Ottawa

Members’ statements intrigue

Peter Goldring thinks the Conservatives were trying to mock him with a members’ statement.

He was, however, upset by what he felt was an incidence of “somebody is having a little bit of fun” at his expense in the House Nov. 8.  That day, Mr. Goldring rose to deliver a member’s statement thanking a group of Ukrainian Parliamentary interns who were leaving the Hill. After he finished, Conservative MP Ed Holder (London West, Ont.) rose to make a statement on Mothers Against Drunk Driving. “I’m doing a serious statement in the House of Commons, and Ed Holder follows right away with a statement that is incorrect that says ‘Don’t drink and drive,’” stated Mr. Goldring.  “I’m sure that I am going to be vindicated on it. But there is a certain amount of sensitivity do it. How can it, coincidently the statement flat-out like that following right up on my statement in the House of Commons? I think that that’s just childish behaviour,” he said.

But Mr. Holder said that his statement had nothing to do with Mr. Goldring. “I thought it highly coincidental that Peter spoke and I spoke, but he didn’t even come up in the thought process, quite frankly,” he said.  Mr. Goldring refused to say whether he believed it was Mr. Holder, or the office of Government House Leader Peter Van Loan (York-Simcoe, Ont.), or another individual, who intended to embarrass him. “This claim is completely false. Mr. Holder’s statement had nothing to do with Mr. Goldring,” said Fraser Malcolm, Mr. Van Loan’s director of communications, in an email. “Furthermore, the Speaker determines when the Independent Members of Parliament, including Mr. Goldring, are recognized to deliver a statement. We receive no advance notice of whether or when Mr. Goldring will be recognized,” he added. 

A preliminary hearing into the charges against Mr. Goldring was conducted last Friday.

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