Madam Speaker, it is a great pleasure to rise today in this House to debate this opposition day motion.
When it is a Bloc Québécois or NDP opposition day motion, the Conservative Party gets remarkably few speaking spots. This is only our second speaking slot today on this motion and, as luck would have it, I get a full 20 minutes. I think colleagues may regret allowing me to have the floor for the full 20 minutes as I do have a lot to say on the motion at hand.
I think it is a happy coincidence and convergence that today's debate is what we call an opposition day or supply day debate. If we look at the chyron on the screen right now it says “Business of Supply”, which is somewhat of an antiquated way of speaking. I believe most Canadians probably do not understand what supply may mean in the context of Parliament, but it means money. It means granting the government the ability to spend money.
In our Canadian parliamentary context, each opposition party has the opportunity to raise debates during the business of supply through opposition day motions before we, in December, grant the government the cold, hard cash. Before December 10 we have the opportunity to debate things. It is like the airing of grievances. We, as opposition parties, get the chance to air our grievances in this House. Why I say this is a happy convergence and coincidence is that the ancient roots of the business of supply rest with the monarchy, so here today we have a fun coincidence where we can talk about the cold, hard cash, about the business of supply and also about the monarchical roots of this process.
I would like to draw the attention of the House to the concept of grievance before supply and its ancient roots. I will quote from the late eminent scholar C.E.S. (Ned) Franks, formerly of Queen's University in Kingston, who wrote, “Parliament demanded and obtained the right to set its own agenda and it placed the expressions of grievance before the King's business. Only in this way could the Commons be assured of a sympathetic and attentive ear. Grievance before supply became one of the key principles of parliamentary government. The Commons also insisted that it could discuss the King's business as long as, and in such a manner as, it wished. From this comes the principle the House is alone responsible for its own proceedings and its own rules and procedures. These are not the King's business, but the Commons'.”
When it comes to the question of supply and the questions we ought to speak of, here we are debating the monarchy.
I am very proud to be part of an opposition party with a leader who believes in putting the people first, their families, their homes, their paycheques, their country. I want to read the preamble to the motion before us.
It states, “(i) Canada is a democratic state”. That is correct. It goes on to state, “(ii) this House believes in the principle of equality for all”. That is agreed.
Let us talk about economic equality and where we are right now in this country where families are struggling to make ends meet and finding it challenging to put food on the table.
I received an email from a senior citizen from near Arthur, Ontario, which of course is Canada's most patriotic village. She wrote that balancing a budget was incredibly difficult before COVID, but now it is beyond her. Speaking for herself, she said that basic essential groceries absorb at least half of her income.
Here we are debating the monarchy, something the Bloc knows full well will not change, is unable to change, based on our constitutional system. That is the issue that it sees fit to debate, not the families in Perth—Wellington, not the families who are struggling right now across the country, not the families who each and every day are sitting down at the kitchen table, often late at night or early in the morning, going through their numbers and wondering how they are going to make ends meet. People are wondering how they are going to make sure that the end of the month does not come before they have enough of their paycheque left to pay those final bills.
I want to talk very briefly about Perth—Wellington. Perth—Wellington is one of the great agricultural places in the country. We are very proud of our agricultural heritage. One of the things we could be talking about right now is the impact the Liberal government is having on Canadian farm families and on the challenges that are facing them, one of which is the carbon tax, which is driving up the cost on Canadian farmers.
This is Business of Supply, and this is an opposition day motion that is just ripe for the taking. We could be talking about how farm families in Perth—Wellington or in any of the Quebec ridings are being impacted by the government's mishandling of the carbon tax or the government's mishandling of the tariff issue on fertilizer. No one in the House would disagree that we need to take strong action against Vladimir Putin and his thugs, but when the government slapped a tariff on fertilizer which was purchased before March 2, it impacted no one except Canadian farmers.
An individual came into my Harriston office recently and gave me a copy of his bill from one of the local farm supply stores. The impact alone on fertilizer purchased prior to March 2 for a relatively small amount was $1,376.20. That is $1,300 that has been taken out of our rural economy for no good purpose, no benefit whatsoever and no impact on the Russian regime, yet it has been taken out of the local economy.
If we are looking at what could be discussed in an opposition day motion when we are talking about the Business of Supply, I think that colleagues in our party and most parties would choose the impact of the housing crisis. The housing crisis is preventing young families from moving into their first home and young university graduates from moving out of their parents' basement. Families are looking for a place to rent. The rental housing crisis is a challenge, and people can no longer afford to actually buy a house.
I have an email from a local councillor in the town of St. Marys. She wrote that there are little to no options. In her small town, she knows of families with four kids that are in jeopardy of being homeless, and also a single dad with children, and young adults that cannot move away from their parents' home, because there is simply nothing available to rent. She said that some families are being displaced, because the owners of homes they now rent want to sell them for profit in a hot market.
These are the issues that are impacting Canadians. These are the issues that are impacting us every single day. These are the issues that we hear of in our ridings across the country, yet we are debating this issue for political and partisan means rather than focusing on a number of the issues that matter. There are issues such as the cost of Internet and the availability of rural broadband.
I see my friend from Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa is in the House today, and one of his challenges now as our shadow minister for rural economic development and connectivity is the fact that across Canada, there are massive amounts of our country that are in dead zones and do not have access to reliable high-speed Internet. Even in my area of rural southern Ontario, which is not that far in the grand scheme of things from places like London, Kitchener and Guelph, we have massive areas of our community that cannot access rural high-speed Internet, and those who can are paying through the nose. I have heard stories of families and farm businesses having to pay tens of thousands of dollars to get fibre down a quarter-mile stretch of a concession road.
These are the types of issues that resonate with Canadians. These are the types of issues that each and every day we as Canadians are hearing about and that we want to focus on. Those are the issues we were sent to this place to focus on, but again, here we are discussing this issue.
There are two final issues that have been brought to my attention by my constituents which should merit discussion. One is food insecurity.
I have the great benefit of having amazing organizations in my riding that go above and beyond the call of duty in ensuring that families, community members and persons living with disabilities have food on their table each and every day. I think of the Stratford House of Blessing. I think of the local community food centre. I think of the Salvation Army. All of them go above and beyond the call of duty.
I get emails like this: “One critical challenge is food insecurity. The shocking reality is in Canada, one of the richest countries in the world, over 4.4 million people can't afford the food they need. In communities across Canada, one in eight households and one in six children are affected by food insecurity.”
The fact of the matter is that with the rising cost of groceries and the impact inflation is having on groceries, these numbers are going to rise. These numbers are going to rise and have that impact on families, on folks in my riding and across the country. They simply can no longer afford to put food on the table.
This leads me to another email I have had, about the family doctor shortage. We all know that when people are food insecure, it causes other challenges in the health care system. The fact of the matter is there are far too many Canadians living in Canada without access to a family doctor.
I have received a number of emails bringing this issue to my attention and urging me to act on the health care workforce issue, specifically on the inability for families to have a primary care physician. They need an individual who can help care for their family and ensure that there are measures in place to prevent the need for urgent care in an emergency department or other matters, to prevent it from ever happening. We all know, going back to food insecurity, that when someone is food insecure, it has an impact on their overall livelihood and health.
I raise these issues because that is where we are today. We are having this debate in the House, discussing the business of supply, and no debate is ever wasted when we can raise the issues that affect our constituents. It is unfortunate that in this specific example we are not specifically debating and eventually voting on food insecurity, on rural broadband, on support for families, on support for cutting the cost of living, or on support for ensuring that every Canadian has a family doctor.
To the issue at hand in this debate, and I promise I will not speak at too much length, I have some thoughts on this motion, not the least of which is the error in the motion itself. The motion refers to the British monarchy, but as members will know, we pledge allegiance to the Crown in Canada.
We can reflect on what is said in what we refer to as “the green book”, Bosc and Gagnon, about the oath of allegiance. Let us be clear on where this motion is coming from. This motion is coming from the Parti Québécois in Quebec. This motion is coming from the PQ, the cousins of the Bloc Québécois. I should point out that despite the efforts of the 32 Bloc Québécois MPs, they helped elect only three PQ MNAs in Quebec, so I question, frankly, the motivation there.
This is all driven by the oath of allegiance that we all take when we are sworn in as parliamentarians. In Bosc and Gagnon, it says the following:
When Members swear or solemnly affirm allegiance to the Sovereign, they are also swearing or solemnly affirming allegiance to the institutions the Sovereign represents, including the concept of democracy. Thus, Members are making a pledge to conduct themselves in the best interests of the country. The oath or solemn affirmation reminds Members of the serious obligations and responsibilities they are assuming.
That is what we are talking about. That is what we need to be focusing on: our duties as parliamentarians and our devotion to our country, our commitment to our country. That is what the oath of allegiance is talking about. That is what the oath of allegiance is focusing on. It is not focusing on the British monarchy. It is focusing on our duties as parliamentarians.
Frankly, I find it somewhat troubling when parliamentarians from a certain party keep referring to the British monarchy. In fact, if we go as far back as 1947, in a classic Corry and Hodgetts text, they wrote:
The British Government and Parliament no longer have any control over its members. The Dominions are autonomous and independent. They are bound to Britain and to one another only by the invisible ties of a common tradition....
We do have a common tradition with our British counterparts, but we also have a common tradition with the first French monarch of 1534, when what is now considered Canada was in fact a French royal province, so we do have a history that is reflected in this place and in this concept.
I want to focus once again on the concept of the Crown in right of Canada, a distinct and separate entity from the British monarchy, and I would quote from Philippe Lagassé and James Bowden, who talk about the Canadian Crown as a corporation sole:
However antiquated or abstract it may appear, it remains that the Crown is the concept of the state in Canada, and that the state is a legal person known as Her Majesty in Right of Canada by virtue of the Crown's status as a non-statutory corporation sole. Claims that the laws governing this Canadian corporation fall under the authority of the British Parliament, or that the legal personality of the Canadian state is still the same as the legal personality of the British state, undermine the independence and sovereignty that Canada began to enjoy after 1926 and could fully claim after 1982.
There we have it. The Canadian Crown, His Majesty in right of Canada, is a separate and distinct legal entity from that of the British monarchy. In fact, if we want to have a more lengthy conversation on where we go as a Parliament and where other Commonwealth countries may go, we will find that it is indeed possible that other countries, including the United Kingdom itself, could do away with their monarchy, but Canada itself, as a distinct corporation sole, the monarchy of Canada, the Crown of Canada as a corporation sole, is a separate and independent institution beyond that of the British monarchy.
My friend from Chatham-Kent—Leamington earlier referenced some of the benefits and some of the added specificity of the Canadian Commonwealth tradition and the parliamentary democracy we have here in Canada, and one of the great scholars, Walter Bagehot, talked about the beauty of a constitutional monarchy. He talked about how it worked and how it has benefited not only the United Kingdom, but in our case our tradition. Bagehot talked about both the efficient and the dignified parts. The dignified parts are the monarchy, the Crown and the august nature of that part. The efficient part is that of the cabinet. We may from time to time debate how efficient a particular cabinet or a particular government may be, but the important part is recognizing the distinction between the two.
The benefit of a constitutional monarchy is that the embodiment of the Crown and head of state does not rest with the partisan deliberations of the day-to-day political struggles of the House of Commons or of other legislatures. That is the benefit: dividing the efficient and the dignified parts and thus allowing us to have a head of state, represented in Canada by Her Excellency the Governor General, but also a separate and distinct efficient part that focuses on the day-to-day running. I know for a fact that other countries where those two are merged, where the head of state and the head of government are one and the same, are not ones we would like to emulate.
As my time is running out, I want to make one final point. Parliament consists of three parts. We often think of Parliament as two houses, which is correct, but it is three parts. It is the House of Commons; it is the Senate, and it is the Crown. Those are the three parts of Parliament, and those are the three processes through which bills become law: through first reading, second reading and third reading in both houses, and finally through royal assent. Those three elements were combined once together in the Speech from the Throne in 1957, when Her late Majesty The Queen delivered the Speech from the Throne from the Senate chamber during her visit to Canada.
