I am thankful for the opportunity to address my colleagues this afternoon.
I want to begin by congratulating all members of the House who were elected on September 20. You won, so congratulations.
To all the new members, I wish to offer my full co-operation and assure them that they can count on me to help them any way I can with their new duties.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the voters of Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier for electing me a third time. I thank them for the trust they have placed in me.
I would also like to point out, Mr. Chair and member for Bécancour—Nicolet—Saurel, that you are the longest continually serving member of this House with this twelfth consecutive term. This is noteworthy, and I must congratulate you on it.
I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate and thank the Speaker of the 43rd Parliament. He did an excellent job managing the pandemic, despite its unpredictable nature. He successfully met the challenges brought about by the COVID-19 health crisis.
We will soon be voting to choose the Speaker of the House. For our new colleagues, today will be their first vote. We must select someone we can trust to accompany us over the course of our mandate. It is important to choose someone who is committed every day to having our rights and parliamentary privileges respected as they should be, and someone who will let us do our work to improve the lives of all Canadian citizens.
Considering the experience we have gained in managing the COVID-19 pandemic, our institution must now ensure that it has the resources, and especially the technology, needed to adapt quickly. We must secure the resources needed to continue our work and maintain our effectiveness. We must ensure that our institution maintains good practices, while bearing in mind that there is always room for improvement.
We can and we should become better.
Deciding on the Speaker of the House of Commons must not be driven by our political affiliations. It must focus on the ability to plan, manage and develop a plan with a functional vision for Parliament.
Our Speaker needs to be someone who has a sense of fairness and respect and such qualities as the integrity and ability to be adaptable so as to interpret the rules in a way that respects the rights of all parliamentarians. He or she must protect current good practices and draw inspiration from what is done elsewhere in order to make them even better.
I believe I am the right person to fulfill this role.
I would like to become your Speaker here in the House of Commons. I do not do this on a whim. I have given this a lot of thought and have made my intentions known for several years.
As Speaker of the House of Commons, I will work with each of you to maintain the decorum of our institution.
I will lead by example by listening to the discussions in this chamber, and I will invite you to do the same to ensure that each member of this House can be heard.
I will take responsibility for making decisions based on the existing rules and will be inspired by jurisprudence while respecting the rights of each member.
As Speaker of the House of Commons, I will have a zero tolerance policy for any show of disrespect between colleagues, employees or any other person associated with this Parliament.
I would like to note that we must have the best technological tools to make our work more efficient and effective.
We must plan so we can be ready to face the next crisis. We must implement mechanisms that respect and protect our members of Parliament.
Finally, we must reinforce respect for our country's two official languages, English and French. That must start here in the House of Commons.
In closing, I would like to thank you in advance for your support.
I look forward to working with each and every one of you.