Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my hon. colleague from Langley—Abbotsford for his thoughtful remarks on sport in Canada. This is an important issue to all Canadians. It really brings to mind the question of the function of committees in this parliament.
There was once a tradition in this place that committees, such as the committee on sport in Canada, were considered to be somewhat independent. They had the ability to operate with some degree of independence from the executive, from the cabinet and from the Prime Minister's office, which, as Professor Donald Savoie recently pointed out in his book on Canadian governance, really runs the entire cabinet as though it is just a focus group.
If the cabinet is merely a focus group, then the committees dominated by the government's majority are just pure optics and have little or no relevance to the actual policy making function of this parliament, as witnessed by this committee decision on sport in Canada.
I would ask my hon. colleague why he thinks it is that committees, such as the one on sport in Canada, have continued to see their importance and independence diminished and marginalized by a government that centralizes all power in the hands of the cabinet and the Prime Minister.
Does my colleague agree with the famous aphorism of Lord Acton that power tends to corrupt and that absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely?