Mr. Speaker, we have listened to the debate. We have had members on the government side saying not to touch the process because it is working so well. However it is not working so well. We heard four members from the opposition say that it was time for change.
I cannot overemphasize the fact that the polls are saying people want change. My friend from Nova Scotia has pointed out that people have the capacity to read into the law things that we never thought were there.
Society has changed in the 20 years since we have had the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. For example, in 1960 we had as a public policy residential schools in the country. Today the notion of residential schools is the worst thing that we could ever imagine. Back in the sixties we had a different opinion on sexual morality than we have today. They could not have envisioned what we have today for sexual morality.
Society has changed. We wrote the Charter of Rights and Freedoms as society was in 1982. We are asking our courts to interpret it today in the year 2002. However we have a different perspective on society. What was debated back in 1982 in this Chamber about the powers to be given to the courts and the powers that would be contained in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms has moved far beyond anything that we could have envisioned. We have rulings coming out of the Supreme Court that would have made people's hair stand on end in 1982. Yet today it is business as usual coming out of the Supreme Court.
Imagine people standing in the House in 1982 and saying that people like Clifford Olson and Paul Bernardo could not only vote in a general election, but it was their right to vote in a general election was guaranteed. My goodness, we would have gone berserk in 1982. Now we just take it in our stride because the Supreme Court has made that pronouncement.
There are different ways that the Supreme Court has ruled in the last 20 years that would never have been thought of in 1982. Yet this murky process of osmosis, of let the best brains bubble to the top, as proposed by our Liberal friends, is the best way for the country to have a Supreme Court justice foisted upon it. Is this the right way and the best way?
I am not looking for a witch hunt. I am not looking for us to bring them in, throw them to the wolves and see if they can stand the pressure. I am just saying that if we are to give nine unelected people the right to determine what this society can or cannot do, we as a society have a right to ask them a question about where they are coming from.
It is not asking much. This is the highest court in the land but many times we would not know it. That side of the House prostrates themselves to the Prime Minister on most occasions, but I was so glad yesterday when finally members on that side realized that they had some power. All they have to do is exercise it.
All of us have constituents who are demanding that our system be democratic, that our institutions be democratic and that our institutions be responsive to the people. That is the meaning of democracy. I hear the Liberals telling us about the great and wonderful democracy in the country but they will not even think about debating or even allowing a vote on this. There is not much democracy in Canada. It is unfortunate.
We are a peaceful nation and we are a civilized nation. We have, in most cases, a Supreme Court that we respect and appreciate. However, at the same time there is no reason whatsoever to continue this process of one man, a Prime Minister, even though he talks to people behind the scenes, having the power to foist on this nation nine unelected people who think they are the last word on our society.