Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I will turn to Professor Dawood and pursue these questions of legitimacy.
You mentioned that some of the mechanisms you think would add additional legitimacy include a citizens' assembly or additional studies or a commission.
We talk about timelines and rushing to an artificial deadline to change our electoral system. We've had a lot of stops and starts in pursuit of electoral reform, and I think it has to do with a very narrow window of political interest over the years. You'll get a political party that says “We're ready to look at this”, and often there's less enthusiasm, as Mr. Broadbent just reflected, once they've gained power.
The first time that a parliamentary committee met to look at getting rid of first past the post and replacing it with proportional representation was in 1921. We've had a number of parliamentary committees since then—Mr. Reid and Mr. Broadbent were looking back to 12 years ago—but we've also had citizens' assemblies in Ontario and in B.C., and most recently, the 2004 Law Commission report.
None of these efforts to pursue an investigation into electoral reform has ever recommended that we should keep our current system. Some have come to no conclusion, while most have recommended some form of proportional representation. In your view, does it add anything to the issue of legitimacy that we have some very recent historical efforts within Canada?