Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition keeps trying to find something that would discredit the process but he does not succeed.
The fact is the process was initiated yesterday in the House of Commons. It is true it is the first time it has been used. I am sure the Leader of the Opposition would admit it is a power that has only recently been included in the statute, although it was proposed that it was included in the statute by the previous government. It is a relatively new power and was used in a circumstance which itself was unprecedented, namely the granting of the exemption order by the CRTC.
In the face of the exemption order being granted on August 30, many groups asked the government to act, saying there were problems with this. If we had not acted in response to those criticisms, I suspect that at least the Leader of the Opposition, or perhaps his critic who often claims to speak on behalf of groups like the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, would be standing in this House criticizing us for having not acted in the way we have acted.