Ewasko responds to being kicked out of the Legislature, supports word ban by Speaker

Lac du Bonnet MLA Wayne Ewasko is sharing his thoughts on why he was expelled from the Legislature and his approval of the speaker’s ban on five contentious words.

On May 4, during question period at the Manitoba Legislature, House Speaker Tom Lindsey expelled Ewasko for not apologizing for an April 15 remark he made during question period when Ewasko yelled to Premier Wab Kinew, “Hey, quit drinking, Wab,” while Kinew was answering a question from Opposition Leader Obby Khan regarding the gas tax.

Kinew, who has been open about his history of alcohol abuse, has been sober for a number of years.

Ewasko admits he said those words to Kinew, but is adamant that he is not racist and that the comment was not racially motivated.

“This has nothing to do with the Anishinaabe men. This has nothing to do with Indigenous men. This has everything to do with his behavior was erratic. His behavior was unbecoming of a premier. Which continues to happen (today),” said Ewasko.

“This was the equivalent of saying, ‘What the heck is the matter with you today?’”

Ewasko said you would not have seen that behavior from former premiers Gary Filmon, Gary Doer, Greg Selinger, Brian Pallister, or Heather Stephenson.

Although the speaker ruled that Ewasko’s remark to the premier was not a threat, Government House Leader and Minister for Families Nahanni Fontaine asked Ewasko for an apology to the premier.

Ewasko apologized to the premier three times in the House, with each apology being rejected by the Speaker who finally expelled Ewasko from the chamber for the day. Lindsey congratulated the members for “meeting a new low.”

“Now, I went out and did media. Shortly thereafter, I apologized again, and you know what I found out? From the clerks and the Speaker’s office, is that I got kicked out because I did not put the word ‘unequivocally’ in front of the word ‘apologize,’” he said, noting he was bewildered by this.

“Because I was, like, how many more times am I going to apologize, right? And so I went to the media, I unequivocally apologized again, and the premier later in the day accepted it, but he doesn’t accept it because he continues to try to rehash this on a day-to-day basis.”

Ewasko also said Kinew is “a showman” and he and his caucus are performing for their social media followers and that is the reason decorum has dropped in the legislature.

The MLA said he doesn’t “wear (getting expelled) as a badge of honour” and that he is upset that he got kicked out as nothing like this has happened to him in the 15 years he has been a politician.

Ewasko and the PCs accuse the NDP of name calling and disrespectful behaviour, and in turn the NDP claim the same of the PCs.

Lindsey told the members of the legislature on May 4 that he has been concerned for months about their decorum. He said the situation has not improved and has only worsened with members yelling across the aisle at each other; members making hurtful, disrespectful, and insensitive remarks off-the-record to each other; and there’s been an increase in unparliamentary language spoken in the legislature, sometimes repeatedly.

“None of this should be happening in this House, and my concern over this has been growing. I’m not the only one who is concerned about decorum in the House,” said Lindsey, noting the public has stopped him in the street to make their displeasure known and media reports have also been critical.

Lindsey said he surveyed all Canadian jurisdictions on this matter, and has deemed the words bigot, homophobe, misogynist, racist, and transphobe as unparliamentary and has banned their use in the chamber.

“These words would be ruled unparliamentary in other legislatures because, like the word liar, they constitute reflections on a member’s character or integrity, rather than debating policy or ideas,” he said when announcing his decision.

Ewasko is in agreement with the Speaker on the banning of the five words.

“(The NDP) are challenging the speaker to reverse this decision. I and the Progressive Conservatives, we applauded the statement because I don’t think there should be any name calling like that,” he said.

However, Fontaine did not agree, rising in the legislature to criticize the decision.

“And while I tread very carefully in response to your ruling, because you’ve set new guidelines on what we can and cannot say in this Chamber, I do just want to point out that not being able to say certain words– that seems to be your concern and the clerk’s concern, rather than the behaviours that fuel it–makes a pretty unsafe workspace in this Chamber,” she said.

Kinew spoke to CBC after Lindsey’s ban saying the Speaker is “100 percent wrong,” and the NDP will be appealing it.

The level of respect amongst members in the House has been on a steady downslide in recent years, as noted by Steinbach MLA Kelvin Geortzen, who has sat in the Legislature for 23 years.

“It’s not that it was ever a gentle place to be. I mean, it’s always been rough and tumble, and there are important issues there that are debated sometimes in emotional ways, and that’s always been the case,” said Goertzen.

“But what I’ve noticed change in the last, well, the time that I’ve been there is it’s gone from sort of heated debate around issues and policies and people’s positions to personal attacks. So, the words that the speaker banned are really the kinds of words that I’ve seen now used more so in the last few years that are about sort of personally attacking an individual. Which has always not been allowed in the legislature.”

Goertzen said the name calling makes it difficult to sit down with the opposition and work together to make legislation when that person, or his caucus, just called you a bigot or racist for no reason other than to throw you off the debate or insult you.

“I used to love question period, and I used to love the debate. And I would have thought that when I retired that I would miss it, but because it’s become so toxic, I won’t.”

Goertzen noted personally attacking someone and name calling would have caused a stir in the media and the public in the past, but now the impact of those words have lost their meaning.

“It’s not like the Speaker has set some sort of precedent that is unique in Canada. We’re actually the last legislature to follow this. And so I think the Speaker was absolutely right.”

Goertzen said in the past four days since the Speaker’s ban, decorum has been better in the House.

Goertzen issued sage advice for his fellow colleagues, “I always caution everybody in the legislature, when you start to talk about somebody in a personal way, you’re heading down a path that’s probably not going to lead to a good place and you should probably just stop.”