Mr. Chair, it's always wonderful to have an NDP member give us a master class on the existence—it's recognized by certain courts—of a gap in the Constitution, a document that Quebecers never signed. What a delight, it's unbelievable. Quebecers will remember this.
While my NDP colleague was getting ready to recite the little lecture he'd memorized on constitutional law, he really should have been listening to me. What I said was that the bill before us relies on federal spending power and therefore this is as far as the federal government can go, even though we really don't like it and feel it's unacceptable. I said that was the content of the bill. If my colleague from the NDP—very respectfully, as he says—had listened to what I said, he probably would have agreed with me.
Let me clarify my argument. The two lines we're asking to strike out have no legislative purpose, they have a political and speculative purpose. We know that the purpose of this bill is to keep the Liberal–NDP deal afloat. It's an insurance policy to guarantee the Liberal majority in the House, and that flies right in the face of the mandate voters gave us last year.
I'm concerned that, from this day forward, in every bill that goes to committee and to the House, we will begin inserting lines from the NDP's political platform for next year, the year after that, the next election or the one four years after that, all to keep this government alive.
These are political and speculative lines, which is why they have no place in the bill. I believe my colleague totally misunderstood what I said.
