Mr. Speaker, unfortunately you were not here for most of my speech, but I did talk about the connection between the negotiations with the provinces and the federal government with regard to agreements. I used, as an example, the space station, which was an agreement that I hoped the federal government had consulted with the provincial governments. I had to use examples of where the federal government had not consulted with the provinces, like the Nisga'a agreement and many of the other agreements that have come forward like the student loan program.
It is a tradition for the federal government to not consult with the provinces about these issues. It is just how it does business. It just rams legislation through, which is the unfortunate, but I am very aware of that.
What I am most concerned about is that not only is that an abuse of democracy, but when the government starts to say “We'll take this witness, but not that witness. We'll pick them”, that goes absolutely to the ultimate end in lack of democracy, which was the point I was trying to make.