Mr. Speaker, in my 10 years, I do remember when it was considered contempt of Parliament to mislead the House in an answer. Again, one could obfuscate. One could make a mistake. However, someone who set out to mislead Parliament, that was considered the most egregious crime that a member could commit, whether it was a sitting prime minister of whether it was a minister of the crown, and there were consequences.
We are at a point now where people just respond somehow with “Get over it”, “Come on”, “Welcome to Parliament”, “It's question period; it's not answer period”. However, the fundamental respect for even telling the truth seems to have been lost within this last Parliament, and that is a concern.
The Standing Orders have always been clear, in terms of the obligation to respond as best one can and as truthfully as one can. The fact that we even have to make it clear shows the fundamental problem that we are seeing in this democracy right now.