Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's fine comments about the wonderful riding I live in. When our party was in government, I was happy to announce, as an example, $45 million for the Rideau Canal. There had not been a significant investment in the Rideau Canal in a very long time. I was able to make that announcement, and many of the projects that were part of that announcement are now almost completed. In fairness, the Liberal government did make additional announcements for our national historic sites, which is great.
It is great to see support for our national historic sites on both sides of the aisle, but during the time when we had some issues on the Rideau Canal, it was brought forward to me that people wanted to make some contributions and there was no mechanism to do that. If someone wanted to make a donation to protect environmentally sensitive lands in Canada, one could make a donation and get a tax receipt. They could give that money to the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and in some cases it turns lands over to Parks Canada. People can get a tax receipt for that, but not for donations to our national historic sites.
In truth, we found there were many people who wanted to have that process for the Rideau Canal. In fact, we have heard from Redpath that it also wants to make significant contributions to our national historic sites.
I hope that members from all sides will support the bill. It definitely is great for our historic sites across Canada.