Mr. Speaker, last weekend I attended the NDP convention in Regina as an observer. Tommy Douglas would not be pleased to see that special interest groups and unions have hijacked the agenda of the party he created.
A recurring theme at the convention was that the NDP exists not to form government but to lobby the Liberals to spend more on big government programs. The cost to the taxpayer of all the resolutions passed was never a topic of discussion.
Not only was there a lack of effective debate on the issues discussed at the convention, there was a complete absence of debate on other major issues that face Canadians. Where was the debate on justice issues like the Young Offenders Act, criminal justice and prison reform and gun registration?
Where was the debate on democratic issues like giving people more control over their MPs between elections, making Parliament work better and giving Canadians a direct say in the affairs of their country? And for a federal political party to remain silent on national unity during the entire convention was a serious oversight indeed.
The federal NDP has evolved into something that acts more like a pressure group-