Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Voltaire you famously said, quote, "I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it." These immortal words are the crux of the matter of this debate, that being the speech of Members of this Assembly that is not subject to our rules of debate, nor the privileges we enjoy as parliamentarians.

Mr. Speaker, Members enjoy certain individual rights and privileges by virtue of being elected to this House. The privilege of freedom of speech in parliamentary proceedings is generally regarded as the most important of the privileges enjoyed by Members of any legislature. This right is protected in the Constitution Act 1867 and section 18 of the Northwest Territories Act that provides the Legislative Assembly with the privileges, immunities, and powers enjoyed by provincial legislatures and the Parliament of Canada.

The House of Commons defines this right as such, quote, "freedom of speech permits Members to speak freely in the conduct of a proceeding of parliament, such as in a chamber during a sitting or in committees during meetings while enjoying complete immunity from prosecution or civil liability for any comment they make in order to encourage truthful and complete disclosure without fear of reprisal or other adverse actions as a result of their testimony. This right also extends to individuals who appear before the House or its committees. The House of Commons could not work effectively unless its Members and witnesses appearing before House committees were able to speak and criticize without being held to account by the outside body."

Mr. Speaker, the reason we have rules of debate, points of order, which Members are very familiar with, is because of this immunity, this fundamental right which gives us complete protection for what we say in this chamber. There needs to be some limit on it which is why we have rights for ourselves. To extend those rights outside the chamber is unnecessary.

On the other hand, Mr. Speaker, the Indigenous traditions of open dialogue, inclusive decision-making, accommodation respecting trust, form the other side of a consensus circle. These principles err on the side of allowing Members to speak more frequently, affords more time to do so, and encourages honest debate that sets aside procedural rules in favour of clear and respectful communication. What this motion contemplates is nothing less than an affront to both sides of our consensus traditions, Indigenous and Westminster, that enshrine the right of freedom of speech that's paramount for our role as elected representatives in the NWT. I believe this motion is reckless, undemocratic, and will lead to a chilling effect on speech in a territory where far too many of our people fear reprisals when speaking truth to power.

Mr. Speaker, this motion is calling on a committee to investigate new restrictions on speech outside of this chamber online and in social media. While the code of conduct requires us to live up to a higher standard than most others, it should not be used to lower the standard for what is acceptable speech. Our citizens enjoy the right to free speech, but even that right has limitations that are determined by the courts through libel and slander laws and criminal offences such as uttering threats. This motion contemplates imposing new restrictions, if the committee chooses to endorse them, of the speech of its Members through the back door by making statements made by Members outside of proceedings online that, quote, "erode trust and confidence in the Legislative Assembly and its Members. These offences could be censure, fines, suspension, maybe even expulsion. Despite the fact that these statements so made would not meet the threshold for legal action in civil society."

Mr. Speaker, my question is who then decides what comments, quote, "erode the trust and confidence in the Legislative Assembly and its Members in the eyes of the public?" This definition is so broad and so subjective that anything written by an MLA that personally offends another Member or a citizen could reasonably interpret it as offensive. Perhaps the Integrity Commissioner would disagree, but regardless an investigation would be required and thus lead to complaint after complaint after complaint any time someone feels so aggrieved.

Mr. Speaker, in his July 16th, 2020, ruling for a complaint made by then MLA Jackie Jacobson, the Integrity Commissioner warned against the weaponization of the code of conduct writing, quote, "I recognize and emphasize that the purpose of the Members' Code of Conduct is to set high standards which MLAs as leaders are expected to abide by in every aspect of their daily lives in order to earn and keep the respect of the citizens they serve. However, it is not the purpose of the code to be used as a political weapon of choice."

Support for this motion encourages exploring ways to further weaponize this code by making every word spoken outside of this chamber subject to a complaint if interpreted the wrong way or interpreted opportunistically by a bad faith actor.

Mr. Speaker, MLAs are accountable to each other, especially so in our consensus system. Confidence in the Premier and Cabinet is held individually, not collectively. That means each Member of the Executive Council is personally responsible to the other Members of this House. They're not appointed by Premier or party leader, and their actions by their peers deserve to have the same level of scrutiny as any other citizen. It is in our very job descriptions and etched into the DNA of our proceedings.

To this end, Members should not have fewer rights of free speech than the public we serve. This is an absurd notion. We must be able to freely communicate with our constituents in the spaces they use most frequently to share their stories and raise their concerns. In 2025, Mr. Speaker, that place is social media for good and for ill. Social media connects the North in a profound way that traditional media never could given our geographic and linguistic differences. It is a hugely important tool for elected officials to communicate with their constituencies. It is a prime venue for free speech of our Members to communicate policies, concerns, and, yes, even criticize government decisions and fellow decision-makers.

Mr. Speaker, the politics of getting along to get ahead is a longstanding concern of many Northerners regarding our system of government. In-camera meetings and discussions are typically the rule and not the exception. Too often is accountability confined into what is tolerable to maintain chummy relationships within a given caucus, relationships that purportedly advance the political priorities of Members. For those who prefer to govern that way, this motion only furthers that style of internal economy by giving new tools to deal with dissent outside of private conversations in-camera that are far away from the public eye.

As per guiding principle number 4 of our process conventions, quote, "effective communication is a double-edged sword. For consensus government to work, all Members must agree to respect the confidentiality of information before it is properly made public. Similarly, Members should acknowledge the fact that information was shared in confidence once it has been released."

Mr. Speaker, this so-called double-edged sword is hard enough to cope with when constituents are looking for answers. With this motion, our ability to speak freely or freely speak to our accountability will only be further restrained, and our ability to speak to the -- as per our ability that's already constrained to speak to confidential matters that are shared with us.

Mr. Speaker, I will say again Members of this House know exactly how reluctant many of our constituents are to speak out publicly, and support for this motion only furthers that fear in public of reprisals from their own institutions. Mr. Speaker, putting all that aside for a moment, the very real -- those very real arguments of a slippery slope towards censorship, I cannot help but raise the question what problem is this motion trying to solve? Because, quite frankly, Mr. Speaker, you've already solved it in your March 3rd, 2025, ruling on a point of privilege brought forward by the Member for Yellowknife South.

Mr. Speaker, you ruled as followed, quote: "In our proceedings, we can speak freely. Our only rules limit what we can say. In this case, the words were not spoken in our proceedings. Had they been, they would have been out of order. If you are following our rules, your words in this chamber are protected. Outside this chamber, including on social media, they are not. Remember, there can be real consequences to words spoken or typed outside our proceedings. Although I did not find it in this case, statements outside of this Assembly easily could have been found a question of privilege."

Now, I'm not reflecting on your ruling, Mr. Speaker, and I do not wish to relitigate any part of it, but it does come to mind in the context of this motion. Clearly, this House has found the boundaries of the rights of Members to speech both inside and outside the chamber. This precedent is now set by your ruling and therefore there is no need for further investigation by standing committee referral. The work is already done, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, democracy is beautiful, even when it gets messy. We shouldn't be trying to sanitize political speech and instead embrace it for what it is even when it forces us to face hard truths about ourselves and what we stand for as politicians. As an elected official, I expect to be scrutinized in print and online; I except to be satirized in editorial cartoons and memes. This is what we all signed up for whether we like it or not. We have better things to do in the limited time of this assembly than police the speech of our Members outside of this chamber and the committee room. Let's fix our broken health care, end homelessness, rebuild our faltering economy, take back our streets from criminals, balance the budget, or any other multitude of issues Northerners sent us here to solve. Censoring Members' words and protecting Members' hurt feelings are not the reason why we were elected. Let's not waste time on matter that have already been addressed by the precedence of this House, by the rulings of our Speaker, that are guaranteed by our privileges and, most importantly, fundamental to our rights as Canadian citizens. Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to reject this incautious motion and get back to the work of what matters most to our constituents. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.