Mr. Speaker, first I want to congratulate the hon. member for Kamloops whose perseverance will be rewarded in a few moments.
I also want to thank the hon. member for Mission-Coquitlam, who made a brilliant presentation on lacrosse, a sport which those who will read Hansard tomorrow will be able to learn more about. If the hon. member has more detailed personal notes on this topic, I would be pleased to read them. In the meantime, I wanted to highlight her contribution to the debate.
Later on this evening, most members will watch the hockey game between Montreal and Boston. As for me, I will probably go to Hull to watch the sixth game between the Hull Olympiques and the Chicoutimi Saguenéens of the Quebec junior major league. My interest in hockey stems more from my career as a journalist rather than from the limited skills I displayed on the ice. Indeed, I was better at writing about the game than at playing it. Early in my relatively short career as a journalist, I covered what was then junior A hockey in Canada, since major junior hockey did not yet exist.
I remember all the trips I made for the newspaper I was working for at the time and the playoffs I covered between teams which became famous. I could tell you stories that may have been forgotten in some areas, but are still much talked about in other places.
I covered games between the Quebec Remparts and another great hockey team, the Cornwall Royals, which also played in the Quebec major junior hockey league, and also the east-west finals between the Estevan Bruins and the Niagara Falls Flyers. What was funny about these finals was that both teams had the very same jersey, and I think it was the Niagara Falls Flyers organization which had to lend their visiting-team jerseys to the western team for the Memorial Cup Finals.
I want to point out that the Centennial Cup Series will start on Friday and will be held in Olds, Alberta. I want to wish the best of luck to the team that will be representing Quebec, the Châteauguay Élites, and may the best team win.
If it were not for all these men and women who drive their kids to the arena, or even an ice rink or somewhere else, and stay to entice their children to play their favourite sport, I do not think we would have a national sport. We talked about people playing in the heat and wearing extremely expensive equipment but there are still people playing outside in siberian cold like the ones we had last winter. We must pay tribute to those people of my generation who started playing hockey with elementary equipment, because that sport was for us the soccer of the North. We would build our nets with ice, use hockey sticks worth 59 cents and quite often make a puck out of frozen horse droppings. Imagine how interesting it would have been in the spring to have a slap shot at the member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, if you will allow me a joke, Mr. Speaker.
I am pleased, in the name of the Bloc Quebecois and of all my colleagues since we share a common interest, whether we are from Quebec or Canada, regarding the two sports we are about to recognize, to support the bill introduced by the member from Kamloops, which we are going to pass unanimously.