Mr. Speaker, the member talked about “the evil Conservative government” but she need look no further than three seats to her left, to her leader, the member for Toronto—Danforth, as the guy who enabled “the evil Conservative government” to take its place in the House. We have the member to thank for that.
I see the chairman of the human resources committee in the House today. He is certainly doing a great job on that committee, on which I have the great privilege of serving. Should the House continue to operate through next week, hopefully we will table a report on the establishment of a crown corporation to direct the rate setting mechanisms of the employment insurance program, which is a key component of this legislation.
Over the course of four to five weeks, the committee embarked on this study and brought in a number of witnesses. The minister himself appeared on two separate occasions. Maybe the Minister of Transport will thank him for that and let him know that we appreciated his input.
The establishment of the crown corporation is of great concern to all Canadians because it is a fairly significant departure.
We put in all that effort and work at the committee and we hear the leader of the NDP, who appeared before the CLC last weekend, commenting that the government was just barging ahead with this with no consultation. He said that the only attention this received at the finance committee was five minutes by the Liberals and five minutes by the Conservatives. As a member of the committee, I was offended by that comment and the NDP member should be offended as well for the effort that was put in.
We know the current leader of the NDP is certainly no Ed Broadbent or Tommy Douglas but does the member not understand that this work was done by the committee and that those comments were a total disregard for the committee, or was it just blatant politics when it comes to this particular issue?