Hon. Sharon Carstairs:

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to the second report of the Standing Committee on Rules, Procedures and the Rights of Parliament. I thank honourable senators for allowing this to remain adjourned in my name during the week before the break. I was not well and am still not well, so let me apologize for not being as articulate as this item deserves. However, I do not like to see items remain overly long on the Order Paper, particularly those in my name. Therefore, I will give it my best effort.

Honourable senators, matters of privilege are among the most, if not the most, important issues to come before us. The privileges of a senator and/or a member of the other place are fundamental to our democratic system. In my role as chair, and past chair of the Inter-Parliamentary Union's Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians, I deal with over 300 cases of parliamentarians who have essentially lost those privileges. They have been murdered, kidnapped or imprisoned; they have disappeared from the face of the earth; or, in lesser ways, they have had their privileges taken from them outright or had them significantly diminished. This is certainly led me to a heightening interested in the importance of parliamentary privilege.

Honourable senators, I have also experienced being the lone member of my party in the legislature of the Province of Manitoba, where it was often far too easy for other members to ignore my rights in favour of their own. For example, the rule in Manitoba at that time was that, if the two whips of the other two parties of the house decided that the bells could stop ringing, they simply brought their members into the chamber and ordered the bells to stop. If I had left the chamber as they had all left, and I was sitting in my office when they would walk into the chamber and announce that the bells had or should cease. This denied me the opportunity to cast my vote.

Fortunately, a back-bench Progressive Conservative member, recognizing this was unfair, would warn me when his party was leaving their caucus room and heading for the chamber, thereby allowing me to leave my office and go to the chamber and cast my vote.

It is in the context of these experiences that I speak today. In 1991, there was a significant change made to the Rules of the Senate of Canada with the introduction of rule 43. This rule prescribed clearly how a matter of privilege could be raised. The new rule did not receive full agreement in this chamber because it gave the Speaker a new role. The late Senator Royce Frith said:

In my submission, that is the rule governing the procedure for points and questions of privileges in the Senate. The whole concept of a role for the Speaker is foreign to their place and is a role that takes place in the other House. It is clear that the Rules Committee has decided — and the Senate has agreed and has had as part of its rules for a long time — that questions of privilege are dealt with in the Senate in accordance with rule 33. They are dealt with by senators and I do not believe that the Speaker should be called upon to talk about prima facie cases, as he is called upon in the House of Commons and in some other legislatures. I know, from have spoken to Senator Ottenheimer, that that is the case in the Newfoundland Legislature and I know that is so in other legislatures, but not in the Senate. The Senate has dealt with these situations not through Beauchesne, not through anybody else's customs, but through our own black and white rules.

I am in full agreement with Senator Frith. I do not believe there should be a rule for the Speaker in matters of privilege, particularly when the members of this place do not choose the Speaker. The prime minister chooses the Speaker in the Senate. While we have been generally well served, particularly by the incumbent, I object to the principle that the Speaker should determine a prima facie case. I believe it is our role as senators to make that determination.

This proposed rule change would, in my view, further erode our powers as senators. It would delete rule 59, which allows a motion from the floor; a motion approved or disapproved by senators without a role for the Speaker.

The argument that has been made in this and previous reports is that rule 59 is redundant; it should have been excised in 1991. It is simply an oversight. Honourable senators, I find this very difficult to believe.

The Rules Committee of the day, under the leadership of former Senator Brenda Robertson, was thorough. They made changes; Senator Robertson was a very detailed person and I find it difficult to believe it was a simple oversight. What disturbs me more is there appears to be no attempt to hear from those who were in this place at that time — and there are many still in this chamber — who could speak to the matter. We seem to have simply accepted the fact that something that existed should not have existed, but that is something that has never been proven.

Honourable senators, there was only one meeting of this committee in this session, despite the fact there were five new members of the committee, many of whom were also new to this place and therefore with little experience of matters of privilege. I am a member of this committee but, regrettably, I was giving a speech on the Special Senate Committee on Aging in Toronto the day of the meeting. Had I known this matter would be dealt with in only one session, I would have asked for a postponement or submitted a brief along the lines of today's remarks.

Honourable senators, this is our chamber. Matters of privilege are our responsibility. Each senator should be engaged in the process.

Honourable senators, therefore, I move that this report be not now adopted but that it be referred back to the Standing Committee on Rules, Procedures and the Rights of Parliament for further study and debate.

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