Madam Speaker, this is a rather special evening. I have worked hard in life to get to where I am today. I have never been singled out for anything because of my name or gender. I have always tried to get jobs because I was good at what I did, not because I am a woman. The problem I have is with the parts of the bill that talk about parity. For me, that does not mean appointing the same number of women as men.
For me, parity is about action. Parity is not just taking a nice photo with 15 men on one side and 15 women on the other, while the rest of the time the men are telling those women to shut up and look pretty. That is not what parity means to me.
I have a problem with this bill because it would mean giving the Liberals a blank cheque. We would be telling them that we agree that they should appoint people, three ministers, without even knowing what their titles will be. Meanwhile, you are causing our regions to empty out. Everywhere—