Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to the motion brought forward by the member for Abitibi--Baie-James--Nunavik, that the government should introduce legislation granting a separate federal electoral constituency within the province of Quebec.
I read the member's brief with interest and listened to his speech. He has enumerated many of the unique difficulties people living in that area have in accessing facilities and services that we in the area nearer the 49th parallel take for granted. I can only imagine the difficulties they face in everything from getting around in their communities to the expense of living day by day. He has portrayed the issue well and has made it better understood by members here in the House and people across the country.
I am sure the member also understands the difficulty we face in a system that is based on representation by population to carve out individual ridings based on the uniqueness or the difficulty of getting around in those ridings or at least making a decision based on that alone. I must point out to him that although this is obviously a serious problem as far as accessing voting booths and for political parties accessing things that they need to do to get their message out, I do not think there is a case to create a new riding.
There are other examples of this problem in Canada. The member for Cariboo--Chilcotin has a riding that spans 120,000 square kilometres. That is a problem for him. The member for Prince George--Peace River has 217,000 square kilometres in his riding. The member for Skeena has 250,000 square kilometres. In Manitoba, the riding of Churchill is 460,000 square kilometres. There are some huge ridings. Every one of them has unique problems and unique opportunities. It is also a unique privilege to represent them.
We cannot solve this issue in a representation by population system by simply carving out a new riding whenever people feel that they do not have good enough representation here in the House of Commons. There are things that can and should be done to increase the feeling of inclusion by the Inuit of that region. I hope that many of the suggestions made by the member will be listened to by Elections Canada and that it will take into account ways to increase communication so the people there can feel more fully involved in Canada's political mosaic.
I do not think the House of Commons is the place to go about drafting those boundaries. There are other things that we can do, such as education programs and access via the Internet which is something I have encouraged Mr. Kingsley to consider in times past. There has to be a way to get the message out into the riding that a person's vote is important and that every person's vote counts. I can only imagine that people in many of those towns wonder what is the point and why bother because they are just part of a small town in the overall scheme of things.
There are 11,000 people of Inuit descent there. In any election that is a lot of votes. If they directed their votes in a certain way to ensure they had good representation, as I am sure they have from the member already, they could influence the next election. That is a lot of votes, and in a close election they could turn the tide.
As has happened in many other ridings, I hope the Inuit people themselves will feel free to stand as candidates. I hope they will be encouraged by all political parties to run as candidates in the region and will be given support from whatever party to give them a good shot at winning in an election.
We have several examples of people of aboriginal and Inuit descent that are able to bring a unique perspective in the House. They bring a lot of value to those discussions. They would do the same if we could get that kind of influence either as elected members, members of political boards, policy advisors to members or parties, and so on. All of them are ways to influence the political process. We encourage that, and hope Elections Canada and all political parties would take advantage of that.
I want to close with a quote from Mr. Kingsley who said:
Our representative democracy and the guarantees it offers citizens are the envy of many peoples. No system is perfect, however, and ours is no exception. The under-representation of women and minorities in the federal Parliament is a gap that we all want to fill.
Mr. Kingsley was right. There are gaps that we need to fill. There are people that we wish were here in bigger numbers. I hope all political parties, because that is where a lot of this emphasis would come, would ensure that the welcome mat is not only out, but that people understand that their influence is welcome, their words would be listened to, and their unique perspectives would have weight within the party and eventually here in the House of Commons.
I understand why the member wants this special riding. I do not believe it is the proper role of the House of Commons to carve that out. We cannot start heading down that road. It would be politicized in short order. I do not believe we can do that.
I would hope that Elections Canada would come back to the member and perhaps to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs to talk about ways to increase the presence of Canada in those regions and towns, and eventually come up with ideas on how to increase the participation rate and inclusiveness in the political process in those isolated areas. I would ask Mr. Kingsley and Elections Canada to do that.
I thank the member for his concern. I think his heart is in the right place, however our role in the House of Commons is not to designate electoral boundaries, but to talk about the bigger principles of how we guide Elections Canada, which in turn must do a non-partisan job.