(Ottawa) The Bloc Québécois suffered a bitter failure on Wednesday in a vote aimed at advancing its bill to fight against Ottawa’s interference in the jurisdictions of the provinces, and particularly one of them.
Updated yesterday at 4:22 p.m.
According to the unofficial results, the House of Commons voted 32 votes in favor and 292 votes against the idea of sending Bill C-237 to committee. Only the Bloc voted in favour. The Liberals, Conservatives and New Democrats opposed.
The bill provided that a province could withdraw from any federal program under its jurisdiction if it had a comparable program, and that this be done unconditionally and with full compensation.
During the debates at second reading, the sponsor of the bill and dean of the House of Commons, Louis Plamondon, said that he entered the political arena in 1984 “so that we could be masters in our own house”, then taking up the electoral slogan of the Premier of Quebec Jean Lesage. And that is precisely why 38 years later he is introducing this bill.
It is ultimately on “respect for the Canadian constitution” that the political parties decide, he summed up during a press conference preceding the vote, noting in passing that “it’s funny that it is a sovereigntist who asks them”.
Bloc national revenue critic Jean-Denis Garon then argued that there is nothing partisan about the bill.
“It represents what is called the traditional position of Quebec,” he said. Since the 1960s, and even before, all the governments in the National Assembly, […] of all parties combined, have all asked that Quebec obtain the right to opt out with full financial compensation with respect to federal programs in areas of provincial jurisdiction. »
Unexpected obstacle
But the Bloc Québécois faced an unexpected obstacle, by Mr. Plamondon’s own admission: the Speaker of the House of Commons ruled that the bill would require a royal recommendation to be put to the vote during a possible third reading since it concerns the expenditure of public funds. In other words, the Liberal government must consent to it, which it had already indicated was out of the question.
“I could never, ever support such a piece of legislation,” Kevin Lamoureux, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House, said at the outset when speaking during the debates.
Mr. Lamoureux explained that the Canada Health Act is one of the prides of Canadians and what distinguishes them from the United States. In particular, this act allows all Canadians to have access to the public health insurance plan, that the care be covered by the public plan, that the care be comparable from one province to another.
The Conservatives, for their part, had indicated that they would vote against the bill because “it is safe to assume” that the bill will not receive a royal recommendation, not having obtained it at this stadium.
The lieutenant for Quebec, Pierre-Paul Hus, added on Wednesday before question period that the Bloc knows very well that “it cannot pass”. However, he affirmed that his party “has always agreed on the principle of decentralizing powers to the provinces”.
On the side of the New Democratic Party, Deputy Leader Alexandre Boulerice said he had “a big problem” with the fact that by removing Quebec from the “essential values” of the Canada Health Act, this “opens the door wide privatization of health care”.
The New Democrats are fiercely opposed to this possible privatization, reiterated Wednesday its leader Jagmeet Singh, during a press conference. However, he did not clearly indicate how his political party will vote in the vote.
According to the Bloc Québécois, this is the first time that such a bill has been put to a vote. The formation had presented a motion on this subject in 2010, without success.