Mr. Speaker, we have to love the Dippers when they come and try to make a rational argument.
The fact is that if he were embarrassed about this prorogation, thank goodness he has not been a parliamentarian for too long. There have been well over 100 prorogations by political parties of all stripes over the last century. This is a common part of government procedure. We go back to a new throne speech mid-term of a four year mandate to try to set the new agenda for the last two years. This has happened with every government in Canada well over 100 times since the early 1900s.
He said, “Why in the world would you because we lost valuable time?” He seems to be complaining that by losing this valuable time, we as parliamentarians and the Canadian public are being disenfranchised somehow. That is why we want to bring the initiatives back to their same state so we do not have to start over.
If the member opposite is truly concerned, he should vote in favour of our initiative to bring back the bills so we do not have to start all over. If he is truly concerned about losing valuable parliamentary debate time, then he should vote in favour of Motion No. 2 so we will not have to have the same debate again.
Sometimes I just do not understand the rationale or the thinking behind some of those Dippers.