That is right. Word comes down from the top that this bill must not pass. Every time there is a free vote, every time there is power given to committee, every time there is any chance that we can take a little power out of that little group of people sitting in the Langevin Building, it is nuked. There is not a chance that this bill will pass. I am sorry to break this to the member for Kindersley-Lloydminister.
That being said, it is likely we will head into an election next week. Will this be an election issue? Will this be something that gets carried on the stump, as we talk about the issues facing the Canadian electorate?
This will not be the burning issue. However, this is symptomatic of two different visions of Canada when it comes to the role of Parliament and the role of members of Parliament representing their constituency.
It will be a vision carried by the Liberal Party which is that the Liberal Party knows best. Not only does it not have to listen to the Canadian people, it does not even have to listen to its own members.
The Liberal Party does not have to listen to people through referendums and free votes and representative democracy. What its members will tell Canadians is "don't worry, be happy, we know best; the rest of you are cannon fodder in the great democratic process". That will be an issue.
When we get on the stump and when we get talking about electoral and parliamentary reform, when we talk about the need to change things in this institution to give power to members of Parliament to truly represent the people who sent them here, that will be an issue.
We will be talking about recall. We will be talking about the right to referendums and citizens initiatives. We will be talking about free votes in the House of Commons, not just on private members bills but on bills in general.
We will be talking about committee power and the way committees are manhandled right now by the ministers to do their bidding instead of truly giving an opportunity for members of Parliament to initiate legislation and to bring citizens concerns to the table.
All those will be issues during the upcoming federal election. A fixed election date is part of Reform Party policy. Recent polling results say that people like that idea. They do not like what the Liberals are doing here, which is that they call it when they darn well feel like it, the Canadian people can put up with it and pay for it and that is just the way it has to be.
Although there is supposed to be a free vote, no doubt those members have been told on the Liberal side to vote against it. It is probably not going to pass, and that is too bad.
All that being said, the Liberals should know that if they have the guts to call this election on Sunday, as we think, then let us have at her. This is a good enough issue to mix in with the others. We will see what the Canadian people really think about a government that lords it over the people instead of listening to them.