Financial Procedures / Business of ways and means

Legislative phase: admissibility; motion to implement certain provisions of the budget

March 13, 2008

Debates, pp. 4109-10

On March 11, 2008, Jim Flaherty (Minister of Finance) tabled notice of ways and means Motion No. 10 to implement certain provisions of the budget presented on February 26, 2008, and to enact provisions to preserve the fiscal plan set out in that budget. The Minister stated that the Motion contained language which would protect Canada’s fiscal framework from the effects of Bill C-253, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (deductibility of RESP contributions), passed by the House on March 5, 2008. Dan McTeague (Pickering–Scarborough East) rose immediately on a point of order to challenge the admissibility of the ways and means motion, arguing that it sought to have the House decide upon a matter on which it had already voted. The following day, March 12, 2008, Mr. McTeague and other Members argued that the Motion was inadmissible in that it sought to implement a measure that did not flow from the budget and that permitting the Government to use a ways and means motion to void a private Member’s bill would compromise the rights of all Members. The Speaker took the matter under advisement.^[1]

On March 13, 2008, the Speaker delivered his ruling. With respect to the objection that the Motion included provisions regarding Bill C-253, which were not contained in the budget, he cited several authorities to the effect that the budget speech and bills based on ways and means motions tabled at a later date are not necessarily linked. Thus, he concluded that the motion was not procedurally flawed in this regard. He also found that the House was not being asked to pronounce itself again in the same session on the same subject, citing other cases in which a bill had repealed sections of an act already amended by another bill adopted by the House in the same session. With respect to the point that the process affects Private Members’ Business as a category of business, or the rights of individual Members to propose initiatives, the Speaker declared that it is not the Speaker but the House which ultimately decides such matters. The Speaker concluded that for those reasons ways and means Motion No. 10 could proceed in its current form.

Decision of the Chair

The Speaker: I am now prepared to rule on the point of order raised by the hon. Member for Pickering–Scarborough East on March 11 concerning the admissibility of the ways and means motion to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 26 and to enact provisions to preserve the fiscal plan set out in that budget for which the hon. Minister of Finance gave notice on that day.

I would like to thank the hon. Member for Pickering–Scarborough East for initially bringing this matter to the attention of the House, as well as for his subsequent intervention, and I would also like to thank the hon. Member for Markham–Unionville, the hon. Government House Leader, and the hon. House Leader for the Bloc Québécois for their submissions.

The Member for Pickering–Scarborough East, in raising the matter, claimed that ways and means Motion No. 10, standing on the Order Paper in the name of the Minister of Finance, seeks to have the House decide upon a matter which it had already voted on.

That vote took place on March 5, 2008, when Bill C-253, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (deductibility of RESP contributions) was adopted at third reading. To this issue, the Member for Markham–Unionville has added the contention that ways and means Motion No. 10, by including provisions related to Bill C-253, seeks to implement a measure that does not flow from the most recent budget, thus, he alleges, enlarging the usual parameters of budget implementation ways and means motions.

He further contended that this was a backdoor attempt to circumvent the rights of private Members as provided for in the rules governing this category of business.

For the sake of clarity, I should state that sections 45 to 48 of ways and means Motion No. 10 are the subject of this point of order. They are conditional amendments that seek to amend or repeal the amendments to the Income Tax Act contained in Bill C-253 should the latter receive Royal Assent. The stated objective of these ways and means measures is, to quote the Minister of Finance at page 3971 of the Debates, “—to protect Canada’s fiscal framework”.

The Government House Leader asserted that the broad scope of ways and means Motion No. 10, and the wide range of taxation and fiscal measures it seeks to implement are clear evidence that the Motion is fundamentally a different matter than was Bill C-253, and therefore, that it should be allowed to proceed.

In support of his arguments a number of procedural authorities were cited, some of which I will return to later in this ruling.

Let me first deal with the argument that the inclusion of provisions regarding Bill C-253 in ways and means Motion No. 10 does not respect our conventions regarding the content of such motions.

The Chair wishes to remind the House that the budget speech and bills based on ways and means motions tabled at a later date are not necessarily linked. House of Commons Procedure and Practice states at page 748:

While a Budget is normally followed by the introduction of ways and means bills, such bills do not have to be preceded by a Budget presentation. Generally, taxation legislation can be introduced at any time during a session; the only prerequisite being prior concurrence in a ways and means motion.

At page 759, Marleau and Montpetit goes on to state:

The adoption of a ways and means motion stands as an order of the House either to bring in a bill or bills based on the provisions of that motion or to propose an amendment or amendments to a bill then before the House.

That text footnotes examples from 1971, 1973, and 1997.

Furthermore, in the case before us, it must be noted that the title of ways and means Motion No. 10 states clearly that it not only implements certain provisions of the February 26, 2008 budget, but that it also aims to:

—enact provisions to preserve the fiscal plan set out in that budget.

On this point, namely the objection that the Motion includes provisions that were not contained in the budget, the Chair must conclude that ways and means Motion No. 10 is not procedurally flawed.

Let us now turn to the argument that the decision of the House to adopt Bill C-253 at third reading must stand since the House cannot be asked to pronounce itself again in the same session on the same subject.

The Chair wishes to remind hon. Members that while a part of ways and means Motion No. 10 touches on Bill C-253, the question that the House will actually be asked to vote on today, assuming it is called today, is not the same as the question it agreed to on March 5, 2008, when it adopted the Bill at third reading.

In this regard the Chair has found a number of examples where a bill repeals sections of an act already amended by another bill adopted by the House in the same session.

For example, in the First Session of the Thirty-Eighth Parliament, Bill C-18, An Act to amend the Telefilm Canada Act and another Act, and Bill C-43, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 23, 2005, both proposed to amend subsection 85(1) of the Financial Administration Act.

In addition, there are also examples of bills proceeding concurrently even though some of their provisions are dependent upon one another.

As mentioned by the Government House Leader, Mr. Speaker Lamoureux ruled on February 24, 1971, on such a situation at page 3712 of the Debates. He stated:

There is, therefore, in my view, nothing procedurally wrong in having before the House at the same time concurrent or related bills which might be in contradiction with one another either because of the terms of the proposed legislation itself or in relation to proposed amendments.

This is further supported by the 23rd edition of Erskine May at page 580, which affirms that:

There is no rule against the amendment or the repeal of an act of the same session.

Most compelling are the rulings of Mr. Speaker Fraser from June 8, 1988, and I refer to the Debates at pages 16252 to 16258, and on November 28, 1991, pages 5513 to 5514, both of which were quoted by the Government House Leader. These rulings clearly support the view that the progress of any bill flowing from ways and means Motion No. 10 rests with the House.

As Mr. Speaker Fraser put it on November 28, 1991:

The legislative process affords ample opportunity for amending proposed legislation during the detailed clause-by-clause study in committee and again at the report stage in the House.

Insofar as this process affects Private Members’ Business as a category of business or indeed the rights of individual Members to propose initiatives, I must point out that it is not the Speaker but the House which ultimately decides such matters.

For the reasons stated above, the Chair finds that ways and means Motion No. 10, as tabled by the Minister of Finance, may proceed in its current form.

Once again, I would like to thank the hon. Member for Pickering–Scarborough East for having raised this matter.