Mr. Speaker, we respectfully acknowledge the comments made by the government House leader regarding the Queen, and it is our opinion that members from the other provinces of Canada have the right to feel such respect towards Her Majesty the Queen of England.
However, we in no way recognize the authority she claims to exercise over Canada, and particularly over Quebec, and more importantly over our institutions.
The representatives of the Queen in Canada are the Governor General and the Lieutenants Governor in the provinces, and this institution, for which we have no admiration whatsoever and which we believe is greatly outdated, needs to be subject to an indepth reform as soon as possible.
Our political party sincerely believes that if members from the other provinces, and Liberal members from Quebec, want a monarch who hails from another country to be the head of their country, they are free to do so.
The Bloc Quebecois members elected to the House represent citizens who want a sovereign country that is not led by any foreign monarch, but one that is elected by the people that he or she will lead.