A Canadian Member of Parliament (MP) Michelle Rempel delivered a speech filled with great emotion in the House of Commons on Tuesday over jobs, including a word that caused consternation among some of her fellow MPs – ‘fart’.
During her speech, Rempel equated the Canadian government’s treatment of her constituency, the western province of Alberta, over employment to “a fart in the room that nobody wants to talk about”.
The Green Party Leader, Elizabeth May, took offence and was quick to express her dismay and demanded her colleague to withdraw her statements, saying the use of the word fart was “un-parliamentary”.
May said: ”I heard her say a word I know is distinctly unparliamentary, and I think she may want to withdraw it.”
And May did not even want to repeat the word, instead spelling it out as if it were an expletive.
Rempel refused to withdraw her statements.
”Is my colleague actually serious?” Rempel asked with disbelief.
She added, ”I just gave an impassioned speech about supporting Alberta jobs, and that’s what the leader of a political party stands up and has to say? No, I don’t withdraw it.”
May disagreed and added: ”Decorum is important, and respect is important in this place.”
She said she was quite aware of the plight facing workers in Alberta – where unemployment is at a 22 year high and food bank use has shot up 17 per cent in a year – but that she still had an issue over the use of the word ‘fart’.
With both sides refusing to give way, the Speaker was forced to take advice from the statute books and read into how he should handle in such a situation.
Canada, according to Dailymail has a long history of banning words in parliament. Some of the words include ‘pompous ass’, ‘ignoramus’, ‘sick animal’, ‘Canadian Mussolini’, ‘evil genius’ and ‘to hell with Parliament attitude’.