Mr. Speaker, I have to take exception to one thing my hon. colleague just said. I personally do not believe that any electoral system has the effect of privileging or diminishing extremism. It has been an unfortunate aspect of this debate that the Prime Minister has asserted that proportionality would lead to greater power being exercised by extremists who would hold the balance of power, potentially, in some future government and be able to get disproportionate influence. My colleague from the Green Party is now making the opposite assertion, that first past the post does this.
The fact is that we have seen pure proportionality used to terrible effect in Germany, in the system under which Hitler was elected, and yet it has not discredited proportionality in other countries, including Israel, the Netherlands, and so on. The same thing is true for first past the post and, I suggest, any system. We need to discuss these things with the goal of trying to improve our system as much as we can, but I actually do not think it is helpful to suggest that any system that is going to be seriously considered in this country, including the status quo, actually privileges extremism. We are an inherently moderate country, we have more than a century of inherent moderatism, and I suggest that our future will be moderate and intelligent as well, as long as we are moderate in our rhetoric.