Madam Chair, the very least we can say is that our Conservative colleagues have quite opposite positions. Mr. Komarnicki states that we should pass an amendment recognizing that right for all provinces, while Mr. Vellacott tells us that we want to impose the Quebec rationale on all provinces. Perhaps you should have a discussion between yourselves to decide on the argument you want to waste our time with.
If our colleagues opposite want to come up with specific provisions for specific provinces, why don't they have the courage of their convictions and introduce amendments to that effect? As Ms. Falco clearly described just now, this amendment is about a Quebec policy. It is about our principles; they have led to ways of doing things in Quebec, the means of our own we have developed.
If our colleagues tell us, for example, that they have a mandate from Alberta, from Saskatchewan or from Ontario authorizing them to secure a different provision for each of those provinces, let them say so and let them do it. But they must not hold us responsible for something they would like. Let them have the courage to go and get it. But they are not doing that.
We respect what the other provinces that want a Canada-wide strategy are doing. They are Canadian and they want to show it with a policy that they see as theirs, because their choices are the same. They have the right to do so and we respect that. Once again, we will vote with them so that is what they get.
We have already done so with clause 3. We say yes to a Canada-wide strategy, but that strategy must not get in the way of Quebec's initiatives in its policy on poverty and its strategy on developing social housing. Despite the fact that the Canadian government completely withdrew from funding social housing from 1991 to 2001, Quebec has continued to develop its policy. Of course, our means were more limited. During that time, the feds kept tax points that normally would have been allocated there. It used them for other purposes, as it also helped itself to employment insurance funds for other purposes.
That is the issue. We are saying yes to a Canada-wide policy, respecting and recognizing the rights and powers already established by the treaties that Canada itself has signed. That is what we are saying today.
Wanting to distort things gets us nowhere. It is of absolutely no help to people living in misery, people with substandard housing or none at all. The merit of Bill C-304 and of our amendment is that we must try to come up with initiatives we can all agree on to help people in substandard housing. That is the merit of this bill.
I invite our Conservative colleagues to get back to the basic intent of this bill and to stop destroying the nature of the amendment we have proposed this morning.