Mr. Speaker, all across our great country, Canadians are struggling and going through financial hardships. Living pay cheque to pay cheque and relying on credit cards to make ends meet has become the reality for thousands of Canadians under the current government.
I would also like to say that I am splitting my time with the amazing member for Trinity—Spadina.
Yet here we are debating whether the Conservative government should give $58 million of taxpayer money to the unelected, unaccountable and undemocratic Senate. This does not represent the best interests of Canadians, which we are here to do.
The Fathers of Confederation envisioned the Senate to be an academic, non-partisan body of sober second thought. Instead, it has been turned into a tool of patronage for Liberals and Conservatives alike.
I would like to share with the House that my political awakening as a teenager, when I was 13, was the 1984 federal election. For those members of the House who remember that, it was Brian Mulroney versus John Turner. It was Brian Mulroney of the Progressive Conservatives, which no longer exist, they are now, I would say, the regressive Conservatives. In the televised debate of that federal election, Brian Mulroney, who was a Conservative, lambasted John Turner for doing a raft of patronage appointments that were asked of him by the former Prime Minister Trudeau. Conservatives at that time said that the Liberals had the option of not doing it.
However, in the past 30 years we have seen that Conservatives and Liberals alike have used the Senate as their patronage dumping ground, at the expense of the taxpayer. All we are asking tonight is to take pause and reflect. Does that chamber deserve the money that the taxpayers are paying for it? We just want to pause and reflect, and see if the money is being well spent over there. As Canadians have seen over the past couple of weeks, I think they would agree with most of the members of the NDP that it is not being spent well, that taxpayer funds are being misused.
That election in 1984 started off with Brian Mulroney riding into Ottawa on a white horse to clean up Ottawa, to get rid of the patronage appointments and it ended in 1993 with two members of the Progressive Conservatives remaining in the House, with division in the country. The same thing is going to happen in 2015. After nine years of power, the current government is going to end up a small rump, if anything, in the House, with a New Democratic government in power.
The Senate is an institution full of scandal and lies and it is a stain on Canadian democracy. I am proud to say that I am a New Democrat and I am proud to say that I am part of a party that does now and has always called for even when—