Mr. Speaker, I enjoyed much of the speech by the member for Oak Ridges—Markham, but to do justice to the debate on Bill C-36, we need to start from the same base level of historical accuracy and information.
I noted that the member for Oak Ridges—Markham said it was the Liberal Party that created the old age security system as we know it today. In actual fact, I would point out that in 1926 it was the member for Winnipeg Centre at the time, the founder and first leader of the CCF, J.S. Woodsworth, who went to the minority Liberal prime minister of the day, William Lyon Mackenzie King, and cut a deal with him that the CCF would support the Liberal government if it finally yielded to its demands and introduced some measure of old age security.
The member for Winnipeg Centre at the time was smart enough to get that in writing. A letter exists today in the archives of the New Democratic Party. Kicking and screaming, the Liberals were forced to introduce some measure of old age security for seniors back in 1926. My colleague, the member for Saint Boniface, remembers that; apparently, he is older than I thought he was.
In actual fact, something that he might remember is that in 1942 the hon. Stanley Knowles took the place of J.S. Woodsworth as the member for Winnipeg Centre. Stanley Knowles was widely agreed to be the father of the Canadian pension system because he dedicated his career from 1942 to 1966 fighting and struggling to get the old age security Canada pension plan that we know today introduced by a Liberal minority government under Lester Pearson at that time.
It was Stanley Knowles who finally levered the Liberals into acting like Liberals in introducing the Canada pension plan. Then he spent the rest of his career, from 1966 to 1984 when he suffered a stroke, trying to get the pension plan indexed to inflation, another huge victory for Stanley Knowles and the party that I represent.
It is disingenuous, if not revisionist, to say that the Liberal Party was responsible for the introduction of the old age security system, the guaranteed income supplement or the Canada pension plan. It was those two great men who represented the riding that I am honoured to represent now whom we can thank for that.
I believe my colleague, the member for Oak Ridges—Markham, is too good a member of Parliament to believe the speech he was given to read in the House today. I honestly believe, at least now that he has been enlightened as to the history and origins of our old age security system, that he may want to revise his comments.