Mr. Speaker, I believe confidence votes should only be on budgetary items or the throne speech. Everything else should be open.
All we need to do is look at the former member for York South—Weston, Mr. John Nunziata, who stood with principle and voted against the government on the GST. The red book promised to get rid of the GST. Only one member of the Liberal party stood and said his constituents had sent him to the House, his constituents had told him to vote against the GST and that was exactly what he would do. Mr. Nunziata's reward: to be kicked out of the Liberal caucus.
We must bear in mind that Mr. Nunziata was a member of the rat pack, and that when the Liberals were down and the Conservatives were up he did an awful lot of fighting to bring his party's stature back up in the House of Commons and raise its profile. His reward years later was to be kicked out of the Liberal caucus because he voted with his conscience and with the wishes of his constituents.
That can still happen today. The government has not learned anything from that example.