Mr. Speaker, I would like to draw attention to the work of my colleague. When he says that there is always room for improvement, he is right. In fact, many members of this parliament want to see the electoral process improved by being made more transparent.
There are two expressions heard very often from members of the Bloc Quebecois: more transparency, more democracy. We need to check that we do not have a beam in our eye, before trying to remove the mote from our neighbour's.
My colleague referred to electoral democracy. It is always a good thing to stick to the things one knows best. In the last election, in my own riding, as was reported in the media, the Bloc Quebecois had trouble accepting a profoundly democratic process. One of their top members for the past 10, 15, maybe 20 years sold 600 membership cards in order to gain eligibility for the fine position of official candidate to run against André Harvey in the last election campaign.
Unfortunately, as members are aware, this was against the most elementary rules of democracy. a candidate was refused access to a convention that seemed above-board in everyone's eyes. Those who claimed in the House of Commons to be profoundly democratic, highly respectful of the basic rules of citizen participation in the elector process, got pushed around, shunted aside, by their leader. The leader of the Bloc Quebecois arrived with his parliamentary leader, the ineffable member for Roberval, to announce “You no longer have a spot, so move over”.
As hon. members have seen, two days before the election, the Bloc Quebecois leader was in my riding, both times proclaiming me the winner. So sure was he of my victory, perhaps, that he decided to ignore the elementary rules of democracy and did not even nominate a candidate.
Before thinking about reforming the entire world, what does my honourable colleague think of each of the parties in our own ridings? a young fellow sold 600 memberships, yet he could not even take part in a convention, because the Bloc Quebecois had decided that a certain person was to be the candidate.