Mr. Speaker, first, I want to salute the initiative of my colleague from Ajax—Pickering, who had the wisdom to make this a non-partisan bill. Anything related to electoral reform must, in essence, be non-partisan. It is in this spirit that any amendments to electoral legislation in Canada must be made.
It is my great honour to support this bill introduced by my colleague to lower the voting age to 16.
In a few moments, the our party's whip, in an effort to educate and ensure healthy democratic debate, will address the pros and cons of this bill. I want to state that this in no way undermines my support for this bill and that of most of my colleagues who, at present, intend to support it.
That said, I want to ask my colleague a question. A few moments ago, he spoke about the reservations often raised to oppose such legislation, stressing the supposed lack of maturity of sixteen-year-olds. I want to ask him the following question: what would one say to people who claim that sixteen-year-olds and seventeen-year-olds are not sufficiently interested? Of course, one can object on the basis of their maturity, but also on the basis of their interest in politics. I want to know what he would say to those who think that young people are not sufficiently interested.