Derek Lee

[Questions On The Order Paper, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.

[Questions Passed As Orders For Returns, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, if Question No. 32 could be made an order for return, the return would be tabled immediately.

[Committees Of The House, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, regarding what is known as the 100 signature rule, I move that the 27th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, presented to the House earlier, be concurred in.

(Motion agreed to)

[Committees Of The House, June 13th, 2001]

moved:

That the Standing Committee on Finance be authorized to travel from place to place within Canada during its proceedings pursuant to Standing Order 83(1) and that the necessary staff accompany the committee.

(Motion agreed to)

[Committees Of The House, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, following exhaustive consultations, I have three motions to present.

I move that the 26th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs be concurred in.

(Motion agreed to)

[Committees Of The House, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present the 27th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs regarding its order of reference of Tuesday, April 24, 2001, in relation to Bill S-10, an act to amend the Parliament of Canada Act (Parliamentary Poet Laureate).

The committee has considered Bill S-10 and reports the bill with amendment.

[Government Response To Petitions, June 13th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the standing orders I am pleased to submit, in both official languages, the government's response to five petitions.

[Points Of Order, June 12th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I take it that we have had a bit of a fessing up about the genesis of Standing Order 56(1).

I want to bring to the attention of the House for your consideration four points in relation to this item.

This may be the third ruling the Chair will be asked to make today. It has been a busy day for the Chair and our sympathies to you for that.

On the face of this rule, which is really what the Chair has to deal with here, I think what the member opposite is alleging is that in some way the element of the order passed that provides for what we are going to be doing in voting later on tonight does not involve the management of our business, to take the words from the rule. That is the one element of Standing Order 56(1) that I think we are dealing with. We are dealing with the management of the House's business.

The member suggests that the business of supply is special and that it goes beyond the management of our business. The whole business of supply to be sure is special and unique in terms of the things that we do around here, but I suggest that we are not managing all the supply procedure here. What we are doing is managing the stream of voting that would occur in amendments to the supply bill. I point out that the order we have adopted does not prevent a vote at second or third reading of the supply bill tonight. It deals with all of the amendment motions.

What we are actually managing here is the voting. I would like to point out that the context that we are dealing with as we vote these days in the House is actually quite a bit different from the context that existed many years ago when this rule was put in place.

All members will recognize that when the House votes now, as we have been voting for a number of years, there are many applications of votes. Our whips in the House routinely, and I use that word advisedly, apply votes. That is a significant change in context for the House. When we as a House routinely apply votes, I suggest that the management of our business does include the management of the application of these votes. Like it or not we apply votes now.

Just a few days ago I think I noted the government whip actually applying a vote for a member who was not even voting with the government. This business of application of votes is now part of our routine and the motion that we have adopted intends to manage the flow of the application of votes. I suggest that is consistent with Standing Order 56(1) which refers to passing motions for the management of order of business.

The member for Winnipeg—Transcona has suggested that the minister had to consult before he moved the motion. The standing order does not require consultation. The standing order requires the denial of unanimous consent. That is precisely what was denied when the minister moved his motion earlier. He did not have to consult. He only had to find a denial of unanimous consent. Therefore the precedent for the application of rule 56(1) was certainly there.

The suggestion is that because we now have parties with less than 25 members that is somehow relevant to the interpretation. I suggest it is not. The rule is clear. The number of members required to force a vote or to deny the motion is 25, not 12. The fact that we have parties that have 12, 13 or 14 members is irrelevant. The rule is clear. We are not in the business of rewriting the rule here for the smaller parties. If we wish to do that later we can.

I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the suggestion that this is out of order is not correct. It certainly raises an issue, but on the face of Standing Order 56(1), for the reasons discussed around the House, I suggest that this motion and this manner of disposition is in order.

[Supply, June 12th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to have an opportunity to participate in the debate today. Some weeks ago it would have seemed strange that we would have an opportunity to spend time debating an issue like this in the House. I congratulate the official opposition for putting it on the table so we may exchange views on making some improvements in the way we do our business here.

It is worth noting that the opposition day motion, which is the format we are following today, is one of approximately six opposition motions which have been adopted since we came back to the House from the last election. It seems a rather high number to me but it is a tribute to both the quality of the motions and perhaps the reduction in partisanship applied in considering them.

I do not know what colleagues will do with this particular motion, but it certainly is an attempt to improve the role of private members' business in parliament.

I have had the opportunity and privilege of chairing the procedure and House affairs committee, which in a bit of an arm's length way looks after some of the private members' business procedure, and the infamous private members' business subcommittee which up until now selected private members' business for votability. The particular task of chairing or even serving on that committee is a mission of real dedication. It is not an easy task because inevitably a few members are pleased with the results and a larger number are displeased.

We try to circulate our colleagues on both sides of the House through the subcommittee as quickly as possible so they are not too bruised and battered. It is an exercise in politics and in trying to make the procedures work. The motion today suggests that there may be another way to do it.

After listening to some of the opposition speeches today, I suggest we should be careful. We really should be careful about stereotyping members on both sides of the House. Not every person on this side of the House thinks the same way, acts the same way or deals with policy issues the same way. The same is true among the membership on the other side of the House.

When a member opposite looks at the government's side and sees all the government members voting together, as so often is the case on a government bill, I understand why they would tend to stereotype us as being one huge group of MPs that simply gets up and votes en masse for a bill. However in many cases it is never 100% clear before we all come into the House how our members will vote. There is always a lot of political pushing and shoving in our caucuses before we come in to vote, as we all try to convince each other to vote in particular ways. This is not strange to politics. It is very much part of the job we have here.

The motion today properly reflects the important historic role of private members' business. The member for Yorkton—Melville who moved the motion has pointed out that private members' business was actually the main stock of business of earlier parliaments. We do not have to go back too far. It was a few generations ago. It was out of private members' business that all bills tended to evolve.

Over time the government agenda dominated and the private members' business portion was squeezed into smaller procedural portions of the day, the week or month, as the case may be. I suppose that is the bad news for a private member. However, the good news is that as an element of parliamentary business, private members' business has never been lost. It is still alive and there.

When I first came to this House in 1988, it was my perception that private members' business, as a living entity, was virtually on life support. I recall a private member's bill, involving tobacco use, quite extraordinarily being passed. There might have been another one passed one a year later.

However, the House and the government since those days have actually accorded a wider berth to private members' business. I am sure someone is keeping track of the fact that there are now quite a few private members' bills and motions that have been adopted by the House, as have opposition day motions, as I pointed out. There seems to be a modest freeing up of partisanship, time and procedure for private members' business and the whole envelope of non-government business.

This has been very healthy. I see members in the House who have had private members' business adopted. I was fortunate in that regard at one point in time. I was very proud of the item that was adopted by the House, and the thumbprint of that work exists to this day.

The member for Elk Island indicated that he had counted some 4,000 pieces of private members' business since 1993. That is huge. That bundle of work by members of parliament on both sides of the House is actually a breeding ground for creative, fresh public policy. Yes, the government does cherry-pick from that pool of creative work. However, of those ideas put forward by members to the House as part of the public record, not all but a lot become part of public policy debate or actual public policy that is adopted in one way or another. That is positive.

Also government votes on private members' business these days are not whipped. It is a free vote that has created some interesting voting patterns, but it has been healthy. The Prime Minister made that commitment and has kept to it. It is a very interesting evolution.

The proposal is that all private members' business items become votable. As I mentioned, with 4,000 pieces of private members' business since 1993, there would be a need to ration the volume in terms of House time. We could not have fit in 4,000 items over the last seven or eight years. It is just too much. For that purpose we have been using a lottery. It is not very pretty, it is not very rational, but members seem to accept it. Perhaps that is not the proper tool. Maybe we should change that.

We also have found it necessary to ration for quality or relevance. That is why the subcommittee reviews the bill.

The suggestion is that we do not need to scrutinize for quality or relevance as we can let the House do that. There are a number of private members' business items that members do not believe will go too far. Is it appropriate to accord House time to a private member's business item that a member happens to like but knows will not go anywhere?

With regard to the rationing mechanism that we are searching for, I would point out that the 22nd report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs is before the House and gets rid of the 100 signature rule. We are looking for a replacement. The opposition day motion, if adopted by the House, would undoubtedly trigger an exercise that would produce a mechanism to treat private members' business appropriately.

[Supply, June 12th, 2001]

Relevance.