Mr. Speaker, this is now the 58th time that closure, or time allocation, has been brought in this Parliament. We are talking about a sad record that has never occurred before in the history of Parliament.
There have been 58 times where debate has been shut down, and this is on a bill that has not been debated for months. Despite this, the Conservative government is trying to impose this bill and shut down debate, although there have been few speakers on the bill and it has not been debated for months.
I want to quote the Minister of Justice, from a comment he made back in 2004.
At that time, the minister made the following statement:
The speed with which the government has acted in this fashion in bringing about closure is a true signal as to how the Prime Minister and the government are going to treat the so-called democratic deficit that the Prime Minister has had a revelation on in discovering that a democratic deficit exists in the country.
This government is the democratic deficit. Fifty-eight times. That is totally inappropriate. When will this government start respecting Canadians and allow Parliament to debate important issues?