Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Ottawa Centre for bringing a lot of substance to this debate by giving a historical view of how the Senate came about and what the real issues are before us.
I also thank him for the work he has been doing on this file in terms of bringing forward the substantive issues on democratic reform, as did the previous member for Ottawa Centre, Ed Broadbent. It was Ed Broadbent who really picked this up and set before Parliament the real qualitative changes that need to be made. The current member for Ottawa Centre is continuing that work.
The problem with this bill, like so many other bills that come forward, is that it is just window dressing. When we think of organizations like Fair Vote Canada or the Citizens' Assembly that took place in British Columbia, these are substantive processes that show there is a hunger out in the communities to address democratic reform.
I find it interesting that both the present government and the previous government had ministers responsible for democratic reform and yet we saw nothing happen. I think part of the question here is the process for arriving at democratic reform. I would like the member for Ottawa Centre to comment on that in terms of the kind of process we need to see, rather than this phony one that is set up for these focus groups, to actually engage people in the question of democratic reform.