Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-290. I had an opportunity to review the argument given during the first hour of debate. I have listened today to the representations of the other three parties. I am not sure whether there is a consensus in the House as to what the intent of the bill is, what the basic principle is.
I think the bill calls out and says that as our population redistributes province by province, every region in the country, and that the per cent of population in our remote regions continues to remain flat or go down, whereas we have a higher concentration in urban centres. This means that not only the geographic size of a particular constituency or riding continues to grow, but there are consequences to the quality of representation that the people who live within the constituency can get as it continues to grow.
There are ridings in Canada that take five hours to fly across. There are constituencies that have 25 or 30 different communities of distinct interest. There are constituencies that have never seen a member of Parliament.
Canada is a very diverse country. In fact, some people out there do not think they are even Canadians any more. No one is talking about their issues. Rural and remote regions of Canada, ostensibly represent the resource industry.
When we think of rural versus urban issues, they are becoming more and more of concern to Canadians. Rural and resource areas, the remote regions of Canada, are getting less attention on the agenda of Parliament, less attention in the laws of Canada and less attention in the investment in their infrastructure and in the services. I think in northern Ontario there is only one passport office. Someone may have to travel a hundred kilometres to the nearest spot to get a passport.
When we think about the growing size of the geography of a riding, where there is a dispersion of population, all Canadians equal to representation and access are not getting it. In fact, the accessibility to services is not there, whether it be health care, social services, education or other needs that all Canadians wish to share with each other. They are not equally accessible.
When those services are not readily available through infrastructure that the Government of Canada has put in all of these communities, people use the member of Parliament as the only person who can help them with their issues, which normally would go through a Government of Canada office. It means the member of Parliament in a rural or remote area of Canada is doing the job that urban members of Parliament, such as myself, take for granted and are done by these other agencies that are available.
Communities in our country are still on party lines. They do not have dedicated phone lines. They do not have access to Internet. They do not have cell networks. Most of our work in urban Canada utilizes those new technologies. Those are not available. Are those people who live in these areas, and not only northern Ontario, but any rural or remote area of Canada, not entitled to the same accessibility for services to which Canadians in urban centres are entitled? How do we get the equity here?
I understand the representations that have been made about representation by population. Because of the constitutional guarantees for provinces, and I will not mention a province because I do not want to pit province against province. nine out of ten provinces are guaranteed a minimum number of seats. Only Ontario does not have a minimum number of seats for representation in Parliament.
In fact, the province of Ontario in 2005 passed legislation to guarantee, I believe, 11 seats for northern Ontario. It has legislation in place because it recognizes the importance of having a voice at the table, not necessarily proportionate to the number of people in that region, representing the interests of that region.
Representation by population is an important aspect. It is not, however, the current situation in Canada. It is not, in fact, reflective of the current democracy in Canada.
I appeal to the government and I appeal to the Bloc Québécois as well to let us look at this bill, not solely from the perspective of northern Ontario but from the perspective of representative democracy, both at election time and in terms of the accessibility of the services that all Canadians should enjoy.
I think we should consider that the principle of this bill is not that it is a northern Ontario bill. It is a Canada bill. It is a Canada bill on behalf of every rural and remote area of Canada, to make sure that as we move down the line, as we get this distribution of population into urban and suburban centres and the percentage of population in rural and remote areas continues to go down, the issues and the contributions that population makes are not diminished in some way simply because there are not that many people.
As a matter of fact, as the technology changes, the numbers of people in agriculture and in natural resource development and delivery are going to go down because we are going to be able to do it more efficiently and meet our needs with less people. Towns are going to disappear.
I do not know how long that is going to take, but we need to keep Canadians connected. The only way to keep Canadians connected is basically through the services that are provided. If, because of population, those services are not being provided by the Government of Canada through offices within reasonable areas, that representation can only be provided by a member of Parliament. That is why we need to have some careful consideration of whether or not the representation of people of Canada in rural and remote areas is equitable. Their voices have to be heard.
I believe that this bill gives us an opportunity to discuss it. I do not think it matters whether the bill passes in terms of becoming legislation in Canada. What does matter, however, is that the points that have been made are important points that should be taken to committee, so that the committee can determine whether or not we are facing a problem or whether there are some remedial steps that can be taken to make absolutely sure that the true representation of all Canadians is respected.