Mr. Speaker, separatists and traditional federalists say that it will be either black or white with the referendum, that is independence or status quo.
By contrast, the Reform Party pledged to renovate the Canadian home. You do not burn down a nice house just to get rid of a few cockroaches. You simply clean it.
Millions of Canadians, including many outside Quebec, have felt frustrated and threatened by the centralizing governments which have dominated our confederation by taking advantage of regional splits and claim that they were acting in the national interest.
A no vote in the referendum will open the door to a new decentralized Canada, patterned on the model proposed by the Reform Party, which is designed to give greater autonomy to the provinces.