Mr. Speaker, we have just heard from the government House leader a scaling back of the proposed changes to the rules that govern Parliament as proposed by her government. We appreciate there has been some movement on the government side. We appreciate there is perhaps some indication of a willingness to compromise. We on the opposition side are certainly prepared to take a very serious look at the new package of proposals from the government.
However, this initiative is coming at the very last minute. In fact, this set of proposals was presented yesterday to the media before it was presented to any of the opposition parties. Therefore, this obviously has not given us a lot of opportunity to consider the rule changes being proposed and it certainly is not something that builds a lot of trust or instills a lot of confidence.
Nevertheless, we are pleased to see a somewhat revised set of proposals coming forward. We are also pleased to hear from the member for Winnipeg North that the government is prepared to have the procedure and House affairs committee consider this question of privilege, rather than use that committee to try to ram through the much broader set of changes to the rules governing Parliament for which the government had previously advocated.
We also heard a very interesting argument from the government House leader about the need to make these changes to the rules governing Parliament because some of them had been in the Liberal election platform. That argument is a bit rich coming from the government. A lot of things were in the Liberal election platform that the government is not doing. One example that leaps to mind is electoral reform. The government was elected on a very clear promise that 2015 would be the last election conducted under the first past the post voting system.
We had the whole process of consultations on electoral reform with a view to making that change. The overwhelming majority of experts consulted by the committee of the House and the overwhelming majority of citizens who showed up at public meetings across the country said that we should implement a proportional voting system in which the share of seats that a party received in the House would more or less line up with the share of votes that it had attracted in a general election. The government's response was that there was no consensus and therefore it could not move ahead.
When it comes to this issue of changes to the rules governing Parliament, there is clearly no consensus at all. There is far less consensus on this than there was on electoral reform, yet on this point the government's argument is that some of it was in its platform so it had to do this, even if meant using its majority to ram it through. On electoral reform, why is the issue that the Liberals need 100% consensus to do anything even if it was in their platform, whereas on the issue of changes to the rules governing the House, the argument is that they have to do it because it is in their platform even if there is no semblance of consensus, even if there is nothing approaching agreement on these changes?
Beyond the analogy I just made, there is another connection between what the government is doing on changes to the rules governing Parliament and what the government is failing to do on electoral reform. What the government is trying to do is pass some of these changes to the rules and procedures of Parliament and then say it achieved something on democratic reform, that this was its democratic reform agenda and it has done it. We in the NDP certainly are not going to let the government get away with that. The Liberals very clearly promised a new voting system. There were very clear recommendations, something that was pretty close to a consensus in favour of a proportional voting system. The government has blatantly broke that promise and intends to go ahead with the outdated, outmoded first past the post voting system.
Whether or not the government puts forward some changes to the rules governing Parliament, it certainly does not make up for that very severe broken promise on electoral reform. In terms of these proposed changes to the rules of Parliament, we on the opposition side are going to need to take some time to take a look at this scaled-back package that we just heard about from the government House leader.
I would like to return to the question of privilege that we are discussing today. I do think it is a matter of great importance that should concern every member of this House. It is an integral principle of this institution that members of Parliament have unfettered access to the parliamentary precincts. As members of Parliament, it is fundamental that we be able to be here to vote and in general that we have access to Parliament in order to represent the people who elected us. When events happen that prevent members from accessing the parliamentary precincts and therefore prevent us from doing our jobs, it is very important that we investigate seriously.
According to the Compendium of House of Commons procedure:
The House of Commons and its Members enjoy certain constitutional rights and immunities that are collectively referred to as parliamentary privilege (or simply “privilege”).
It goes on to say:
Any physical barrier preventing a Member’s access to the parliamentary precinct or blocking their free movement within it may be treated by the House as a breach of privilege.
That is exactly what we are talking about today. When members are not able to come to Parliament, it fundamentally prevents each and every one of us from taking on the very specific and important role of holding the government to account.
The privileges of the member for Milton and the member for Beauce as elected representatives to this House have been breached. What happens after that is what brings us into this whole discussion of parliamentary privilege that was raised by the member for Perth—Wellington.
The member pointed out that it was an inappropriate violation of privilege for the government to end debate on the previous question of privilege in the manner that the government did without a vote. The Speaker quite wisely ruled that it is not appropriate for debate to simply end on this point. Equally problematic is that the government continues to try to shut down debate and limiting dissent in this House.
As I acknowledged at the outset, the government seems to have backed off a little on the sweeping changes to the parliamentary rules that had been proposed at the procedure and House affairs committee. We welcome that, as far as it goes, but I would also note that when the New Democratic House leader asked the government House leader whether this new package of proposed rule changes would require consensus or whether the government would just ram it through using its majority, we still did not get much of a commitment to a consensual process or much of a commitment to actually consult with other parties, which we believe is the standard required for changes being made to the rules governing this House.
It obviously would not make sense and would not be democratic for whichever party has a majority to use that majority to rewrite the very rules of Parliament. It is kind of a different category from all sorts of other public policies that we accept the government has the mandate and the authority to control.
We are faced with a very serious question of privilege. We are hopeful that it will be resolved either here or before the procedure and House affairs committee. We are going to take some time to seriously consider the scaled-back set of rule changes that the government House leader just introduced here a few moments ago.