Mr. Speaker, I enjoyed my colleague's speech and the historical context that he provided. He said that when Lower Canada and Upper Canada joined—this is the concept of the two founding peoples—it was easily decided that Upper Canada and Lower Canada would have equal weight in the House, in the central government, even though Lower Canada was much more populous than Upper Canada.
This said, the government opposite, with its question and the heckling from certain Conservative members at the back of the room, seem to be saying that this is a sovereignist debate. But it seems to me—and my colleague can correct me if I am wrong—that this is not a debate between sovereignists and federalists, but between the Quebec nation and the Canadian nation. There is a strong consensus in Quebec among all political parties, sovereignist as well as federalist, and all of Quebec's civil society, that 25% of the members in the House of Commons must from Quebec, and that proportion must be protected.
The handful of people from Quebec who oppose that are here in the House. They are the dozen or so Conservative members and some Liberals as well. Apart from those federalist members here in the House of Commons, the other federalist members and a huge majority of Quebeckers oppose this bill.