Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech.
The Senate has never been a chamber of sober second thought or particularly representative of the regions, which it should have been, according to the Fathers of Confederation. It has always been a haven for the cronies of the party in power, no matter which party that is. Blue or red, things have always been the same.
The Liberals, through this motion, are saying they want to preserve the status quo, although they will be removing a few bad apples from the Senate. The problem is that there is an increasing number of bad apples. I feel that the whole orchard is contaminated. It is becoming hard to find any apples that are not rotten. I am sure there are some. I do not mean to say that everyone is crooked, far from it, just that there are too many problems.
I wonder why the Liberals seem to be defending the status quo regarding the operation of the Senate. Given that there are so many problems and that this institution is decaying and falling apart, would it not be in the public interest to simply abolish it?