Mr. Speaker, I very much welcome the comments the hon. member has made on the accountability act.
Let me say first that I am really quite disappointed that we need to legislate accountability from government to Parliament and that we have to deal with this act at all, but apparently, after the last 12 years in particular and the way the Liberal government conducted itself, it is now necessary for us to deal with this in a legislative manner. I do welcome the Conservative government's bill.
I also appreciate the member's very detailed analysis of that bill. He has focused on many of the items on which I would have wished to talk today, so I will be very brief.
I wonder if the member could perhaps explain his position on what to me is the most fundamental omission in this bill. Yes, this bill deals with government's accountability to Parliament, but it does very little to speak to our accountability to the people who have sent us here, who have expressed their faith and their trust in us as elected members. This bill would do nothing to stop parliamentarians from crossing the floor immediately after an election. Mr. Emerson's crossing the floor certainly is not the first--