Mr. Speaker, the hon. member can demand that I answer him whatever way he wishes, but I will still answer the way I wish. The way I wish to answer is to go right back to the first point I made.
The member stands up and brags about these 300 meetings. Can he imagine what would happen if there was just one with all the premiers at one time?
The member is trying to suggest that the 300 number would go down to two. That makes absolutely no sense at all, just as it makes no sense at all for the government to talk about how productive it is when, at the ministerial level or at the minister of state level or even at a parliamentary secretary level, there is respectful dialogue between the federal government and the provinces and territories.
I would extrapolate from the member's comments that the 300 times is meant to say that those were 300 good meetings and 300 good things happened. I am not questioning the veracity of that. However, I am suggesting that starting to have more regular meetings with the Council of the Federation makes a lot more sense than telling it to hit the road.