is that we have done good work. However, when people who have been appointed to the Senate because they are supposedly important and have accomplished great things in life behave in this manner, that is shameful.

It is embarrassing to go door to door and be told about the poor opinion people have of our work. Rather than doing their Senate work properly and rigorously in accordance with their mission, in order to help us better understand our own work, senators have played a detrimental role by forcing us to waste our time on issues like the Senate scandal.

A government member might well say that if I consider this to be a waste of time, why then am I asking questions? Well, because this is about taxpayers’ dollars. Parliament is a democratic institution and it is therefore critically important, as I see it, to ask questions.

Despite the fine job that the leader of the Leader of the Opposition is doing by putting questions to the Prime Minister, we would much rather be discussing other concerns. However, I feel we have a duty to tackle these issues head on, because ultimately it is our democracy that is on the line. The legislative work of both houses is at stake.

Many people have asked about the constitutionality of the changes that need to be made. I am thinking in particular about the Conservative member who spoke before me. If we look closely at the changes that are being recommended here, I do not believe that the two measures being proposed require major changes.

Of course, as we move forward, some proposed changes such as Senate abolition, which the NDP favours, will require some major changes. There is no need to be afraid of that.

It is interesting to note that the government often raises this point. In truth, the changes that the government is itself proposing will require some constitutional amendments.

So then, the question is this: do we have the courage to address these problems and resolve them?

The NDP has, I believe, been very clear. It has even acted very responsibly. One need only consider the motion before us today to see that.

I am going to repeat myself, but this is extremely important. We are mindful of the fact that change is something that will happen over the long term. In the meantime, however, if we can act responsibly to bring about the changes that will help limit the damage, so to speak, then we can only support such action.

The two parties represented in the Senate, namely the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, have no strong desire for change. The Liberal Party advocates the status quo, whereas the Conservative Party insists on our supporting its reform proposals. However, it is hard to debate reform measures that have yet to be tabled. Even measures that were put forward have been withdrawn.

Instead of twisting in the wind and doing nothing, we are putting forward some concrete measures to minimize the damage done by the various scandals that have plagued the Senate. We want to give senators the tools they need to concentrate on their real job, which is to participate in the legislative process.

I hope that by proposing changes like these, I can continue to knock on doors in municipalities in Chambly—Borduas and feel somewhat less embarrassed to belong to a political class whose members unfortunately show very little respect for their mandate and the task at hand.

I truly believe that members of all parties, not merely NDP members, have good intentions where their constituents are concerned. So then, let us show our good intentions and take concrete steps to attempt to resolve once and for all the problems plaguing the Senate.

I welcome my colleagues' questions and comments.

[Steven Fletcher, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's comments with interest.

The NDP, by advocating abolition, is advocating for the status quo, no changes, and the reason is that, right now with the Constitution as it is, it is too difficult to abolish the Senate.

Are P.E.I. or Atlantic Canada going to give up their seats?

A more practical solution is one that the government introduced when I was minister of state for democratic reform a few years ago, and that was non-renewable term limits. Would the NDP support an initiative like non-renewable term limits of, say, eight years?

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member is confusing us with the other opposition party. The only party proposing the status quo is the Liberal Party.

The NDP's position is clear: abolition, pure and simple. Meanwhile, the hon. member has mentioned how difficult it will be to achieve that goal. That is correct. We do not get involved in politics in order to achieve simple goals.

At the end of the day, as aware as we are of the challenge before us in achieving what we firmly believe in, what we hear on the doorsteps in our constituencies is that it is a priority for Canadians to get rid of the Senate.

In the meantime—as we are doing today with the opposition motion that the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth has introduced—we are proposing changes that will require senators to at least live up to the ethics and the mandate that they have as lawmakers for as long as the Senate continues to exist.