Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today to speak to the issue of the various options available to the House for reviewing its procedures.
If I may, I would like to provide a bit of background. When I was training in the law, I went from one Code of Civil Procedure in my undergrad, to a new Code of Civil Procedure after I was called to the bar. In the interim, I had some difficulty understanding the point of procedure in a legal context. I realize that once you really get into the thick of it, it is easier to understand its purpose, and this reminds me the important role that procedure plays.
As its name suggests, the role of procedure is, on the one hand, to ensure that things proceed properly. That is really important. Procedure helps us adapt to changes and new realities. COVID-19 is a great example. Procedure is what allows us to be true to principles that are immutable. It is often said that procedure must be a servant of the law, not its master.
If it is true that, in a legal context, procedure must serve the principles of law and justice, then, in a parliamentary context, procedure must serve parliamentary values. Parliamentary procedure must highlight and reflect those values.
In Bosc and Gagnon's House of Commons Procedure and Practice, there is a good quote by John George Bourinot, an expert in parliamentary procedure and Clerk of the House of Commons from 1880 to 1902. I would like to read it. He said, and I quote:
The great principles that lie at the basis of English parliamentary law have…been always kept steadily in view by the Canadian legislatures; these are: To protect the minority and restrain the improvidence and tyranny of the majority, to secure the transaction of public business in a decent and orderly manner, to enable every member to express his opinions within those limits necessary to preserve decorum and prevent an unnecessary waste of time, to give full opportunity for the consideration of every measure, and to prevent any legislative action being taken heedlessly and upon sudden impulse.
The COVID-19 crisis gave us the opportunity to revisit the values of the House. In the context of the discussions surrounding the creation of a virtual Parliament, the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs had to look at the values we wanted to see respected in the implementation of a virtual Parliament. Among the main themes that emerged were transparency, member participation and accountability.
As a young parliamentarian, I do not claim to know everything about procedure. Similarly, when I was a student, I did not understand everything that was happening. However, I discussed this with some of my more experienced colleagues and we came up with seven ideas that would help to better reflect these values in Parliament.
The first proposal concerns the adjournment proceedings. The role of the adjournment proceedings is to allow a member to obtain a more satisfactory answer to a question asked during question period. The problem with the current format of adjournment proceedings is that they use somewhat the same format as that of oral question period. The participants are just given a little more time to assert their claims. On the one hand, we have a period consisting of four interventions of 35 seconds each. On the other, we have a period consisting of two interventions of four minutes each, followed by two interventions of one minute each. This does not permit us to hold an adversarial debate where we can delve into the details of the subject matter.
Instead we should have a form of more focused questioning, as is used in the courts. If we were to adopt a format somewhat like the one used during the meetings of the Special Committee on the COVID-19 Pandemic, we would have five minutes to ask a question and the person answering would have the same amount of time to respond. We would then have the opportunity to ask other questions. By alternating questions and answers, we would likely have less of a dialogue of the deaf, which tends to consist of prepared questions and also prepared answers. We could delve deeper into the subject matter and achieve the purpose of the adjournment proceedings, which is to get answers.
The second proposal concerns Private Members' Business. I think it would be a good idea to have a period of questions and comments after each intervention. Currently only the sponsor of the bill is entitled to a period of questions and comments. Subsequent debate helps us to see who is in favour of the bill, but since we cannot question them we are unable to improve the position of each speaker or make amendments in committee based on each position that is raised. We are also unable to know where members stand in the end because when we present a position we always present it in the best possible light. It is when we are asked questions that the full picture appears.
Still on the topic of the order of business, I would like to see every bill that does not reach second reading before prorogation get reintroduced in the House thereafter. For example, the Bloc Québécois had already announced and introduced the majority of its private members' bills in January, well before the COVID-19 pandemic. The House was prorogued in the summer and those bills were not addressed before September or October. A lot happened in the meantime, including a global pandemic. Some of those bills introduced in January may have benefited from a review, some could have been dropped and new, more current ones could have been debated. I suggest considering this possibility.
I will move on to secret ballots in the House. I understand the idea of using secret ballots to elect the Speaker, for example, because we want to preserve the credibility and uniqueness of that office. The voting process for electing the Speaker is more like the one used in general elections than the one we usually use in the House. However, for the sake of the transparency I was talking about earlier, I suggest that, when the Subcommittee on Private Members' Business designates a bill non-votable, leading to a secret ballot in the House, the result should at least be announced. I am not saying that the vote should be public, but it should be justified by announcing the proportion of members who accepted the bill's validity and votability.
I also have a suggestion about Fridays, which is one of my favourite days of the week but could use some reinventing. In Quebec's National Assembly, there are certain days when about an hour and a half is set aside for members to question a minister. This serves as a kind of a prolonged question period focusing on a specific minister, who could be chosen at the parliamentary leaders' meeting on Tuesday. That would give members of the House other than committee members access to the minister to ask questions about topical issues.
It would provide greater flexibility and require more accountability on the part of the ministers. We could simply revise the Friday schedule, for example, by starting the sitting with this ministerial question period between 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. From 11 a.m. to noon would be oral question period, followed by the continuation of the ministerial question period from noon to 1:30 p.m., before returning to the normal schedule with private members' business from 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. We could make up for the two lost hours by starting earlier on Monday and by adding more time at the end of one day of the week.
As for convening committees outside their regular meeting schedule, I would like to suggest that we require only four members to call a committee meeting. Also, there would have to be members from at least two recognized parties, which would prevent one party from taking the committee's schedule hostage and making calling a meeting a very partisan tool. If there were only two recognized parties in the House, my suggestion would have to be modified, but it would prevent one party from using it as a partisan tool.
Lastly, I suggest creating a “Wednesday motion” to be voted on but not debated. This motion would be halfway between a unanimous consent motion, which is dealt with quickly, and an opposition motion, which is debated for an entire day. Unlike a unanimous consent motion, the vote would require that each member take a position on the motion. That would also allow us to move more quickly, since we would not necessarily need a full day's debate, as we do with an opposition motion.
I am out of time. I thank the Chair for giving me the floor. I am ready for questions and comments from my colleagues.