Juno News - September 15, 2022


Pierre Poilievre delivers tribute to Queen Elizabeth II in Parliament


Episode Stats

Length

6 minutes

Words per Minute

138.81151

Word Count

897

Sentence Count

48


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 For all the pomp and circumstance, the real work of governing is not glamorous.
00:00:06.400 It often requires putting aside egos, keeping our heads down, and keeping on with the job.
00:00:12.480 Her humility reminded us that government is not about us, it is about those we serve.
00:00:18.460 We are, indeed, servants, and not masters.
00:00:22.760 The Queen had a special place in our hearts, and we had a special place in hers.
00:00:30.520 She spent a more official time here in Canada than in any other country save the United Kingdom.
00:00:36.540 She first visited Canada as Princess Elizabeth in 1951.
00:00:42.620 It was on that trip that she said, and I quote,
00:00:45.220 From the moment when I first set foot on Canadian soil, the feeling of strangeness went,
00:00:50.920 for I knew myself to be among not only friends, but amongst fellow countrymen.
00:00:56.000 She would visit Canada over 20 times as Queen, and she was present at so many of our most important occasions.
00:01:04.620 The opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 59, the Centennial Expo in 67,
00:01:09.880 the 76th Summer Olympics, and the Patriation of our Constitution in 1982.
00:01:16.320 As we reflect on Her Majesty's, Her Late Majesty's, life and her service,
00:01:22.100 we reflect also on the enduring nature of the institution over which she was the Crown.
00:01:27.980 On her visit to Canada in 1951, then Princess Elizabeth planted an oak sapling in Vancouver.
00:01:39.500 Seventy-one years later, that sapling has grown into a mighty and stately oak
00:01:45.020 whose canopy provides relief from the sun, or, it being Vancouver, perhaps more likely shelter from the rain.
00:01:54.700 The oak tree has long been a royal symbol.
00:01:57.640 It is a symbol of the British Constitution,
00:02:00.640 whose forms we inherited and whose conventions we follow in this House.
00:02:06.140 In Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, he wrote,
00:02:08.940 the Constitution was a spreading oak tree, under whose protective shade the British could peacefully
00:02:15.440 and securely enjoy life, as is only possible for those who live under ordered liberty.
00:02:23.220 In Burke's day, the Crown was already a largely symbolic institution.
00:02:27.120 The Civil War had made Parliament supreme more than a century earlier.
00:02:32.160 The conventions of Cabinet were established and similar to what they are now today.
00:02:36.220 But there were voices who thought that it was time to set aside the monarchy.
00:02:41.980 Burke understood, however, that the key to stability, civil peace, and freedom
00:02:46.460 was not to scrap the Crown, but to keep it free from day-to-day politics.
00:02:51.200 When each of us entered this place, this Parliament of ours,
00:02:54.780 we entered a place rooted in a historic compromise between Crown and Commoner,
00:02:59.180 a compromise that was forged over centuries through bloody conflict,
00:03:03.220 but also through peaceful evolution.
00:03:04.800 The authority of the Crown may, in a sense, be fictional, but it is also functional.
00:03:10.620 You see, the separation of symbolic authority from political power
00:03:13.860 allows partisan politics to be contested fearlessly
00:03:16.480 without threatening the enduring constitutional order.
00:03:20.360 Parties and politicians come and go, the Crown endures.
00:03:23.220 The Division of Duties, or the org chart, as we might say in workplace lingo, is simple.
00:03:30.760 The Crown preserves parliamentary democracy, and the commoners practice it,
00:03:35.280 as we do here in this place.
00:03:38.460 And where does all this come from?
00:03:40.800 Well, it's at least as old as the Magna Carta itself.
00:03:45.540 In 1215, the barons gathered in the fields of Runnymede, outside London, to confront the King.
00:03:51.840 They were angry at being overtaxed to fund royal adventurism overseas,
00:03:56.780 and frustrated by arbitrary excesses of royal power at home.
00:04:01.160 And they were determined to reign in the Crown's authority.
00:04:04.500 The barons forced King John to sign the Great Charter, the Magna Carta,
00:04:08.220 which spelled out the rights and freedoms that the Crown must honour.
00:04:13.160 This was and is liberty under the law.
00:04:19.280 Over the next 800 years, those liberties would be gradually extended,
00:04:24.140 improved upon, and given to citizens not only of the United Kingdom,
00:04:29.100 but all of those who inherited British-style parliamentary democracy.
00:04:33.540 Though this system is 800 years old, it is only one generation deep.
00:04:37.480 If one generation throws it away, all may lose it forever.
00:04:41.860 That is why the work of Her Majesty in preserving that liberty and that system
00:04:46.580 is such a treasured gift to us all and to many more yet to come.
00:04:51.360 As Burke put it, it is a partnership between those who are living,
00:04:56.120 those who are dead, and those who are yet to be born.
00:04:59.660 We are the living generation, and we have a duty to pass on to our children
00:05:04.820 and what Diefenbaker called the heritage of freedom we inherited from our ancestors.
00:05:10.080 And when the Queen spoke at the patriation of our Constitution in 1982,
00:05:15.680 at a ceremony not far from where we stand, where I stand, and where all of you sit today,
00:05:20.780 she said,
00:05:21.780 The genius of Canadian federalism lies in our consistent ability to overcome differences
00:05:27.440 through reason and compromise.
00:05:29.880 That ability is reflected in the willingness of ordinary people of French-speaking
00:05:33.420 and English-speaking Canada and of all regions to respect each other's rights
00:05:38.660 and to create the conditions together under which all may prosper in freedom.
00:05:44.140 It is with a heavy heart, but heartfelt thanks, and with confidence in the future that I say,
00:05:53.160 Godspeed, Queen Elizabeth II, God save the King, and God bless Canada.
00:05:59.780 Thank you.
00:06:00.120 Thank you.
00:06:00.920 Thank you.
00:06:13.160 Thank you.
00:06:17.680 Thank you.