Mr. Speaker, I thank all the officers and employees of this Chamber for being so patient with some of us who must seem terribly long winded. It is an important gesture that so many members have been willing to speak to the devastation that so many millions of our fellow citizens have recently experienced.
While I as an Albertan did not have any direct experience with the devastation of the recent ice storm, I want to add the voices of my constituents in solidarity with those who were so deeply devastated by the adversity of ice storm and its consequences to the many eloquent speeches this evening. I represent some 75,000 people in Calgary who live in a part of the province that has been fortunate enough not to experience natural disasters of this nature. When they see a disaster occur in another part of their country they feel affected by it. Many of my constituents expressed to me their desire to assist in any way they possibly could.
My home parish, St. Bonaventure parish, managed to establish a charitable relationship with the St. Thomas More parish at Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu which is in the middle of what was called the triangle of darkness in order to raise the necessary funds to support the people in Saint-Jean who have lost so much and are still just recovering.
My only experience with the storm was indirect in that I was supposed to be in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu to attend the Centre d'immersion de la Chambre des communes for French instruction. But on the day I was planning to leave the news of the storm came through and I was unable to travel to Saint-Jean. The Collège militaire, where the immersion centre operates, became an emergency centre for the people of that area. I would like to put on the record our thoughts for the staff of the House of Commons at the immersion centre in Saint-Jean, namely Elizabeth Gervais and her colleagues who are very dedicated servants of this place. I know they have no doubt been deeply troubled by this disaster.
Members of my party often criticize government. We are often characterized as being enemies of government, but one of the things we saw in this storm was the need for government. We saw government at its very best serving the people. We saw local, provincial and federal levels of government working together, marshalling all their resources, as other members have said, putting partisanship, ideology and politics aside to serve their people in their most urgent need.
We have learned many lessons about how we must be better prepared for such emergencies in the future. This demonstrated to those who are cynical about government that government can and must be a force for good in particular when it is so urgently needed at moments like this. That comment is no more clearly applicable than to our military, an institution which for too long in this country has been allowed to decline and dissipate in its strength and resources. For various reasons we have chosen not to invest in the resources needed by our military forces. Now we see how necessary they really are to people when it counts.
More important, the response to the recent adversity really demonstrates what Canada is all about, not government but civil society, community in the most authentic sense. It is about neighbour helping neighbour. It is a cliché but it is profoundly true. We saw the same kind of response to the floods in the Saguenay and the floods in the Red River Valley. We see it whenever Canadians are confronted by adversity.
The history of this country is one of carving out an existence in an intolerably cold and difficult land against the forces of the elements. Sometimes, such as in the last month or so, we find that the elements are stronger than we are. But by gathering together and through the power of synergy that we find in community and civil society and voluntary institutions, it is amazing what can be done to relieve suffering.
Finally, the last lesson I take from the recent adversity is one I learned in the only natural disaster I lived through, which was the terrible devastating earthquake in San Francisco in 1989. Several hundred people died in that city as a result of a huge earthquake in the bay area in California where I was going to college at the time.
I was sitting in a class studying Thomas Aquinas, the doctor of theology. The lecture was about Thomas Aquinas' writing on the grandeur of God and his dominion over nature. Just as we were discussing this rather prescient reflection by the great medieval scholastic, the world began to shake underneath us. I even wondered for a moment whether we were going to fall into the Pacific Ocean and whether it was the big one.
What flashed through my mind at that time which has stuck with me ever since is that no matter how pompous we are about our own powers as human beings, we are brought to the realization from time to time that we are really not in control of our own circumstances, that we are at the mercy of much greater powers than we can ever imagine. I think that was no doubt an emotion and a sentiment experienced by so many of the hundreds of thousands who struggled through this adversity.
I want to close simply by reiterating what some other members have said in their remarks, that financial help is still needed. For those who may be watching these debates, if they have not yet found a way to assist those who have struggled through the ice storm, they can still do so through the good offices of the Red Cross which I understand is still distributing funds to those in need. The Red Cross can be reached at 1-800-850-5090. I understand the Red Cross is still taking financial contributions and distributing them where those resources are most needed.
I want to commend all the other members of this place who have spoken so eloquently and our fellow citizens who have shown us what it really means to be a Canadian.