(Ottawa) Two members of the Independent Senators Group say local police and the Senate security team have opened an investigation into threats that forced one of them to spend last weekend at a location secure.
This situation is part of the debates in the Senate regarding Bill C-234, which aims to exempt certain fuels used by farmers from federal carbon pricing.
On Tuesday, Quebec Senator Raymonde Saint-Germain raised a question of privilege to report that she and her Ontario colleague Bernadette Clement had been physically and verbally intimidated in the chamber by other senators on November 9.
According to Mme Saint-Germain, some senators would not have liked Ms.me Clement adjourns debate on Bill C-234, instead of passing it quickly.
“After violently throwing his earpiece, the Leader of the Opposition (Senator Don Plett) stood in front of Senator Clement and I, who were sitting in our seats, shouting and berating us for proposing this motion of current affairs which would have allowed the debate to be resumed the following week, upon our return,” said Mr.me Saint-Germain during his question of privilege.
“Such an aggressive attitude towards a common practice aimed at prolonging debate – and commonly used by the opposition, by the way – illustrated the intense pressure to pass this bill that day and violated the right of senators to adequately do their work,” in his opinion.
In addition to the incident in the chamber, the situation would have been transported to social networks, when conservative senators would have relayed an image having the appearance of a wanted poster to ask people to call and “harass” Mme Clement and Chantal Petitclerc, another senator, to ask them why they wanted to limit debate on the bill.
According to Mme Saint-Germain, this situation is deplorable.
“I think it’s a wake-up call for our democracy,” she said Wednesday in an interview with The Canadian Press.
Follow protocol
Mme Clement, meanwhile, revealed that a very angry man called her to her office and threatened to come to her home in Cornwall, Ontario. After discussions with the Parliamentary Protective Service and the Cornwall Police, the senator chose not to stay at home and to spend the weekend in a secure location.
“In general, I feel safe at home. But there, they told me that I was not,” explained the senator, adding that the two police forces had reminded her of the importance of following protocol.
So she went to her downtown Ottawa apartment, which she uses during Senate sessions, where she has her own security system. The police also suggested that he keep his panic button, provided by Parliament, nearby.
Chad Maxwell, who is a field operations inspector with the Cornwall Police Service, confirmed Wednesday that an investigation has been opened into the matter.
“The Cornwall Police Service is aware of the current situation regarding Senator Bernadette Clement and is in communication with the Parliamentary Protective Service,” said Mr. Maxwell.
“These threats and online harassment are unacceptable and are taken very seriously by the police. »
A bill that stirs passions
The private member’s bill proposed by a Conservative MP calls for removing natural gas and propane that farmers use to heat their buildings or run their grain dryers from carbon pricing.
Since its adoption in the House of Commons last year, Conservative senators have put a lot of pressure on it to receive rapid approval from the Upper House.
There is one stage of debate remaining before a final vote in the Senate can pass it.
The bill received little attention in its early days but has received greater scrutiny in recent weeks, particularly since the Liberals moved to exempt home heating oil from carbon pricing during three years.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre therefore launched a large-scale effort to pass Bill C-234 as part of his campaign to completely eliminate the carbon tax. He accused the Liberals of trying to prevent the bill from being approved in the Senate.
Before the question of privilege was raised on Tuesday, Senator Plett, who leads the Conservative caucus in the Senate, returned to his role in this heated debate.
“No one is happy about what happened that Thursday, and everyone has their reasons,” he said.
“I don’t like being called a bully. I don’t like to act like a bully either, but I am a passionate person. I am passionate and determined to defend the causes I care about. I will never apologize for it. I will fight fiercely to defend these causes and my party, but I want to do it with respect, dear colleagues, and if I did not do it during our last meeting, it was not acceptable. »
Several senators spoke in favor of Senators Saint-Germain and Clement, recognizing that the behavior they witnessed was unacceptable.