The Conservatives offered cooperation. Apparently the Liberals wanted submission.
Sean Fraser, I need you to explain something, because the definition of cooperation seems to change depending on whose name is on the bill.
Your Liberal colleagues keep telling the Conservatives to contribute something constructive, get on board and help move legislation forward. Tamara Jansen brings a bill addressing something you also support, acknowledges the objection to its wording, and offers to work with you on the changes.
The Liberals vote against sending her bill to committee. You promise government legislation pursuing the same central goal.
So the objective is worth pursuing, but working on Jansen’s bill isn’t? I don’t buy that explanation. There was a proposal before Parliament and an offer to address the problem. Apparently that still wasn’t enough.
Jansen introduced Bill C-218, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (medical assistance in dying), on June 20, 2025. Her bill sought to permanently prevent MAID eligibility where mental illness is the sole underlying medical condition, using the Criminal Code’s term, “mental disorder.” You are promising legislation to indefinitely prevent that same expansion.
There was agreement on the central objective. That ought to have given both of you somewhere to start.
On October 7, however, C-218 was defeated at second reading, 187 votes to 141. The motion would have sent Jansen’s bill to the justice committee, where MPs could hear evidence, debate the provisions and propose amendments within its scope. Committee members could examine the wording, change what needed changing and settle on language that accomplished the intended goal.
Nobody was being asked to accept every comma until the end of civilization.
The Liberals argued that “mental disorder” is broader than “mental illness” and could affect eligibility beyond the people Jansen intended to address. Jansen offered to address that exact concern.
On September 23, she told the House: “We are prepared to work with the government at committee to make the technical changes.”
That offer was recorded in Hansard before the vote. Jansen wasn’t insisting that you accept her wording untouched. She offered to work on the objection your colleagues had raised so the legislation could do the job properly.
How is that not cooperation, Sean?
Now put her offer beside Steven MacKinnon’s remarks on April 27. During debate about committee composition, MacKinnon said Canadians in Conservative ridings were asking their MPs to be “a positive part of the solution.”
There she was. Jansen was being positive. She was offering to be part of the solution. Instead of digging in and demanding everyone accept her version, she proposed working through the concern.
Apparently that wasn’t the kind of participation your colleagues wanted.
Does being “part of the solution” mean Conservatives can contribute ideas, or does their role begin and end with casting a vote for a Liberal proposal? Because if the invitation disappears when a Conservative brings the bill, Canadians should know that before MacKinnon delivers another speech about cooperation.
Wayne Long made the expectations fairly plain on April 20. Discussing housing, Long told the opposition to “stop the podcasts, stop the tours, stop the obstruction, stop the rhetoric, and get on board.”
Well, Mr. Long, Jansen brought legislation and offered to work on the wording. How is that not getting on board? She was prepared to change her proposal to make it meet the intended need. If anybody in that exchange showed a willingness to put the result ahead of getting her own way, it was Jansen.
What was she supposed to do differently to qualify as helpful?
Patty Hajdu asked, on December 8, 2025: “Why will they not get on board?” Then, on June 2, discussing antisemitism and the anti-hate bill, Evan Solomon said: “We do not need lessons from the opposition as to the seriousness.” In the same answer, Solomon urged the opposition to “join us.”
Come help, but don’t presume to know anything. I’ve dealt with people like that. By the time you’ve finished helping, you’re apparently the reason everything took so long.
Those exchanges concerned other policies. But the recurring demand deserves to be held beside what happened when Jansen offered cooperation. Your colleagues can’t keep advertising an open invitation and expect nobody to notice the conditions attached.
October brought more of the same. François-Philippe Champagne used the no-lessons line on October 7. Stephen Fuhr used that formulation about Conservatives on October 8, while Peter Fragiskatos accused Conservatives of offering no constructive ideas.
Sean, nobody was asking Champagne or Fuhr to sit through a lesson. An opposition MP offered to work on legislation. How am I supposed to reconcile your colleagues’ complaints with the proposal and the offer sitting right in front of us?
Liberal MPs ridicule Conservatives, complain that Conservatives contribute nothing, then demand Conservative cooperation. Jansen contributes something and offers cooperation, and the Liberals vote against the proposed route to doing the work.
How much of that are Canadians supposed to overlook?
Your announced package also includes changes concerning advance requests for MAID: a person making a request while capable of giving informed consent, intended to apply later after losing that capacity—for example, through dementia.
I don’t accept the broader package as a convincing answer to why the Liberals refused to work on Jansen’s narrower proposal.
Want additional changes? Bring additional legislation and debate those changes. Committee amendments have limits, so an entire advance-request system could not simply be assumed to fit into C-218. That still does not explain why you couldn’t pursue your additional measures while working with Jansen on the objective you share.
The bill had been drafted, introduced and debated. Jansen had used her opportunity under the randomly drawn order for private members’ business. She cannot simply demand another turn whenever you decide you would prefer a different approach.
If the offered technical amendments could not resolve the problem, explain precisely why. Pointing to other measures you want does not answer that question.
I find the explanation contrived. The additional proposals may be real; their existence does not establish that rejecting Jansen’s route was necessary.
As a taxpayer struggling to get by, I am sick of this. I have to account for what I spend. You should be able to account for why the Liberals rejected an opportunity to work with legislation already before Parliament.
Parliamentary time, drafting and support resources cost money. The additional cost of this decision has not been established, and neither has the claim that separate bills would have been cheaper. Canadians are still entitled to ask whether useful work is being repeated unnecessarily.
Answering that is part of your job. We shouldn’t have to endure another condescending lecture to get an explanation from the people spending our money.
This concerns people suffering from mental illness, their families and the rules governing an irreversible decision. Those people deserve careful legislation and MPs prepared to work through the problems. Surely that can survive the indignity of a Conservative having brought the proposal.
Picture yourself and Jansen at a podium in Parliament, microphones in front of you, explaining that both MPs agreed on the objective, had worked through the language and were moving a measure forward.
For all the speeches about division and coming together, there was an opportunity to show the country cooperation. A Conservative and a Liberal, sharing the work and the credit. Canadians might even have believed the next speech about unity.
Instead, we have another promise and the same unresolved question.
Sean, was rejecting the offered committee work a direction from Mark Carney, or a decision you’re prepared to own yourself? Stop pointing to what else you want to do and account for what the Liberals refused to do here.
I don’t know what was said behind closed doors. I know what Jansen offered publicly and what happened at the vote. That is enough to challenge the story Canadians keep being sold about which party refuses to cooperate.
Somebody should mail Fraser the dictionary page for “redundancy.” He can reject it and announce his own definition.
The opposition’s job is to question, scrutinize, propose alternatives and hold ministers accountable. Conservatives do not have to arrive carrying grateful agreement with whatever a Liberal minister announces.
So when MacKinnon asks for Conservatives to be a positive part of the solution, put Jansen’s offer beside his words. When Long demands that Conservatives get on board, ask what was missing from her proposed committee work. When your colleagues complain that Conservatives bring nothing constructive, explain what Canadians are supposed to call C-218.
Do you see the contradiction, Sean? Jansen brought a proposal addressing a shared goal and offered to work on the objection. The Liberals rejected the route to committee while promising legislation toward that same goal.
Then Canadians are expected to keep accepting the complaint that Conservatives won’t help.
The audacity of expecting people to swallow both things without noticing.
Judging by those actions, the part of democracy where the opposition contributes seems to be an inconvenience your colleagues would rather work around. Liberal ministers demand cooperation, but when an opposition MP offers a route to it, cooperation suddenly isn’t enough.
That looks an awful lot like obedience dressed up as cooperation. The mask is slipping, and another lecture from the Liberal benches won’t hold it in place.
We’re paying you to govern. Your egos can fund themselves.
Who the hell do you think you are?
- Melanie In Saskatchewan
CAN I HAVE JUST ONE MORE MINUTE OF YOUR TIME…
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