Mr. Speaker, sitting here listening to the hon. member, whom I congratulate on his new role, I was reminded of my days as a student at Université de Montréal. Incidentally, I would like to remind the hon. member of a professor, a former colleague of his, with whom he published a book on constitutional review.
I know that the hon. member is from the moderate wing of his party and I caught myself thinking how nice it would have been, in light of things to come, if he had been the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs instead of the current minister. I wish he had held that position because the meaning of the old Jesuit proverb, according to which the relevance of what you say is not determined by how loudly you say it, is lost on the current incumbent. During the referendum debate, if we had had someone like the hon. member to speak to on the other side, we would certainly have been able to lay the basis of a real dialogue.
I know that you would like me to put a question to him, and that is exactly what I anm about to do. The hon. member is quite familiar with the constitutional background of this country, which rests on three main doctrines-special status, associated states and sovereignty-association-which I have had the pleasure of studying as part of a master thesis that no one has read.
Does the hon. member agree that the partnership offer that the Government of Quebec put on the table during the last referendum campaign is the best way to achieve reconciliation between the two founding peoples of Canada, and would he mind rising in his place and telling us whether or not, as a constitutional expert, he is prepared to concur with this offer?