Madam Speaker, first of all, I would like to thank my colleague from Skeena—Bulkley Valley for the wonderful work that he has done. He has been doing an excellent job on this file for some time now, since this was a fairly long process.
I am very pleased to rise today in the House. It is a real honour to talk about this issue because no issue is more important than the foundation of our democracy. Voters can participate in the election process, which makes it possible to have a Parliament that reflects the diversity of views in society and a democracy that reflects the choice of the people as fairly as possible .
That is the promise that the Liberal Party of Canada made during the last election. That was not a small promise involving a change to a rule or an administrative change. The Liberals promised a historic change that would improve our democracy and make Parliament more representative and more consistent with the message voters are sending.
This promise was repeated hundreds of times, maybe even a thousand times, and people believed it. We, too, took the Liberals at their word. When the Leader of the Liberal Party, who became Prime Minister of the country, tells us that the 2015 election will be the last one under the current voting system, we have every reason to believe it. What is more, when he specifically mandates the minister responsible for democratic reform to make that change, we again believe it. When it is in the throne speech, we continue to believe it. When the parliamentary committee is tasked with making that change, we continue to believe it. Unfortunately, today, the Liberal party is telling us and all Canadians that we should not have believed it. In fact, perhaps even the Liberals themselves never believed it.
Coming from a government whose platform said that it would restore the public's trust in democratic institutions, it is a slap in the face. It is extremely serious because it deepens the cynicism of the people we meet in our ridings, communities, cities, and towns.
After the Liberal promise was broken by the Prime Minister, many people asked us what needed to be done for politicians to keep their promises. This is serious, because the Liberals have just sown doubt in many people's minds or confirmed the doubts they already had.
We uphold the principle of hope and keeping one's word. What is the word of a Liberal politician worth today? It is difficult to go on saying that we can trust them. Let us remind people that the Liberal Party has not kept its word on an issue that goes to the very heart of our democracy.
The current system, first past the post, is almost no longer used at all by other western democracies, because it creates very serious distortions between the people's choice on election day and the representation in the House, in Parliament. In 2011, with 40% of the votes, the Conservative Party was able to form a majority government with 55% of the seats. This means that a minority can form a majority government that, for four years, can practically do whatever it wants. We saw what that bulldozer did.
At the time, the members of the NDP, the Green Party, the Bloc Québécois, and the Liberal Party said that it made no sense and that the system had to be changed. In addition, 63% of Canadians voted for parties that wanted a more proportional voting system.
Once in power—with, guess what, 39% of the votes and 55% of the seats—and once the whole process was over, the Liberal Party pulled a 180, broke its promise, and said things are just fine as they are.
That has consequences, and we think that a proportional voting system makes for better government. That is how it is done in 85% of OECD countries. It is not a hare-brained idea or so complicated that people will not understand how it works. It is simple, it works, and the principle is one that any elementary school child can understand. If a party gets about 20% of the votes, it should have about 20% of the seats. That seems logical to me, and it is what the people want.
A parliamentary committee was created to study the issue. Thanks to the NDP's proposal, the committee makeup reflected how people voted in 2015. The committee was given a mandate to study possible changes and alternatives to the voting system. We heard a lot of things. As my colleague said earlier, roughly 90% of the experts were in favour of a proportional voting system. About 87% or 88% of the citizens who came to see us were in favour of a proportional voting system.
The committee conducted an online survey that received 23,000 responses. Some 72% of respondents said they were in favour of a proportional voting system. The Liberals created their bizarre little website, MyDemocracy.ca, with completely convoluted and planted questions with no science behind them whatsoever, and people still said that they wanted a proportional voting system.
At the end of the process, the four opposition parties involved in the study had a discussion. We all put some water in our wine. We accepted the principle of a referendum, which was important to two other opposition parties, the Bloc and the Conservatives. The committee produced a majority report, which, guess what, argued in favour of a referendum on a proportional voting system.
Quite frankly, the Liberal government has a lot of nerve. I do not want to use unparliamentary language, so let us just say that it is resorting to a premeditated inaccuracy or planned misrepresentation in saying that there was no consensus. What a bunch of nonsense. This is the Liberals' way of getting out of a broken promise that was extremely important to thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of Quebeckers and Canadians all across the country.
There was a consensus. The only problem is that this consensus was not in the Liberal Party's interest. That is what is happening today. Now, with this vote in the House, in Parliament, on the majority report of the committee on electoral reform, all Liberal members present have the opportunity to rise, keep their word, and respect the will of their voters. We are being generous by giving them the opportunity for democratic redemption. They should keep their word and respect the choice of voters and the consensus of society. People overwhelmingly said that they no longer want this old inequitable, unfair, and archaic system. They said they wanted real change, a system where their vote is respected and every vote counts.
In the House tomorrow, we will have the opportunity to respect the will of the people, to keep our word, to fulfill the election promise, and to move forward with a new proportional voting system.