Mr. Speaker, this is a real challenge because it is a balancing decision.
A couple of general principles could be applied. One I would use is that if there has been or is already a private firm or competition among private businesses, the government should stay out of it. If it is already being done and done well, the government should simply stay out of it as a matter of principle. That is a principle of government. It is in place but the Liberal government is ignoring it.
It is supposed to be a principle of governing that it does not compete with private enterprise. On the other hand we have those situations where the government can do best. I think of an example which relates back to my youth a long time ago. I remember when I grew up in Saskatchewan that my dad was the chairman of the Bode telephone company.
Members have probably heard of Alberta Government Telephones and B.C. Government Telephones. Now they are evolving into the different names and we have Telus. Before Saskatchewan Government Telephones ever came along there were literally thousands of individual telephone companies spread around all the provinces. My dad was the chairman of the local one and there were five subscribers. It was a big company. We had five people on the line and two longs and a short was us.
My grandfather was with a different company, the Peel telephone company. If we wanted to phone my grandfather we had to dial one long, which was the operator. She would hear this as sat in her little office in Swift Current. Everyone has seen Lily Tomlin do this. Well there she was in Swift Current pulling the cord out and connecting our line to Peel. Then she would dial grandpa's number. He would answer, or grandmother would answer, and we would be able to talk to them.
That was very inefficient and going nowhere. What happened in each province at least out west is that all these little individual companies got together and formed an organization that would allow the whole province to do it together. It was done under the auspices of the government. It was a fine co-operative effort on behalf of the people. At that stage it was a totally legitimate way of doing things.
That is probably no longer the case. With communications being what they are, it is probably better to let free enterprise and competition rule.