Yes, Mr. Speaker, they should applaud. He was not right that often.
That is one of the reasons I voted for what he was attempting to do.
Fast forward to today, members and Canadians know that our Prime Minister has a very aggressive legislative and budgetary agenda. I will provide some comment on that. We are at a stage, getting closer and closer to that two-year mark as legislation has been proceeding along, where we have to recognize there is a need for the House to have extended hours. That is nothing new. That should not be a news flash for anyone sitting in the chamber. I have been a parliamentarian for 25 years, whether here in Ottawa or in the Manitoba legislature, and we have quite often had extended hours of sitting to encourage more debate. In fact, in the last 10 years in Ottawa, we have seen it six or seven times. What we are debating today is nothing new. It is something that is important.
The member for Elmwood—Transcona said something that really tweaked. There were a lot of things said, and I want to pick up on a couple of points that I heard today. One of them was that a proportion of time should be allocated towards opposition days. I should remind the New Democrats, before they get too cozy with the Conservatives on that particular issue, that the Conservative government House leader brought it up. I should let the member know, because he was not here when Stephen Harper was the prime minister, that Stephen Harper had opposition days on Wednesdays and Fridays. Wednesdays and Fridays are short days, as all members know, so where is this argument about proportion of time? Is the memory of Conservatives that short that they have forgotten it?