Hon. Marty Klyne: Minister, I have a question about the ongoing Senate reform. In June, Senator Dasko shared a poll showing that 69% of Canadians want future governments to continue appointing independent senators. Only 5% of Canadians want a return to the partisan system.

In May, our Government Representative successfully initiated rule changes to ensure fair treatment of independent parliamentary groups within the new system. However, the Senate still does not have rules to ensure fairness, transparency and due diligence in our process for House of Commons private members’ bills, which are easily filibustered.

Is this an area where you would like to see reform to ensure that appointed senators vote on elected MPs’ bills, as Conservative senators proposed in 2014 and as Senator Dalphond and Senator Sinclair proposed in 2020?

Hon. Dominic LeBlanc, P.C., M.P., Minister of Public Safety, Democratic Institutions and Intergovernmental Affairs: Your Honour, thank you for the question. I also took note of that public opinion research that was published. I happen to share that view. I think that Canadians have been well served by the very good work done in this place over the last number of years. The appointments process and the kind of women and men who have applied to serve in this place and have been selected by the Prime Minister speak to the effectiveness of that process. I certainly am very proud of that and was happy to note that Canadians were as well.

I also think that our Government Representative is doing absolutely terrific work in this place, and he comes to the Cabinet Committee on Operations that I chair. He would update us, for example, on some rule changes that he was proposing and the progress that he was making working with colleagues here around those rule changes.

My cabinet colleagues are always interested in hearing from Senator Gold on Monday afternoon, but we would certainly not purport to offer advice to honourable senators as to the appropriate rules that you would decide to adopt. We would think it would be helpful and positive for this place to study private members’ bills that come from the other place, but the mechanism to do that I would leave in your hands.

I’m happy to work with the Government Representative as we do effectively every week and sometimes many times a week. He had kept us updated around some of those rule changes, which we took to be very positive.

Senator Klyne: The government’s independent Senate appointment process has advanced reconciliation by giving a greater voice to many Indigenous peoples in Parliament and federal law-making, with about 10% of senators now being Indigenous. Will the government commit to maintaining this level of representation, and would you encourage any government of the day to do the same?

Mr. LeBlanc: Your Honour, there are a number of very distinguished Indigenous Canadians who have come forward and serve in the Senate now. There were some that had served in this place in the past. I’m thinking of the first Indigenous senator, Len Marchand, who was a friend of my father’s and somebody whom I knew as a kid, who passed away some time ago. There is a long tradition of Indigenous people serving with honour in the Senate.

I like the fact that so many Indigenous persons are currently serving in the Senate. I wouldn’t purport to speak for future governments. I don’t, of course, make the appointments, but I am happy when the government chooses Indigenous Canadians to serve here.