Mr. Grafftey:

That was 13 years ago. There has been lack of real consultation. Look at how this bill was introduced into the House. It was barely mentioned in the Speech from the Throne. Nothing was ready. After a long, long recess we came to the floor of the House of Commons. Obviously, no significant legislation was ready. I can just see the cabinet meeting last week "Somebody produce something". The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Abbott) said he had something kind of ready. Therefore, last Thursday we were informed we would deal with second reading of a fairly important bill. It may turn out to be a paper tiger, but I will call it important at this stage. Our House leader was advised that it would be given second reading today.

Aren't you ready?

Mr. Grafftey:

I am not like the socialists. We examine things a little more. We do not have this Pavlovian gut reaction to everything. This bill was presented to the House on the valid assumption and I sincerely think it was a valid assumption that the opposition really wanted to help in making this kind of legislation better and making a constructive contribution. I say to the minister, is this really the way to conduct government business?

To get into some of the specific interests of the bill-

Hear, hear!

Mr. Grafftey:

The minister said that he consulted the provincial authorities. Has he ever heard of property and civil rights? With regard to some of the disclosure provisions, some of the unwarranted interest rate provisions, I really wonder if some of the officials or some of the members of the government have studied constitutional law at all. We on this side of the House hope that the pitfall has been avoided.

I listened with great interest to the question put by the hon. member for Edmonton West. I am concerned about some of the constitutional provisions in the bill, certainly in the province of Quebec, which would involve property and civil rights. In other provinces there are other considerations. I ask the minister whether he has read the Saskatchewan brief on this whole matter. Frankly, from reading the bill and some of the provisions in it I doubt whether there has been real consultation with the provincial authorities vis-a-vis the constitutionality of it.

November 1, 1976

Maybe I am not up to date with respect to some of my legal principles, but I always thought that no matter what we said here in the House of Commons, it was a long-standing principle of law that it was incumbent on the plaintiff to prove his case. The minister will surely have to prove his case to us both in the House and in committee. No doubt the law is fraught with exceptions to the general rule, but I rather doubt that this is one of them.

I see all kinds of difficulties from a practical as well as from a legalistic point of view about asking the defendant to prove his case, as now seems to be proposed. 1 always thought it was a principle of law that innocence was presumed until the contrary was proved. Some of the thinking behind this provision is certainly foreign to me. I note the minister has expressed the hope that there will not be much litigation as a result of this bill. But where litigation does arise, it will come before courts under provincial jurisdiction whose judges will have the last say as to who is going to prove what, how and where. Seriously, I wonder to what extent the provinces have been consulted in relation to this bill. When we get into committee, and later on in the debate, the minister will certainly be called upon to allay our fears on this point.

The hon. gentleman has already stated that the first purpose of the bill is to protect Canadian borrowers-

Five o'clock.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Turner):

It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the questions to be raised at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Hargrave)-Agriculture- Beef-Request for restriction of imports; the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie)-Government administration-Possibility of moving part of Veterans Affairs to Prince Edward Island; the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Neil)- Industry-Toho lead and zinc refinery.

It being five o'clock, the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper, namely, notices of motions (papers), private bills and public bills.

Changes in Standing Orders

Mr. Robert McCleave (Halifax-East Hants) moved:

That, this House do modify its Standing Orders and practices, to the end that it bring its affairs more closely into conformity with modern (that is, acceptable mid-20th century expectations), by

1. Cutting by one-half the time limits for speeches where such time-limits are set forth in Standing Orders;

2. Setting up a committee composed of members of all parties, and of members of the parliamentary press Gallery-each component to number seven-which shall supervise the rules to govern the recording by instruments capable of radio broadcasting and of telecasting of the proceedings of this House and of any committee or other recognized entity thereof, and the public use thereof;

3. Providing that the rules for the so-called late show, or adjournment debate, be altered to provide for the participation of five instead of three, and that the Speaker have absolute discretion to extend the time for reply by up to three minutes;

4. Providing that no member of this chamber shall have to wait for recognition by the Chair for longer than three oral question periods if that member has risen in each of such three consecutive question periods, such question and recognition by the occupant of the Chair to be recognized upon the request of such member at the conclusion of the third such period;

5. Providing that the government through its House leader may designate up to six measures per session for consideration and disposition by legislation where such proposals reflect these principles:

(a) an amendment to existing legislation which shall incorporate not more than one major change, the final opinion in any dispute to be that of Mr. Speaker;

(b) the government does not propose to amend such legislation in any other manner in that calendar year without unanimous consent;

(c) the speeches by the mover and the designated replier for each party shall not exceed fifteen minutes, and by subsequent spokesmen of not more than five minutes;

6. Setting at five the number of those who may oppose unanimous consent to any motion made in this chamber.

He said: Mr. Speaker, these are six ideas, and any other member of the House could, I imagine, present six alternative ideas of equal validity for the reform of our practices and procedures. I framed my motion in such a way as to directly develop interest among hon. members. I think this afteroon we shall have the privilege of welcoming back an old friend into the debate, making his maiden speech as a backbencher. I refer to the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Sharp).

Hear, hear!

Mr. McCleave:

I will say simply that I hope when the committee on procedure is reconstituted he will be in his place at the head of the table. He has done a thoroughly excellent job in that committee.

Mr. Speaker, were this a gathering of physicians it would be inappropriate that somebody should die of a cold, and this being a gathering of parliamentarians I do not think it would be appropriate if I talked the motion to death and used up all the time allotted to me. I have 20 minutes, and I am going to try to make my contribution in ten, thus leading up to the very

November 1, 1976

Changes in Standing Orders

first point that I make, to cut by one half the time limit for speeches in this chamber, the exception being the "late show".

I don't know how you can make do with much less than four minutes in presenting a case, with three minutes for reply, but everything else I would chop in two. As for supplementaries during the question period, what I would do to those who ask them goes beyond anything I should like to state to the Elouse now.

The first point, then, is an obvious one. I do not regard it as a major cure for procedural ills, though. I think that means restoring debate in committee of the whole. However, that is rather too large an idea to put forward in a motion such as I am presenting this afternoon. The second point calls for a committee composed of members of all parties and of members of the parliamentary press gallery to solve the problems of broadcasting and telecasting. Perhaps this is not generally known, but our sound system is such that all the radio correspondents we have in the gallery-there aren't any there now, I guess; we have the usual lone minion from Canadian Press, God bless him-could, at the start of the day, if they were given the authority, plug into our sound system and questions and answers could be sent forth immediately to a waiting public.

It would not take very much to bring that about. What it would take is unanimous agreement by everyone in this chamber. I do not intend to scout the idea at any greater length, except to say that I can see disputes ahead. I can see misuse in certain quarters of facilities for broadcasting the proceedings of the House. I know there is some suspicion on the floor of this chamber as to what might happen if broadcasts from the chamber were left, without any check or balance whatsoever, to the mercy of some people who pass for journalists in this country. So this is a way of giving some protection at least to members.

A week ago I was listening to a program called "Here Today" out of my own CBC station in Halifax. In this one-hour program, this is what I was fed as an innocent bystander. First, a speech by Mr. Mitchell of the Liberal cabinet in Halifax. Then a speech by none other than the Liberal premier of Nova Scotia. Then a speech by somebody from the other place-but, again, a Liberal. The fourth one- and here we get to the national scene-was the Minister of Fisheries and the Environment (Mr. LeBlanc). Next was the Prime Minister of the country (Mr. Trudeau). That was Liberal number five. He was followed by the parliamentary secretary to the minister who speaks on urban affairs every day except Monday. He got in there as number six. Finally, the prime minister of Quebec, Mr. Bourassa, got in there: That made seven Liberals.

The leavening of political virginity in this one-hour program came in the form of the Premier of Saskatchewan who happens to belong to the NDP. No other political party need have applied. From the party to my far left and my own particular party there was not one person who said anything that day which could find a place on that program in Halifax. It was an almost incredible turn of events. Eight voice clips, and not one

of them from the official opposition, not one of them from the Creditiste party. It was a most shameful abuse by a handful of people posturing as trying to present an objective picture of the news. The only honourable exception I would make is that the weather forecast had no political slant and I thought the sports program was rather well presented.

When something like that is happening, you know as a member of parliament that if you allow a very large machine such as a television camera to come into this place, there must be some mechanism by means of which a member of parliament can voice his displeasure at the way in which the editors are using their material if he feels he is being mistreated.

I turn, now, to point number three, concerning the "late show". I think the "late show" is the best thing to have happened in this parliament for ten years by way of reform. I would simply extend the three units to five, so that anybody who has a grievance would not be obliged to wait around for a long time but could be heard quickly.

The fourth point concerns the problem of recognition by the Chair during the question period. This is something which often bothers members. It may surprise my listeners on the government side, but there are a number of us on this side of the House who do have this difficulty. In my own case, I think I am as tall as the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) and we weigh about the same, but I can remember one occasion when he was recognized four times running in the course of a single question period, and I was not recognized at all. I do not think this was because I failed to catch the eye of the Speaker, but I think the hon. member for Calgary North was perhaps a little more adept at catching the Speaker's ear. My proposal is that anybody who is persistent for three consecutive days should have his moment in the sun at least at the end of the third question period.

My fifth point is one which I consider to be important. I share the concern of many about the pace, or lack of pace, at which business is done in this chamber. What I am suggesting is a method of dealing with what I call good housekeeping legislation, much of which arises out of decisions of courts which seems to be at variance with what we in parliament thought we had done when we passed certain legislation. My proposal would offer a quick way, for example, of amending the divorce legislation without holding up every aspect of it, whether relevant or not, for debate in this chamber.

Some day we shall have to adopt my suggestion, or a suggestion of a similar nature, if the necessary amount of legislation is to pass through this chamber. I suggest that if we fail to take such measures, the device of taking action by way of order in council, regulations and the like will increasingly become standard procedure, which again removes us one step further from parliamentary control. I therefore suggest that whether this be the formula or something else be the formula, some thought has to be given to good housekeeping procedure, so I have set it forth. My final point is that if unanimous consent is required, it can be resisted but it would take five people to do so. This would end the present abuse of one or two members who would stand together until hell freezes over,

November 1, 1976

resisting anything sensible which was being suggested in the House about prolonging debate or doing something when unanimous consent was required.

May I say, finally, Mr. Speaker, how much I appreciate the fact that as a result of the draw I had the opportunity to make this subject number one on the list of private members' motions. I am sure it will not be the last dealing with procedure in our chamber. I anxiously await the speeches which will be made on the subject this afternoon, including that of the newly-discovered backbencher, the hon. member for Eglinton.

Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Eglinton):

Mr. Speaker, this is a day of beginnings for me. Today I asked my first question of the ministry, in the House of Commons and now I am making my first speech as a backbencher. I find both these duties quite congenial and I intend to continue to harass the government and participate in debate.

I begin by commending the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave) for his initiative in sponsoring this motion. The hon. member has a well-earned reputation in this House for impartiality and fairness. His work as the co-chairman of the joint committee on statutory instruments is well known and quite outstanding. Personally, 1 appeared before that committee on a number of occasions in my previous ministerial capacity as president of the privy council and have always been greatly stimulated by the cross-examination to which I was subjected. I look forward particularly to the conclusions of that committee, and hope that the co-chairman will urge his co-members to bring in a report as soon as possible on that vexed question of access to documents. I am sure the government will be waiting anxiously to see what advice the committee offers.

The hon. member is also a member of the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization and has participated in the debates there. The motion before the House is, therefore, more than normally significant because it is being put forward by a leading and respe'cted member of the opposition. He is a man of long experience, of outstanding ability and with a well-earned reputation for objectivity. No one can accuse him of having any ulterior motive in putting forward this motion, and particularly no one can accuse him of wanting to help the government by the reform of the rules that he is advocating.

My views on this question are very similar to those of the hon. member. The procedures of this House are outdated. They have become obsolete. Our proceedings should be televised, because this is a modern and effective method of communication which was not available to the previous generation and which we should make use of now since it is available. Just as at one time Hansard was introduced as a modern method, strongly resisted, it has now become accepted as a logical way of communicating to the public the words uttered in this House.

This House of Commons is the heart and centre of our democratic institutions, and it is not an exaggeration to say

Changes in Standing Orders

that the people of Canada judge the health of our democracy by the functioning of this parliament, and particularly of the House of Commons. I think it almost goes without saying that our procedures do need reform. Surely no one who looks at the way we use our time is satisfied that we use it profitably. Surely the time has come when we should face up to the necessity for modernizing our procedures.

I was particularly happy to see in the motion put forward by the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants that he linked together changes or reforms of the rules and procedures with the televising of the proceedings of this House. I think the question that ought to be addressed to those who would resist procedural reform is whether they would be satisfied to see the House proceedings being televised according to the rules that now prevail. I ask them, for example, if it were technically possible-and 1 think shortly it will be-to have a continuous live broadcast of the proceedings of this House, how long people would be content to look at the televising of our proceedings if members made 40-minute speeches? 1 am quite sure that after one or two, people would shut off the television and say, "I have heard it all before. This is just repetition and a quite unnecessary way of debating the affairs of the country".

So why do we continue to make 40-minute speeches if they cannot stand the light of day, or shall I say the light of television? Is it because members are trying to persuade one another to change their point of view? I do not think so. I think it might be necessary-I am sure the hon. member will agree with me-for the leaders of the parties or the principal spokesmen on these subjects, to be permitted to speak for 40 minutes, or even longer if necessary, in order to put forward the respective views of their parties or the school of thought they represent. But I have observed this House now for 13 years and, as I see it, most of the speeches that are made by ordinary backbenchers and not by the leading spokesmen for the parties are intended to be for the record, whether for reference later or in order to distribute them to constituents.

If we were to televise our proceedings there would be great urgency to revise our procedures, to shorten our speeches, to be able to forecast with some certainty what we were going to be debating within the next few days. We would want to show the public that we were focusing our attention upon the issues that were of concern to them, upon the leading issues of our time. Television would certainly affect parliament. I have heard the criticism that parliament would change if television were introduced. Of course it would change-and for the better, just as it changed when we brought into our proceedings the idea of writing down with an independent hand the words that are uttered in this House. That did change the House of Commons. It changed it for the better. In my judgment, televising the House would also change it, and for the better. It would be as if all the people of Canada were watching us.

When it is televised, in my judgment the House of Commons will once again become the focus of debate on public affairs. What seems to be more important today is not what goes on in the House of Commons but what goes on outside

November 1, 1976

Changes in Standing Orders

the House of Commons, in the interviews of members of parliament by the press who meet us downstairs in the "scrum" and say, "What is that you said in the House of Commons. Did you really mean it?" Or they put to a member of parliament another question that was not asked in the House of Commons at all.

Surely the time has come when we members of parliament should see that what goes on here is accurately reported to the people of the country so they can judge for themselves.

Hear, hear!

Mr. Sharp:

That is not now possible. I do not blame the media for the distortion that goes on, I blame ourselves. The media dominates us because we do not use it to televise our proceedings. That is the problem. People criticize the media- I do occasionally-for the distortion that takes place, but the remedy lies in our hands. We can have our proceedings made known to the public at large through television; we do not have to depend upon the media.

It is possible, of course, that the television stations that relay shots of our proceedings will distort by selection. That is possible, and I am sure it can and will happen when we do have television in this House. But if televising is carried out under the control of the Speaker, as I gather is the view of the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants, and as was the intent of the motion that was on the order paper in the last session, then distortion is minimized. At least the television cameras are not going to distort what is going on in the House of Commons, because those television cameras will be under our control, under the control of our president, the Speaker, and I would hope of the members of the House as proposed by the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants. At least the public will see their elected representatives in action in the House of Commons.

What a difference there is, for example, in the cross-fire here between the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark) and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and the cross-examination by the press of either of these gentlemen. This is the place where this debate should be seen, and not as distorted inevitably by the media who have an interest which differs from that of the members of the House of Commons.

Moreover, it seems to me that if we did televise our proceedings, then the media could perform its function much more effectively. Then the commentators could comment on what went on in the House of Commons, the public having had a look at it. The press, in their interviews, and so on, would have what went on in the House of Commons as the basis for their reports. Now they can only refer to what went on in the House of Commons, and no one except a few people who happened to visit or to be in Ottawa and in the gallery would have seen it.

Television would make it possible for the whole of the country to see what we are doing at any time. During the debate on the budget I took the occasion to deal with the televising of the budget debate. At that time I pointed out the

advantages which would follow if there were a live broadcast of the minister of finance delivering his budget address, and of the spokesman for the opposition delivering his rebuttal. How much better that would be than the hocus-pocus we go through now of hiding people away in a locked room where they learn what is contained in the budget while the rest of us are ignorant until the minister of finance gets up in the House and delivers his speech.

One could have gone out into the lobbies during the last budget debate and heard the minister of finance giving his comments in advance in the locked room. That is practical. Moreover, if the budget debate were televised, then there is no need for any problems about anticipation. The budget speech could come on earlier and everybody in the world would hear the minister of finance simultaneously. This we are denying ourselves by refusing to allow cameras, under the control of the Speaker, to be brought into this House.

It may be that we are closer than we think to technological advances that will enable live continuous broadcasting of our proceedings. I had occasion, when I was president of the privy council, when I had some responsibility for these matters, to look into these possibilities. It would appear, because of the large number of channels now available to cablevision, to have either simultaneous or soon-after broadcasting of the proceedings of this House. That is perfectly possible. We should be thinking in these terms, and not only in terms of televising the proceedings of this House that is not live or from which excerpts will be taken. That is one possibility, and the most likely one immediately.

I think, however, that it will be possible for parliament to have its own channel, and not too expensively. Think, then, of the advantage of that available broadcast. It is true that most people would not want to take the time to watch continuously the televised proceedings of parliament. But think of the farmers, for instance, who would have an opportunity to hear what the minister of agriculture and his principal critics are saying about dairy policy, and so on. They could hear it. They could turn on the television set and hear it themselves, rather than having to depend on the media. It would not be wasteful to have that material broadcast continuously. I think this is the way in which we should be thinking. We should be thinking about the possibilities which exist now for this House to have its proceedings televised for the general advantage.

In respect of the particular proposals made by the hon. member for revisions of the rules, I shall not comment on them particularly except to say that I rather favour their direction. The standing committee has considered a number of proposals along the same lines, some of which do not go quite as far, and others which go much further than the hon. member has proposed in his motion. These are all to be found, as members of the House know, in the report of the Committee on Procedure and Organization of last session, dated September 30, 1976. As an addendum to those minutes, there are a number of proposals made by subcommittees which are now before caucuses for their consideration. I urge all members of the House carefully to study those proposals. I urge them to look at them

November 1, 1976

not as supporters of the government or as members in opposition, but from the viewpoint of the functioning of this House.

I repeat again that I think the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants has performed a notable service by giving all of us an example of objectivity and non-partisanship. He speaks as a parliamentarian who is concerned, as we all should be, that this institution not lose its credibility. That is the danger we now face. It is not something we can do or not do. Our own reputation and the reputation of this institution is at stake. I cannot agree more with what the hon. member said when he talked about the urgent necessity of modernizing the rules of this House so that they have some relationship to the nature of the problems we now face.

Finally, let me express my general views in summing up. This House spends too much time on unimportant matters, and too little time on important matters. It sits for too many hours a week. It sits for too many days a year. Its agenda is too uncertain. The rules create unnecessary difficulties for members in looking after their constituents. These rules were not made for modern days; they were made for some situations, sometime ago, when there was less business to do and less urgency in getting it done. The sooner we wake up to this and get down to a serious look at our rules, the better it will be for all of us.

I know that reform of the rules will not turn this House into an ideal forum. That depends on the nature and characteristics of members of this House. What it could do is enable both the government and opposition to perform their role more effectively-and it is urgent, in the words of the motion before us, that we get down to business immediately.

Hear, hear!

Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):

Mr. Speaker, if, as I hope will be the case, the media reports the debate of this hour, I imagine there will be emphasis on the discussion that is taking place with regard to the broadcasting by radio and television of the proceedings of this House. That being the case, I should like to join the two distinguished members who have already spoken in making it unanimous, and I hope that by the time the hour is over that unanimity will still stand.

The hon. member for Halifax-East Hants (Mr. McCleave) has put quite a bit in his motion. There are some details with which I might quarrel, and there are certain other rule changes he has not included which I might think should be in such a motion; but rather than detract from the unanimity in which I should like to join, I prefer to leave those details alone and concentrate my few remarks on the matter the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Sharp) spoke about just now'.

I agree with both of the preceding speakers that it does not make sense at all in the latter part of the twentieth century, when everything else that happens is heard on radio or seen on television by our people, for this institution not be heard or seen by them directly.

Hear, hear!

Changes in Standing Orders

Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):

As others have pointed out, not only today but on other occasions, sometimes I think it is even worse than that because of the false impression that is given of this place by the interviews that take place downstairs. They do not do this institution justice.

I recognize that there would be problems. If cameras were in here this afternoon, they would have had a great time panning over empty seats. Hon. members will have to do something about their attendance. Also, we will have to do something about the length of speeches. We will have to do something so that when there is conflict, it is audible. There were times today when modern electronics at its best would not be able to report what was happening.

I can foresee problems associated with members wanting to get the floor. There are about 258 or 259 prima donnas in this place. I am trying to count everybody but myself to recall how many we now have. I believe there are 259 with the two who came in today.

Notwithstanding the problems, this is something with which we should proceed without further delay. As I have already said, I can see some problems with the changes that may be required in terms of the rules, but the hon. member for Eglinton is perfectly right that, if we are going to have our proceedings broadcast, we will have to make some changes. So I welcome the fact that this afternoon his first question as a backbench member-it is an interesting phrase, a backbench member sitting in the front bench-to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) was about broadcasting of the proceedings of this House. I hope it will come along very soon.

I said I would be brief. I will leave it at that. That is three of us who favour broadcasting the proceedings of this House by radio or television. I hope that whatever happens to the motion, that will still be the unanimous position by the time this hour of debate is over.