Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Victoria because I know his roots trace back to where I represent folks, back in the Niagara Peninsula. His roots actually come from back there, but we have allowed him to go to Victoria to represent the great folks out there. Let me say that he is a great member. I say to the folks of Victoria that they are lucky to have him and I want to thank him for that opportunity.
As to the question, if we allow the matter to stand, it clearly means that all of us can stand in our place, misspeak, and then come back tomorrow and say, “Mr. Speaker, I would like to correct my misstatement from yesterday. While I am here, I apologize to everyone in the House and to all Canadians. Thank you very much.” Then we would leave.
You, sir, would then say, “I guess that is what they want in the House, because that is how they dealt with it, so it doesn't matter what they say anymore.” Members could get up and say whatever they liked, whether truthful, anecdotal, or not truthful. No one would care, just as long as we came back within a reasonable amount of time, a couple of weeks or a month, and said, “Sorry, I did not mean it. I misspoke. I just misspoke. I really wanted not to misspeak, but somehow it happened to me. I got caught up in a long-winded conversation I was having and I misspoke.”
If we get to that place where we all just misspeak, which is what we have called it, and we can apologize the next day, I would never envy you, sir, sitting in the chair and trying to referee the issue of who has misspoken today and who has not. We would be lined up on a million points of order, saying to you, sir, “I would like to retract my misspoken words from two weeks ago.” The place would not function any more.
Only our words are our bond. When we give them across the way in the sense of saying what we believe and what we believe to be true, the other side must accept the fact that it is, and as soon as they cannot, there is no longer debate or dialogue in this House and the system does not function appropriately any more.