Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak on the motion of the member of the third party, the hon. member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, stating:
That this House condemns the attitude of the government, which refuses to introduce in-depth reform of the legislation on the financing of federal political parties even though the existing legislation allows for a wide range of abuses.
We would like to support the Bloc motion although we have a different view of what constitutes legitimate reform of electoral legislation, of federal financing legislation for political parties.
At the outset I would like to say that we share the concern of the other opposition parties with the recent scandalous revelations about the fundraising practices of the Liberal Party of Canada.
The integrity of our democratic system and the public consent with which this Chamber wields such enormous power rests on the confidence of the Canadian people. That confidence is shaken every time a political party, particularly the governing party which wields such enormous power, the criminal law power, the power to tax which is the power to destroy, the power to intervene in the economy; basically powers of life and death are wielded by this Chamber which is controlled by a party. When that party engages in criminal activities in raising the funds to meet its insatiable desire to spend more—