Mr. Speaker, I have an interesting proposal for the minister. If, as he claims, the Prime Minister is indeed a good and great democrat, then let us hear him reassert his position. He simply has to vote in favour of the motion. The Prime Minister simply has to tell his government colleagues that he is not afraid of repeating what he said in 1970 and wrote in 1985. This is what we are asking him to do on this opposition day.
The minister also says that we lost the debate. The fact is that the democratic and political debate is not over in one day. This is not the society of a thousand years, as former Prime Minister Trudeau once said. We have a right to democratically discuss ideas. We had a good example of that last week. The debate on the issue of sexual orientation as a prohibited ground for discrimination lasted for over 25 years in Canada.
People maintained their position and, thanks to their tenacity, finally got what they wanted. This is how changes are brought about in the political process. This is what we were taught in the past by very democratic people, in Quebec and in Canada. We learned that political debates are the way to go, that battles are won by convincing people with good arguments.
Right now, new arguments come up every day and more and more people are in favour of Quebec's sovereignty. It is so because, in the days that preceded the October 30 referendum, the Prime Minister, speaking for the current federal government, said to us: "We will make major changes". It is the second time in 15 years that we are told major changes will take place, and this time again there are no changes. Each time, some people realize they made a mistake by voting no, and the next they will vote yes. This is the reality. This is the real political debate, and we will win it.
The people of Quebec has been forging ahead for a long time. The fact that sovereignists have been here for over two years is not a coincidence. For a long time, we believed that we could become sovereign by simply forming the government in Quebec City. We realized it was important to send a message to Canada and to make the country realize that sovereignty was not a folksy thing in Quebec, but a deeply rooted feeling. Such was the message sent by Quebecers to all federalists at the 1993 election.
Quebecers said: "We want to be represented by a majority of sovereignists, and we want Canada to know that. We will make decisions accordingly and we will always do so in the respect of democracy".
Today, we are merely asking the Prime Minister to say that, yes, he will continue to respect the rules of democracy. The decision rests with him.