Mr. Speaker, I would like to broaden the overall theme that the hon. member for Medicine Hat has constructed for us.
He pointed out the essential difference between this side of the House and that side of the House. On this side, we believe in economic freedom, that it is individuals, not big government, who create wealth. It is entrepreneurism, not politicians, who create jobs.
That theme of overall individual freedom was further illustrated today in the House of Commons when numerous members of the House on this side had to stand up and defend charter provisions, which protect religious freedoms and the rights of individuals to exercise their own religious morality, against the position of cabinet ministers on that side of the House who oppose religious freedom and who want to impose their values on various different religious and cultural groups. People who come here from other countries to enjoy religious freedoms will have those freedoms impeded by a government that wants to force independent religious organizations to perform weddings that are against the religious values of those religious institutions.
Ironically, we saw the minister on democratic reform stand in the House repeatedly claiming that he believed in the charter, when in fact he stated on CPAC that those marriage commissioners who refused to carry out same-sex weddings should lose their jobs. Other ministers have said that churches that fail to perform same-sex weddings should lose their charitable tax status.
I bring it back to the ultimate question of individual freedom, and I ask my friend from Medicine Hat this. Is it not true that it is us on this side of the House of Commons who are defending the Canadian constitutional values of individual freedom, economically, religiously and in other facets of Canadian life?