Mr. Speaker, a cornerstone principle of democracy is that each vote should carry equal weight to the extent possible. With that in mind, in the last election we committed to restoring the principle of representation by population, which had fallen behind for the faster growing provinces of Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia. At the same, we committed to the provinces with slower growing populations that their seat counts would be protected.
As part of our agenda to strengthen accountability in democracy, I introduced new legislation on Friday entitled the democratic representation act, which keeps our commitment. This legislation provides a modern, balanced and practical approach to ensuring fairness in representation for all provinces in Canada.