This is interesting. The hon. member says that is more progress than the Tories made. I draw to the member's attention that since he and his colleagues came into the House they have added to the debt $76 billion plus. That is their contribution to the fiscal health of the country. It is on the backs of the people that the deficit and the debt ride, and they are getting heavier and heavier. I suggest to the Prime Minister and to my colleagues opposite that the back that is being broken is the back of the taxpayer, not of the deficit.
There comes a time when one almost has to say that what we have here is a tyranny of the majority. It is not the interests of the people that are being addressed in this motion but the convenience of a particular group of people who not want to live by the procedures that we have all agreed to. They want to change them.
It would be one thing to say this will simply bring back the bills the government wants back on the table. Then it ties that with this sort of noble condescending attitude, almost patronizing, saying it will also allow private members' bills to come forward. That does not change the principle one iota. It seems the government wants to get some kind of prestige, or to drain some credibility from the fact that yes, private members' bills will also be able to come to the table. If it was morally wicked before, if it was a fraud before, it is no less wicked and no less a fraud today than it was then.
I suggest that the sooner we get on with the business of the country and deal with things like the deficit, justice issues and keeping criminals off the streets, we will be far better off than wrangling here on whether we should bring back all that stuff that was really supposed to have been stopped by prorogation at the whim and fancy of the government whenever it wishes to do so.