Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that this country is looking for change. When the Liberal government first came to power, it came in with something like 37% of the votes. That does not make any sense. The governing party was elected by one-third of the country and yet two-thirds of the country voted for those of us sitting on this side of the House. In the current political environment parties are all split up, but to make it worse, because of the first past the post system, we are all sitting on this side of the House.
The Progressive Conservative Party believes that there is a problem with the system. The system needs to be fixed. The first thing we would do if we formed the government would be to establish a commission which would hold public consultations on the most appropriate electoral system for Canada. In other words, we would put out some options for people to look at. The commission would be empowered to make recommendations to Parliament regarding any changes in the electoral system. If proportional representation was decided as the way to go, then that is the way we would go. Parliament, if possible, would implement changes in time for the next election.
We are in a pre-election mode right now, and are probably only eight months away from an election. To ask the government to call for a referendum on this question is unrealistic. We could support the second part of the resolution, but certainly not the first part.