The Counter Signal has learned that Liberal MP and former Speaker Anthony Rota will be pursuing the Speakership for the upcoming parliamentary session.
Tradition and procedure prescribe that each Parliament must elect a Speaker of the House of Commons at the beginning of its term.
Since Trudeau was re-elected to a minority government this year, MPs will get a chance to elect a Speaker when they return to Ottawa this fall.
Readers will remember that despite being a Liberal Party member, Rota has been a thorn in the side of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s autocratic fantasies.
In June, then-Speaker Rota announced the Liberal government was suing him in court after the House demanded the unsealing of documents related to the firing of two federal scientists who collaborated with China on highly contagious virus research.
Things got so heated between Rota and the federal government that he was forced to drag Public Health Agency of Canada President Iain Stewart before the House of Commons to explain why he refused to hand over the classified documents to Parliament.
When Stewart failed to produce the documents claiming that he was prohibited under the Canada Evidence Act, Rota announced that he would challenge the courts on the matter.
According to Rota, the “legal system does not have jurisdiction over the operations of the House.”
“We are our own jurisdiction. That is something that we will fight tooth and nail to protect,” he stated in June.
Moments before the election was called (and Parliament’s order was dissolved), the Liberals dropped their plan to use the courts to protect whatever information they were hiding about what went on at the National Microbiology Lab in Winnipeg.
If re-elected, Rota’s speakership could indicate a division within the Liberal Party’s rank and file.
After barely holding onto a slim minority government, Trudeau will inevitably face challenges to his leadership from within his own party. If Rota’s past principled stance on transparency was genuine, being elected Speaker could indicate the beginning of the end for the Prime Minister.
