Ralph Goodale

[Public Safety Act, April 24th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, There have been some discussions among all the party House leaders, and I believe you would find unanimous consent to discharge the order for consideration of Bill C-42 and to withdraw this bill from the order paper.

[Child Protection, April 24th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I would advise the hon. member, as he well knows, that yesterday, during the discussions with respect to the motion before the House, we offered an amendment that in fact embodied the words of his leader word for word as expressed yesterday in the National Post , and it was turned down.

[Microbreweries, April 24th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, as the law officers of the House pointed out, Bill C-47 does not in any way deal with the beer industry. Accordingly, there is no possible conflict of interest between the chair of the committee and the beer industry.

As the secretary of state has pointed out, the matter of the excise taxes in relation to beer is being considered in an entirely different forum in which, in fact, the chair of the finance committee is not involved.

[Microbreweries, April 24th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, this is a scurrilous personal attack against the chairman of the finance committee who is a distinguished lawyer, a longstanding member of the House and an experienced parliamentarian as a committee chair and as a parliamentary secretary. She was prudent enough in this matter to seek legal advice from the law officers of the House in advance of the committee hearing and they have ruled conclusively there is no conflict of interest.

[Privilege, April 22nd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I move:

That the member for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca be suspended from the service of the House until such time as he appears at the bar of the House to apologize, in a manner found to be satisfactory by the Speaker, for his actions in disregard of the authority of the Chair and in contempt of the House.

[Privilege, April 22nd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the House will recall that on Wednesday of last week there was a deeply troubling incident in the House which involved the unparliamentary misuse of the mace.

I signaled at that time my intention to pursue this serious and premeditated affront to the order and decorum of the House. We as members I believe cannot simply ignore it. We cannot pretend it did not happen. We have a duty to respond. Indeed, many members of parliament on all sides of the House have made this point to me over the past few days. If we at every turn do not defend the dignity of parliament, we embark upon a very slippery slope. Accordingly, nothing could justify the unparliamentary behaviour of last Wednesday.

Mr. Speaker, if you find that there is in fact here a prima facie case of privilege, I would be prepared to move an appropriate motion.

[Royal Assent Act, April 19th, 2002]

moved that Bill S-34, an act respecting royal assent to bills passed by the Houses of Parliament, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Business of the House, April 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, as the House knows, for four days this week the House could have had thoughtful and fulsome debate on the report stage of Bill C-5 about species at risk. Unfortunately, the official opposition did not appear particularly interested in that.

Nevertheless, I will continue to consult with opposition House leaders to try to reach agreement on how to complete the debate on that very important legislation and I hope that there will be more interest shown than we have seen so far.

In the meantime, the House will proceed this afternoon with consideration of the Senate amendments to Bill C-15A, amending the criminal code. Tomorrow we will debate Bill S-34, respecting royal assent, followed by Bill S-40, respecting financial clearing houses.

On Monday we will return to any unfinished business from this week and, if there is time, we will turn to Bill C-15B, which of course is another criminal code amendment.

Later next week, if Bill C-50, the bill dealing with the WTO, and Bill C-49, dealing with excise, are in fact reported back to the House from committee in time, we will deal with their final stages as well as concluding any business left over from Monday.

As the House already knows, Tuesday, April 23 and Thursday, April 25 will be allotted days.

[Privilege, April 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I gave notice yesterday of my intention to proceed with a certain question of privilege. However, in view of the international circumstances that have arisen overnight, I think it would be more appropriate to deal with that matter on another day in the very near future, and I would first ask for your permission to do so.

Second, I understand that there would be consent in the House to proceed at this time directly with statements by ministers and then to return to the normal daily routine of business when those proceedings have been completed.

[Privilege, April 17th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, in the last number of minutes the House has witnessed some rather extraordinary behaviour.

I am pleased the hon. member for St. Albert talked about behaviour that is proper, legal and judicious because earlier this evening we saw behaviour that was exactly the opposite. In an affront to the dignity of the House and an assault on its order and decorum a member of parliament from the opposition attempted to seize and remove the mace from the table. There could be no more serious affront to the dignity, decorum and order of the House than that.

I wish to put on record my strongest possible objection and indicate to the Chair that at the earliest opportunity at the next sitting of the House I will seek the opportunity to elaborate on this point from a legal point of view. I will put the argument before the House that this is a question of privilege that deserves to be dealt with, and I wanted to give notice at the earliest opportunity.