Mr. Speaker, when we were at the industry committee hearing on the census, we heard from several expert witnesses. One of those witnesses was Mr. Darrell Bricker, who is a statistician. He said, “it's not impossible to move to a voluntary census and generate very high quality data that would be as high a standard as anywhere in the world”.
The difference between the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, in its approach to the census, is that we on this side the House believe Canadians should be treated like adults. The other side is moving a Liberal-sponsored private member's bill that would re-enshrine the threat of $500 fines for Canadians who do not want to tell the government what their religion is, how much yardwork they did last week, how much time they spend with their kids or how many bedrooms they have in their houses.
This side of the House does not believe Canadians should be threatened to get that information.