Mr. Speaker, I want to add my voice to the ironic debate we are having.
At the very time the government is moving to add more parliamentarians, the current parliamentarians are being stopped from having fair and open debate.
Let us talk about democracy. Democracy is not about moving time allocation to ram an agenda through within a very short timeframe. Democracy is not about inviting more MPs into this House so they can sit here at great expense only to be muzzled and not given the opportunity to speak.
I ask the minister, on this legislation which is all about the democratic process, why is the government denigrating the parliamentarian democracy that we have? Why is the government using a time allocation motion to stop debate on such a fundamental issue that will change the nature of this Parliament?