Mr. Speaker, I always consider it a privilege to rise in this place on behalf of the constituents of Hamilton West. We are supposed to be dealing in this debate with Bill C-31, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament March 6, 1996.
My constituents elected me back in 1988. My colleague from Winnipeg St. James and I were colleagues back in 1988 and we sat on that side of the House in opposition. Whenever an opportunity came along we were not shy on words or prepared to take off on the government on the plan it had.
In those days we had pretty good evidence in our hands; precise statistics, precise numbers, precise policies that the Liberal Party, in opposition from 1988 to 1993, could attack the Tories on. We sat over there, we made our arguments and they were solid.
I will drift away from Bill C-31 only because I cannot let the comments of the hon. member for Wild Rose get by. First he says "pompous attitudes". I do not see any pompous attitudes coming from this side of the House. I see red books being thrown across the floor. I see members over there getting up and calling other members liars, getting kicked out of the House and that kind of thing, which is outrageous.
I remember an election promise from the Reform Party that it would do things differently in the House of Commons, that there would be a certain attitude, a new way of doing politics in the House. There would be a new decorum in the House of Commons.
I did not understand that it meant the decorum would get worse. I assumed it meant the decorum would get a little better in the House of Commons.
Then the hon. member for Wild Rose says: "I am not sure, but blah, blah, blah. I do not know much about that, but blah, blah, blah. That is all fuzzy and feel good to me, blah, blah, blah". You cannot talk in generalities.