Mr. Speaker, I would like to join my opposition colleagues in condemning this outrageous attempt by the government to denature—for that is exactly what it is, and I emphasize this for the benefit of the government House leader—the very idea of opposition days and the very essence of the Canadian Alliance motion.
When the government House leader attempts to play down the introduction of this practice in the House by saying that opposition motions have only been amended, or amendments brought to these amendments, for the past two or three years, I would remind him that this practice has been around much longer than that.
It first began when the Bloc Quebecois was the official opposition in this House, in other words just after the 1993 election. This has been an established practice in the House for almost seven years now.
This is why I would agree with those who say that we have never seen or gone along with the government introducing amendments to amendments introduced by the opposition parties on allotted days since, if memory services, we first came to this House, in 1993.
Clearly this practice of the opposition parties amending their own motion has become established practice in the House. Why? The simple answer, as the leader of the New Democratic Party points out, is that the government has taken to amending the opposition motion in order to vitiate its very purpose.
I would respectfully submit to you that what is going on right now has no other purpose than to vitiate the Canadian Alliance motion.
Not only is the government's outrageous attempt contrary to established practice in this House but, if you read the government's motion to amend the amendment, it vitiates, or denatures the very essence of, the motion.
I urge you strongly, Mr. Speaker, to reject this government motion to amend the amendment and to rule it out of order.