Mr. Speaker, I am not sure what the Reform Party thinks the purpose of a whip is. Is it to be in the House at every single moment to deal with its deleterious and destructive motions? I can assure members that no whip spends every moment in the House of Commons, nor should we.
Speaking of spending time in the House of Commons and who is interested in the issues, the member has the gall today to talk about drunk driving, a resolution of this House, and victims rights and the justice committee and what it is doing about that. While Mothers Against Drunk Driving were at committee this morning talking about exactly both those issues, who was there listening to them? Not the Reform Party which drags its tragedies into the House of Commons and bleeds all over the floor about them, but eight Liberals and one Reformer.
I think people should know there were nine committees meeting this morning. That is nine Liberals on every committee. That is 81 Liberal members in committee listening to groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the International Centre for Human Rights. No, they do not want to sit here in the House listening to these people blathering on time after time and making the same speeches over and over again. They want to be in the committees, doing their work, caring about things like drunk driving, like victims of crime, like human rights. That is where they have been this morning.
There are many times I sit in this House and Liberals as well are speaking to empty benches opposite. We accept that members of parliament have many responsibilities. We do not frankly jump up and criticize them every time they are not here sitting in the House listening to us.