Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank my colleague from Châteauguay for his question, which is not easy to answer. There is no magic way to counter the initiatives, which are to some extent illegitimate, of a government like this one, because our democratic rules are involved.
A government can legislate in areas where it believes it is legitimate to do so. When this government decides to more or less disregard the constitution, particularly where ethics are concerned, then the roads are clear, as we say in Quebec. It will be up to the voters to make a decision, following a properly conducted election campaign with a real debate. Hopefully, if there is a referendum, this type of issue will be raised.
It is all the more odious that listening to the member for Châteauguay, I was reminded that this government, which claims to be democratic and boasts about Canadian democracy, acted without a mandate, without consultation, without proper debate and without a popular verdict, in other words without the support of the population and without any referendum, when it decided in 1982 to repatriate the Constitution and in 1999 to launch the social union.
On the one hand, the government decided to repatriate and bring a major amendment to the constitution by entrenching into it a charter of rights, which was a transcendent event in the history of Canada, without a referendum, without seeking the opinion of the public and without any mandate. The issue was never raised during the election of 1980, but that did not stop the government. Neither did the government address the issue of social union in 1997 as we had. There had been discussions between the provinces to try to improve co-operation with Ottawa. When the federal government started throwing its weight around to impose its point of view, while giving goodies to the provinces that had given in, it had no mandate to do so, there had been no debate, let alone a referendum.
This is all the more unbearable today that we feel that the government is relying on this transcendent event in the history of Canada. Some people are talking about the major one, with the repatriation of the constitution, and the minor one, with the social union, in the evolution of Canada, a Canada that is moving ahead.
Today, the government draws on the social union to come up with this kind of bill, which is giving obvious moral authority to the Government of Canada without having any real legitimacy. It has no legitimacy, as it arises from a people's consensus that would have the Canadian government head in that direction. It is thus very wrong to act in this way, especially when the federal government claims that Canada is a democratic country.
I do not know if this answers the question of my colleague from Châteauguay, but like other measures taken in recent months, this bill clearly shows that this is how things are done in Ottawa now, and that Quebecers need to take note, because the provinces including Quebec will be cut out of the loop.