Who is muzzling Conservative MPs — the Speaker or Pierre Poilievre?

Who poses the greater threat to the free speech of Conservative MPs — the Speaker of the House of Commons or the leader of the Conservative Party?

In a fundraising appeal this week, the Conservative Party told its supporters that it was Speaker Greg Fergus, a Liberal MP, who was silencing Conservative MPs.

"The Liberal Speaker kicked THREE Conservative MPs out of the House of Commons for speaking the TRUTH," the party wrote. "The corrupt Liberals are censoring the truth. This is the same government that wants to censor your speech."

That same morning, Radio-Canada published a report about the close control and scrutiny that Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and his office impose on what Conservative MPs say and do.

"Everybody is being watched. What we say, what we do, who we talk to. We're told not to fraternize with MPs from the other parties. And that's not normal," a Conservative source said.

A Conservative leader imposing tight discipline on his caucus is not exactly unheard of — Stephen Harper was famous for prioritizing control. And all parliamentary caucuses exercise some level of discipline over their members, either explicitly or implicitly.

But there is some obvious friction between Poileivre's stated belief in "freedom" and "liberty" — especially when it comes to speech — and his apparent emphasis on controlling what his caucus says and does. It's also an awkward fit for a party that seems to see tyranny and censorship lurking in so many other corners.

The Speaker of the House did eject three Conservative MPs from the House on Monday — officially, he named them and asked them to withdraw for the day. But while the Conservatives say that their only crime was "speaking the truth," Fergus surely would argue that their offence was using unparliamentary language and then rejecting his request to withdraw the offending words.

The list of MPs who have been ejected from the House in recent years is getting long.

An official tally of members who were asked to withdraw suggests that from 2003 through 2016, not a single MP was told to leave the chamber. That streak ended in 2017 — when Conservative MP Blake Richards was ejected — and then another MP (NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh) was asked to leave in 2020.

There was one ejection in 2022 and another in 2023. So far in 2024, six MPs have been ejected from the chamber.

At the very least, that trend line suggests recent Speakers — particularly Fergus, who presided over the last seven ejections — have been more willing than some of their predecessors to use ejection as a means of maintaining order. But it's also notable that seven of the last eight MPs to be cast out were Conservatives — including Poilievre himself, who was ejected earlier this year.

Conservatives might argue those numbers only prove the existence of the problem they're calling out: Liberal censorship. But it might also suggest that Conservatives have become much more willing to test the rules of the House and defy the Speaker. (It could also suggest that Fergus, whose speakership has been troubled from the start, is simply struggling to enforce order.)

Former Liberal MP Peter Milliken, who served as Speaker from 2001 to 2011, did not believe ejection was an effective punishment. And recent examples demonstrate how MPs can turn around and wear their expulsion like a badge of honour.