Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. friend for his compliments. I appreciate that. If that is his style, I look forward to more of this back and forth.
I would remind the member that there are problems in democratic unions just like there are problems in Canada, in our own democracy. We even had an inquiry led by Judge Gomery which looked into people accused of stealing tens of millions of dollars. Did that mean that we said to heck with Canadian democracy and threw it out the window? No. We say we have a problem, but we have systems and checks and balances to take care of that problem and we will do it in an open and transparent way. That is exactly what the labour movement does with those sorts of things. The members are in charge, they pay the freight, and they are the ones calling the shots.
That was what was so obscene about the legislation. It left the impression that unions were full of big union bosses and the goons and the guns and the stealing and all the other nonsense. That was the impression my colleague's party left and it was the impression it wanted to leave. That was the impression the legislation left. It had the desired effect. That secret ballot lessened the number of successes that were there because of intimidation. Anyone who has studied this issue knows that this is a fact. This hiding behind the secret ballot as the only way to do it is not the issue at hand. What matters is fairness and equity, and the workplace is not a fair and equitable place. Different rules are needed for that kind of circumstance.