René Villemure

[Privilege, May 27th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent for his pearls of wisdom. It is always appreciated. He demonstrated through his argument that the legitimacy is not there, that the confidence is not there, and he suggested that the Speaker can use his wisdom and make the only choice left to make.

Now, if he does not want to make that choice, what should we do then?

[Privilege, May 27th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, it is not easy being the Speaker. It is not easy to be impartial. It is not easy to strive for neutrality. It is a hard thing to do, and that is why the position has such high-level requirements.

Although our constituents are not interested in day-to-day debate, I would say that this affects them a great deal because it affects the House, which is not working well.

Therefore, as my colleague said, I believe that the Speaker was unable to show that he had what it takes.

[Privilege, May 27th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, things that happened outside the House nevertheless affected the Speaker's legitimacy to sit in the House. This is serious because, once again, the Chair is an important position that demands the most exemplary conduct. It is not a good look if the Speaker lacks legitimacy.

We are not the only ones who asked the Speaker to resign. Quite a few members here have done so. I realize that it may not be the majority, but even one is too many. When one person believes that the Speaker lacks legitimacy, that sends a message. When there are 100, that sends another message, and so on.

Even though the incidents occurred outside the House, I believe that the Speaker's legitimacy has been completely undermined. The conclusion is obvious.

[Privilege, May 27th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Winnipeg North. I love to hear him speak, by the way. I feel he needs to know that.

The Conservative and Liberal members may have different motives in this case. In response to my colleague, yes, this latest oversight was the Liberal Party's fault, and it was acknowledged as such. Not every injury is fatal. There were two previous incidents. Then there are all the little, daily incidents that are not deadly sins but that still smack of partisanship.

I like the member for Hull-Aylmer. I have worked with him a lot, but I just do not think he is the right person for the job. I would think he is unhappy in this job too, because it cannot be easy being challenged like this every day.

Again, perhaps the solution is a serious dose of introspection coupled with a fairly firm invitation from our side to leave. I value the position enough to ask the Speaker to leave.

[Privilege, May 27th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot.

Today is a sad day, because we cannot help but be disappointed. I will read part of the motion that was moved. It states, and I quote:

That the Speaker's ongoing and repetitive partisan conduct outside of the Chamber is a betrayal of the traditions and expectations of his office and a breach of trust required to discharge his duties and responsibilities, all of which this House judges to be a serious contempt and, therefore, declares that the office of Speaker shall be vacated effective immediately...

That is serious. We are not trying to figure out how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. This is something extremely important. The role of the Speaker of the House is the highest office in the House, so the Speaker must be beyond reproach.

For some time now, I have been hearing that the Speaker made a mistake, that these things happen. I think it could be x, y or z. The key word in the motion is “trust”. What is trust? It is the ability to rely on someone else, and I will add without having to check constantly. Trust is an element of faith. Members should have faith in the Speaker. Unfortunately, that is not the case.

One mistake can happen. Three mistakes is a pattern. It is not the same thing. We have to be careful. Unfortunately, I believe that the Speaker did not understand what his role entailed. I think he wanted to take up the role and he is happy to be in it. However, I do not think he understood. We are talking about comprehension. I would like to provide a bit of background. I love to play with words. The word “comprehension” comes from the Latin “comprehendere”, which means to grasp the whole situation. I do not think the Speaker has been able to grasp all that he is. His vision is a little narrow. He sees part of the whole situation, the partisan part. Having worked with the member for Hull—Aylmer on the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, I can attest that partisanship is part of his terms of reference.

Members will not be surprised to learn that the Bloc Québécois is going to ask the Speaker to step down. We have not had any confidence in the Speaker since December. This is nothing new. Despite the fact that most members of the House are actively contesting them, the Speaker continues to make decisions that show a lack of impartiality and neutrality. Neutrality is rather demanding concept, but we should at least be able to expect the Speaker to be impartial. In this case, impartiality is the ability to choose for the common good. Unfortunately, we do not think that the Speaker has that quality.

We are talking about repeated errors. Let us make a distinction between three different words that deal with the same thing. What is a mistake? A mistake produces an unintentional result. If someone is following a path and takes a wrong turn and gets lost, they can backtrack and find their way again. That is fine. People can make mistakes once. It can happen once.

There is a difference between a mistake and an error. An error is when someone should have known. In these cases, the Speaker should have known. A person cannot be Speaker and assume that they can attend a function wearing their Speaker's robes without sending an implied message. That person cannot assume that a partisan message like the one recently sent by the Speaker does not have any consequences. They cannot do that. That would be an error.

There are things that are more serious than a mistake, like negligence. Negligence is when someone should have known better, but did not bother to know. They did not pay enough attention to know what they should have known. It is like saying that a doctor acknowledged symptoms, but did nothing about them. That is negligence. The Speaker's repeated negligence bothers me. As an ethicist, I am bothered by this. I believe that the Speaker, our supreme adjudicator, collectively brings us to make the right choices, to be guided the right way. Currently, because of the lack of trust, we are uncertain. The lack of trust turns into mistrust. Then we look at all of the Speaker's actions and we wonder if he is in the right place, on the right side. Mistrust does not make for a good environment. It is something that makes us too prone to looking at and questioning every action. We cannot doubt the Speaker's decisions every day.

I pay close attention to the Speaker's actions, and I find him extremely partisan. Some of his decisions are a bit hard to take. I am not saying that all of his decisions are partisan, I am saying that none of them should be. He is just not quite up to the task.

It always makes me smile when I hear him address members as his colleagues. A Speaker has no colleagues. The people under his authority are not his colleagues. His inability to elevate himself is exactly the problem. I am not blaming him for being partisan, but a person cannot be partisan and be Speaker at the same time. There is no overlap between the two roles. Depending on the circumstances, this would be a mistake, an error or negligence.

If we cannot trust the Speaker, or if we distrust the Speaker, what happens next? Distrust leads to defiance. Defiance is precisely what creates trouble, being unable to accept authority and then going a little overboard to compensate for too much partisanship. The issue at the centre of our debate is trust, or should I say, a lack of trust, which leads to defiance and, in turn, worsens an already tense situation.

I repeat that the Speaker holds the highest office and must therefore be beyond reproach. If I were in his shoes, I would be questioning myself when I stood in front of a mirror. I would be wondering if I were the right person for the job. I have a great deal of respect for the role of Speaker. It is a very important position, but one needs to be better prepared.

Earlier, my colleague from Salaberry—Suroît was saying that someone who holds the position of Deputy Speaker of the House may be in a better position to fulfill all the duties that come with the position. I think it is difficult to take someone who is very partisan, which is nothing to be ashamed of, and make them Speaker overnight. I can understand being partisan, but that is incompatible with the role of Speaker.

I think that the Speaker should make the only choice he has left, since his first choices were not very good, and decide himself to step down.

[Official Languages, May 23rd, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, that is laughable.

The federal government is the worst employer in Quebec when it comes to protecting French. Coincidentally, it is the main employer in the Gatineau region. Between 2016 and 2021, the proportion of Gatineau residents working mainly in French went from 77% to 62%. That is a 17% drop in just four years.

We are talking about the ridings of Gatineau, Hull—Aylmer, Pontiac, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, all four represented by Liberal members. Their public service is the worst workplace for French in Quebec. Coincidentally, French is declining everywhere, and more so in Gatineau than elsewhere.

Instead of protecting their colleagues at the APF, will they protect francophones in Gatineau?

[Official Languages, May 23rd, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the minister's correction.

To protect a Liberal who denies the decline of French in Quebec, the Liberals are taking responsibility for the decline of the APF. I could not make this stuff up. That is not all they are responsible for, though. All those new French language enthusiasts at the APF must have read the report released by the Office québécois de la langue française yesterday. Guess which sector has the lowest proportion of workers using French most often in Quebec workplaces? The federal public service.

The Liberals are the primary drivers of workplace anglicization in Quebec. When will they stop driving the decline of French?

[Official Languages, May 23rd, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, let us get back to the case of the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell.

To prevent him from being sacked as chair of the association des parlementaires de la francophonie, the Liberals infiltrated the organization. They signed up in droves, swelling the number of Liberals from 25 to 112, including a whole bunch of unilingual anglophones. For the first time, the APF had to send out an agenda in English. It even had to bring in interpreters for the unilingual English-speaking Liberals suddenly enamoured with the French language.

Do the Liberals realize that, in order to protect their colleagues in the APF, they are literally anglicizing it?

[Bernard Pivot, May 7th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, it is a sad day for all lovers of the French language, because celebrated author and television host Bernard Pivot passed away yesterday.

As host of the TV show Apostrophes and its later iteration Bouillon de culture, he was a enlivening force in French cultural life for decades and helped cement French as the literary language of choice.

His all-encompassing curiosity made him the ultimate embodiment of a cultural, global and pluralistic francophonie. At home, his enthusiastic support for Quebec authors did not go unnoticed.

Bernard Pivot also succeeded in taking dictation exercises, often considered as popular as a trip to the dentist, and turning them into a social phenomenon. He taught us to love French in all its complexity and complications. Year after year, he would seek out hard-to-spell words like “sot-l'y-laisse” and “anacoluthe” to create an obstacle course that was as fun and playful as Bernard Pivot himself.

Mr. Pivot, on behalf of the French language, thank you. What a tragic loss for us.

[Democratic Institutions, May 6th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the Hogue commission report also exposes the Prime Minister's and the Liberal Party's irresponsible attitude toward Chinese interference.

The report confirms that as early as 2019, the Prime Minister was duly informed of irregularities in the nomination in Don Valley North. The report specifies, on page 137, the Prime Minister's reasons for not withdrawing his candidate from the election. Among the reasons, we learned that “the [Liberal Party] expected to win [Don Valley North]”. In other words, the Prime Minister does not care if there is interference as long as the Liberal Party is winning.

Should democracy come before partisanship?