Madam Speaker, through the political process, I have gone through a metamorphosis from a neophyte to a second term member of Parliament now. More than that, I am a human being who literally sits with my constituents. In the north we have very small confines. I live with my constituents. I cannot disappear into a city as one might in cities like Ottawa and Calgary. I live with my constituents.
We did have a poll and it was a great poll. It was won poll by poll. I did have a poll and I have the utmost confidence. I won my election in a landslide in 1988. When I won my election employment equity was part of the red book. In 1993 I won every single poll in my riding, advanced polls, special polls, every poll. Those are the polls that count.
I do not believe we can have a 1-900 democracy or 1-900 governments. That is not the way to run this country. That is being a chicken because they cannot face up to it and make the decisions people elected them to make. They elected me to make the tough decisions. I am here and I will make them with this government.
If the people are afraid in that city, I do believe the member has made it intrusive. He has talked about this legislation as intrusive, as abusive and as discriminatory as Reformers have done with almost every other piece of legislation that has come forward that people have supported.
If the people of Canada did not like employment equity they would not have voted for us. They read about it in the red book in 1993 and we were elected with a full majority. It was clear and it gets clearer by the day what we intend to do.
We are making the federal contractors program and this employment equity legislation as broad, as fair and as all inclusive as possible. It is not intrusive, discriminatory or abusive. It is anything but that. It will be inclusive. It will create for once in the 125 year history of this country the kind of equity that is needed so that all members in this House can participate, all members of this country can participate. For God's sake, even Reform Party members can participate. That is how inclusive it is.