As I was saying, it would be appropriate to await the outcome of this referendum before making changes.
Personally, as member for Lévis, I would like to point out another reason why I think it should be deferred. Basically, to keep changing the electoral map all the time is counterproductive in terms of fostering a sense of belonging within a region or a community.
Some countries tend to keep the same electoral boundaries, despite shifts in population. This is done in France and other countries as well. There is evidence that it provides a certain stability and allows local communities to strengthen their feelings of solidarity and work more effectively to promote their economies.
We should not make changes as a matter of course, every other election. We live under a federal system, which means federal elections, usually every four years, and provincial elections as well. Generally speaking the provinces adjust their electoral boundaries as well, before every other election, as in Quebec. Unfortunately, there may be a lag, so that some voters, especially in the urban ridings I am familiar with, do not know to which riding they belong. In some cases, they do not even know their members. That may be because the members are not always very efficient-I am referring to the past because there are more and more Bloc members in Quebec, and people know us and will get to know us even better, because we are going to be very active. Why do people have problems? Because things change so often.
In terms of electoral boundaries, we have the territory covered by federal ridings and the territory covered by provincial ridings. Administratively speaking, voters want to identify with a territory. And what happens? Administratively speaking, although this may not be directly relevant to today's subject, the individual needs to identify with a given area. That is very important. It is very important for the individual to know to which area he belongs.
In the riding of Lévis, we have the Lévis Regional County Municipality, the territory covered by the provincial riding, school boards and LCSC areas. Provincial departments usually provide maps indicating which areas are covered by various services. If we add to all that the areas covered by federal services, by all the departments, the local employment centre and the rest, we could look at all the departments, and we would find as many ways to divide the area as there are departments.
Furthermore, there are a substantial number of federal government agencies and Crown corporations which also have their own areas. Imagine an individual trying to cope with these constant changes! People can get very confused-