Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to pick up where I left off before question period, in order to discuss this important question of privilege. I must digress a little first, however.
In their responses today, the Prime Minister and the Minister of National Defence repeated the same talking points, regardless of the question. After hearing the Prime Minister give the same answers in the same way to every question he was asked, I have to wonder why this government wants to give the Prime Minister a full question period to answer the opposition's questions. I think he would be able to give identical answers to everything in three minutes and we would see right away that it would always be the same.
To come back to my speech, we can all agree that as representatives, we are all entitled to the same parliamentary courtesies and privileges regardless of our political affiliation. Whether we are on the government benches, on the opposition, or independent MPs, we all have the right to the same consideration when it comes to accessing the House of Commons.
Preventing a parliamentarian from exercising his or her right to vote, regardless of the reason, is unacceptable. The Liberal government was elected on promises of transparency. It referred to sunny ways. It also promised the following on page 29 of the Liberal platform:
For Parliament to work best, its members must be free to do what they have been elected to do: represent their communities and hold the government to account.
That is exactly what we are doing, and it is exactly what the Liberals are trying to do with the proposed changes to our rules, to our Standing Orders, our bylaws, and how our House operates. In light of what has gone on in the past few weeks, it is clear that this promise from the Liberal platform is unfortunately not one that the Liberals will keep, just like the promise they made to have only a small deficit.
The deficit is currently quite enormous and the books will not be balanced before 2055. It is the Minister of Finance himself, not the opposition, who is saying this. If the opposition had not done its job and raised the issue, we would never have found out because the minister kept this tidbit of information to himself. He made it public a few days before Christmas and most Canadians would not have learned this important information. It is not surprising, coming from a political party that mastered the art of making promises during the election and doing the opposite once elected.
The government says that it is honouring its promise to improve and modernize Parliament. On page 30 of the Liberals' platform, we read: “We will not resort to legislative tricks to avoid scrutiny.” That really takes the cake, because it is exactly what the Liberals did.
First there was a discussion paper containing a threat regarding the adoption of a report before a certain date. If that is not a trick, I do not know what is. The Liberals realized that it did not work, so they backed down on their discussion paper and took away the committee's right to do its work. Then they brought the matter back to the House, where they have a majority and where they could be sure to have more control over the opposition members. The government had to back down because of a public outcry.
The government now says that it is backing down and that it wants to go ahead with just what it promised during the election campaign. However, as I just clearly and explicitly demonstrated, not only is the government not keeping all of its promises, but it is cherry-picking the ones it wants to keep. That is a trick.
It still wants to make changes without assuring us parliamentarians that it will not impose any changes without the unanimous consent of all parties of the House. This is a power grab. How else can we describe what this government wants to do?
I would like to quote a few articles. I especially liked one that was in Le Devoir this morning and was entitled “Liberal Doublespeak”. I will not read the whole article, because that would take too long.
However, there are certain passages that warrant our attention. The title of the article is “Liberal Doublespeak”. I will read a few passages.
The parliamentary process has its faults, but that is the price we pay to keep tabs on our governments....In trying to escape that scrutiny, the Prime Minister's Liberals are only making things worse and casting some serious doubt on their promise to respect Parliament.
Since March, work in the House of Commons has been slowed by the opposition's stalling tactics, brought about by an argument largely provoked by the government, its parliamentary leader, and their proposals to make changes to the rules of Parliament. Were it just a matter of making changes, there would be no problem, but the government insisted on a tight deadline and stubbornly refused to commit to not act unilaterally in the event of a stalemate....
The opposition is furious, and rightly so, because, according to the conventions of the House, consensus must prevail, promise or no promise.
I think that is fairly clear. It is not the opposition that is saying it. Anyone who has seen what has been happening here over the past few weeks knows that the opposition is just doing its job. The opposition is defending the right to speak of Canadians who are represented by the MPs they duly elected. That is what we are doing, and the media is starting to pick up on it. Surprise. Now the Liberals are trying to take a small but strategic step backwards. Unfortunately, as we can see from the editorial in this morning's edition of Le Devoir, journalists and Canadians can see right through those tactics.
The article goes on as follows:
This backtracking is welcome, but the Leader of the Government is using it as a pretext to issue a warning.
Did I understand the meaning of the new proposal correctly? The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons is giving us a warning.
She wrote, “under the circumstances, the government will need to use time allocation more often in order to implement” its legislative agenda. One would think she was a Conservative minister.
When the Liberals were on this side of the House, they sang a different tune. They promised sunny ways, a new way of doing things, and so, so much respect. Now it looks like they have opted to stick with the tradition of government acting in accordance with rules approved by consensus. That is what we did when we were in power. That is what they should keep doing if they want to restore respect and balance to the House.
The editorial writer went on to say this:
Nothing justifies this threat. After a year and a half in power, the government's legislative agenda is pretty thin. Even so, it has used time allocation to expedite the study of 11 bills. [The Liberals] say they want to consult and talk, but attacking the Conservatives, insisting on taking unilateral action, and threatening closure sends quite a different message to the other parties.
The reason their legislative agenda is being obstructed, as it was last year, is that they are no better now than they were then at resisting the temptation to manoeuver in a bid to take greater control over Parliament. Their appetite for power not only hinders their ability to keep their promises, it is inconsistent with those promises.
Those excerpts were from an editorial by Manon Cornellier in today's edition of Le Devoir.
Mr. Speaker, I believe that if you seek it, you will find the unanimous consent of the members of the House for me to table this article so that everyone can read it.