Mr. Speaker, today the Minister of Justice has decided to call upon the Supreme Court on the referendum question, stating as his reason, and I quote: "To leave this issue unresolved would pose a serious threat to orderly government in Quebec and in the rest of Canada".
Could the minister explain to us why order and good government would be threatened today, when this was not the case in 1980, nor in the last referendum in 1995? If the government is going before the Supreme Court today, is the real reason not that it has nothing to offer Quebec and is afraid of losing the next referendum?