Rodolphe Lemieux (Speaker of the House of Commons)
Liberal
Mr. SPEAKER:
Mr. Prime Minister, Mr. Bennett, I wish to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your kind words. I have been in the house for thirty-four years. My heart is in this house. From the day I came here I have met friends only. On returning home this evening I can truly say that as Speaker of the Commons I have been actuated by good faith and fairness to all. When I took the Chair in 1922, I resolved that from the moment I stepped into it I should cease to be a partisan. I had been, God knows, a good partisan. I have striven to live up to my promise and I can declare honestly and conscientiously, that in every ruling, in every decision I gave as Speaker of the House of Commons, I have ignored parties and have followed the standing orders, the usages, the customs and traditions of parliament.
In 1926, when for the third time you unanimously reelected me Speaker of the house, I said that every morning as I passed in front of the monument of Alexander Mackenzie, that great Scoteh-Canadian and revered Prime Minister of the Dominion from 1874 to 1878,-I would read the beautiful inscription which characterized his life and crystallized his sense of responsibility:
Duty -was his law, conscience his ruler.
I have tried to live up to the great teaching that I find in that sentence.
Once more, I thank all parties in the House of Commons for the support they have given me. I have tried to maintain here British parliamentary traditions, and if I have a word of advice to offer to you, my friends, it is that in future, whether you sit on the left or on the right of the Speaker, or there, yonder, you will live up to those traditions. What is taking place in the world to-day shows conclusively that after all those traditions. when deeply rooted in the soil, constitute the best safeguard for justice and Liberty.
Motion agreed to and at 9.30 p.m. the sitting was suspended until 10.15 this day.
Prorogation
The house resumed at 10.15 o'clock.