Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale for that question, because he is right.
Tonight we are being asked to consider continuing to fund the Senate, which is, as I said, a constitutionally important, mandated part of our parliamentary democracy. One of the rationales being given by the NDP is that because there are some expenses to do with some of the members, that body should be relieved of all of its funding.
Currently we have 68 members of the NDP caucus, two-thirds of its caucus, who have spent $2.7 million, three times as much as, if we are understanding correctly, what the NDP—