Now Liberal MP Irwin Cotler is calling on House of Commons Speaker Andrew Scheer to revisit the issue, and to compel Miller to withdraw his remarks "unequivocally", or face the consequences, which, in this case, could include not being recognized in the House until he does so.  

Will the furore over the Fuhrer reference derail the government's purported plans to host post-vote festivities to celebrate the bill's final passage through the House?

Here's a fully linked and annotated  recap of the story so far: 

Now Liberal MP Irwin Cotler is calling on House of Commons Speaker Andrew Scheer to revisit the issue, and to compel Miller to withdraw his remarks "unequivocally", or face the consequences, which, in this case, could include not being recognized in the House until he does so.  

Here's a fully linked and annotated  recap of the story so far:

Courtesy of Hansard, the initial exchange, which took place during the final hours of report stage debate of C-19, which will dismantle the gun registry:

Mr. Larry Miller (Bruce--Grey--Owen Sound, CPC):  [...] Before I discuss the bill I would like to review how we arrived at where we are today. I would like to share with the House a quote from former Liberal justice minister Allan Rock: "I came to Ottawa last year, with a firm belief that the only people in Canada who should have firearms are police officers and the military."

Does that sound familiar? Adolf Hitler, 1939.

Mr. Justin Trudeau: Oh, come on.

Mr. Larry Miller: Mr. Speaker, this statement is the reason we are here today. We now have an ineffective and wasteful registry that has been estimated by the state broadcaster to cost in excess of $2 billion. Similar to Mr. Rock's comments, another--

An hon. member: I don't think the PMO wrote that.

An hon. member: Don't lose hair, Larry.

Mr. Larry Miller: Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether the members of the Liberal Party want to listen or if they want--

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bruce Stanton): Order, please. I appreciate the enthusiasm hon. members have for the speech of the member for Bruce--Grey--Owen Sound, but I am sure other members would like to hear what the hon. member has to say

    The hon. member for Bruce--Grey--Owen Sound.

Mr. Larry Miller: Mr. Speaker, we now have an ineffective and wasteful registry that has been estimated by the state broadcaster to cost in excess of $2 billion.

Similar to Mr. Rock's comments, another prominent Liberal at the time, Senator Sharon Carstairs, said the following, "The registering of hunting rifles is the first step in the social re-engineering of Canadians". Can hon. members believe that statement, "the social re-engineering of Canadians?" That is what Adolf Hitler tried to do in the 1930s. [...]

The two statements I have shared should clearly illustrate why this registry was created. It was not about decreasing gun crime or improving police officer safety. All evidence shows that it has not achieved any measurable improvements to either issue. The long gun registry is, at its core, solely about an idea that the Liberals of the nineties had that guns were inherently evil and must be taken out of the hands of the general population.

Again, who does that sound like?

A few hours later, Miller rose to offer the following apology, apparently directed at "anybody it might have offended" by his use of Hitler's name in the House:

Mr. Larry Miller (Bruce--Grey--Owen Sound, CPC): Mr. Speaker, earlier today in this House I was speaking to Bill C-19 and I referred to and used the name Adolf Hitler. While the references to the gun registry and what this evil guy did to perpetrate his crimes are very clear, it was inappropriate to use his name in the House and I apologize to anybody it may have offended.

That, however, wasn't enough to mollify Liberal MPs Denis Coderre and Massimo Pacetti, who called on Miller to extend his apology to cover both former colleagues -- Rock and Carstairs -- whose words he had seemingly equated with those of the "evil guy" in question, despite the best efforts of both Government Whip Gordon O'Connor and House Speaker Andrew Scheer to declare the matter closed.

Hon. Denis Coderre (Bourassa, Lib.):  Mr. Speaker, the member said he was sorry for using Hitler's name, but he compared our former colleagues to Adolf Hitler. I would like him to apologize, not for using that name, but for comparing my colleagues to Hitler. That is unacceptable in a democracy.

The Speaker: I heard the hon. member apologize and withdraw what he said. It is usually the practice of the House that we leave it at that.

     The hon. member for Saint-Léonard--Saint-Michel.

Mr. Massimo Pacetti (Saint-Léonard--Saint-Michel, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I am usually not a person to question somebody's apology but I was in the House when the member for Bruce--Grey--Owen Sound spoke in reference to Hitler and directly attributed him to our former colleagues. However, on these occasions when he actually specified and used the terms that he did, they were written and he read them out. They were not said by accident. I have no problem with the apology but the apology must be truthful and sincere.

Hon. Gordon O'Connor (Minister of State and Chief Government Whip, CPC):  Mr. Speaker, the member has apologized and the apology has been accepted. We cannot keep grinding this around. He has genuinely apologized and it should be over.

The Speaker: As I mentioned, it is the practice of the House that once a member withdraws a comment or apologizes it is left at that.

(For the record, Carstairs has previously denied making the statement attributed to her, which was allegedly delivered during an informal Q&A session at a law conference in Winnipeg in 1996, and of which no recording or official transcript exists.)

In any case, at that the matter might indeed have been left, had it not been for Miller's subsequent comments to QMI reporter Tracey Richardson, during which he all but retracted his already somewhat half-hearted retraction, and reiterated his belief that "the similarities between the two are very clear":

"While I retracted my comments, the similarities between the two are very clear and you can't convince me of otherwise. But it's obvious the media didn't have much to write about yesterday because that was the hot-button issue. So just in order to take the buzz off and what have you, I partially retracted the statement in the house."

Miller said he was trying to point out the similarities between the gun registry and Hitler confiscating guns from Jews.

"While the similarities between the gun registry and what Adolf Hitler did to perpetrate his crimes are very clear and obvious, it was inappropriate for me to point those out in the House of Commons," he said Wednesday.

"And I went on to say that I apologized to anyone who was offended, but the truth is the truth and what he (Hitler) did at the time was his men went around and collected all the guns from the Jews. So I was just pointing out the similarities. That didn't happen in Canada, but it could have and that's one of the reasons there's been such an uproar against the gun registry in this country. So that's the end of it."

Miller said he had a great uncle who was killed in the Second World War, adding that his comments Tuesday were taken out of context.

"I'm not going to beat it to death. I said it. Sure I'm regretful if it offended anybody, but there was no offence meant and what I said was the truth."

Those comments brought Liberal MP Irwin Cotler to his feet the following day to request -- in the form of a point of order -- that the speaker reconsider his decision to declare the matter closed, on the grounds that, by retracting his apology and expanding on his original comments "with even more odious language," Miller had "reignited" the issue.

You can read Cotler's full statement here, but here's the gist of his argument in favour of reopening the debate:

[...]Mr. Speaker, you said, during discussion of this point when first raised that "it is the practice of the House that once a member withdraws a comment or apologizes it is left at that". I believe the practice of the House is also that a member cannot say he or she apologizes in here and then retracts the apology or undermines it and indeed in fact repeats the odious reference outside this place.

In essence, the member did just that by offering an apology that was insincere, by his own admission offered only "to take the buzz off" and, per his own clarification, is only a partial retraction.

The House will recall again that should the Speaker find language to be unparliamentary, as per page 619 of O'Brien and Bosc, the member "will be requested to rise in his or her place and to withdraw the unparliamentary word or phrase unequivocally". Thus, Mr. Speaker, while you cannot change the member's mind, you can ask that he withdraw the remarks, something which he did not do.

Furthermore, with respect to the retraction of his apology, I believe stronger sanction is warranted and urge you, Mr. Speaker, to, in line with the precedence outlined in the sixth edition of Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms of the House of Commons of Canada, name the member or inform him that he will not be seen by the Chair until he appears at the bar of the House to apologize for these obscene and odious remarks and comparisons.

Simply put, the member has not sincerely and completely apologized for his remarks. Indeed, he has even reaffirmed them in a more hateful form and they remain as he did not withdraw them. This cannot be an acceptable practice or precedent that we can allow to stand in the House. Redress and sanction are warranted. I implore you, Mr. Speaker, to exercise your necessary authority in this regard so that the integrity of the House and its members be protected so that those who are maligned outside the House would also be protected and, indeed, that the memory and meaning of the Holocaust be protected and preserved.

In response to Cotler's point of order, the government house leader's parliamentary secretary, Tom Lukiwski -- who, it bears noting, has had his own experience with off-the-cuff comments coming back to haunt him -- noted that Miller himself was not currently in the House, and should be given the opportunity to respond.

For his part, the speaker agreed with Lukiwski on the need to hear from Miller, although he also reminded Cotler that he has "no authority to rule on statements made outside the House," and generally appeared to be distinctly unenthusiastic over the prospect of having to wade back into the controversy.

In any case, there the matter stands until such time as Miller returns to the parliamentary spotlight to defend himself -- or, alternatively, apologize afresh, and actually stick to it, rather than reverse himself once outside the confines of the Chamber.