Mr. Speaker, I had prepared a ten-minute speech, so I will have to skip over some of it.
However. I would like to speak about three dates. The first is December 19, 2005. I spoke about it earlier. That is when the Conservative Prime Minister, who had not yet been elected, made campaign promises. We were in the midst of the campaign. In his speech to the Chamber of Commerce, he said that he would monitor the federal spending power that had been so abused by the Liberal government. He added that this outrageous spending power had given rise to domineering and paternalistic federalism which is a serious threat to the future of our federation.
I think that he did not understand what he said. Today, we must conclude that he does not want to monitor the federal spending power. However, the Bloc Québécois is giving him that opportunity by presenting, on a silver platter, the excellent proposal by my colleague from Papineau of limiting federal spending powers in Quebec's areas of jurisdiction. That is extremely important. Yet, he prefers the domineering and paternalistic federalism. That is the Conservatives' preference as they have so clearly demonstrated today.
The second date is November 27, 2006. What was that date nearly a year ago? We will soon be marking the first anniversary of the recognition of Quebec as a nation. That motion passed in this very House with 265 votes out of the 308 members. Two hundred and sixty-five democratically elected individuals rose in this Chamber and voted to say that the Quebeckers formed a nation.
Recognizing Quebec as a nation is not insignificant. Now that nation must have its basic rights recognized. What have we had from the Conservatives over this past year? Has there been any recognition of a right, prerogative or privilege for Quebec? They have done nothing, nothing at all. The Bloc Québécois were the ones who were forced to rise in this House day after day to remind them of that.
Incidentally, one of the accomplishments of the Bloc was to gain recognition and respect of the Civil Code, one of the fundamental elements of our nation. No other province in Canada has a civil code. We have one and we have been obliged to remind the Minister of Labour of that, day after day for close to six months in this House, in order to stop him from getting a clause in Bill C-62 passed which would have flouted our Civil Code and would have changed it.
And who was it who defended the clause on the insolvability of RRSPs within Bill C-62? The Bloc Québécois. Only the Bloc members in this House promoted our amendment to that bill. Where was the Quebec Conservatives' protection of the Civil Code? They were not there, they did nothing. The Liberals followed us, cautiously, when we at last managed to convince them, and the NDP was not proud of us but did not dare to show much public opposition.
Yet the Conservatives were publicly opposed to the Bloc's insistence that its Civil Code be respected by Bill C-62. The Conservatives were finally obliged to respect the Civil Code and Bill C-62 was at last passed by them on June 7. Again this afternoon we passed it again for referral to the Senate.
If I understand correctly, that is the end of my time. That is really too bad.