Mr. Speaker, that is fine. I accept the admonition. I have finished my quotes in any event.
Those with the most experience with employment equity are usually its staunchest defenders. With nearly two decades of equity programs in the workplace Sun Life Assurance vice-president Lucy Greene says: "It is just part of our thinking. It is good business sense. Everybody should be doing it".
Few would agree more than Troy Peck, a 25-year old administrative assistant with the planning department of the city of Vancouver. His employer adopted employment equity in 1976 when Troy was still a little boy with a spinal tumour whose future employment prospects did not look promising. Thanks to employment equity this qualified young man who uses a wheelchair found his job on the basis of merit. Troy told the Vancouver Province this past summer:
Employment equity gives you the chance not to be automatically dismissed as an applicant because of your disability. It gives you the chance to show you are skilled and able to perform.
That is all any member of the designated groups is asking of the House. They just want an opportunity to prove that talent comes in all kinds of packages. They ask us to remember that what is important is not the package but the gift inside it. Our gift to future generations in the country must be the assurance that we will give every last young woman and man that chance. With Bill C-64 unamended we can do exactly that.
I urge hon. members of the Reform Party to withdraw these amendments and proceed with the bill as it stands.