Madam Speaker, we have just heard the government House leader wonder why the filibuster is occurring.
It is becoming readily apparent to members of this chamber that the government exercised options here. The government exercised options in its tabling of the rules for how this debate would proceed. It did not set any limits on the time period for the debate.
The standing orders established what the time of speeches would be. Unlike other bills the government has introduced, for which it set limits on the time for debate at each stage, for this bill the government did not do that.
It did it for the HST debate. It did it for the budget implementation act. It did it for the mega-trials bill. It did not do so in this particular instance. It could have when it tabled government Motion No. 3, and it did not.
Why not?