[Report continued from volume A]
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STANDING ORDERS REFORM / RÉFORME DU RÈGLEMENT
Continuing the debate on government notice of motion number 7 on amendments to the standing orders.
The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): We are now dealing with Mr Eves's motion to adjourn the debate.
The House divided on Mr Eves's motion, which was negatived on the following vote:
Ayes 23; nays 57.
The Acting Speaker: The honourable member for Parry Sound had the floor.
Mr Eves: I was just coming to the conclusion of my remarks, and while I gave the government every opportunity to reflect upon some of the quotes from the Premier, the government House leader, the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Financial Institutions from years gone by, lo and behold, on my fax machine, as I was down there just now -- in fact, it's dated 18:19, which was 6:19, a few minutes ago, and it's from the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers Local 128. I just thought that before the government members rushed out of their seats they might like to hear what a union has to say about how it's proceeding with its proposed labour legislation and why we don't need these unilateral changes to our standing orders, because we need more protection for people to hear.
The letter is addressed to the Honourable Bob Rae, Premier of Ontario, dated June 22, 1992, and it says:
"Dear Mr Rae,
"Re: labour law reform, disaffiliation provisions, benefit plan trustees for the province of Ontario, trusteeship and union democracy in the construction industry:
"In response to the above, please accept the following:
"The proposal for a division of assets between trust funds and the diversion of members' rights in trust funds is a proposal for a nightmare. It will sacrifice the interests of members to the political ambition of officers of a local union, and will in the end achieve nothing of value for the members.
"There is no need for a provision which 'vests' the interests of members in pension and health and welfare plans. The Pension Benefits Act and most trust fund documents achieve that result in any event. It is obvious that even the drafter of this legislation assumed that the disaffiliated local union would set up its own separate trust funds. What will that achieve for the members such plans are designed to serve? We say it will achieve nothing. It will inevitably be a fight over who is entitled to how much and on what basis. It is easy to use simple phrases like 'all the assets of the pension plan attribute to such members,' section 15a(1)(d), but much harder to determine what the phrase means. Will we have plan windups? Transfers on a going-concern basis? Simple divisions based on historical contributions, with or without purchases service credits? What warranties will be available if the calculation leads to a shortfall in one fund? The possibilities are endless, the costs high, and the potential benefit to members nil.
"There is tremendous value to our members in national health and welfare and pension funds. This legislation invites needless waste of resources of these funds in legal and accounting costs with no direct benefit to the members these funds serve. It is of no value to us at all.
"Labour relations matters:
"This proposal contains a number of unworkable and undemocratic provisions with respect to the future of a trade union after disaffiliation.
"In some senses the proposal wants to have the best of both worlds. The disaffiliated local will maintain a kind of status in its craft -- the international or its affiliates may not attempt to operate in the disaffiliated local's geographic area, section 157(6), but must bargain with them as a joint employee bargaining agency, section 158(4).
"These proposals are nonsense. If the principle of freedom of choice to join a trade union means anything, then this government should not be creating little kingdoms based on former geographic divisions of an international union. Section 157(6) is an attempt to deny the chaotic results of such disaffiliation on organizing, bargaining and representation in the province. It simply highlights the problems you will create.
"To suggest that international and independent unions can bargain together after what will no doubt be a bitter split is naïve and dangerous. Bargaining in the ICI sector is difficult enough without enforcing a marriage on one side of the table between parties who have determined to go their own separate ways.
"Why wouldn't the government consult with the construction industry in Ontario before implementing such drastic changes?" this union president wants to know. "These proposed changes are counterproductive and should be withdrawn."
"I would appreciate a response to this matter. I remain,
"Yours truly,
"Joseph Maloney, business manager, Boilermakers Local 128 Ontario."
Then we have a letter dated today to the Premier again. It's by Ed Power, the president, business representative of Local 128.
Hon Mr Pouliot: What has that got to do with the debate?
Mr Eves: It has everything to do with the debate because this government doesn't even want to consult. It wants powers under the standing orders to ram through any piece of legislation, including its labour legislation, without proper consultation, without proper debate -- "We want to invoke time allocation, we want to invoke closure and we want to do it unilaterally."
"Dear Mr Rae:
"Re: Labour law reform, disaffiliation provisions, benefit plan trustees for the province of Ontario, trusteeship and union democracy in the construction industry:
"The abovementioned proposed legislation is without doubt going to seriously have a negative impact on members of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers Local 128 Ontario.
"Since I will ultimately be the person who has to explain to my membership the possible ramifications, I would appreciate an answer to the following questions:
"1. What happens to national or multiprovincial health, welfare and pension trust funds under the restructuring of benefit plan trustees clause?
"2. If our existing national funds are forced to wind down and restructure provincially, how is this going to impact on the existing pensioners?
"3. Who is responsible for the cost of such a wind-down?
"4. What happens to craft jurisdiction, ie, international trade agreements if one local or an area of a provincial local decided to merge with another union?
"5. Is this proposed legislation going to be binding on the United Steelworkers of America and the Canadian Auto Workers, who are now attempting to create construction divisions?
"6. Why was there no consultation between the building trades and your government on this issue as promised?
"7. How many construction locals have been arbitrarily placed under trusteeship since your government came into power?
"I would appreciate a response to these queries at your earliest possible convenience.
"Your truly,
"Ed Power, president/business representative, Local 128."
This is the very reason we don't want unilateral rule changes: so members of the public out there who have a concern about a particular piece of legislation will have an opportunity to contact and voice that concern through opposition members, will have wide-open public hearings so that they can come and present their case to the government of the day, and to us as both opposition and government members so that we can improve, hopefully, whatever legislation it is and address some of the concerns of concerned people.
I put on the record here today and in my previous discussion where certain influential members of this government stood on the question of time allocation and closure when they were in government. We know they stood firmly against it, despised it, spoke vehemently and from the heart about it and talked about democracy, not being able to stifle opposition members and preserving everybody's right of free speech. Now that they're in government, they don't believe in any of those principles any more. They believe in unilateral rule changes in the province for the first time in Ontario's history.
The same government House leader who, when he was House leader of the official opposition, said, "You can't change rules; you can't do this stuff without consensus; it's supposed to be negotiated in a House leaders' panel meeting," now says: "We want to unilaterally change it. We don't want to talk about legislation in the last six days, we want to talk about unilateral changes to the rules."
I think their words are going to come back to haunt them. As Mel Swart said over the weekend, "What has happened to the heart and the principles of the New Democratic Party in Ontario? Where has it gone?"
Mr Bisson: Finally, after some time, we have an opportunity on this side of the House to get up and speak about why it is necessary for the government to make the changes we're proposing right now.
Before getting into that, I want to touch on something very quickly. I'm going to write the time down here so I can watch how long I've got.
Why is it that members of the opposition are conducting themselves the way they are with regard to the whole question of rule changes and why is it that they're so upset? I think all members in this Legislature -- all parties have had an opportunity to sit in opposition at one time -- would probably argue in much the same way, but I think what really irks the opposition and one of the reasons they're so upset about this is that with the changes to the rules in this Legislature, if it should happen, it will totally change the strategy of the opposition. One of the things the opposition has to do in order to get re-elected, in order to try to defeat this government in the next election, is to try to put the case to the people of Ontario that --
Interjections.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. The Speaker is having great difficulty hearing the honourable member for Cochrane South. I can assure all members that you will have an opportunity to participate in the debate, so please hold your comments until your turn comes about.
Mr Bisson: There we go, Mr Speaker. I make my case.
The whole question of why the opposition members are so upset is that it changes their strategy. The opposition parties, both Liberals and Conservatives, from the time this House came into session after the 1990 election, have had as their goal and their job, as any political party sitting on that side of the House, to make it to this side in the next election.
Various parties develop strategies in order to do that. Some parties take a look at the question of policy and try to show the people of Ontario that there are policies that are necessary for the people. All parties try to do that to a great extent, the Liberal opposition and the Conservative opposition, and that's fair game; the NDP was in opposition and put that point forward. We talk about policies and issues according to the needs of the people of Ontario, and we talk about how those policies would come into being for the benefit of the people should we get elected. That's fair game. That's what politics is all about. That's what opposition is all about. If an opposition party criticizes the government about a particular policy, that's fair game. Any government that does not have any opposition, I would say, has a certain difficulty, because the opposition is there in order to serve the role of reminding the government every now and then when it does something wrong.
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What has really been happening in this place for the last 18 months is that the opposition has to be able to build up a whole scenario. They have to try to prove to the people of Ontario -- watch them jump wild in a second -- that we are incompetent as an NDP government. Oh, they didn't jump wild.
Interjections.
Mr Bisson: There they go. I knew I'd get them there. They have to be able to prove we're not able to do what we want as a government. But how can you make that happen if the story is absolutely not true? You do that by slowing down the process of this House. If the opposition can prove, after four years of government, that the NDP government has not been able to put through the legislation that is necessary in order to benefit the people of this province, its case has weight. For 18 months of sitting in this Legislature it has been very apparent what they've been doing. They've been slowing down the whole legislative process within the Legislature of Ontario.
Monsieur le Président, je le mets très simplement. Ce qu'ils font, c'est qu'ils se tournent de bord et puis ils disent, «Écoute, on va faire un coup aux personnes de la province et puis on va montrer que le gouvernement NPD ne peut prendre des décisions.» Comment est-ce qu'on va faire ça ? C'est très simplement comme ceci : Ils vont tourner de bord, ils vont ralentir tout le processus de l'Assemblée législative de l'Ontario, et en ralentissant le processus de l'Assemblée ils seront capables de faire leur cas.
Ce dont ils ont vraiment peur avec ces changements-ci, c'est que le gouvernement de l'Ontario ait la chance d'avancer ses projets de loi selon les politiques du gouvernement. Pendant le temps que nous étions dans l'opposition, quand on a voulu prendre des points sur des questions faisant affaire avec certains projets de loi, oui, Monsieur le Président, nous aussi avons fait de l'opposition. Mais nous avons choisi très correctement selon les positions, selon les lois, selon les projets de loi de parler faisant affaire avec l'opposition du gouvernement dans le temps. Mais ce qu'ils font, c'est tous les projets de loi.
J'ai vu parfois à cette Assemblée, comme d'autres membres l'ont vu, même quand l'opposition est d'accord avec un projet de loi du gouvernement et que les Conservateurs et les Libéraux votent en faveur de quelque chose que le gouvernement fait, des débats très longs aux deuxième et troisième lectures. Même dans des débats où les deux partis d'opposition sont d'accord ils vont se lever, ils vont parler pendant deux heures à la fois, ils vont aller, quatre, cinq ou six membres, pour trois ou quatre jours à la fois aux deuxième ou troisième lectures, même s'ils sont d'accord.
Le député qui vient de parler a fait le point que le gouvernement n'avance pas son agenda. Mais ce n'est pas mal difficile d'avancer son agenda, quand une opposition fait des tactiques comme ça. C'est bien simple, très simple. Tout ce qu'ils font, c'est faire de l'opposition pour l'amour de faire de l'opposition et pour arrêter les politiques du gouvernement. C'est aussi simple que ça.
Mais si l'on regarde dans le passé, oui, il y a eu des temps que nous dans l'opposition avons essayé d'arrêter l'agenda de l'Assemblée. Il s'agissait des projets de loi qu'on a trouvé très importants pour les personnes de la province, mais pas sur tous les projets de loi. On a choisi, comme parti de l'opposition, certains projets de loi que l'on a trouvé très mauvais pour les personnes de l'Ontario. Et oui, on a fait de l'opposition sur le projet de loi 162. On a fait de l'opposition faisant affaire avec l'assurance- automobile, parce qu'on croyait, pendant le temps, que ce n'était pas avantageux pour les personnes de l'Ontario. Mais quand on était dans l'opposition et qu'il y avait des affaires où on était d'accord avec le gouvernement, on n'a pas joué des jeux, on n'a pas fait des points d'ordre, on n'a pas fait des points de privilège et on n'a pas fait sonner les cloches. On n'a pas fait faire toutes ces affaires-là quand on était d'accord avec un projet de loi. C'est très simple.
The other thing that happens in regard to the opposition is that it has to paint a canvas, and it paints this picture for the people of Ontario that no matter what we do on this side of the House, it can't be right.
We heard two previous speakers before talk about amendments to the rent control legislation that was brought in. They talked about the amendments that were made. Yes, there were amendments made, because we said when we came to government that we would listen to the people of this province, and in the process of listening to people, it means you refine your particular positions.
On the question of the Ontario Labour Relations Act, it is the same process. We've gone through a very long process of listening to the people of the province, of going out from community to community in order to listen to what business, labour and other interested parties had to say about that particular bill. Yes, we amended that as well, but they're trying to paint a government that listens and a government that amends its legislation according to what it's hearing as being weak. If we did it the other way around, they'd still be opposing, they'd still be jumping up and down; it's as simple as that. The point is that no matter what we'd do on this side of the House, they would not be happy.
Interjections.
Mr Bisson: I see we have their ire up again, Mr Speaker.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Cochrane South has the floor. Please give him the opportunity of participating.
Mr Bisson: You know, I find it very interesting. We just sat through the previous member's two or two and a half hours of debate. There were some interjections on this side of the House but not in the amount we have now. Another thing we see in this House is that any time a government member gets up to speak, all we hear is heckling and jeckling and yelling on the other side of the House. They can't sit and listen to a debate. Why? Because they can't accept that we're the government. They can't accept that on September 6, 1990, the people of this province voted, by majority, an NDP government. They haven't been able to accept that. It is quite apparent.
I sit here in debate and I listen to opposition members of both the Liberal and Conservative parties get up in debate on particular things. All of us on this side of the House at one time made some interjections but never at the level we have right now. The process is very simple. The interjections are there in order to try to stammer the member who is speaking on this side of the House so that he loses his track or his train of mind, so that somehow or other he will fumble within his speech, so as to try to make it look as if we don't know what we're talking about. It's as simple as that. That's what they're up to.
Mr Steven W. Mahoney (Mississauga West): Now you have got our attention.
Mr Robert V. Callahan (Brampton South): That is the best point you have made.
Mr Bisson: Very good. We got them; finally we got them. The point is, what ended up happening is that it's been constant games in this Legislature since September 1990. That's what's been happening. If you take a look at the legislative agenda in regard to what has happened through the whole process of legislation coming through in the sittings we've been in -- the fall of 1990, the spring sitting of 1991, fall 1991 and this one -- if you take a look at the pieces of legislation that have been allowed to go through, they are quite a bit different from what was allowed to go through when members of both of those opposition parties sat in government.
When both the Liberals and the Conservatives sat in government, they were able to get, on average, about 30 bills through this Legislature. Why? Because the opposition parties allowed, yes, a debate to a certain extent and allowed the business of the House to go ahead because we understood, as an opposition party, when we were there, that the government does have the right to govern and at the end of the day it must put forward its agenda. Democratically, they have that right.
What ends up happening when we come to government is that no matter what the bill, there is constant interjection, there is constant debate, there is bell ringing, there is every trick that is able to be used in the House to slow down the legislative agenda. They slow down the legislative agenda for one reason. It comes back to their strategy. If you can slow it down long enough to make it look as if nothing has happened, they're able to make the case to the people of the province that we're not doing our jobs. That's what they're up to.
The reason they're so upset is that the rules of the House will allow for debate. The rules of the House as proposed are to turn around and put some sort of rules around this place that make debate in this House somewhat more productive. We quite often see members get up on pieces of legislation that they even agree on and speak for two and three and four hours at a time. If a member can't stand in his place and make the points within a respectable period of time, 30 minutes or an hour -- why do you need two hours to make that particular point?
One of the rules we're proposing is that on debates on second and third reading we're going to allow for 30 minutes of debate for a member to get up in his or her seat to speak on that particular piece of legislation. The person who leads off the debate will get 90 minutes. Members of the opposition have called that draconian. They have called it everything in the book. They have said: "That is unfair. That is a stymie of the parliamentary process."
But you go back and you look at every Legislature across Canada except for Prince Edward Island and Ontario. Every Legislature in Canada and the federal House of Commons have similar rules. Why do they have similar rules? They have similar rules because they have recognized that you have to have a process to allow the Legislature to do its business, to allow the legislation to go through the House. But more important, it's to allow full participation on the part of all members, because one of the things that happens when members in the opposition take two and three and four hours in debate is that it doesn't allow other members who represent ridings across this province to get up and speak in regard to the issues pertaining to their ridings.
What we are proposing is very simple. We are saying if you give 90 minutes to the leadoff person in regard to debate and 30 minutes for every member after, what you're going to end up with is more participation on the part of all the members in this assembly in order for more members to be able to get up and speak about the particular legislation that we're talking about, from their particular aspect of representing their ridings.
Now that is totally democratic. If you were to take a look at some of the other legislatures in regard to that particular rule -- for example, the federal House of Commons I think is some 20 minutes -- if a member gets up in debate he has 20 minutes in order to make his point, to a maximum in one of the other provinces which I think is somewhere around an hour. So they have 20 minutes to an hour to get up in their spot and debate the legislation coming before the House. They have that amount of time in order to be able to do the debate.
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I think that is pretty reasonable. If you can't come to your point in 20 minutes you have a real problem. If you can't come to your point in an hour you have a real problem. That is basically what that rule is all about: to limit the time of debate, in order to give people the time to be able to represent the views of the people of their riding in regard to those particular rules.
The other question is the time allocation. I understand what the members of the opposition are saying. They say that if the time allocation regulation is put into the standing orders, what you would end up with is an arbitrary use on the part of the government. No. If the members of the opposition want to do constructive debate in regard to debating the issues of the bill, I don't think any government would want to stymie that process.
But if an opposition party or opposition parties and those members decide that all they're going to do is to get up and oppose for the sake of opposing and not turn around and make any valid points other than just obstructing, quite frankly, at that point the government has a responsibility to the people of Ontario to turn around and put limits on that debate and say, "Listen, there are other pieces of legislation we must be able to get through in order to get to the business of the House."
Monsieur le Président, c'est très simple. C'est pour tourner de bord et dire : «Écoute, quand il s'agit de la législation qui passe à travers la province, c'est que chaque député a le droit et la responsabilité de parler de ces projets de loi-là faisant affaire avec les besoins et les aspirations des personnes de leur comté, et c'est leur responsabilité. Mais s'ils abusent de cette responsabilité pour des raisons politiques seulement, le gouvernement a une responsabilité de mettre un arrêt à ce processus-là. On n'est pas ici pour jouer des jeux ; on est élus ici pour les personnes de nos circonscriptions et pour être capables de représenter les personnes de notre comté quand ça vient aux questions de législation.
Venir à cette assemblée et jouer des jeux seulement, Monsieur le Président, ne nous met pas dans l'estime des électeurs dans nos comtés d'une manière qui est très agréable dans leurs yeux. On le sait tous dans cette assemblée : Conservateurs, Libéraux et NPD. On retourne dans nos comtés et on voyage à travers cette belle province, mais on parle au monde dans les rues de la province. Ils disent au sujet des politiciens : «Vous-autres, vous allez à l'assemblée pour jouer des jeux. Vous êtes en train de jouer des jeux seulement pour votre intérêt. Arrêtez de faire ça et commencez à travailler selon les problèmes. Moi comme Ontarien ou Ontarienne j'ai besoin d'avoir un point réglé pour être capable de m'avancer dans cette société. Arrêtez de jouer des jeux.»
La semaine passée il y a eu des classes à travers la province pour tous les députés qui sont venus pour participer à l'assemblée, pour faire une tournée dans notre bel édifice et venir regarder soit la période des questions ou des ordres qui se passaient à l'assemblée elle-même.
Mr Conway: I was wondering if he had said anything about setting back the time by a month.
M. Bisson : Monsieur le Président, s'il vous plaît.
Le Président suppléant (M. Noble Villeneuve) : À l'ordre, s'il vous plaît. À l'ordre, s'il vous plaît. Le député de Cochrane-Sud a le plancher. Vous aurez chacun votre tour.
M. Bisson : Ces groupes-là sont venus à travers, et je me rappelle un groupe de mon comté de l'école Saints-Martyrs qui est venu ici la semaine passée participer à l'assemblée quand il y avait tous les rappels à l'ordre. À un point ils m'ont dit : «Quelle sorte de jeu que vous jouez là-dedans, vous-autres ?» Ça nous met dans l'estime des électeurs de la province d'une manière très agréable devant eux-autres si tout ce qu'on fait c'est jouer des jeux. Le monde reconnaît que, comme politiciens et politiciennes de la province de l'Ontario, on vient à cette assemblée pour travailler pour le monde de nos comtés, qu'on représente leurs vues dans les débats qui se passent ici et qu'on ne joue pas de jeux.
Ce qu'on essaie de faire avec le changement du Règlement ici dans l'assemblée, c'est mettre en place des ordres qui allouent des heures pour avoir le business de la province à travers cette assemblée, c'est passer à travers la législature d'une manière qui fait un peu de bon sang. Si l'opposition ne jouait pas les jeux qu'elle at joués, ces changements-ci ne seraient pas nécessaires. Mais c'est très évident, Monsieur le Président, si l'on regarde ce qui est arrivé ce printemps-ci, l'automne passé, le printemps passé : il y a eu des situations où l'opposition a opposé seulement pour faire le point d'une opposition ; pas sur des questions de tourner de bord et puis parler seulement d'une politique qui est importante pour leur parti, mais seulement pour s'opposer.
Si l'opposition avait pris une attitude de venir ici et dire, «Écoute, sur les questions sur lesquelles on peut s'entendre comme partis politiques, si on peut s'entendre on va travailler ensemble, et sur les choses politiques sur lesquelles on ne s'entend pas, on n'a pas...
Interjections.
M. Bisson : Monsieur le Président, s'il vous plaît.
Le Président suppléant : À l'ordre, s'il vous plaît. Le député de Cochrane-Sud continue à participer au débat ; donnez-lui le privilège de participer sans interruption. Le député de Cochrane-Sud.
M. Bisson : Merci beaucoup.
Mr Elston: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: The honourable member for Cochrane South is one of the few members who incessantly chats through most of the speeches by the opposition people. He will not abide by the same treatment that he imposes on us. Where is the equality in that?
The Acting Speaker: It's not a point of order.
Le député de Cochrane-Sud, s'il vous plaît.
M. Bisson : Ce n'est même pas un rappel au Règlement et ce n'est pas même proche de la vérité. Il y a des rappels auxquels tous les députés de cette place-ci vont faire des interjections, mais la plupart des députés du côté du gouvernement écoutent. Si le monde regarde la télévision, ils vont voir, quand on peut entendre le plus de «heckling» qui arrive dans cette place-ci, c'est quand le bord du gouvernement parle parce qu'eux-autres ont bien l'habitude.
On essaie, de ce bord-ci de l'assemblée, du bord du gouvernement, de montrer qu'on a du respect pour cette Assemblée et qu'on a du respect pour les personnes de la province, et montrer qu'on peut se comporter d'une manière --
Interjections.
M. Bisson : Voyez-vous, Monsieur le Président, qu'on peut se comporter avec un peu plus de respect envers les personnes de la province.
Mr Speaker, the question of the rule changes is necessary because of the things that were outlined, which was that if --
Interjections.
Mr Bisson: Mr Speaker, I make my case. This is the problem we have in this place. I think you can see the animosity running within this place by the types of interjections going on around you.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. This is a number of times I've had to call the House to order. The honourable member for Cochrane South has the floor very legitimately. You may not agree with all of his comments, but he is certainly free to participate in the debate and make whatever comments he wishes. You will all have your turn. The honourable member for Cochrane South.
Mr Bisson: Thank you, Mr Speaker. There are a number of pieces of legislation that have to go through this assembly in order to get to the business of this province. We have now seen from all of last week that there's not a bit of legislation coming through here because of the games that were played. We saw a couple of weeks ago, when we were on the Class Proceedings Act -- or was it the Courts of Justice Amendment Act? One of those particular bills -- we saw three to four days of debate on a bill that both opposition parties agreed on. That's what's been happening around here.
Right now, I'm just going through some of the bills that have to go through this Legislature we haven't been able to get at. We have Bill 1, An Act to establish the Waterfront Regeneration Trust Agency; Bill 11, An Act to amend the Corporations Tax Act, which is good news for the corporate sector; Bill 20, An Act to amend the Education Act; Bill 23, An Act to amend the Colleges Collective Bargaining Act and the Ministry of Colleges and Universities Act; Bill 27, An Act to amend the Education Act and certain other Acts in respect of School Board Finance; Bill 37, Bill 38, Bill 39, Bill 40, Bills 42, 112, 162, 164 and 165. There are a number of bills.
Interjections.
Mr Bisson: The members in the opposition say, "Call the bills," but it's very difficult. You can put all the bills you want on the order paper, but if you can't get the opportunity to debate to get them through second and third readings, how in heck are you able to get them on the order paper? The point is that if the opposition wants to work along with us on those bills on which they agree so we can get through the business of this House, very well; no problem. But we've been having the whole --
Interjection.
Mr Bisson: The member should be in his own seat, I believe, when he's heckling.
The Acting Speaker: Order. Interjections are out of order, particularly when those interjecting are not in their own seats. The honourable member for Cochrane South has the floor.
Mr Bisson: Thank you. So there are a number of pieces of legislation that have to get through this assembly to be put in place for the people of this province. That cannot happen when you see the constant game-playing that is going on in this place. You have, as you've just seen right now, a 30-minute adjournment in order to amend the debate on a bill. Why is that necessary? Tell me. Is that a good use of time of this assembly, two and a half to four hours of debate on issues?
We've just seen, for example, a two-hour debate in order to move to 12-hour sittings of the House, one week of playing around with that. At every other time that has been done in the province of Ontario since that regulation has been in the standing orders since 1989, you have never seen the government of the day not being able to have the cooperation of the opposition to move to sittings of up to 12 o'clock at night for the last two weeks of the sitting. We have never seen that. You've seen that now. Why? I think the point --
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Interjections.
Mr Bisson: There they go. Look at them. The members of the opposition are a little bit excited right now, a little bit upset, because it's true.
The point is that they've been slowing down the whole process of this assembly since they've gotten here. The whole point comes down to that they don't want to accept that the Liberal government of the day in 1990 lost the election. The last time I looked at the papers, that's what happened, and they've never been able to accept it. I listen to the interjections during question period; I hear the comments on the other side. They can't live with themselves. They're beside themselves. They haven't been able to deal with the question that they lost.
As for the Conservative Party over there, my God, we don't know where they're coming from half the time. But they have to recognize that the people of Ontario made a decision, and in 1994 or 1995 the people of Ontario will again make a decision, and I'm confident what the people of this province will do. The people of this province, more than likely -- I don't have a crystal ball, but I wish I did -- will turn around and say --
Interjection: Ha ha.
Mr Bisson: My God, listen to that. That was quite a comment coming from the opposition.
I just thought I'd go through a couple of very quick things. It's fairly obvious what's been happening around this place -- very, very obvious.
Mr Randy R. Hope (Chatham-Kent): The Liberals are sad when Tories come back with an empty bus.
Mr Bisson: That's about the size of it. It's very, very obvious. The opposition parties have a game to play. The game they have to play is one day to get to this side of the House, and the way they do that is to build a case with the people of this province. How they turn around and do that is quite simple. They slow down the whole process in this place. They slow down the process to a crawl.
They slow it down to the point of not getting any legislation through, because then they can go to the people of the province of Ontario and they can say: "We told you so. We told you. Look at that. There's no legislation that's come through here. No legislation has come through the Legislature. It goes to show that the government hasn't done its job."
That's why we're doing the rule changes. We're doing the rule changes because it is very, very necessary to have rules that allow the legislation through this House to go through in a smooth and effective manner, and when you've got opposition parties playing the games that quite frankly they've been playing around this place, it is quite, quite, quite something.
Mr Conway: You know, if you knew anything about this place, this might be credible, but for somebody like you to get up and make this speech, that is unbelievable.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please.
Mr Bisson: My God. I just heard the member for Renfrew North --
Interjections: We want Bob. We want Bob.
Mr Conway: I want the Minister of Labour to get up and repeat what he said two years ago. If he's as principled as he says he is, he'll get up and do it and he'll say what he said two years ago, if he's an honourable, principled man. But I don't believe --
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. There's a great deal of animosity at this point in time and that will accomplish nothing. The honourable member for Cochrane South has the floor. Please allow him the opportunity of participating and then all other members will have an opportunity.
Mr Bisson: To say what the member for Renfrew North has just said in heckling in this place is quite something. I listened intently while the member for Renfrew North stood in his place and did a vicious attack on our House leader that was totally uncalled for. A personal character assassination is what it was about. And I see the members of the opposition. I make my case. This is what's been going on around this particular place. They just can't live with themselves.
I'd like to read just a couple of editorials that came through in regard to what happened at that time. Out of one of the papers, an article dated May 16: "Our politicians should by now have realized Canadians are sick and tired of the partisan games-playing and silly squabbling that makes a mockery of intelligent debate." This is for you guys.
Mr Stockwell: The biggest bunch of hypocrites I have ever met in my life.
The Acting Speaker: Order. Would the honourable member for Etobicoke West please withdraw that comment?
Mr Stockwell: Yes, I withdraw that comment.
Mr Bisson: It is extremely difficult to come into this House and be able to participate in an intelligent debate when you have the kinds of things that are happening right now in the opposition. We have just sat through one of the members from the Conservative Party, the honourable Conservative House leader, and we've sat through the debate from the member for Renfrew North. They have gone on at very long lengths of two, three and four hours in debate, and to a certain extent there was an amount of quietness in this part of the House in regard to the government and in regard to the debate that was going on.
I've had the floor for some 25 minutes now. For 25 minutes, we've heard heckling from that side of the House. We've heard people calling other members names that should not be used even in the school yards of this province, utilizing the kind of language on this side of the House that quite frankly is unfitting and disrespectful on the part of elected representatives coming to this House.
Mr Harnick: You guys aren't used to working in the summer, are you? This will be a real treat.
Mr Bisson: Listen to them again.
Mr Bradley: On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: I think it's very unfair for the member for Cochrane South to make those kinds of statements to people who are out there watching as though everybody is sitting there using language that they wouldn't normally hear in a school yard. He only need listen to the entire House, and I'm not saying the opposition or the government, but he should listen to the entire House before he starts making those judgements.
The Acting Speaker: I don't believe it's a point of privilege; it's an opinion. The honourable member for Cochrane South.
Mr Bisson: I would tend to agree it's more a point of opinion than anything else.
Just before I finish, one little quote from the leader of the third party, Toronto Sun, May 4. Put very succinctly at that time in regard to what's happening in this Legislature, this is from Mr Harris: "I'm in effect hijacking the system."
I haven't had the chance to go through all the material I'd prepared to go through this debate. It's been rather difficult with what's happened on that side of the House. But to finish it all up, it comes down to this: The opposition parties are upset because they know that with the rule changes they are not going to be able to keep up their games. With these rule changes we in this Legislature will then have to get to the business of this province, the business that is supposed to come forward before the 130 members who sit in this Legislature and debate it according to the needs and aspirations of people of this province.
The rule changes that we are introducing are very simple. We're saying that members will have 30 minutes to get up and to debate once getting up on legislation at second or third reading. If a member can't make his point in 30 minutes, he may as well sit down.
We're also turning around and we're saying in regard to the question of time allocation that if the opposition parties want to utilize the rules of the House in order to hijack the process, such as the leader of the third party has said in the Toronto Sun on May 4 in regard to hijacking this Legislature, the government has the opportunity to bring in time allocation on debate.
The rules are necessary. It's quite apparent from what we have seen. The whole time we've been in government, since 1990, we have seen a constant haggle within this House on the part of the opposition to slow down the entire process. If they want to get on board and they want to work along with us, and oppose where they feel there are issues that it is necessary to oppose, yes, they should do so, but not to slow down the whole legislative agenda of this government. They have a responsibility in opposition to represent the people of their constituencies. Not all the people of their constituencies see things the way they do, and they should come into this assembly with that in mind.
With that I would like to sit down and cede my place to somebody else.
The Acting Speaker: Further debate? The honourable member for Brampton South.
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Mr Callahan: I really feel exceptionally honoured to be able to participate in this debate tonight. In fact, I'm surprised the House is not jammed to the rafters, not for my speech, but because this is one of the most important issues that will ever be debated in this House. I think the people in the press have perhaps misunderstood just how important it is to be able to speak freely in this place.
I watched Bob Fisher on Global Television. Bob Fisher said, "A pox on everybody's house." Bob Fisher was talking about the most essential commodity that we as legislators have in this democratic state; it's the right to be able to speak freely without the possibility of the government of the day, because it has a majority, being able to cut us off like a guillotine.
I'm really surprised that tonight in this House, because the government wanted extended sittings, there will not be more people here on the government side to listen to this most important debate, to participate in it, to not turn it into a partisan fiasco or a circus. It is very important.
I know the frustrations of you people over there, the backbenchers. The cabinet ministers don't have that frustration, but the backbenchers have it. You can feel it. We've experienced it when we were over there. You want to speak out. You want an opportunity to speak out. You think this is going to give you that opportunity? Well, I have news for you. It won't. It will allow your political masters -- that consists of the Premier, probably the Treasurer, probably the House leader, perhaps the Minister of the Environment and perhaps about six or eight unelected spin doctors back there on the second floor -- to decide what will be important for the people of Ontario.
You have to believe this. When I'm speaking tonight, I'm not talking to you in a partisan vein. I'm talking to you in terms of this being the most important debate that will take place in this House for a long period of time. Now you say, "Why?" I think it's important to explain to the people of Ontario why it's important. Because the proposal by the House leader, which was done unilaterally, takes a matter called closure which in a non-democratic state would be understood as being silencing you and not giving you the right to represent the people that elected you. Closure exists on our rules and orders now, but what it does do is it interjects the Speaker. The Speaker has the right to decide whether or not there's been sufficient debate in this House that the rights of the minority have been protected.
We all represent people of Ontario. I'm sure that you as good legislators, as we in our constituency offices, are prepared to serve people of whatever political stripe. It doesn't matter if they're Liberal, New Democratic, Conservative. They're the people we represent. They gave us the sacred trust. I'm sure that people in this House have been elected by people who probably don't understand the political process. We as politicians tend to think that everybody's got a political stripe.
I think if you walked down your main street in your town you'd discover that these people don't have any political stripe. What they've got is they've got a concern. They're concerned about whether their job will be there. They're concerned about whether their kids can go to a school where there'll be discipline and there won't be killings and muggings. They're concerned about the question of whether they'll have decent housing.
I think that's the reason we all get into politics. We get into politics to serve the people. It's not a question of whether you're on the government side or on the opposition side or the third party side. You're here to serve the public. Now I think you have to think about that in terms of how these rules affect your ability as a member to serve the constituents who put that trust in you. If you think for one minute that what you're doing here is a progressive step, I've got news for you. It's not.
There are some of the contents of this proposal that perhaps make sense: the question of 30-minute time limits on debate. That may give you people as backbenchers an opportunity to speak, if the whip or the House leader or the powers to be in caucus say you can speak. I don't know how my friend from --
The Acting Speaker: Order. On a point of privilege, the honourable member for Cochrane South.
Mr Bisson: A very fast point of order. Notice how quiet it is around this place.
The Acting Speaker: Order or privilege?
Mr Bisson: Privilege.
You would notice that it's very quiet around this House within debate, unlike what we've seen when government members are up.
The Acting Speaker: Thank you. That's not a point of order or privilege.
Mr Callahan: I don't understand how the member for Cochrane South got to be the designated hitter in speaking on this matter, but I'm sure that it was done in some way, sort of the short straw or the long straw, or rolling of the dice or whatever, and I'm sure a lot of you people over there -- I can feel it; I've talked to you people -- would like to have had that opportunity to be able to speak, because I think you people over there, a lot of you, the ones I've talked to, want to serve your people. You want to serve the people who elected you. You want an opportunity to be able to participate. You want an opportunity to be in a system that will provide the opportunity to do that. We had the Deputy Speaker, Victoria-Haliburton, bring a private member's bill to talk about the reform of this place, to change it, to make it more effective, to make it worthwhile, to make it mean something.
The longer you're here, the more complacent you get because you figure: "Well, if I'm here after three terms, I can be elected for ever. No one will ever put me out of this comfortable place." We're going to make it more comfortable: We're going to have night sittings. None of you has ever seen what night sittings were like in this place. I think it was described by my friend from the Ottawa Valley as being situations where, after dinner, the amount of work you got done was directly proportional to the size of your bill on the wine list and so on at dinner.
Now, do you want that? Do you want to take time away from your families to sit here at night and to participate in what is really a non-debate? Do you want that opportunity?
Interjection.
Mr Callahan: No, you're suggesting Monday and Tuesday nights, that that's going to be the order of the day. I suggest to you that that's really a waste of time.
The problem you've got -- and it's not necessarily a problem that you people have created totally; Mr Speaker, they haven't created this situation totally. What in fact has happened is that the House leader for the New Democratic Party has poisoned this Legislature. He has taken those steps by unilaterally going to the press and telling the press exactly what he was going to do. I often wonder if he had his hand in his coat like Napoleon, because he broke one of the traditions of this House that should not be broken: that this place doesn't run on an autocratic rule; it does not run on the basis of you guys having more than we have. It operates on the basis of cooperation. Cooperation will get you a lot more than the jackboots and the efforts to do things secretly by slipping notice on the table on Thursday and not letting anybody know about it.
I think the public has to understand that the net effect of two of the measures in these rules are totalitarian. The first one is the question of closure. What closure means is that when the government of the day, which is supposed to be looking after the interests of the people of Ontario, decides it's heard enough, it just brings it in and zip, it's like Madame Lafarge doing the sweater while the guillotine goes down.
I have to say to you that if I were out of this place and sitting back in Brampton as an unelected member and I realized that my representative was going to have absolutely nothing to say, may never get on the panel to speak, may not have an opportunity to say anything, because this draconian measure was being brought in, I would be down in front of the Legislature by the thousands protesting this interference with democratic society.
We're watching in eastern Europe people who for tens and tens of years have been denied even the slightest little bit of thumbnail democracy, and we are in fact now taking upon ourselves the opportunity, with a majority government, to say, "Sorry, but we're going to introduce this, and we are now going to say when you can talk, how long you can talk, and then we cut you off."
Mr Kimble Sutherland (Oxford): No, we're not.
Mr Callahan: I'll tell you, some of the members over there, I don't think you've read through the rules. If you did, you would understand that the present rule on closure -- nobody ever wants to use the C-word; it's always "time allocation," because that's secret, nobody knows what it is. But the big C-word, closure, presently requires you, Mr Speaker, to have the right to intervene to protect the rights of the minority.
We represent people of this province as well. We may not be the government, we may not drive the swell cars and all the rest of it, but we in fact represent people from our community. I represent something like 90,000 people in my community. Those people are very important to me, of whatever political stripe they are. My constituency office and the people in my office at Queen's Park who admittedly do all the work -- I think if we're all honest; we take all the bows but they do all the work -- work hard for all the people of my riding.
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You're cutting off any opportunity I might have to speak. Some of you might say: "Amen, great thing. Maybe it'll shut him up," as the member from the Ottawa Valley commented. But think about it. You are not in government for ever. It is not the divine right of kings. You have to understand that. You will one day be over here in either the opposition or the third party.
When you say to the people as you're getting elected, "I'll represent you, I promise," and you take the oath before the Clerk, you have to understand that these rules have literally cut you off. You'd be lying to the constituents. It's bad enough now. You sort of tell them a white lie now because you say, "When I get elected, I'm going to do thus, thus and thus." But if we explained how this whole place works, it doesn't work that way. We all know that. George, you know that. This place works on the basis of you're either in the inner circle or you're in the outer circle. If you're on the outer circle, you're nothing more than a glorified ombudsman. You have nothing to do or say about what legislation comes down the pipe that's good for Ontario. The determination of what's good is reflected by a number of things.
Hon Elmer Buchanan (Minister of Agriculture and Food): Is that how they run your caucus?
Mr Callahan: The Minister of Agriculture and Food has intervened -- a nice fellow.
The issues that are important in terms of legislation are based directly on ideology of the party in power and what's a sexy political issue. It's not based on what's important for the people of Ontario. If that were the case, there would not be people sleeping on the streets of Toronto, there would not be food banks, there would not be people whose children cannot get enough money, there would not be children's aid societies that are underfunded and so on, because those people would be looked after. To New Democrats, and I think as well to all members of the Legislature, those are grave concerns.
But what do we do? We have money for everything. We have money for Jack Layton at $300 a day. We have money for this, we have money for that. But we don't have money for those issues that are important to each and every one of us.
I know you people sit over there and you must feel totally frustrated. Sometimes you want to sneak off and start your own caucus. That's happened in every party. You want to go off and start up sort of a shadow caucus because you're tired of what your government is doing or what this select group of people is doing. You're playing right into their hands, believe me. People must be astounded.
It's almost like the wave during the Blue Jays game in this place. When there's something announced that the government wants a vote on, it's like the wave. It goes right down your entire benches and you all vote for it. I don't criticize you for that because that's happened since time immemorial as well. That's why this place needs to have the roof blown off, and it has to be reformed.
Hon Mr Buchanan: By these rule changes.
Mr Callahan: No. The Minister of Agriculture and Food says, "By these rule changes." You're not reforming this place by these rule changes, Mr Minister. What you're in fact doing is you're constricting it. You're giving those special powers the right to constrict you even more.
The second one is question period in this place. Every tourist in Ontario comes down and thinks: "That's the Legislature. It's great. Loved it. It was exciting. It was great theatre." The proof of the pudding is it is theatre. More often than not the questions that are asked are answered with a question or they are not answered at all. Our rules allow for that. If you want to change the rules in a reasonable and productive way, make the rules say that if a minister is asked a question, he or she has to answer the question. That's the whole purpose of this process.
But we don't do that. What we do is we start playing with things like question period has to start at 4 o'clock, and if for some reason the proceedings are delayed, we could in fact wind up with half an hour of question period. As imperfect as it is, it does give us an opportunity to at least get some answers from some of the ministers or at least get some idea of what they're thinking about over there. If they cut off that period, that's again a trammelling of democracy.
I was born and raised in the United States and made a wise decision to come to Canada to go to university and stay here. But I have to think back to the US roots of Patrick Henry, "Give me liberty or give me death," the Boston Tea Party.
Mr Stephen Owens (Scarborough Centre): Do we have any choice on that?
Mr Callahan: Are you saying you have no choice about these rules? You should have. If you can't vote independently, then you'd better not go back and ask for the vote of your constituents.
The Boston Tea Party, "Taxation without representation is tyranny."
What in fact we're doing here is limiting the right of debate. I'm going to give you a quote from the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, and it talks about parliamentary procedure as follows:
"Parliamentary procedure, also called rules of order, the generally accepted rules, precedents and practices commonly employed in the government of deliberative assemblies" -- that's what we're supposed to be. "Such rules are intended to maintain decorum" -- which they don't -- "to ascertain the will of the majority and to preserve the rights of the minority and to facilitate the orderly transaction of the business of an assembly."
As I listen to the members on the government side who have spoken on this issue -- there have not been that many and I hope there will be more, because this is a very important issue, one of the most important to this place -- what you're saying is that because of the shenanigans over here, because of the loose rules, you can't get through your legislative agenda.
Let's for a second suggest that that's true. I don't accept that hypothesis, because you could have called all sorts of orders and we would have been prepared to deal with them. Instead, you wanted to mess around with time allocation, you wanted to mess around with evening sittings, you wanted to mess around with everything else. Had you been interested, or your House leader, who seems to be the guy who's running this whole thing, been interested, there were all sorts of bills that could have been passed. Instead, he's chosen to throw down the gauntlet and say to the third party House leader and the official opposition House leader, "Sorry, guys; I have made my decision and this is what it will be."
He negotiated through the press. You people are familiar with labour disputes and with collective bargaining. How many of you people would approve of either management or labour negotiating through the press and trying to get a leg up, instead of bargaining in good faith? In fact that's what your House leader did. Your House leader bargained through the press. He tried to embarrass the House leaders of the third party and the official opposition into accepting his way or the gate.
Well, I'm sorry. If there's one thing I will not accept, and I would hope no member of this House would accept, it would be the silencing or the muzzling of me as a member who represents the riding of Brampton South. There is no way I'm going to allow this place, this House, this chamber where democracy stops -- because you can't go much beyond this. There's no appeal to the Court of Appeal. You can't even appeal the Speaker's rulings any more, even if they're wrong.
What you're doing is tightening the screw. You're not tightening it: You're just following orders, you're joined at the hip, you're doing exactly what every other majority government has done; when you're told to jump, you jump. And you haven't even got the benefits of that. The ministers at least have the limos, the special perks, all the rest of it. You guys have got nothing. You may have a few little crumbs they give you, with which they threaten you, "If you don't vote with us, you lose." We've seen that happen with one of your members who had the guts to vote against his party on an issue because he felt consciencewise bound to do it, and he lost his chairman's job and 10 grand.
You can sit over there tonight and say, "Callahan, you don't know what you're talking about, you're trying to bend my mind," or you can walk out, as one of the members is about to do, or you can walk in, as one of the ministers is about to do, and you can say to yourself: "It doesn't matter. It's a cushy job. There's no heavy lifting and you don't have to work in the rain." That's really what you're saying by being joined at the hip over there and voting for every measure the government says, and I don't say that disparagingly. You are not unique. You did not invent this whole process. This process was invented a long time ago.
But what you have the opportunity to do -- and it may be a very limited opportunity if you're only here for one term -- is that you have the opportunity to make a difference. If you have left your family, be you male or female, and you don't have the opportunity of seeing your kids every day, you've given up a great deal. Make it mean something. Don't allow that Napoleon, your House leader, to dictate to you how you will vote on these rules, because these rules will come back to haunt you. They will in fact decapitate your tongue, because you will not be able to speak. They have been designed to stop the member for Welland-Thorold from speaking in debates on the insurance bill.
Interjection.
Mr Callahan: They have been designed to prevent the member for Welland-Thorold -- and I wish he'd stop speaking now. I wish the rules were maybe in place for just a minute. They have been designed to stop any opposition whatsoever to the Minister of Labour's bill.
I say that with great respect to the Minister of Labour. I've been here since 1985 and I have never heard the Minister of Labour talk other than on what he's putting forward in the legislation. For that I respect the man. It just doesn't happen to be, in our humble position and that of the majority of the people of Ontario, the appropriate bill. It has to be looked at. It has to be examined to make certain we don't overthrow that balance we have between labour and management. We can't afford to do that in a crisis time as we have now. It's not trying to favour one side or the other, management or labour; it's saying you can't destroy that balance.
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The minister puts forward a bill, but we're going to debate the rules first. We're going to bring in the guillotine rules first, the rules that will prevent us from inspecting that bill -- and you people from inspecting that bill, for that matter -- to its nth degree to ensure that it doesn't disturb that balance between labour and management and thereby throw more people out of work or create a greater and deeper recession. You have that opportunity.
You have a unique experience. The fact is that only you as members can come into this chamber. Doesn't that just blow your mind? That's awesome. That should also tell you the awesome responsibility you have as a member. You have a privilege. A stranger can't come in here. You have a privilege. If you miss the opportunity for that privilege, it may very well make our society down the line a little less favourable for your kids and mine and for my grandchildren. I'm sorry, but I didn't come down here to waste the time, to simply be told what I should do, when I should do it and how I should do it.
Mr Len Wood (Cochrane North): You've been wasting it for the last 20 minutes.
Mr Callahan: I'm told by one of the members over there, and I don't know what his riding is, that I've been wasting their time for 20 minutes. If I have been, then you've just turned off your mind. I wish you luck, because you're going to be called upon to be responsible either here or someplace else for the power you had or the ability you had and the right you had to do something good for your fellow man, and you didn't do it.
In any event, I come from a background where for these type of rules to be introduced -- in a courtroom scenario, let's say, if they were to introduce these rules and say, "All right, you're only allowed one half-hour or one hour for the trial, and you can only ask 30 questions during the trial and then off with the person's head or send him off to jail," I would be totally astounded that we would allow that to happen in a free and democratic society.
One may say that here it's a different scenario. Here we're only dealing with people's rights in terms of future rights through legislation; we're not dealing with their rights in a courtroom scenario But we are dealing with their rights. We're allowing, particularly in committees -- committees are really something the public should attend to see how they're run. We all know how the committees are run, and these rules will apply to committees as well.
So you have a majority government. You get on to a committee. You've gone out and spent $100,000, $200,000, $300,000 or $400,000 to hear from the public all over this beautiful province. Then you come back to the committee to do clause-by-clause and there's not one change made in the legislation; or, in the alternative, the government members who have the majority rule on that committee say, "We're invoking closure." So the Chairman says, "Okay, we come back here into the House and we ask the Speaker." The Speaker says, "Closure." That's it.
So you've got $400,000 just whipped down the drain. You've got these people on that so-called committee who've taken time out of their lives to travel around the province supposedly serving the people who are out there watching this, hopefully. What I'm trying to do is tell them that it's not as simple as the press says. It's not a question of dilatory actions on the part of the opposition. We're trying to tell people that what's happening out there in fact is the most important event of their lives. They are seeing democracy shut down in two areas: The closure motion where the Speaker no longer has the right to intervene to protect their rights, and the question of whether question period may be held or may not be held.
Lord knows, it's established a principle. If David Cooke, the member for Windsor-Riverside, accomplishes this, if he achieves this success, well then, what else? He could achieve anything he wants in here. He could literally shut down the place or tell us, "We'll introduce 12 bills today and you've got one minute to speak." It allows for all sorts of things. You've given them a chance to put the iron fist down and say this is the way it will be.
For crying out loud, I've talked to a lot of you people on a personal level. I've been on committees with you, and I think you people really represent very honest and concerned people who came here for a reason. Don't let them shackle you.
Mr Bradley: They're not listening to you.
Mr Callahan: Well, they should be. I've been chairman of probably eight or nine committees in this place over the time I've been here. I have always tried to be impartial and I think some of you who have served on those committees perhaps will endorse that.
You have, however, created a situation where the Speaker can no longer protect the rights of the minority. I guess in order to understand that, you have to be a minority. It's kind of interesting when you look around this place -- and you heard my friend the member for Parry Sound reading back the speeches from the now Premier, then opposition leader, Bob Rae; from David Cooke, now House leader and minister of whatever -- minister of everything, I guess -- and reading the speeches from Minister Mackenzie, Minister of Labour. Maybe that's why those speeches are so much along the lines of what we're saying, that closure is dangerous, it's undemocratic, it is frightening, it's closing up the crack. We're building the wall. You know, all over the world, the walls are coming down and democracy is reigning free. By these two strokes of the pen on those two issues we are in fact creating for Ontario a question of putting the power in the hands of a very small minority -- absolute power. It's absolutely frightening, and that's why I say I can't understand it.
If you tried to put restrictions on the crap the press puts in page 2 of the Sun, if you tried to object to that or you tried to object to some other pornographic literature that it puts forward, there would be the cry, "Freedom of the press; you're taking away our freedoms." Where are they tonight? Not to be found -- nowhere. Where are they? Where is the press?
You have to understand what the press does in this place. They get their quick fix and they disappear. They should be more importantly involved in being here to discuss what they consider to be so vital to their needs that they can write anything they like. They can create harangues in the press that cause all sorts of problems and get away with it. If we try to interfere, "Well, my God, you're interfering with freedom of the press."
Some of the crap that appears in those papers in terms of the advertisements that kids look at and get hosed into -- yet the press, where is it? They're not here. They can't be bothered. They got their story, their quick fix; they can't be bothered looking at what's happening to these rules. They think it's just game time at the Legislature, that the opposition is over here playing the game of trying to delay you. Of course we're trying to delay you. We're delaying you because you are trammelling the rights of this entire place, and what you trammel now, you trammel for yourself; those footprints will be yours.
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If you're prepared to sacrifice those rights now, then I really think you've not done your job. You won't get defeated in the next election because you failed to serve your people in terms of your constituency or your Queen's Park office; you will fail because the people will understand, as bills are ramrodded through this place on the basis of this.
Mr Agnew, how are you doing? Good to see you. There's a spin doctor there just going to the back. He's checking out this whole thing, trying to figure out whether I've convinced any of you that guys like him -- with all due respect to him; I don't even know him. He's just another spin doctor; they've been around for time immemorial. The pharaohs probably had them, and the kings and everybody else. But in fact what you're allowing them to do is to take away your rights, and every little bit of the right they take away to speak in this place is one more move towards an undemocratic society.
I really find it interesting. You people have your agenda. I don't necessarily endorse your philosophy. I must say I feel great empathy for people and there are a lot of things I'd like to see done if I could wave a magic wand and get them done. I sometimes sympathize with some of the things you're trying to do because I feel that I'm concerned about them. I don't like to see people sleeping in the streets. I don't like to see kids who are being abused. I don't like to see children's aid societies which don't have enough money to deal with the kids that come to them. I'd like to see more money for the court system. I'd like to see different ways to deal with people. I'd like to see less crime on the streets and all the rest of it. I think we all have those aspirations; nobody has a total monopoly on them. But if we don't do something, if we don't stop the powers that be from changing those rules in those two specific areas, then in fact what we have done is endorse them. We've given them the right to do it, and that's rather staggering.
The member for Cochrane South made a comment that we should listen to the people of Ontario. But did you ever think -- and this is not my thinking; this is actually the thinking of James Renwick, who was a noted parliamentarian in this House. I would endorse his speech in 1982 for any one of you to read, because the man made eminent good sense. He was sitting over here as either the third party or the opposition -- I'm not sure -- castigating the Conservative government of the day for trying to bring in time allocation. That's what they called it; it was really closure. He made a speech that made a lot of sense. I would suggest, if you have any time, that you read it. It's about five or six pages long, and it is excellent.
One of the things I want to take out of his speech which I think is very important is the factor that we have been accused of wasting time in terms of dealing with legislation.
[Applause]
Mr Callahan: Mr Mammoliti, the member for Yorkview, applauds. I thought you'd let me finish, George, because I think you'll appreciate this. It's one of your members, a very good member who is now out of the House, but I want to tell you what he said. It made sense to me when I read it.
He said that if the opposition is given the tools to allow public opinion to catch up with what is being proposed by the government, then in fact what you get is public opinion either behind the legislation or against it. If that happens, then we serve the majority of our constituents.
Let's face it: You people as New Democratic Party members have your own philosophy; I as a Liberal have my own philosophy; members of the Conservative Party have their own philosophy. But what gives us the right to drive through our philosophy on the people of Ontario until we're sure we have the majority support for it? Doesn't our society work on the basis of majority rule? Isn't that the foundation of a democratic society? I'm sure you don't do this, but it would be kind of like taking the approach that in my constituency office, because I'm a Liberal, I would only serve Liberals; you would only serve New Democratic members and the Conservatives would only serve Conservatives. So as you came into the office, you'd pull out your party card and you'd be checked to see whether you were one of those three parties.
Surely to heaven that's not our purpose. Our purpose is to serve the needs of people of all parties in this province. As I said before, if you miss that opportunity, you have missed out.
I think back to the expression, to those to whom great power has been given, great will be demanded. You will have to be accountable at some point to your children, to perhaps other areas, for the rights, abilities and responsibilities you were given, and if you don't carry them out, then you will be a person who will have to account very seriously for that. It's a missed opportunity.
We've all seen missed opportunities in our lifetime: We should have played harder at a sport, we could have been the fullback of that team; or we should have studied hard, we could have got that opportunity to advance in some other career. Those are missed opportunities, perhaps not of the magnitude of the accountability we will have to our grandchildren. I suggest you look at that very closely.
But Jim Renwick had the good sense to say that the reason these rules are in place is to allow the opposition the opportunity to ensure that public opinion supports those measures. I don't think it goes without saying that there's a large majority of people out there who don't understand the labour relations legislation. There are those who oppose it fundamentally because they're of a particular mindset. There are those who still have an open mind. There are those people who want to hear; they want to give you input. What kind of input can they possibly give you if they know that the politicians they have elected, be they NDP, Conservative or Liberal, have their hands tied because they're limited in their debate? And the Speaker has the opportunity to intervene and push the guys aside and say: "Hey, look, you guys are bigger than the other guys. We want to give them more time to speak." But that right is being taken away.
For the life of me, I can't understand why the government House leader would have ever suggested that. That goes beyond the worst thing I can think of. He must have got that out of Mein Kampf. It couldn't possibly be in any democratic book. It couldn't have been taken from any Eastern European country where they had suffered the slings and arrows of being silenced, of being denied the slightest and smallest right. Surely he must understand that.
To try to understand the House leader, the House leader did something dastardly. He snuck in on a Thursday and stuck a motion on the table to try to fool us. Once he did that, it was kind of like Judas; he didn't know what to do. He felt badly about what he'd done and flung the 30 pieces of silver back at the priests. David did that, and then he did this press release. When he was found out, he realized he had destroyed a principle of this House that makes the place work, and that principle is cooperation, consensus.
We may not agree on all the legislation, but over the almost eight years I've been here, if we didn't have cooperation we would have sat here some periods until the spring thaw. We wouldn't even have got out at Christmas. It's amazing how quick politicians can come to consensus when it means getting home for Christmas. They can see the Christmas tree lights. There are 105 bills or something on the Orders and Notices and suddenly they're all done. They're done because there is consensus in this place. The minute you poison that consensus, you've ruined it.
What I say to David Cooke tonight is: David, member for Windsor-Riverside, you're forgiven -- I think. Come on out. Let's negotiate a sensible arrangement. Let's get on with the people's business. Let's stop playing the games you're playing. I know your pride may be hurt by having to admit you were wrong. But please come forward and get together with the House leader for the third party and for the official opposition and let's get this place operating for the benefit of all the people of Ontario. Let's not just have it operate.
It's interesting; there are four seats there. The Minister of Culture and Communications, is back there shaking her head. You're in the back row for a reason, let me tell you. It's all done in the order of prominence.
Hon Ed Philip (Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology): That's why you're where you are.
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Mr Callahan: I don't know whether Ed is in the inner circle, but I certainly think the Minister of Labour is. I certainly think Ruth Grier is. I certainly think the member for Windsor-Riverside is; certainly my good friend the Treasurer and the Premier himself. The rest of you are important when it comes to a vote, and you should always remember that, because if you don't vote the right way, you're finished.
Hon Mr Philip: Where are you, Bob?
Mr Callahan: The former Minister of Transportation makes a comment, and I have to admit I often was a bit of a maverick. I felt that the first obligation was to your constituents. The Premier did not get you elected; the Premier will not get you re-elected. You get yourself re-elected. If you do a poor job out there, you won't be here a second term.
[Applause]
Mr Callahan: The member for Yorkview applauds. I don't know whether you were applauding your own demise or what. In any event, to get off the partisan -- I'm sorry, you dragged me into a partisan area. I didn't want to get into a partisan area.
It's important to understand that the rules that have been proposed are so far-reaching. We've heard discussions here that the rules mirror-image some of those of other Commonwealth areas. I suggest to you that's not the case, most specifically with the question of closure. I know you've had some bedtime stories from past speeches by various people read to you by the leader of the third party, and I'd like to read you a few too, because what goes around comes around. That's why anything you say in this place, you'd better mean what you're saying and be convinced that what you're saying is true and fair and honest, or it will come back to haunt you.
It's not hard to understand why in the United States there are some 70 congressmen who are not running for re-election. They're first-termers; they're not running for re-election. Why are they not running for re-election? They're not running because they were totally demoralized by the whole process. The process gave them absolutely no empowerment, gave them no ability to do anything. Most of the agenda's probably arranged by the lobbyists -- fortunately, I don't think we've got to that stage yet -- in the United States, and really made giving up that time out of their lives for public service a waste of time.
You people are still newly elected. Hopefully, you have not yet fallen into the complacency that seems to creep into the bones of people after they've been around here for a while, particularly if they've been given a smell of power, that their constituents come second and their perks and their comfortable pews become primary, and they read their press clippings. Press clippings are really big; you can read about how you did this, this and this. In fact, when you've stood up in the Legislature to speak on a matter, you have not represented the views of your constituents, nor have you voted the way they want you to.
When I look at Jim Wiseman -- I can't remember what his riding is, but he's being burned alive by the Minister of the Environment. She's done nothing, even though they stood on the edge of Whitevale, I think it was, and made all sorts of promises. Now it's not happening. The Premier came out to my riding and stood in front of a school and said they'd get rid of the portables. He stood in the Rouge Valley: "No dump." What've we got? He's not even prepared to answer the questions on it. He shoots them over to Ruth.
I don't know about yourselves, but I find that the most important issue in this place is to start by not allowing those rules to be ramrodded through, at least those two; that each and every one of us decides tonight that if we're going to spend time away from our families in this place, we're going to do it for a meaning: that we're going to serve the people of Ontario.
I'll tell you something we found out in spades in the last election: People are mad. They're mad quite justifiably. They don't understand, I don't think, why they're mad. All they know is that they're taxed to the hilt and they don't see any response from their local members as to what's happening with that money.
Mr Mammoliti: You made them mad, you and your leader.
Mr Callahan: I see. Well, I just had a response from one member that I would ignore, because if I repeated it I think he would probably be hastily de-elected.
The Acting Speaker: The member for Yorkview will come to order.
Mr Callahan: There should probably be a right of recall in this place, that if you're not doing your job -- the United States has it. We should have a right to recall. If they don't like what you're doing, they should be able to recall you. I think you'll see that come. It may not come in my time, but it'll come, because I think people are tired of giving you a four-year term where you can do anything you like. I should say do anything you like and not do what you're supposed to do and totally disregard the people and expect to get away with it. You can't tell me any other job in this world where, if you don't do the work for your employer -- and they are your employers, don't kid yourself, as a public servant -- you have the right to be able to just snub your nose at them, go off on your holidays, take all your perks and do nothing. It's a very unusual job we have. So I think the right to recall is coming.
More important, when somebody stands up in this House 10 years from now and starts quoting from one of your speeches and you have to sit over there and cringe because what was said you didn't believe in or you weren't convinced about, I tell you, I think it gets pretty tough. I'd like to be able to say when I leave this place, and I would hope many of you feel the same way, that when you leave this place, the minister of -- what are you, Tourism? No, you're libraries or something, are you? She laughed. I guess it's not important that the record show that you didn't consider it serious.
But I have to tell you that this place is the most serious place -- here's the Premier; welcome, Premier -- the most important place I would like to be right now, but only if somebody has the guts to change the process. Not the way it's being changed now; that's going the wrong way. That's constricting the power. That's giving the power to even fewer people. That's something many of the people who come here from other countries who represent a large proportion of the people of our society would understand. They know what it's like to have their rights of speech denied. I'm sure the Jewish people understood that when the books were being destroyed and thrown on the fire before the Second World War. I'm sure people in other eastern European countries understood that.
Don't kid yourself. You may think this is not doing that, but you examine it, you look at it, you examine how it could be used. I'm not for one minute suggesting that the Premier here or your government will do it, but those rules are etched in stone and those rules cannot be changed as long as there is a continuation of majority government.
What if some government came in here and decided to be totally machiavellian? Let's say they looked at the rules and said: "Here are the powers we have. We can shut the place down. We can force through legislation of any type we want." I wouldn't be comfortable.
Hon Mr Philip: There is something called a Constitution.
Mr Callahan: The Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology says, "There is the Constitution." You're quite right. In fact, in the Constitution we were so concerned about the question of freedom of speech that we enshrined it so that for time immemorial we will be given the right to speak.
But the interesting thing about it -- it's interesting you raise it -- is that while we gave those rights to people out in Ontario and Canada, we as legislators are about to diminish and take away the rights we have, and oddly enough, the rules of the Legislature are not subject to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. While we considered as a society that it was incumbent and important to give people certain basic rights -- freedom of speech, freedom of religion and so on -- we are in fact here in this chamber -- and not even with the will of the Legislature. It's being forced on us by a House leader who brought them in without any consultation. He wants us to pass them and he's going to get them through because he's got the numbers.
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Does that say to me, if I'm out on the street, that the average citizen of Ontario has greater rights in speaking out than I do as a member of the Legislature? That's a really frightening thought. Yet he could have, very cooperatively, put it to a committee and it would have been no problem.
As we have Mr B. Rae, the Premier, in our midst, I thought I would refer to a comment made by him before he was Premier. Is that you? I don't think that's you, is it? Yes, it is. He said, "First of all, I want to say to the Premier" -- I think that was the former Premier, my predecessor in Brampton --
Hon Bob Rae (Premier and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs): It was George Drew.
Mr Callahan: Oh, was that who it was? You're not that old, Bob.
"First of all, I want to say to the Premier that as Leader of the Opposition I do not approve of or condone the use of closure by this government to get its legislation through. I want him to know that."
Do you wonder that people out there begin to get really chagrined about us and wonder whether we're really saying it like it is? Why do you think you get a 20% turnout at provincial elections and probably about 15% at municipal elections? They're fed up with us. You get comments like that, you get the current Premier -- delightful guy, nice guy -- saying: "First of all, I want to say to the Premier that as Leader of the Opposition, I do not approve of or condone" -- this is like talking to your kids -- "the use of closure by this government to get its legislation through. I want him to know that." What about people out there? They're in front of their sets going: "Jeez, how can he say that over here and do something over there? Are we to believe what people say when they get over there in the smell of the limousine dust? Do they lose it, or what?" It's understandable why people are just so fed up with politicians. They've had it.
I've just got to read something here from the House leader, Mr Cooke, because I thought his was even more interesting. This is a member's statement. I guess he couldn't get a question on that day. He said, "I think it's important to look at a couple of the issues that have led us to the point where the government has brought in unilateral changes to our rules to make this place an undemocratic institution in Ontario." Was "undemocratic" said by the House leader? My God, that's incredible. Where is he? How could he say that? That's absolutely incredible.
I'm just looking for some choice ones here that spell it out. Mr Cooke, the House leader, was referring to Erskine May and he quoted from page 408.
Mr Bradley: Who does he play for?
Mr Callahan: I think he's first baseman for the undemocratic party.
He said, "I would like to refer very briefly to Erskine May and quote from page 408: 'In many sessions in order to secure the passage of particularly important and controversial legislation, governments have been confronted with the choice, unless special powers are taken, of cutting down their normal program to an undesirable extent, or of prolonging the sittings of Parliament, or else of acknowledging the impotence of the majority in the House in the face of the resistance of the minority. In such circumstances resort is had...to the most drastic method of curtailing debate known to procedure, namely, the setting of a date by which a committee must report, or the allocation of a specified number of days to the various stages of a bill and of limited amounts of time to particular portions of a bill. Orders made under this procedure are known as "allocation of time" orders' -- even he doesn't talk about it as closure; people are afraid of that C-word; they don't want to talk about it as the C-word -- 'and colloquially as "guillotine" motions.'" Cut off the head. "'They may be regarded as the extreme limit to which procedure goes in affirming the rights of the majority at the expense of the minorities of the House, and it cannot be denied that they are capable of being used in such a way as to upset the balance, generally so carefully preserved, between the claims of business and the rights of debate. But the harshness of this procedure is to some extent mitigated either by consultations between the party leaders or in the Business Committee' -- which in our case is the House leaders' panel -- 'in order to establish the greatest possible measure of agreement as to the most satisfactory disposal of the time available.'" That's called consensus, which we haven't had here and which we were told this afternoon would not take place again.
"In this particular circumstance, this argument in Erskine May is very relevant in that all the sections of this bill on the second reading debate, the public hearings and the debate of the report coming from the standing committee on general government, were dealt with by consensus and by discussion in the House leaders' panel. Two days after we get into committee of the whole House, the government says, 'Well, we have dealt with this by consensus in the past.' At 6 o'clock -- they do not even give us advance notice; no discussion at all on the House leaders' panel -- they bring in this closure motion."
Doesn't that sound familiar? That sounds a bit like what the House leader did; sort of, "Five o'clock? Closure," at 10 to 6 on Thursday. He talks about this. This was the House leader who was referring to this, so I suspect that's where he got the idea to do it.
"To sum up, I believe this motion is out of order." Then Mr Cooke goes on to say: "The Speaker must protect the integrity of the rules and the integrity of this institution, and the Speaker clearly must protect the rights of the minority and the rights of free debate in this place. This bill has been handled by consensus until now and the importance of this bill and the fact that there are 62 amendments to be dealt with in the committee of the whole means that the solution the government has introduced is unworkable and is unfair to the public at large and certainly to the opposition parties to have their positions put forward."
That is the House leader, the man who's coming in to try to stifle debate, to put the muzzle on the Legislature. How can he say those things? How can the people of Windsor-Riverside ever have any confidence in David Cooke again in any future election if, on the one hand, he says one thing and then when he's over there he says another thing? Surely, David, let's get this place unpoisoned, get back to consulting with the House leaders of the official opposition and the third party. Put your pride behind you. Don't let your pride prevent you from doing that and let's get on with the orders and business of the day. That is the important aspect of this whole thing.
Then there is Mr Cooke again. That's actually under the old standing orders, so it wouldn't be --
The Acting Speaker: The honourable member for Brampton South, please be seated. There is a point of order.
Mr Bradley: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I think it is important that when the member for Brampton South is making reference to Mr Cooke he define clearly which Mr Cooke he is talking about. There have been other Cookes who have served in this House over the years, including the former member for Kitchener, that I can recall. There may have been, I imagine, in years gone by, members by the name of Mr Cooke and I think it is important that when he mention Mr Cooke by name that he ensures it is the appropriate Mr Cooke.
The Acting Speaker: The honourable member for Brampton South has the floor.
Mr Callahan: The House leader, the member for Windsor-Riverside, has really become the focus of this evening's discussion because of the unilateral way he's approached it. I hope that clarifies it for the member for St Catharines, that that's exactly whom I'm talking about.
I was here. I had the privilege to be here when the member for Welland-Thorold did his stint, his filibuster, as it was called. I guess the reason I was impressed by it was that if anybody has ever seen Mr Smith Goes to Washington, where he filibusters -- but the member for Welland-Thorold was allowed to go home. He was allowed to take adjournments. You remember Jimmy Stewart; he almost collapsed in his place.
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The reason I raise that, even though it may be Hollywoodish and dramatic, is that I think that movie demonstrated the obligation that each and every one of us has in terms of looking after our constituents. I'm sure that any of you who has seen that knows he was was fighting for a boys' camp in a valley that was about to be flooded by a couple of avaricious senators who didn't want him to speak, and he stood up and continued to speak.
Well, the member for Welland-Thorold pursued an avenue that his predecessor had felt very important. Now the member for Welland-Thorold is literally silenced.
Interjection: No, no.
Mr Callahan: Oh, yeah, I think he is. I really think these rules should be dedicated to the memory of Peter Kormos, the member for Welland-Thorold, because I think when history is written, it will be that these rules had to be brought in at this particular time and under these particular circumstances.
Mr Bradley: He will vote against them.
Mr Callahan: No, I don't think he will. I think he still has those illusions that the picture of him in the Toronto Sun will melt, fade off into the sunset, and he'll have an opportunity to go back to driving the limo and ordering people around. If I were the member for Welland-Thorold sitting over there, and also my good friend Mel Swart -- who is a good friend, and you ask him about that; he is an excellent guy --
Interjections.
Mr Callahan: Flattery will get you no place. I chaired the justice committee that went around this province for Mel to have the opportunity to put forward his views on Sunday shopping, and that man was committed to the hilt. I have great admiration for him. I think he is a man of great integrity. He is in fact the symbol of the type of person you people should try to emulate. He was a man who came to this Legislature and did not allow the powers that be to pull him around by the nose. Mel said what he meant and he did it for the people in his community.
You'd better take a page out of that, Peter, because the people of Welland-Thorold revere Mel, and well they should. When I see that former member of Welland-Thorold at the New Democratic Party convention on the weekend haranguing the Premier for his turnabout on this very important issue to Mel, and the insurance issue, and now when I see that this bill is being brought forward unilaterally by the House leader without any consultation whatsoever, it is going to muzzle his successor.
Mel obviously wanted a member to follow him who would fight the good fight and complete the work he had worked so hard and feverishly for. That man gave a good period of his life to issues that were very important to him. I can remember him standing up in here as a consumer critic with bottles of this or bottles of that. That man worked tirelessly, and I think we should all take a page out of his book, because he represents, and he understood, the responsibility to be a member of the Legislature and the trust and the opportunity to help the people in his constituency.
I'll tell you, when I read the newspaper and read about the proceedings of the New Democratic Party convention, I felt great sympathy for Mel, a man who had devoted his life to this place, to find that on two issues that were extremely important, you just brushed him aside.
Mr Owens: That's what you guys did to Stuart Smith.
Mr Callahan: Stuart who? No, no; sorry about that.
You just brush them aside. The message I'm trying to get across is, first of all, that you take someone like Mel Swart and make him your image of what you should be as a legislator, and I mean that totally. I'm speaking most importantly to the member for Welland-Thorold. You are not going to have the opportunities you would have liked to fulfil the obligation to the legal community, to the people who are injured in automobile accidents, to the people whose rights were being suspended by our legislation, according to you. You're not going to be able to fulfil your promise. So in fact what has happened is that you're going to go away, you're going to go down in history as having let down not just Mel and the people of Welland-Thorold, but all those people who during that 16-hour or 16-day debate -- I can't remember, it was so long --
Mr Bradley: Seventeen days.
Mr Callahan: Was it 17 days? You will have let down all of those people who sat on the edge of their seats and said: "Go, Peter. Go, Peter. Go get them." Suddenly you're becoming a follower, Peter. The member for Welland-Thorold is becoming a follower, which I find really reprehensible, Mr Speaker. He really demonstrated to me, or at least I thought he did, that he was a fighter, a gunslinger, that he was going to look after the cause of the common man.
Mr Bradley: And woman.
Mr Callahan: And woman. What does he do? He settles into his comfortable seat where there's no heavy lifting, there's no working in the rain, the hours aren't that bad, the pay's pretty good, the pension's excellent, and he reads.
I really find that sad, because it's not too often that you see fighters come through here, people who are prepared to fight for their constituents. To see them just relax in the comfortable pew thereafter makes one feel as if the whole place, everybody, gets that way. That's unfortunate. When they turn the lights out in this place at night -- and tonight they'll turn them out about midnight -- there are people around here who will labour tirelessly to prepare this place for us, because they consider it a privilege. This is the Legislature of Ontario, and we treat the place like it's school, like you come here and you put in your time and that's it. I really find that sad.
All joking aside, we have, I think, good camaraderie here. I certainly like every person in the House. I'm not sure they all like me. But I find it really disconcerting that we can be debating something as important as this, Mr Speaker, and actually have people -- I'm not sure they understand what it is to have their rights curtailed. Maybe they think the government is all-wise --
Mr Owens: Never been a union member, obviously.
Mr Callahan: Well, there really is an analogy there. The rank and file of unions depend upon their leaders to negotiate good collective arrangements for them and to ensure their rights are adequately protected.
There was a certain OPSEU arrangement negotiated where the correctional officers, by way of an arbitrator's award, were given the right to negotiate their salaries separate and apart from OPSEU. I hate to tell you, but during the recent 1% or whatever it was given to OPSEU, these correctional officers were in fact required to participate in this collective agreement. If that's democracy, I tell you, it makes for very poor democracy. I think people out there who come from undemocratic countries would understand that these people got screwed, so don't talk to me about that.
But there is a similarity. People seem to think the rank and file of unions are people who support the New Democratic Party. I have large numbers of union people who are good friends and who support me. But they get the same story perhaps. They get the same story you're getting from your leader: "I know what's right. Trust me. I will look after your interests." From David Cooke: "I'll look after your interests. These rules are good for us because they're going to create a more streamlined, swifter way of our getting our measures through." Well, I'll tell you, I hope you never decide that your political philosophy is to be changed, because you may find that now you're being ushered into doing things that later on you might regret.
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I want to say a few things about the suggestions -- and I don't think these are realistic. I don't think the member for Windsor-Riverside is really serious about the amendments for the Monday and Tuesday night sittings, because we could read through the transcripts of previous legislatures where they sat at night. I can tell you one thing: that after supper this place becomes non-productive, or pretty well non-productive.
Hon Mr Philip: It's unproductive tonight.
Mr Callahan: The Minister of Industry, Trade and Technology says it's unproductive tonight. I always recognize constructive criticism. Then I analyse from whom it came and I decide it wasn't constructive.
They're trying to shorten the spring session. Why would we do that? That's really interesting. That amazes me. Here we are, talking about the House leader bringing in these rules to streamline things so that you people can get your agenda through, and he's suggesting a shorter spring session. I would think that if you're interested in producing for the people who elected you, you'd be enlarging the amount of time we sit here rather than trying to shorten it. The only thing I can figure from that is that the House leader must consider that there's nothing productive done in here. That probably is something said about all governments.
They don't want question period. When question period's not in place, even though it is theatrical and you don't get any answers from the ministers necessarily -- and I don't say all of them; some of them give you answers -- while they have to face question period, they're exposed to public view. The public gets a chance to hear their answers, or non-answers. If you can shorten the time that question period's available for the opposition and the third party to perform a legitimate task on behalf of their constituents, then in fact you've done something. You've gained sort of a nudge up.
I think the people out there in the province understand that. In fact, I think the common perception on the part of people in Ontario -- maybe it's a fair one -- is that when the House adjourns, everybody goes on holidays. I'm sure we've all had people say to us, "You're on holidays now, are you?" I say, "No. We're out in constituency work." That's the impression they get because this place is the centre of the universe.
And well it should be. This is the opportunity of a lifetime. This is the place where you can speak out on behalf of everything. Even in government, you can bring to the attention of the Premier and to the ministers how you were walking down Yonge Street or along Avenue Road and there were people lying there in the street in the middle of winter with a box over them, or you went past the food banks and the people were lined up down the street or you heard about a mother who had four children and couldn't find a place for her kids to live.
What's the government doing here? We're talking about casinos. What else? Sunday shopping. All these important things, while people are out there freezing to death. That strikes me as very strange. I don't know how people can deal with that. I don't know how you can feel that you're accomplishing anything as a member of the Legislature if you don't raise those issues.
Sometimes the fastest road to cabinet, if that's where you want to go, is to prickle the government. If you look through the history books in this place, the people who got into cabinet were the people who asked the most pressing and telling questions of their own ministers and their own Premier to the point where he said: "Hey, put that gal or that guy in cabinet. We want to get rid of them." If that's the name of the game, if you want to get into cabinet, that's the way to get in: Really put it to them. Don't let them try to cut back and limit your rules. Don't let them cut back and limit the whole purpose of why we're all here.
If we cannot speak and we cannot argue and we cannot debate and we cannot look through legislation, there's no purpose in this place. Turn out the lights. Let's all go home. Save the people of the province hundreds of thousands of dollars. In fact, that's what's happening; it's happening in spades with these two items in the rules. There's the question of closure, which is really telling your kids to shut up, and having nobody there to be able to say, "Hey, Dad or Mom, maybe you should let them speak because they may have something to say about that legislation." It's telling the people of Ontario: "We're not interested in your views. We're not interested in what your representatives have to say about the legislation. We're just going to ramrod it right through."
When you wake up tomorrow and your Legislature has been silenced and your member has been silenced, you'll find that the province of Ontario will have changed just that little bit much more, that will make it more uncomfortable for us to live in this province. If you feel good about that and if you feel that's a service to your constituents, I'll tell you something: You're wrong. You're dead wrong. I think anybody who cares about you, your spouse or whatever would tell you that. They'd ask you when you come home: "Why are you so stressed?" "I'm stressed because I have to follow the party line. I have to do things that bother me. I have to do things in terms of cutting off my rights to speak." I think that when people come home from their jobs, particularly a job of this responsibility, they should be able to come home and feel good about it, feel as though they've put in a good day, that they didn't muzzle the rights of the minority.
You people, as I think all members of the Legislature do, have serious concerns about people who are in the minority. We try to look after them. That's part of the Canadian way. It's what makes Canadians so great. But you look over here and what you see is Liberals and Conservatives. What you should be doing is looking over here and seeing the constituents from Brampton South, the constituents from Brant-Haldimand, the constituents from Newmarket. That's what you should be looking at.
If you could do that, you would get rid of the partisan nature of why we are arguing so strenuously that these rules not be changed unilaterally, that they be changed not in the ways that they're being changed but to the benefit of the people of Brampton and the benefit of the people of other members of the opposition parties who want to truly represent their constituents. Then you wouldn't look over here and think: "Jeez, he's a Liberal. I'm not going to accept anything he says." Or: "He's a Conservative." That's not the way it operates. And it shouldn't operate that way.
Mr Mammoliti: Oh, oh.
Mr Callahan: The member for Yorkview seems to find this rather amusing. I trust that when you go home tonight you'll be able to report to your family that you put in a good day's work, that you sat there and didn't listen to one word.
Mr Mammoliti: We want to work. That's why we're doing this.
Mr Callahan: You don't want to work, you want to muzzle this place. That's what you want to do.
Mr Mammoliti: My family understands --
The Acting Speaker: Order. I'd ask the member for Yorkview to please restrain himself. I'd also like to say to the member for Brampton South that he's been doing a lot of talking across the House rather than through the Chair; so if you could, please address the Chair.
Mr Callahan: I apologize, Mr Speaker. One of the frustrations of being in this place is that there are very significant issues from time to time in this place -- there should be, more often than not -- where you just find they are treated with such levity. You feel like you're just sort of spitting in the wind and they don't understand. That's the most frustrating part of it, the fact that they consider this to be just some sort of joke: "We've got the power so we're going to put in rules that will set us back to the Middle Ages."
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We should go back to some of the debates in English history, what people have given up to have the right to speak, freedom of speech, the right to be able to debate, the right to be able to gather together and decide things for the people in this province. We treat them like they're just something that we can give away holus-bolus and that we have the right to do that. We don't have the right to do that. We have the right to be the guardians of that free speech and to ensure that this free speech is used productively.
Yes, I agree with you that there's a lot of funny stuff that goes on in here that shouldn't go on. But more often than not, if you examine why it goes on, it's triggered in the main because of the inability of the other side to be a little flexible, to recognize that maybe by bringing in a piece of legislation, you're destroying that balance that has made Ontario so great, because it happens to be your political philosophy. I don't think anybody has total truth; none of our parties do.
When a party introduces a piece of legislation, it's normally not done by you backbenchers. It's done by some of the spin doctors and the others who think they're sexy political issues. Nobody has a monopoly on truth. That's supposedly why our committee system works. That's what we're supposed to be doing: going out and listening to the people of Ontario and finding out what they think about the legislation and trying to get a feeling of whether we've got this balance, whether we're maintaining this balance. But I can tell you, and I'm sure you've experienced it in the short time you've been here, that you go out on these trips and it comes back to the committee hearing and they go through clause-by-clause and there's not one single amendment introduced.
That the people of Ontario don't care or don't understand -- I doubt that. Hopefully, they will try to learn more about this place because it's their tax dollars that are being spent for us to go out and "communicate" with them and find out their wishes, because that's who we represent. And we don't. The measures that are being brought in by the House leader are the equivalent of what I always said about minimum sentences. When a particular crime carried a minimum sentence, where if you were convicted you got seven days or six years or whatever, I used to say to my client and to the crown attorney, "We could all stay home." The judge could stay home, the crown attorney could stay home and I could stay home, because whether we were there or not, that person was going to get the minimum sentence.
That's kind of like the closure that's being suggested by the House leader, the member for Windsor-Riverside. He's saying to us that closure can be enacted on a motion by the government of the day, and there's no safeguard. I think it's important that this be considered. Perhaps for the benefit of the people out there who may be watching at this late hour, although I'm sure they're probably watching the Blue Jays game, you will let me just have a second, Mr Speaker.
As you know, the present orders that we have and that are to be changed read as follows: "A motion for closure, which may be moved without notice, until it is decided shall preclude all amendment of the main question, and shall be in the following words: 'That this question be now put.'" Here is the democratic safeguard: "Unless it appears to the Speaker that such motion is an abuse of the standing orders of the House or an infringement of the rights of the minority" -- that's the opposition in a majority government -- "the question shall be put forthwith and decided without amendment or debate. If a motion for closure is resolved in the affirmative, the original question shall be put forthwith and decided without amendment or debate."
In plain, good old English, what that means is that if at some point during the debate the government of the day decides -- and it has that already. It has that power now. It's like the "notwithstanding" provisions of the Charter of Rights. It just takes the political gumption to do it. If you believe what you're doing is right, you have the political will and the political guts to use section 33 of the charter, the "notwithstanding" provision, or, in this case, you have the guts to use closure. Nobody ever calls it "closure"; they always call it "time allocation," but in fact what it is is closure.
The real hook here, the real democratic saving grace, is your intervention, Mr Speaker, and they're taking that away with their amendment. They're saying they can move a motion of closure without any intervention or without any protection of the rights of the minority. I say that's wrong and I think the majority of the people of Ontario would say that's wrong, that that is not proper, it's not fair and it is something that cannot be done. They're waiting for the press to echo the clarion cry that what's happening is that Ontario is being taken over by a totalitarian move to change that rule.
If they're prepared to accept that, if the phones of the government members don't ring off the hook about that, then what we have done is exactly what happened in eastern Europe before the Second World War as Hitler was mustering his troops and taking a little bit here, a little bit there. England sent its member over to consult with Hitler and he came back and he said, "I don't see anything wrong." Do we have to hear the tanks rolling in the street before we realize that our rights have been usurped?
Mr Gordon Mills (Durham East): Give us a break. Sit down. What have you got in the water over there?
Mr Callahan: Fine. I'll tell you something. It's great --
Mr Mammoliti: I used to like you, Bob.
Mr Callahan: I'm going to lose a lot of sleep over that, believe me.
It's great to sit there on the government benches and say, "You're getting to the point of hyperbole." Maybe I am, the tanks in the streets and so on. But if you take an honest look at what's happening, you know the purpose of this legislation is to muzzle the member for Welland-Thorold and a couple other mavericks you've got there who are going to speak out on these things. That's what they're doing. What you do is, when you go to the government caucus, you say to the members, "Look, guys and gals" -- I don't know whether I used the right word; "guys and ladies" or whatever; I don't want to get myself into that issue.
Mr Bradley: Men and women.
Mr Callahan: Men and women. You go to your caucus and probably David Cooke -- I can see him standing there at the front of caucus, this huge caucus room you've got, saying, "If we bring in these changes, it means each and every one of you will get a chance to speak because the debates are being limited to 30-minute debates." Well, I want to see whether that happens. I don't think it will, because when you're over there on the government side, they tell you when to speak, when to mop your brow, when to go to the washroom, when to whatever.
Mr Bradley: That didn't happen with you.
Hon Mr Philip: You can go now, Bob.
Mr Callahan: You all do it, and do you know why you do it? Because you have that expectation that you may have the car and the plane and whatever else if you're good, if you're a good little boy, or a good little man or woman. If you're not, you're in trouble.
I suggest to you a better remedy. You want a better remedy? I'm going to suggest a better remedy to the people on the government side. Rather than aspire to your own limo, borrow a limo from the minister and take it away for a weekend. They're gas guzzlers. They don't drive that well. The brakes are probably gone on them too. So that's the better way. But don't let them con you. Seriously, don't let them con you into thinking this is going to free you people. It won't. You won't be freed until you're over here in opposition, and the reason is that they have to control you. It's very important that they control you people, because if they don't -- you're all sensitive, nice people, and you're going to listen and you're going to decide that maybe what's being said over here is not all that untrue. Something's going to strike a chord, believe me. I know when I was over there, opposition members would say the same thing. I'll tell you, it struck a chord with me and I started to search whether I was doing what I should be doing. It was at times like that I spoke out. But I haven't seen any of that over there.
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I must admire you, you have a well-controlled caucus. There have yet to be any defectors, but I'll tell you, if there's something worth fighting for it's this. This is the Waterloo. This is where you take your stand. No more retreating, because every piece of legislation that's forced through this Legislature as a result of our rights being diminished in looking at it and talking about it, you men and women will be responsible for; and if it's not perfect and it's not good stuff, you've just ruined your community, maybe, or you've taken a little shade off your community.
Think about it. The member for Niagara Falls, she is going to have a casino in her riding.
Interjections: We don't know that.
Mr Kormos: The party hasn't approved it.
Mr Callahan: Oh, come on. It's done by order in council. Don't kid yourself.
What will casinos do? Casinos will attract prostitutes, carpet-baggers, loan sharks, crime. Suddenly, Niagara Falls, which is a lovely area, may very well become the Taj Mahal in a war zone. That's what Atlantic City became. It's just a delight, it really is. It's a delightful place to visit, but bring your police dog and a gun with you. Toronto's going to get two of them. They're really lucky. They are so lucky it's incredible; it's just unbelievable.
There is one thing I find interesting about this. I went to the annual meeting of the Big Sisters in my riding. They're a delightful group, and they do a lot of good work. I looked at their financial statement, and they made $147,000. They have to fund-raise 70% of their money. They made $147,000 on those tickets you rip off, Nevada tickets. The minute this government opens the first casino with handles you can pull, Nevada tickets are history. The Big Sisters are then going to have to look for $147,000 to support their very worthy cause. Are they going to run a casino? Is that the plan? Or are they going to be beholden to the government in terms of getting their money and they'll have to come crawling to you to get it?
You may not think so now, but this is what's going to happen when you as a member of the government say, "Hey, I didn't know that was going to happen; I want to speak out against it." You'll say, "I want to get up and speak," and somebody will say to you: "Well, sorry, the rules don't allow you to. We're invoking closure, and you're not going to get a chance to speak at all on this issue." Then you'll say, "Well, maybe the member for Brampton South wasn't all that wrong."
I don't even begin to say that I have all the answers, but I've certainly tried to think about them and I would hope to God that we could get some of you people thinking about them too, because you're really playing with a loaded pistol and you could find that these changes will not just affect us, they will affect you.
I don't think that, in truth, all of you people over there are totally enamoured with every piece of legislative policy that's brought forward by the government. I know the member for Welland-Thorold isn't. His predecessor wasn't. So how do you fight that? Do you go back to your riding and say, "Well, look, I belong to the government; I had to vote that way"? If the people in your riding were smart, what they'd say to you is, "Well, tell you what, why don't you stay at home and we won't be paying your salary? Why don't you just disappear, because you're not representing me?"
I think people are going to say that. People expect accountability. They expect to know that you are representing them effectively, and they expect you to fight for every rule down here that will give you the right to do that. Every time you sit mute or ignore what's being said in this place and you don't move towards massive change of this legislative chamber, you in fact create that situation.
I say to the Premier, I read somewhere where you're going to make massive changes in the whole process here. If this is the start of what you're suggesting, I'd urge you to go back to the drawing board, with all due respect, because these are not changes that are going to democratize this place, they are in fact pulling the strings of power closer together and eliminating any possibility of dissent or any possibility of any person of the province of Ontario being effectively represented by the members they elect and put their trust in. I suggest to you that you think hard about that.
The fact that we're sitting here till midnight means we're all giving a great deal more of our lives and we're away from our families. I think we have to be looking after the fact that we're protecting not just the people of Ontario we represent, but our families. If you think that's just ho-hum, and "Please go away, member for Brampton South," which there will probably be a great round of applause about, and "You don't know what you're talking about," then I guess I've wasted my time here tonight trying to give you some idea of the experience I've had in the seven or eight years I've been here and the fact that I feel very strongly about the issue of being able to speak.
If you think about it, a Parliament has nothing but speech. If you can't express yourself in this Parliament, we may as well just close the place down and disappear. Why do you think they give us the right to say things in this place that may be untrue or that --
Mrs Irene Mathyssen (Middlesex): So you can speak, Bob.
Mr Callahan: Irene says -- no, no, no. Why do you think they give you the right to libel somebody in here without being sued? Why do you think they give you the right not to be arrested while the House is sitting? They give you all sorts of privileges, and the reason they give you those privileges is simply because if you didn't have them, if there couldn't be a free exchange of ideas in this House, then the benefit to the people you're representing in society would be diminished. In fact, that's what the government House leader is doing, and he's not even doing it in consensus with the House leaders.
The best thing he could do -- you might suggest this to him; it would stop the debate and get on with the things of the day, and it has been suggested -- would be to suggest that this be referred to a committee such as the Legislative Assembly committee. That's how we've done it in the past. Let all of the members have some say in this and perhaps listen to people from other jurisdictions who can tell you whether what you're being sold is a good bill of goods or a bad one. Would you buy something from a salesman at the door without knowing who he or she was and without knowing something about the product? That's what you're buying here. You're buying it because the member for Windsor-Riverside says it's a great product. I'd check to see if it's got a 10-year warranty, because if it doesn't, you're in trouble.
It's interesting that the House leader would have done that, because somewhere in among the stuff I've got here, he said to the press that they would in fact do this. Remember his famous press release which caused a bit of consternation because he hadn't bothered to talk to anybody about it? I must find it.
Oh, yes, here it is. At page 3 of his press release it says, "Mr Cooke said he would welcome the opposition's insight and input on the motion he tabled last Thursday." I think this came out on the Friday, so it would be difficult for the opposition to have had any input because they didn't know about it being on the table. "'I would ask the opposition for its fair consideration of these proposals. I believe that together we can make the House work better.' Mr Cooke said that since becoming House leader almost a year ago, he has made early and repeated attempts to establish an all-party committee to reform the House rules." I'm told that's balderdash. "'After almost a year, the opposition House leaders have only just nominated their representatives. The committee has not yet met. We have an opportunity now to make the Legislature work for the people of Ontario and for this and future governments,' he said." What a bunch of malarkey. He gives that gobbledegook to the press, and we know he doesn't want to do anything like that.
Surely an all-party committee of the Legislature would be the fair and honest and legitimate way to deal with this and to get the views of everybody and to ensure that the final product was one we could all be proud of and that we could all work in this House with.
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Has anybody ever, in your lifetime, been satisfied with a single opinion? When we go to our eye doctor, even, or our doctor or our dentist or our shoemaker or whatever, we always try to get a second opinion. Nobody has truth in totality. Mr Cooke doesn't have it, with all due respect to him. I have to ask myself, is this unseemly rush to push through these rules to ensure that the member for Welland-Thorold doesn't get to speak on the insurance bill or on the Sunday shopping legislation or on the Ontario labour relations amendments? Is that the reason? Do you think that's what it's being done for? I really think that has to be at the root of it, because otherwise there would be no reason to push so vehemently to have these matters dealt with.
If the Ontario labour relations amendments are that good, they can stand the scrutiny of this place. They can stand the scrutiny of not having to close off debate. They can stand being looked at by the people of this province. Do you not think the people of this province deserve that minuscule amount of participation? Do you think their representatives should not have an opportunity to be able to address those concerns and to make suggestions that might improve the lot of workers in this province?
With all due respect to the Minister of Labour, as much as I respect him in that he's always believed in that and always been an advocate, he doesn't necessarily have all the answers either. Let's face it, we're all driven by our own political philosophies. The Minister of Labour has always been a very strong advocate of injured workers and so on, and I respect him for that. But do you think he can look at these amendments and direct their implementation in an unbiased way that will eliminate the possibility of our screwing up the very intricate and important balance of labour and management in this province? I think he'd be the first one, if he thought about it and perhaps didn't want to get this through -- and I understand why he wants to get it through. It's been a labour of his life. But if he looked at it objectively and perhaps considered some of the statements that might be made by his colleagues and by members of the public, and even workers -- I think the member for Parry Sound read out a couple of letters from people in the union who said they didn't think this legislation, as presently phrased, was all it was cracked up to be.
Mr Bill Murdoch (Grey): We've got four more letters.
Mr Callahan: I understand we've got four more letters; the third party has come in saying that. I think the workers deserve to have the opportunity to have full and proper representation by their particular MPPs, and what the House leader is doing by ramming through these amendments without proper consultation is depriving people of their democratic rights. That's certainly going to result in an imperfect working of this place. It's not going to speed up things; it's not going to make them any better. It's going to make things more difficult.
In fact, what you're doing is lighting the barbecue for your seats when you come back here, because everything you do will have a boomerang effect. You'll be subject to the same rules, by who knows what government. So I would strongly suggest that you give strong consideration to it and not be moved by the promises and the perks and the benefits you get. It's a great thing to represent people, as I'm sure you've all found out at this stage, being a couple of years in the House. When you go out to events in your riding, they tell you it's an honour to have you there. My feeling and my response to them is usually, "It's an honour to be invited." You usually get the privileged seats if you go to an event. I really find that interesting, because we get privileged seats and people who are volunteers, who get paid nothing but who are honestly pursuing the efforts of volunteers in a very responsible and honest way, wind up in the back row. Yet we as those so-called politicians who are the honourable members and the privileged few get those front seats.
I always feel a little embarrassed about that, because if we are not doing our job down here, if we're going to let these rules slide through without the scrutiny of the public and without the scrutiny of all the members of this Legislature, then we've done a job that doesn't even merit us the back seat. We should perhaps not be going or at least trying to avoid looking at our constituents.
As I said when I started, to me, this is one of the most important debates this Legislature will participate in while I'm here, which may not be very long, because quite frankly I've found that the degree of participation and concern by members is sometimes very limited. They prefer to hold private conversations while we're attempting to discuss one of the most important issues. There doesn't seem to be very much interest over there. I guess it's just a foregone conclusion that the Berlin Wall is going to be built, that democracy is going to suffer, that the flame of democracy is going to flicker a little smaller. It's going to perhaps go out. That'll all be done while these vigilant members are here having their own conversations, considering that it's more important to discuss other items than to listen to the debate.
Mr Robert Chiarelli (Ottawa West): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: For a considerable period of time the opposition was rather attentive and orderly, and for the last several minutes there have been many conversations and the member has been unable to make his point.
The Acting Speaker: I'm sorry. It's not a point of order; however, it's a point of respect for those people who are participating in the debate.
Mr Mills: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I'm a very considerate person, but the member says I'm not paying attention. I can't pay attention to such drivel hour after hour. It's just driving me nuts.
The Acting Speaker: That is an opinion. It's not a point of order at all. The honourable member for Brampton South.
Mr Callahan: I think that member's predecessor would be spinning in whatever job he's in now. I find that really interesting, Gord, because I always thought you were a person who was sensitive to the needs of your community. It becomes quite apparent that you're not, because you've missed the entire content of what I've been trying to say. You've either turned off the mike or whatever or you've decided that you're so intent on becoming a minister of the crown that you're prepared to adopt everything they say holus-bolus. I hope the people of your riding association and the people of your community understand that, because the member who preceded you represented his community to the hilt, and you've certainly demeaned it by making that comment.
The Acting Speaker: I want the honourable member for Brampton South to address the Chair. It may be much less inflammatory.
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Mr Callahan: I'm sorry, Mr Speaker, but there are many times in this House when issues allow for levity, when perhaps there are things that may be a matter of unconcern to the members because it's a bill in which they don't have any particular interest. But I'm suggesting that tonight is a watershed. Tonight we are debating something that will change this province and change this Legislature dramatically, and if that message has fallen on deaf ears of the members of the government, I hope it's because they weren't listening or, in the alternative, I hope it's because they're not capable of understanding.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. On a point of order, the honourable member for York East.
Mr Malkowski: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I don't find acceptable the term "falling on deaf ears." I find that somewhat pejorative and would ask him to withdraw that, please.
Mr Callahan: What did I say?
The Acting Speaker: That is not a point of order; however, the honourable member for Brampton South may want to rephrase.
Mr Callahan: If I have offended the member for York East, I apologize. I have watched him tonight and he is one of the few members of the House, not just on this occasion but on other occasions, who listens and watches intently and follows the proceedings. He should perhaps spread that around his colleagues and it might be much better participation. So I apologize for using that phraseology. It was certainly not meant in any inappropriate way.
The Acting Speaker: Thank you very much.
Mr Callahan: But the issue tonight is one that comes before a Legislature perhaps once in a session or once in a politician's time here. It is a question of whether we are going to have the right to represent adequately the members of our constituency or are going to be denied that right by a majority government of whatever political stripe, whereby you as Speaker will not be able to intervene and ensure that the rights of the minority are protected.
I suggest that's a very important issue. That's one that comes down through history to us. There is not one institution you can examine in history that has not suffered dramatically as a result of a reduction in the rights of the minority. We've seen it in numerous jurisdictions around this world. Minority rights, once trammelled, once their rights are denied, the majority becomes a little more courageous in terms of trammelling them even more, and the next thing you know, the minority rights have been snuffed out. I suggest to you that that's the issue being debated on this floor tonight. It's a debate that's not drivel. It's a debate that's important. It's a debate that should be paid attention to by every member of this Legislature, and if for a minute they're not vigilant, they are allowing those rights to slip away. I would hope that anyone speaking on this issue tonight will take it in that vein and will not consider it to be one of the more esoteric items we debate in this place from time to time and consider that it's something you can just ignore. It's not.
We have opened the door to a precedent-setting situation here. We have allowed the House leader of a majority government -- one that only had 37% of the electoral votes, by the way -- to tell the minority, the other members of the Legislature who equally represent large factions of this community -- I represent 90,000 people. Am I to go back home and tell them: "I'm sorry. You no longer have the same rights you had before this motion was passed, because this is what happened to you. My rights to speak on your behalf are now limited so much more"? What will happen the next time? Once a precedent is set like that and the government has the power to do that, the next step is something more dramatic.
I suggest to you that it shows the extreme arrogance of a government that will perform in that way, that will attempt to do it unilaterally. The member for Windsor-Riverside has been around this House long enough to know that this place operates on the basis of consensus. He has also been quoted by the member for Parry Sound as having made extreme comments about the question of closure. He doesn't like it, he thinks it's draconian, and here he is being the architect of it himself. Not alone -- he's playing through. He's playing a single game. He's not even allowing the other members to participate.
So I suggest to you that what we are debating tonight is not just the usual stuff we debate, which will rise or fall on the basis of a word or the crossing of a "t" or the dotting of an "i." What we're discussing tonight is important in terms of what it says and what it doesn't say, and it's equally important in terms of the precedent it sets for what a majority government can do with its majority. If we allow this thing to become just one of the ho-hum debates in this place, then I'll tell you something: We have let our constituents down totally. I mean, lots of times we fail to do things or we do them perhaps not to the totality they should be done, and there are no dire effects. This is going to create for the people of this province less representation by members who happen not to be members of the government.
I can remember times when the suggestion was made that unless you had a government member in your riding, you weren't going to get the same benefits you would if you had a government member in your riding. I remember early on in this government's mandate where some statements were made to that effect. I'll tell you something. What that says to me is that I, having been elected by the constituents of my riding, do not have the same rights and privileges as a government member because the government members can now push through anything they like. They can go to the minister and say, "Hey, I like this idea." Maybe the minister will pick it up and do it. Because I've been denied my rights to debate with the protection by you, the Speaker, of my minority rights, I as an opposition member have been reduced to a less effective member for the people of my riding. I think that's wrong. I think it's totally wrong.
I also said to the backbenchers over there that they are being denied their full rights. They may think this is going to open up a whole avenue of opportunities for them. I'd suggest it's exactly the opposite. They're shutting the doors on it. They're giving the central powers -- we saw Mr Agnew. He was around here earlier. I guess he's back there doing something. They're giving greater power to them to draw on the strings. When you look at it, you see strings being drawn in all over the place.
Casinos are drawn into the strings. Bring in casinos so you can make the charities come begging to you on hands and knees to get the money they used to earn in their own way by doing bingos and so on. Draw on the string by upping the tariffs on probate fees and on registration fees by 100%. Draw on the strings by upping this, upping that. Really what it is doing is tightening the noose around the Ontario citizen, and this is one more example of it, trying to make the members of the opposition less effective and give them less opportunity to adequately and fully represent their constituents.
I've spoken a long time because I feel passionate about the fact that this is one issue in this House, the first one I've seen since I was elected seven or eight years ago, which I feel is so important that every member of this House should be debating it and that it should go out to a legislative committee. For God's sake, if the government House leader could understand that and didn't have his own agenda of trying to get it done before he pushes all this legislation through, it would be done.
If that were the case, it wouldn't be necessary for members of the opposition to stand up here and try to plead with the government that it respect democracy, that it ensure that the traditions of thousands of years of gaining these rights and the right to speak freely are not lost to a government which feels it has a right to rule by divine will.
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The Acting Chair: Thank you. Further debate? The honourable member for Carleton.
Interjection.
Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): One of the members says I look tired. I think after my speech, starting this evening, many members of this Legislature are going to be tired.
First of all, I want to say how ridiculous this debate really is. You know, I've been through a fair number of these --
Mr David Winninger (London South): Are you going to tell us your war stories?
Mr Sterling: I'm going to tell you some war stories. I think you're going to get a few of those. Now, in 1951 -- no, no, I'm not going back that far.
Mr Winninger: I was barely born then.
Mr Sterling: Well, I was barely born then either.
Mr Winninger: That's not what I heard.
Mr Chiarelli: Hurry up and get warmed up.
Mr Sterling: There's lots of time to warm up. There are days and days of debate that can go on. Why should we hurry? What's going on in the Legislature has nothing to do with how these rules are going to be resolved.
Hon Floyd Laughren (Deputy Premier, Treasurer and Minister of Economics): You look tired, Norm.
Mr Eves: He looks rested to me.
Hon Mr Laughren: You don't know what he did over the supper hour.
Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, I'm having a very difficult time in starting my debate because of all the interjections.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. I want to remind all members that it is all members' privilege to speak in this Legislature. Interjections are out of order. I want to go back to the honourable member for Carleton; he does have the floor.
Mr Sterling: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.
On Friday last I was so concerned with the lack of understanding, in my view, of the media and perhaps the people of Ontario with regard to the debate that we are forced into by the government House leader. I say "forced" because the government House leader puts us in no position but to filibuster, to talk and to talk and to talk on this motion, perhaps until Ontario freezes over.
I wrote to the editor of many of our daily papers while the Treasurer was basking in the sunshine of the Riviera. Was that where you were?
Hon Mr Laughren: No, no.
Mr Sterling: Oh, it was Germany. They don't have a Riviera in Germany.
I wrote to all the editors, and I think I should read this letter because it summarizes, to my way of thinking, what we're faced with here:
"The people of Ontario must understand that the present fight over changes to rules governing the Legislature is essential in order to prevent Bob Rae...becoming a virtual dictator. In our 125-year history, the rules" -- which are our constitution -- "have never been changed without negotiation with other interested political parties. Parliament is intended to be a balance between the right of government to govern and the opposition to oppose. In a majority Parliament, the only tool for the opposition to seek compromises is to delay.
"Mr Rae has decided that he should be able to unilaterally" -- on his own -- "dictate how long a debate will take place on any future legislation. For instance, he can decide on his controversial labour law changes that he will only tolerate an hour of debate on second reading, perhaps one day of public hearings and one hour of debate on third and final reading. He will probably choose to be more generous than that, but that is the power he is seeking.
"If Mr Rae gets his way" -- and he will, eventually -- "he will virtually eliminate the usefulness of opposition members in the Legislature and committees, save for question period. Over the past six years in opposition I have been successful in forcing the government of the day to accept some amendments to their legislation. My only tool was to delay or threaten delay. What sense is there for me to bother to debate if I have no means to make them listen?
"Mr Rae says that he is following Mr Mulroney's lead in bringing time allocation motions now used in the House of Commons, but conveniently, he forgets about other balancing factors, such as the ability of the Senate to stall.
"Rules governing our Legislature are boring stuff for the public. I understand why the public believe that we are being childish in using every stalling technique available to us. However, we are fighting for the life of our democratic institution and must continue to do so until the government agrees to sit down and find a reasonable compromise. We will continue to be ready to negotiate new rules which will make our Parliament more efficient.
"However, if the public are concerned about arrogant governments that don't listen, just wait until they see the result of this huge power grab by Bob Rae. Those same people who are today saying opposition parties are not acting responsibly will probably be asking at a later date why the opposition or why the public was not given the right to be heard.
"The government's agenda has been poorly thought out and full of inaccuracies, causing long delays. A failure by Bob Rae to tolerate those who disagree with him, or want to correct his errors and mismanagement, should not result in an attack by him which will destroy the delicate balance of power required in our provincial Parliament."
That summarizes the basic argument that I will be putting forward tonight and in the days to come.
Hon Mr Laughren: Carried, carried.
Mr Sterling: If the member for Nickel Belt, who is interjecting not from his seat, which I think is contrary to the rules of the House -- it's a funny rule. There are a lot of funny rules to the Legislature, but I believe parties can get together and can resolve those differences and can negotiate changes which will be for the good of Parliament.
You know what's very odd about this particular change of the rules which has been thrust upon the Legislature by Bob Rae and Dave Cooke alone? The public should understand that Bob Rae or Dave Cooke didn't come and negotiate with us before he put this down on the table. I find it odd that Mr Rae was in the House tonight. Last February or March when we were talking about the Constitution of Canada, I can remember Bob Rae saying: "Brian Mulroney, our Prime Minister, I don't want you to put down a unilateral deal to Quebec. Each and every province and the territories of Canada should be consulted on the deal that is presented to the province of Quebec so the province of Quebec will deal with our Constitution then and come into our Constitution." He insisted that Brian Mulroney, the leader of our federal government, consult with the other partners in our institutions across Canada.
I think there's a very strong similarity to the process we are going under here today and in our Legislature, because the standing rules of the Legislature are essentially our Constitution. The standing rules tell us who has what power at what moment. So while Bob Rae lectures Brian Mulroney, he comes back to the Legislature and does what Brian Mulroney didn't do. Who has more honour in all of this, Brian Mulroney or Bob Rae? Bob Rae is acting as an arrogant leader in putting forward these changes without consultation with other members of the Legislature who are represented in the opposition benches.
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Mr Winninger: You wouldn't show up at the meetings.
Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, I hear an interjection from across the way that we wouldn't show up at the meetings. The three designated hitters, if you want to call them that, or the negotiators for the three political parties, of which I was one, were asked by the member for Oxford, who has been a member of this Legislature for the sum total of one year and one half, to meet with him to negotiate changes to the rules. I think we were asked on three different occasions and we were not able to strike a common date for a period of three weeks. Now, does that give the Premier of Ontario and the government House leader the right to impose their dictatorial will on all members of this Legislature? It certainly doesn't.
When we talk about the kinds of negotiation and consultation which went on in the past, I have in front of me a report from the standing committee on procedural affairs regarding agencies, boards and commissions. This, I say to the member for Nickel Belt, who's so interested in this debate, was issued on November 18, 1985.
Mr Bradley: That's back when the monarchy meant something in Ontario.
Mr Sterling: To the member for St Catharines, I say it's back when a government, the Progressive Conservative government, had respect for this institution and would not dare do what you're doing, Bob Rae. We wouldn't have dared for a minute to come in with draconian changes to the rules which give an absolute dictatorial power to the Premier of the day.
In 1985, the procedural affairs committee produced a report that is quite thick and has a number of suggestions which I will be referring to over the next days in terms of the different matters that were of concern to the members then.
The chairman of that committee, incidentally, was Michael Breaugh, then the member for Oshawa and now a member of the federal House. Mr Breaugh, myself and Mr Reycraft, the then member for Middlesex, negotiated over a four-year period, before the Liberals dropped the hat, if you want to call it that, in terms of bringing forward a motion in front of this House. So, for those New Democrats who claim that three weeks of negotiation were excessive, I only say that the comparison to former days relates to years, not weeks.
I remember too, Mr Speaker, as you do, because you came into this Legislature in the late part of 1983, I believe -- I remember it because I was out in the riding with the honourable member for S-D-G & East Grenville -- that during that period of time, the whip then, the member for Mississauga North, Mr Gregory, had a terrible time with our caucus from day to day, because he felt we were having to eat crow day after day and the opposition was stalling any of the legislation we brought forward.
I can remember great debates in caucus: "Let's do something. Let's put it to these guys. Let's change the rules of the House. Let's do all of these wonderful, nefarious things." But Tom Wells was the government House leader at that time, and I can remember him saying: "Now, just a minute, before you get too arrogant, before you want too much control of this Legislature, you must remember that ultimately this Legislature will only work if there's cooperation among the various parties." Mr Wells prevailed and there were no changes to the standing orders during that time. During the time I was here, there were very few changes to the standing orders. There were, I think, some minor changes made in 1986, but after that time there were very few changes to the standing orders.
Mr Bradley: Do you remember the calendar question back in 1983?
Mr Sterling: No, I don't.
Hon Mr Rae: It was 1982.
Mr Bradley: In 1982, the now Premier asked a question on the calender where he was out by several thousands of dollars. I'd forgotten that myself.
The Acting Speaker: Order, please. The honourable member for Carleton has the floor. I know interjections at times are interesting but the honourable member for Carleton does have the floor.
Mr Sterling: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. During the time when we debated these various changes to the rules that ultimately came about in October 1989, the negotiating committee, the three members who were appointed -- Mr Reycraft, myself and Mr Breaugh -- met first in 1986 and 1987, and we came together with a package. We presented that to the government and to the other parties. It was acceptable to the two opposition parties but it was not acceptable to the government of the day.
Let me talk about a few of the things that were in that initial report, because I think the report was the springboard for some very progressive changes to the standing orders which we now enjoy. I think too, oddly enough, that during the period of time of the last negotiations, I raised the possibility of limiting a member's opportunity to speak. When I was in opposition I suggested that perhaps there was some merit to talking about some limitation on a member's opportunity to speak. Of course, the Liberals were in government at the time and that looked somewhat attractive to a governing party. But guess which party refused to discuss any limitation on the time a person could speak in this Legislature?
Mr Bradley: The NDP, I'll bet.
Mr Sterling: It was the NDP. Isn't it amazing that --
Interjection.
Mr Sterling: I'm sorry, Mr Speaker. When you were running -- I didn't remember everything. Bob Eaton, the member for Middlesex before Mr Reycraft, was a Speaker.
But isn't it amazing how things change in this place when people cross from one side of the floor to the other? There was within the contents of the report the suggestion that the Speaker should be elected by this Parliament. One good thing about negotiations, when you're talking about the rules, is that there is a tradeoff. In terms of members saying, "Let's elect the Speaker," the tradeoff to that particular matter was that the government of the day didn't want the ability of a member to stand in this place and challenge the Speaker.
Can you remember, Mr Speaker, the last time that trick was used in this Legislature?
Mr Bradley: The NDP.
Mr Sterling: I think it was a fellow who was sitting up where the new member for Brant-Haldimand is sitting right now. His name was Peter Kormos; that was it.
Mr Robert W. Runciman (Leeds-Grenville): Where is he now?
Mr Sterling: I don't know where Mr Kormos is now.
At any rate, Mr Speaker, for those members who weren't here before, it was possible in this place to force the Speaker into making a ruling, and you would immediately stand up and challenge the Speaker and then you would get the bells ringing and the bells would ring and ring and ring. That's what precipitated the last change of rules.
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That was engineered by none other than Dave Cooke, the then opposition House leader, and Bob Rae, then the Leader of the Opposition, and that was over the Joan Smith affair. Joan Smith, as you remember, was the Solicitor General and there was a concern over her involvement in a police matter. But the bells rang for about five or six days and Joan Smith resigned as a result of those bells ringing. That was a direct result of the member for Welland-Thorold, Mr Kormos, standing up and challenging the Speaker, as instructed by the member for Windsor-Riverside, Dave Cooke, and I'm sure Bob Rae knew what the strategy was at that time. Those things don't just happen. The bells rang for five or six days and Joan Smith resigned.
We came back in here and Sean Conway, the member for Renfrew North, who was then the government House leader, introduced his motion to change the rules. There wasn't any consultation other than the three or four years that we had been consulting together. Of course, when he put down his motion -- I think it was motion 5, as I remember, because we talked about it -- everything broke loose in this Legislature. Boy, was there righteous indignation in this Legislature. I can remember Dave Cooke standing up and saying, "Some would call this sleazy." I guess he didn't call it sleazy, but he said, "Some would call this a sleazy move." That was Dave Cooke's response to it -- now the government House leader.
The one thing the member for Renfrew North, the government House leader at that time, didn't do was call the motion for debate. He let it sit there. I think he was justified in putting something forward because something had to be put down as to what the government's position actually was and what it really wanted in terms of changing the rules and making this place somewhat more efficient.
Over the months of June and July of 1989, negotiations went on in earnest. As a result of those negotiations, the changes to the standing orders were approved, I believe in late July. And I believe that on October 15, 1989, when we came back that year, the new standing orders were in place.
The important part of all of that is that there was consultation. The government House leader, who had 94 seats at that time, not the 74 seats the present government has, felt he couldn't use that power in order to overwhelm the opposition, notwithstanding that he could have done what the government House leader has done today.
I also want to talk a little bit about the recent past. I just want to go back about a week and a half ago to when we were sitting here on Thursday night. I think the government House leader really started this whole confrontation when he moved to extend the hours at a quarter to six on Thursday night. A lot of the members had gone back to their constituencies and those who were left here were left to make certain the government didn't take unfair advantage of the chance they took at that point in time. Under that standing order, any member who holds the floor can ask to extend the hours, and there have to be 12 members to block it at that time. At that point, late in the day on Thursday afternoon, there weren't 12 opposition members here, somewhat like the government not having 20 members here the other day when quorum was called last Thursday.
Mr Bradley: Out of how many?
Mr Sterling: Twenty out of 74, which I guess is roughly the same proportion as 12 out of whatever number of opposition there might be. But when Mr Cooke came in and did that, he really threw up the red flag, because he said: "The gloves are off, fellas. The gloves are off, ladies. We're going to have a donnybrook."
Interjections.
Hon Mr Pouliot: Mr Speaker --
The Acting Speaker: The honourable Minister of Transportation on a point of --
Mr Jim Wilson (Simcoe West): A point of foolishness. Sit down.
The Acting Speaker: On a point of what?
Hon Mr Pouliot: Merely a point of rhetoric, a sense of --
The Acting Speaker: I'm sorry, the member does not have a point.
Hon Mr Pouliot: It's important, Mr Speaker, that it be noted --
The Acting Speaker: The honourable member for Carleton.
Mr Sterling: I apologize if I have offended anyone, Mr Speaker. The term I used is very common in my own constituency and your constituency and is the acceptable term in some parts of Ontario still. That's the unfortunate way it is.
I want to talk about the election of the Speaker, because I think that exemplifies a question that came to mind when this Premier took over Parliament, the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. The whole idea of the election of the Speaker was to have a person from this Legislature, ideally elected freely by members of the Legislature in a free vote and a secret vote, and that my party leader, the leader of the Liberal opposition, and the leader of the government, Mr Rae, would not try to influence that vote unduly. So what did Bob Rae do on the day he was sworn in, October 1, 1990? When asked, "What about Mr Warner, who has experience in this Legislature?" he said, "He's going to be Speaker."
Mr Winninger: We thought you were good too, though.
Mr Sterling: You didn't think I was good enough. That's the problem.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: I didn't see the count.
That was my concern; that although the Premier had sat in this Legislature for some eight or nine years and had sat in the federal Parliament, did he really understand the delicate balance, the feeling and the intention of the standing orders under which we were governing this Parliament?
Incidentally, Mr Speaker, I think they elected the best man with regard to the Speaker, in hindsight. That, together with this move, this unmitigated show of arrogance to change the rules in such a draconian way as to be able to virtually control this place, is amazing.
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I started to allude to it earlier, but we have seen the bringing forth of a new political party in Canada, not at the provincial level but at the federal level, the Reform Party, as we all know it. Part of the attraction of the Reform Party has been that its leader, Mr Manning, has talked about reforms to the Legislature, that individual members should have more power, that members on committees should have some real power, that there should be free votes in this Legislature.
Do you think that giving the government -- one man, essentially -- the right to dictate to all of us exactly how long we have to talk on any particular issue or subject matter, how long the public have to give their input, is an increase with regard to the powers that individual members have in this Legislature?
This move is such a retrogressive step with regard to the individual's importance in this Legislature that it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable that while we talk about the power at the centre, the power that the executive, the power that the cabinet has over each and every one of us in the Legislature --
Hon Mr Laughren: No. That was the old days.
Mr Sterling: I know the member for Nickel Belt doesn't think he has enough power. But this particular move by the leader of the government, Mr Rae, to be able to say on auto insurance, for instance, something that is near and dear to the hearts of the New Democratic Party, or was --
Mr Stockwell: There's nothing near and dear to the hearts of the New Democratic Party, nothing.
Mr Harnick: Except Kormos.
Mr Sterling: Peter Kormos; okay.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, they're trying to break me up. The member for Nickel Belt's trying to get to me.
Can you imagine the Liberals bringing in their auto insurance plan or their Sunday shopping bill and saying, "You're going to have two weeks to debate" --
Mr Cameron Jackson (Burlington South): George, aren't you driving around your riding tonight, working on that mileage? Who's driving your truck tonight?
Interjection.
Mr Jackson: He's had one trip too many to Canadian Tire this week.
Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, I'm not sure these night sittings are a good idea.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: I want to get on with the substance of the debate, as I'm sure all members of the Legislature are interested in that.
During the time that we were negotiating the calendar -- it was actually an invention of our leader, Mr Harris, who suggested to me that although we hadn't talked about a calendar in the procedural affairs report in 1985, and it had not been discussed until the negotiations of the rules went on in earnest in June and July of 1989, we brought forward the idea of putting down a calendar.
When we were negotiating that, I can remember the concern by the New Democratic Party that the calendar had to include more days that this Legislature would sit than it had in the past. In 1984, the Legislature sat for 96 days; in 1985, it sat for 53 days; 1986, 111 days; 1987, 67 days; 1988, 91 days; and if the calendar had been followed in 1989 and 1990 it would have been about 110 days in each of those years. Now what do we have? We have the New Democratic Party, which was arguing not three years ago that it wanted more days in the Legislature, now telling us in a motion that's been put forward that it wants fewer days, and the Treasurer says it's more efficient.
I agree. We could all be more efficient if in fact the government put forward legislation which was well-thought-out, which had very few mistakes in it and which had some direction. This idea of the House leader coming out and saying, "Last Thursday, we wasted $290,000 because we didn't sit" --
Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): They didn't have a quorum.
Mr Sterling: I want to say to the government members: Do you remember last year how many days we talked about Sunday shopping? What was your answer to the Sunday shopping issue? You brought in that law where you defined "tourism." If it were a big store, they would have to go to the municipal council, but if they were little stores, they could all go to the council. We debated this for days in this Legislature: $290,000 a day, I guess it was at that time, I don't know how many days.
Mr Michael D. Harris (Nipissing): I couldn't believe it.
Mr Sterling: I couldn't believe it either. And then it went out to committee and they had weeks and weeks of hearings in committee. I assume that was $290,000 a day too. We must have wasted, I don't know, $4 million, $5 million or $6 million on the old Sunday shopping law. That was so important last summer. It was so important that this government went ahead with it. It was very high on its agenda. It was higher than the 121 pieces of legislation or something that they are talking about now. What's happened? Less than one year later it said: "Well, we've reconsidered. The old law doesn't work; we're going to scrap it."
After $5 million or $6 million of our legislative time, it scrapped the law, just like that. The Premier stands up and says --
Mr Harris: Snip, snap, just like that.
Mr Sterling: Snip, snap, $5 million, just like that. I don't know how the government House leader comes in here, when we're having a major fight over the most important changes to our standing orders, our constitution, and says we're wasting $290,000 a day in this place.
I guess the general assumption out there is that progress is marked by passage of legislation in this place. I'm not sure that assumption is always correct. It wasn't correct last year anyway, when we were dealing with the Sunday shopping law, because a year later it's been scrapped. To say we're progressing because we're passing legislation isn't necessarily true.
I'm sure the member for Welland-Thorold doesn't agree that the present Sunday shopping law, which we're going to debate in this Legislature, is progressive and that it has any advantage to the public. I am now sitting in committee; I sat on the standing committee on administration of justice this afternoon. We're dealing with some very important legislation, which I believe all opposition parties have been constructive in trying to find the right answer to, and that's dealing with consent to treatment, primarily dealing with people who are not capable of making their own decisions, and how best to advise those people and how best to deal with health professionals who have to carry out those treatments.
As we get deeper and deeper into that legislation, I'm not sure we're doing anybody a favour by changing the existing legislation, because there seems to be more and more questions coming up about the new law and how it will impact on the various people who help vulnerable adults and vulnerable children. So I'm not certain about the assumption by the public that the more legislation we pass, day after day, leads to a better Ontario. I'm sure most of them would prefer that we didn't pass the Treasurer's tax bills, as onerous as they have been. I know the public are not in favour of those. I know they're not in favour of a great deal of the legislation.
At this point I'd like to adjourn the debate. I move to adjourn the debate, Mr Speaker.
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The House divided on Mr Sterling's motion, which was negatived on the following vote:
Ayes 26; nays 61.
Mr Sterling: I moved adjournment of the debate because --
The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Not again.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: No, I'm not "moving" it. I'm telling you that I "moved" it --
Interjection: The Speaker's a little jumpy.
Mr Sterling: I had a "d" on the end of "move," sir. I know I'm mischievous from time to time, but I wanted to explain that I moved adjournment of the debate because we do not understand, on the opposition side, why we're here this evening debating this motion. Because if things would unfold as they normally do and have over the last 125 years, we would be sitting here tonight debating the legislative program of the government of the day. Instead, we find ourselves debating a motion which the government House leader, the government itself, has admitted has no more relevance because we are in the stages of negotiating the changes to that motion perhaps this very hour. So we are engaged in a fruitless exercise. Mr Speaker, I don't like wasting the time of the Legislature.
Hon Mr Laughren: Hear, hear. Keep a straight face, Norm.
Mr Sterling: I thought the Speaker was supposed to keep a straight face. I thought he was not supposed to be partisan. Mr Speaker, I believe you're not partisan.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: Bob Rae has foisted this ridiculous debate on the people of Ontario. Bob Rae and the House leader for the government party have insisted, "My way or no way." That's what the arrogance of this government is saying to the members of the opposition.
I think other members, particularly backbenchers of the government side, should know that there are other issues on the table which they have not heard of yet. I want to talk about a few of those, because we believe in our party that all members of the Legislature should have enhanced powers, should be able to do more in this Legislature, do things that are constructive and that everything shouldn't be left up to the one man over here to tell us exactly what he is about.
Mr Conway: Tell us about Bill Davis and schools, Normie.
Mr Sterling: I don't know what relevance that has tonight, I say to the member for Renfrew North.
One of the suggestions we have put forward is that committees of the Legislature be given the opportunity to introduce bills in this Legislature through their chairmen. This would give real meaning to members of committees who identify through their hearings that legislative change is needed. This was actually tried in the last Parliament, Mr Speaker, and you may remember that the former member for Waterloo North, Mr Epp, as the chairman of the standing committee on the Legislative Assembly, introduced a bill on behalf of the committee members, who unanimously agreed that there should be a change in our Legislative Assembly Act. It was a very minor matter with regard to what a government's agenda might be. The amendment dealt with the serving of papers upon a member of the Legislature and clarified for members of the public, sheriffs and bailiffs what they must do in order to serve a member who is being sued by an Ontario citizen.
The point is that Mr Epp brought forward a bill. He introduced it as a private member's bill, because that's the only tool we have in this Legislature, and he used his private member's hour in order to debate that bill. That was one of the few private member's bills which received second reading, received third reading and became law.
The second example of this particular tool being used was when I was chairing the committee on agencies, boards and commissions. At that point in time, we were reviewing the Ontario Food Terminal Act. The committee on agencies, boards and commissions reviewed the Food Terminal Act and decided to write another report.
I had been on that same committee some 10 years prior to its considering that particular food terminal, which is an agency of the Ontario government. The committee was making the very same recommendations that a committee had made 10 years prior to 1989 or 1990. So I said to the committee: "Look, why don't we do something different here? Instead of just submitting a report and bringing it back to the Legislature, why don't I, as your committee chairman, introduce a bill in the Legislature and we will try to talk to the government House leader" -- at that point in time I think it was Mr Conway -- "to call the bill and to have second and third readings?"
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Not only did the members of the committee all agree to it, but the minister involved, the Minister of Agriculture and Food, Mr Ramsay at that time, also agreed to the amendment, which we all thought was useful. At an appropriate time, the government House leader at that time called the bill for second reading and called the bill for third reading, and the bill passed in a matter of 10, 15 or 20 minutes, because cooperation was achieved with all members of different parties. It was, I think, the first private member's bill which I have ever carried in this Legislature.
Now what we are suggesting to the government House leader is that in addition to having government bills, private members' bills and private bills, there'll also be a committee bill that a committee Chairman can bring forward with a majority of his committee agreeing to the legislation. The committee Chairman would come in to the Legislature and introduce that bill as committee Chairman. The government House leader would be obligated to call it for second reading only and would have to give it a certain amount of time for debate.
Normally when you bring forward a bill which is reached by consensus within a committee, there isn't a great deal of debate in the Legislature, because everybody has already talked about it. They are not earth-shattering issues, normally. They are small issues, but they are important to a segment of the population of Ontario. So what it would give, in my view, is real meaning to members of committees in the Legislature. In the agencies, boards and commissions committee, for instance, if you are talking about a particular corporation or commission and you see a need to change its act, but the government cannot get it high enough on its priority list because, well, it's a minor matter or a matter of medium significance in the political realm, then it would give it an opportunity to clear away that particular matter and do that correction and get it done in this Legislature. It would give a constructive role to those members of this Legislature who are not cabinet ministers.
The only obligation the government would have would be to call that for second reading in this Legislature, and therefore it would not be necessary to call it for third reading. So if the government House leader, in a minority Parliament in particular, disagreed with the majority of the committee which had forced this process, then he would not have to call it for third reading.
I believe there is a real need for members of the Legislature who are not cabinet ministers to have a constructive role, and I don't think they can be expected or that a minister can expect them to take over the very high-profile issues or issues which are of huge significance. But I'm talking about small or medium-sized issues, if you want to call them that, in a political sense, which I believe would be a very progressive step for this Legislature.
In some ways that would give advantages to this Legislature, to members, which our American counterparts enjoy in the United States, whereby each and every individual member of their legislature has the opportunity to introduce legislation and have some real hope that he has been part and parcel of bringing a piece of legislation forward and having it passed into law. That's one suggestion that the member --
Hon Bud Wildman (Minister of Natural Resources and Minister Responsible for Native Affairs): You want more regulations.
Mr Sterling: We don't want more regulations. Some of the regulations which we have now don't serve us well, and some of them should be changed, and in some cases it might be the recommendation of a committee to delete a section of an act or to delete an act or to change a particular commission.
Anyway, I know it's a minor matter to cabinet ministers and I know it's a minor matter in terms of what the public might do, but one of the frustrations members in the back bench have is that they are always told what they're going to do or what the agenda is.
My experience with reports from committees is that governments, I don't think intentionally, take the report and put it on the shelf. They get the reports, and one of the rules which is deficient in this Legislature as well is that there is no obligation on the government House leader to ever call a debate on a report which is brought in here by a committee. So when members feel strongly that there is a law which they could change, which only they have had time to look at -- because, quite frankly, a lot of the matters you deal with in committee from time to time tend to be of a minor nature. In most cases, I'm sure members of the committees who represent the government side would go and consult with the minister and say: "Look, do you really mind? The committee, in dealing with this matter, has heard evidence and thinks the law should be changed."
This would be a cooperative kind of legislation to bring forward. Even though we might want to put in the rules that in bringing this bill forward, the committee Chairman would have the right to one sessional date of debate within perhaps 30 days of the introduction of that bill, I'm sure that in most cases a debate on a minor bill like this would take 10 or 15 minutes, as was the case in the two examples which I cited before.
That is one suggestion which I feel is very progressive. I'm not heartened by the response I'm getting from the government House leader. I don't think it's a great gamble for any government and, quite frankly, if this government doesn't do it and we are in a position to govern the next time, if we are fortunate like that, I would very much press my own party to bring in that kind of amendment to give not only members of the opposition a constructive role, but also those who sit in the back benches of the government.
Mr Bradley: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I think the member is straying off the topic of this resolution when he starts to lead into -- and I can tell he's coming to this -- the fact that the New Democratic Party is now going to accept donations from corporations. I don't think that's part of this debate.
The Speaker: I don't believe it's a point of order, but it certainly is of some interest to some people. The member for Carleton.
Mr Sterling: I do not believe it was all corporations; only small ones up to 500 employees. I was trying in this debate to be as non-partisan as I possibly could be.
Mr Noble Villeneuve (S-D-G & East Grenville): It's not easy.
Mr Sterling: It's not easy because this debate has been focused on a partisan debate because of the way it's been introduced. It's been introduced by one side and there haven't been any serious negotiations going on in good faith. These people over here talk about bargaining in good faith all of the time.
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Interjection.
Mr Sterling: Yes, these people, the government. They understand bargaining in good faith probably better than I do because of their closer association with the union movement, having gone through a fight many times, joining with unions involved in differences. I understand that bargaining in good faith is an extremely important principle that was part of the labour proposal, which I think has been dropped at this point in time, some more definitions to that. But bargaining in good faith means both sides are sitting down and saying: "Okay, let's negotiate new rules. Let's deal." You want this kind of power or you want this advantage, and then the other side would say, "We want some changes as well."
One of the changes we would like as well that we have put on the table is that up until this budget the government House leader has always called for budget debate. Because there were some disputes in this Legislature around the time when the government House leader introduced his budget, the government House leader said, "You aren't going to get any debate on the budget." So no debate on the budget. That was done unilaterally because he used the rules. That may be fair game.
Mr Conway: But they were at least allowed to read a budget.
Mr Sterling: They were allowed to read a budget, not like the former member for Brant-Haldimand who, when he came in here, was prevented from reading his budget and had to --
Mr Stockwell: Who prevented him?
Mr Sterling: Actually, it was the opposition of the day, the New Democratic Party, I believe. At any rate, we would like to see enshrined in the rules at least some limited time for budget debate. Even the government backbenchers might understand that when you're talking about one of the major documents, or the major document, in terms of the government's outlook for the coming year, a major fiscal document, the opposition should be given some opportunity to debate that, be it three or four days. I'm not certain what the exact time should be, but we would like to see that included in the standing orders.
There is another standing order we'd like to see amended. There was a matter which arose a couple of weeks ago when the government House leader tabled a motion in this Legislature and we did not become aware of it until late into Monday of the next week. That was because there was a significant amount of mixup on that late Thursday night, and the next day the orders for the day were not printed until late in the day and there were no pages around to deliver them to members' offices. Therefore the opposition found out about the government's intentions in his motion through the newspaper.
We don't believe that leads to good relationships within this Legislature. We don't believe that is the way the opposition parties should find out about the government's motions, and therefore we are asking the government to change the standing orders so that when the Clerk receives a motion, he notifies the other parties immediately of that motion once he has found it in order. I think that's a reasonable request to make and I think your government House leader may be agreeing to that particular suggestion.
Hon Mr Wildman: Very flexible.
Mr Sterling: Very flexible. Another suggestion we have put forward to the government House leader is with regard to supplementary questions by government backbenchers who are asking questions. We believe, Mr Speaker, that you should be given the discretion to disallow a supplementary question from a government backbencher -- and if they wanted to argue that it should be disallowed from opposition as well, other than leaders' questions, I might be willing to talk about that -- if the question were more suitably addressed in a ministerial statement. Therefore, if a member stands up in the Legislature, particularly from the government back bench and says, "Mr Minister, what is your program with regard to moose hunting licences," when the minister has 20 minutes each day in order to make statements, we don't understand why the time of question period should be used up for that.
I think government backbench members should know that it is only in this government that government backbenchers have taken up essentially every opportunity to ask a question when the rotation came to them. It is our feeling on this side that it's the right of every member to ask a question, particularly of the ministers, but we find it a little grating from time to time when those questions are even less than soft. They are questions which should really be covered off in the ministerial statements. We see it also as a ploy for a minister to avoid standing up and making a statement and giving the opposition the opportunity to respond to that statement.
Those are four suggestions that we have put forward to the government side and there are some other suggestions as well with regard to some of the rule changes which the government has put forward through the government House leader.
The first change which the government has suggested is that the House would sit three fewer weeks than under the current calendar. We don't necessarily like that because we don't get the opportunity in opposition to ask the government questions if we're not sitting here, so you can see, from the opposition standpoint that's a downer for us. But we recognize that there's some validity to that kind of a request, because in fact what seems to happen now is that there is precious little business done in this place, and the committees tend to get stacked up if the Legislature is cranking at its normal rate. While we find it strange that the government, when they were in opposition, was very much in favour of having longer sitting days, more time in the Legislature, we can see some reasons for that kind of change.
Another change they put forward is that the House would sit for two weeks in December instead of three. We don't really care that much about that particular change.
The government put forward an idea of having Monday or Tuesday evenings as sittings. I know the former member for Sudbury East would really agree with this with all his heart, because --
Mr Conway: To say nothing of Ross McClellan. Remember Ross on this subject? His best speeches: "anti-family."
Mr Sterling: At any rate, the reason we oppose this kind of amendment is that the whole idea of a calendar is so that each member in this Legislature can have some idea as to what he is going to do in the next week or the coming weeks or whatever it is. If the government wants to change its plans for Monday or Tuesday evening of any given week of the Legislature, you or I may have a constituency function or a meeting etc that we must go to. Those kinds of arrangements are made months in advance and we just don't feel that there should be an option to the government either to have a sitting on Monday or Tuesday evenings on fairly short notice or not.
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If they want to argue for evening sittings, fine and dandy. Let's argue about whether we want to have sittings on Monday nights. Some of the out-of-town members, particularly the member for Simcoe East, likes to sit at nights. He enjoyed 1981 to 1985 and sitting here in the evenings. I know the member for S-D-G & East Grenville is a long way from home and he doesn't mind sitting nights; that doesn't bother him.
If we need more legislative time, let's start sitting at 2 o'clock in the afternoon, if that's where we want to give up the time, because we always negotiate the time. The total hours are always part of the negotiations that go on. That's what happened the last time, when we moved the starting time from 2 o'clock back up to 1:30 pm. It will give us more time during the lunch hour to do business with people, to meet with people and to do all those kinds of things that we must do as politicians, and we can designate either Monday or Tuesday night that we're going to sit on.
I'm not that concerned about it. It doesn't bother me to sit from 8 pm to 10:30 pm if we think that would be more fruitful time. But let's not add a rule to the Legislature which in fact puts the option and then we don't know whether we're going to sit or we're not going to sit. The whole idea, as I said before with regard to a calendar, is to have some idea as to what's going to happen in our lives over a longer period of time so that we can plan, as we must, months in advance of the various meetings with the individuals whom we must meet with.
The next item that the government talked about was limiting members to 30-minute speeches in this House. Normally I don't have a problem with some kind of limitation on speakers. In fact, I want to tell the members of the House that when we went through the last negotiations on the standing orders, I suggested that we put into the standing orders that a member should be allowed to speak for 20 minutes, save and except that he could waive the rule at the beginning of a speech and he could say, "Mr Speaker, I'm going to require more than 20 minutes this evening in order to express my views on such and such." At least it would have been a lead toward members starting to think about giving speeches in a 20-minute block of time. The Liberals, who were then the government, agreed to it. It's not the greatest restriction in the world, but it's a little bit of a restriction. We agreed, but the New Democratic Party said, "No way are we ever going to stop the right of an individual to speak on end in this Legislature if he feels strongly about a particular matter."
Mr Kormos: Right on.
Mr Sterling: The member for Welland-Thorold, who has just said "right on," was a prime example when he spoke in this Legislature for 17 hours.
We are trying, as I say, to be constructive. We can agree with some of the things the government House leader has put forward. We have to have the ability of at least the first, maybe the second speaker, of the critic having the opportunity to speak at length, and therefore a restriction of 90 minutes is unreasonable, in our view.
Mr Speaker, I think the government House leader wants some assurance that he is going to be able to get to orders of the day each and every day. We don't consider that an unreasonable expectation. Therefore, in countering the government House leader's suggestion that some restrictions should be put on the total routine proceedings, we have suggested to him that he limit the amount of time for introduction of bills to 20 minutes, as he does in petitions, so that the maximum time we spend in here on bills would be 20 minutes. Therefore, there would be some assurance that the government House leader would in fact get to orders of the day. He would get to orders of the day even if bills were introduced. The only thing that would prevent him from getting to orders of the day would be points of order.
Perhaps the most significant change government House leader has talked about today is the time allocation motion. That is called "time allocation" by the government but is always called "closure" by the opposition.
To my knowledge, there are only two parliaments in this country which have time allocation motions written into their standing orders. One is in British Columbia and one is in the House of Commons. As I understand the time allocation motion in the House of Commons, it has been used relatively rarely, on few occasions, I believe, and it is balanced as well by the fact that the Senate has the opportunity to stall a bill on which the government is refusing to budge or move. So they have, through their Senate, a second chamber of sober thought.
Time allocation motions are also used in the British Parliament, anywhere from two to seven times each year, I understand, but they have never been used by the government until after the legislation has been in committee for a significant amount of time. So even though the majority governments in Britain have had time allocation motions, they have been very reluctant to utilize them, so I am told by the legislative research people here.
We are very, very much concerned about that. At present, if the government gets the floor, for instance, on this motion, they could say -- listen carefully, because I don't want you to think I'm saying it -- "Mr Speaker, I move to put the question." They could say that; I'm not saying that, okay?
That ends the debate; the motion is called and that just cuts the debate off. Mr Speaker, in our standing orders at present, you have been given the discretion either to allow the government to put that question or you can say that there hasn't been the opportunity for adequate debate. The government seeks to take away that discretion from you. Basically they want to be able to cut off debate even if the Liberal opposition has spoken for five minutes, for instance, on a bill. If we had spoken for five minutes, the government could then stand up and move the closure motion.
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We don't like that, as you can well imagine. We think that particular discretion has not been badly misused by you or previous speakers. When the government has moved closure, in most cases it has been granted that. We don't understand, quite frankly, why the government needs to take this discretion away from the Speaker.
One of the downfalls of the standing orders in my view is that the Speaker perhaps is not given enough discretion to run this place, so we have tried, like the people of Canada are trying in their Constitution, to nail everything down in writing. They're trying to figure out each and every kind of circumstance that can arise, and then they're trying either to tie the hands of the opposition or to gain more power in the government. So successive governments are now going through changing this standing order or that standing order to deal with whatever they view as the problem of the day in terms of getting their legislative agenda on or going down the road as they would like.
I mentioned before that one of the things I would like to see is giving you some discretion in terms of supplementary questions, even if at the very first it deals only with government members. They may not like that, but I think that question period as seen by the public is generally an opposition exercise. We don't want to limit government members from asking questions of the minister, but we think they're abusing it at this time. That's our opinion.
Interjections.
Mr Sterling: I can't force the members of the opposition to listen to this very important debate, but I think they should understand that the precedent that's being set by the present Premier and his House leader with regard to this change in rules doesn't live only for them. If another party should ever get over there -- and it's going to happen as sure as I'm standing here that some other party is going to be elected there, be it the next election or two or three elections from now. But government members and backbenchers should understand that the next government is going to have the precedent of dealing with changes of rules in this, I would say, unilateral and draconian manner that has never been known to this Legislature until this past week. They're going to give governments which want to ram legislation through here very extreme powers. All you will have to get is a leader of a party -- and I don't think Mr Rae is this draconian -- who wants to ram legislation through here at an unprecedented rate with no public debate, with no chance for public input. These rules, as they are proposed, will allow him to do that. They will be able to pass legislation here; they will be able to pass hundreds of bills every year.
Mr Conway: If I had had these rules for the school bill, I could've really had some fun.
Mr Sterling: Yes, we could've had some fun.
Mr Speaker, you know your counterpart in the House of Commons has a significant amount of discretion in dealing particularly with question period. For instance, when a member puts a question in the Legislature, the Speaker has the right to either allow or disallow the supplementary question. Quite frankly, I think our question period would move along a lot quicker if you were given that kind of discretion. I would think that members would have to get their questions off quicker, that ministers would have to respond in a more meaningful way than they do at the present time, and that every time a government member or an opposition member asked a question which was dragging on and on, you would be able, in a sense of fairness, to say, "Well, Mr MPP, you've taken more of the time than is reasonable for other members of the Legislature." I would really like to see some serious discussion with regard to that as well.
I don't mind debating in this Legislature, but I'm having a very difficult time concentrating on my notes, because all of the government members are talking with each other, Mr Speaker.
The Speaker: The member for Carleton makes a valid point. There are a number of private conversations in the chamber which perhaps could better be held outside of the chamber to allow the member for Carleton to continue with his remarks.
Mr Sterling: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I understand that people want to talk with each other in the Legislature and I understand that some of the stuff may be repetitive and it is boring for people who don't understand the rules or don't understand what the balance of power in this Legislature is about. They don't understand the need to protect the institution before they protect their own self-interest. What is happening here is that we have a government which is not interested in protecting the parliamentary institution. They are interested in labour law and see as an end the change of the institution.
Mr Speaker, I don't care what piece of legislation this government or any future government brings to this Legislature. I believe, and I think you know that I believe, Mr Speaker, that maintaining the balance of power and the usefulness of this Legislature and the usefulness of this institution is more important to the people of Ontario than a Conservative agenda, than a Liberal agenda or, obviously, more than an NDP agenda. The institution itself deserves defending, and that is what we are forced to do by the government House leader and Bob Rae. They are trying to "rape" this institution by the taking of unilateral power to ram legislation through this place at an unprecedented rate.
What is very upsetting to us who have sat through the previous Parliament is the total change in attitude by the experienced members of this Legislature. I would have thought that Bud Wildman and Ruth Grier and Mr Pouliot would go to Dave Cooke and said, "You know, I understand our frustration, but surely, surely you've got to negotiate."
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Interjection.
Mr Sterling: Well, there goes "Shirley" now.
Having gone through four or five years in negotiation with the other parties when they sat on opposite sides of this floor, I cannot understand particularly the New Democratic Party wanting to give any government the kind of powers they are seeking. I can't understand that, because they've got to know -- they're only at 30% in the polls now, and the Liberals are higher than them, and we're almost neck and neck with them, even though we have an unpopular federal Parliament -- that their chances next time are somewhat limited. "Somewhat limited" is perhaps being kind. If they change the rules for us -- or for them -- they're going to be sitting over here with their hands tied. They're not going to be able to do anything. They won't be able to get us to change our minds, they won't be able to get us to listen to their arguments --
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
Mr Sterling: What is the point of debate if you can't make the government listen to you? How do you make the government listen to you? There's only one way, and that's either to delay or threaten delay. The government is clearly trying to cut off the opposition's opportunity to cause that kind of delay.
Governments in the past have managed to deal with oppositions. The former Liberal government managed to deal with the opposition. The former Conservative government for 42 years managed to deal with the opposition. Somehow this government, a year and a half after they're into power, can no longer deal with the opposition.
Mr Chiarelli: Because they're paranoid.
Mr Sterling: I think the member for Ottawa West is right. They are paranoid, and I think they're incompetent in terms of what they're bringing forward. The Premier is shaking his head, but I can only point to the pieces of legislation we have to deal with: The Minister of Housing's bill had 250 amendments to it. Bill 121 had 250 amendments to it. The health consent legislation had 199 amendments. Bill 150, which dealt with the investment bill of the Legislature and the employee buyout, had 51 sections and had 49 amendments to it. The Sunday retail shopping law which we had last year not only had amendments to it, the amendments didn't even make it. The law was scrapped in eight months.
The question of getting legislation before this Legislature to be debated for a reasonable period, before going to committee and being debated for a reasonable amount of time, is not a problem we've created. The problem has been created over there on the government's benches, because each piece of legislation they bring forward is fraught with mistakes. Often it doesn't seem to be clear as to what they're trying to do or not do with regard to their legislation, and the investment legislation was a prime example of that.
We are as frustrated as they are. We don't like to sit around here in the Legislature and be negative all the time. We want to be constructive in terms of fixing up government legislation. We have shown that on Bills 74, 108, 109 and 110. The government has given us all kinds of opportunity to deep-six that legislation. We have had all kinds of opportunity. In the justice committee on those bills, on which I have sat, we have had about 150 groups come in --
Interjection: How many?
Mr Sterling: One hundred and fifty, and out of 150, I think there were about five or six that were in favour, 145 against. What kind of an opportunity is that? The opposition could have sat there and said, "Why don't you just ditch this legislation?" In fact, I think the government was considering that. But no, the opposition didn't say, "Ditch the legislation." We said: "Let's try to fix it up. Let's listen to the groups," and the government came forward with 200 amendments.
It's complicated legislation, and in that one I'm glad they brought in 200 amendments; that was fine. But I think they have to admit, when they have to amend legislation to that degree, that maybe they didn't listen closely enough at the first blush. Maybe they didn't consult with the people who are going to be affected by the consent legislation. All 24 health care providers, as recognized under our health professions legislation, were against the legislation.
I think the member has a problem back there. He's got his hand up.
Mr Stockwell: Yes, you can go.
Mr Villeneuve: Washroom? Go ahead.
Mr Sterling: We have a lot of debate to carry on with regard to the standing orders. I have not yet started to discuss this committee's report in 1985, because there are still some good suggestions with regard to some of the things we considered some five or six years ago. Basically, I think I'd like to hear from some members of the back bench of the government. I'd like to hear what their ideas are so they can make their lives more meaningful as MPPs.
I've sat on a lot of committees in this Legislature and I have found --
Mr Mills: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: The member has said he'd like to hear of something from me or some of our members. How many times is a member allowed to repeat the same gibberish without you calling him to order? This is the same thing for hours and hours, and the people who are watching this must be thinking we've all gone mad here. This is absolutely ridiculous, and it's time to get on with the business of the House.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
Mr Elston: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I cannot let the member for Durham East speak in those tones about getting on with the business of the House when I, as House leader for the official opposition, have day after day offered to go ahead with dealing with legislation, and they won't call their legislation. If the honourable member for Durham Eastwishes to get on with the business, all he needs to do is ask his House leader to call some bills and we will be at it. I believe we can be out of this place by very early next week if they would just call their legislation, but they refuse us.
The Speaker: The member for Carleton, experienced member that he is, will recognize that repetition during the debates is not something that is appreciated. But the member can continue with his remarks.
Mr Sterling: I'm sure the member for Durham East would like to talk about waste disposal sites. I'm sure the member for Durham East would like to talk about a number of matters. But the member for Durham East doesn't realize what the Premier of Ontario is doing with regard to these changes in rules. He's hijacking this place. The member for Durham East should understand that the Premier is going to be able to run this place out of the corner office, and you or I or any other member of this Legislature is going to have nothing to say about it. That is what is being tried in this Legislature, and that's why we are upset in this party. That's why the opposition is upset. We find it most distasteful that this government continues to insist on its agenda for changes to rules without any consultation with the opposition parties. We find that totally against all tradition in this place. To my knowledge, it's not happened in 125 years. I know it hasn't happened in the last 15 years. And with that, I will adjourn the debate.
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The Speaker: I'm sorry. The member's motion is not in order, having moved the adjournment of the debate previously.
Mr Sterling: Mr Speaker, I then move to adjourn the House.
The Speaker: That motion is in order. Mr Sterling moves the adjournment of the House. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?
All those in favour will please say "aye."
All those opposed will please say "nay."
In my opinion the nays have it.
Call in the members; a 30-minute bell.
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The Speaker: Would all members take their seats, please. Mr Sterling moved the adjournment of the House. All those in favour of Mr Sterling's motion should please rise and remain standing until the count is completed.
You may be seated.
All opposed to Mr Sterling's motion should please rise and remain standing until the count is completed.
You may be seated.
All members who are present in the chamber at the time when a vote is being taken are required to vote, and a vote must be cast either for or against.
Mr Elston: On that point, we understand our obligation to vote in this House at particular times. We were under the impression, I guess, that certain arrangements had been made, that certain commitments had been arrived at, and as a result the member for Carleton moved the adjournment of the debate around 11:30 of the clock as we understood the arrangement to have been.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
Mr Elston: I wish to register in the strongest terms possible our concern that these --
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order.
Mr Elston: I think it's not worthwhile, Mr Speaker.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order. The House leader for the opposition has the opportunity to complete his remarks.
Mr Elston: No, I think it's not worth the time.
The Speaker: I regret to inform the members that under our standing orders all members who are present in the House are required to vote either for or against. I would ask the members of the opposition to so indicate either their support or lack of support for the motion that was proposed by the member for Carleton. The member for Bruce places the Speaker in a very awkward position.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order. Members are obliged by the rules to cast a vote and if the members do not cast a vote they will be --
Interjections.
The Speaker: I'm sorry, the members are then out of order. I would ask the House leader for the official opposition to very seriously consider that if a vote is not cast then the members are out of order, and you know where that leads: to being named.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Would the member resume his seat. It being beyond 12 of the clock, this House stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock tomorrow.
The House adjourned at 0002.