Madam Speaker, I am glad to be joining the debate on Motion No. 11. Ahead of time, I am going to inform you that I am going to be sharing my time with the member for Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley. I have to look at him just to remember his riding name, so I recognize it is difficult to memorize all of the members' riding names here.
I want to start by saying something for constituents back home who are wondering why we are debating this motion. It is actually not government legislation; it is a motion that would structure how we use the time of Parliament on a go-forward basis from now until the end of June. I want to highlight some of the parts in the motion I am most concerned about. It directly affects my ability to represent my constituents back home in the riding of Calgary Shepard. They have honoured me with the ability to represent them for a third term in Parliament, and I want to recognize that fact.
We had a member from the Liberal caucus who said earlier that they could not understand why over 50 members of Parliament wanted to speak on a piece of legislation. It is just that simple. This place exists to debate legislation. This place exists to debate. That is the whole point of Parliament. The government has all of the powers necessary, if it chooses to use them. It is always a choice. It can choose to use them to limit debate and to also program debate. For example, it can do time allocation. It can say there will be five more days of debate on a particular piece of legislation. It can have evening sittings if it chooses to, as it is choosing to do in Motion No. 11.
The problem with Motion No. 11 is that it has also larded on all of these extra measures, like prorogation on demand. Section (c)(iv) states, “a minister of the Crown may move, without notice, a motion to adjourn the House until Monday, September 19, 2022, provided that the House shall be adjourned pursuant to Standing Order 28 and that the said motion shall be decided immediately without debate or amendment”.
That is the type of thing that side, the government's side, the Liberal caucus, in 2015, promised it would never do; it would never prorogue Parliament. That was not the Conservatives making a promise. That was the Liberal Party of Canada. The Liberal government made the promise that it would not do such a thing. It has already prorogued Parliament once in the past six and a half years that I have been here.
The Liberals have now also inserted into this motion prorogation on demand. At any moment of the day, a minister of the Crown can decide that is it. We are done. It is too much. The heat is on. We need to flee for the summer, before the rest of the parties and the public realize what is going on in the House of Commons. It is wrong, and they should not be doing such things.