Madam Speaker, my remarks will not take very long. It is late. I would like to tell the hon. member that his bill is based on good intentions. However, there is a principle that we do not create laws unless it is necessary to do so. In this case, I do not feel that it is necessary. I have sat in this House since 1996 and only once did it not seem legitimate to me when a member crossed the floor.
However, we do not enact a new law for one case. Mr. David Emerson, a couple days after the election, crossed the floor to be appointed minister. That was unacceptable as he campaigned against the Conservative Party, but a few days later became a minister. If this were a pattern, of course, I would agree to do something, but it is an exception.
In the other cases that I have seen, the members who changed parties had legitimate reasons for doing so. For example, when Jean Charest gave up the leadership of the Conservative Party to become the leader of the Liberal Party in Quebec, the Conservative Party really changed. Many Quebec members were no longer part of the new party because the leader had changed and their constituents asked them why they did not join the Liberals, so they came to us. When election time came six months later, they were all re-elected. The voters followed them. Had they been obliged to resign and had they been prevented from doing their work in their ridings for six to eight months, what purpose would that have served? They told me they were hopeful that their voters would follow them when they made that change.
All hon. members who have switched parties more or less justify their decision that way. They feel that they did not change, but their party did and that they were elected for certain commitments that the party has not respected. They were no longer comfortable in their party and they switched. It does not happen very happen, but it does happen from time to time. Every time it happens—and I do not necessarily approve of the change when it is Liberals who leave to join another party—I am not happy about it, but I cannot deny the legitimacy of the decision. As the hon. member was saying earlier, if voters do not follow them, they will not be re-elected. They will be treated as turncoats and they will be defeated. That is how the system works. I do not see the need to change it when we do not have the necessary justification for unduly strengthening the parties with respect to the free choice of the hon. members of this House, who, for personal reasons, might want, quite legitimately, to change their allegiance.
My colleague mentioned other parliaments earlier. The parliamentarian who quite possibly is the most respected in the history of democracy, who not only saved a country, but a civilization, is Winston Churchill. If ever there was a parliamentarian who switched parties often, it was Winston Churchill. Thus, under certain circumstances I think it is legitimate to switch parties. That being said, I am a Liberal and I will always be a Liberal.