Madam Speaker, I would like to pose a question to the member because of his longstanding experience as a politician. I want to make it perfectly clear that this is not a trick question. I want some input from a person who has been involved in the political process for a long time.
One concern I have as a member from British Columbia is what the Liberals have done in terms or responding to a perception, thereby creating more of a problem than there was in the first place. In fact, there was no problem. That is with respect to the fact that in Alberta, in the mountain time zone at least, the polls will be closing at 7.30 p.m., and in the Pacific time zone they will be closing at 7 p.m.
The major concern I have is the government responded to the member for Vancouver East and some of the things that have been popular in the press about the fact that people in western Canada are concerned that the vote is all over before they even start to count their ballots, which of course is nothing but a problem of perception. In trying to resolve this problem of perception, they are now going to be closing the polls in a metropolitan Vancouver, where many people are travelling for an hour or an hour and a half from work, arriving home at 6 p.m. or 7 p.m. before getting out to vote.
This member has been a politician for an extended period of time. Would he agree with me that what is going to happen, particularly in Vancouver, is people who are working for candidates and who have the ability to telephone people to try to get them out, this is going to be a severe detriment and problem for many of the people involved in the political process? It is going to be a different situation in politics in Vancouver than it will be in Toronto or Montreal because of that time change. It is a very unfair change. I wonder if the member would care to comment on that.