Mr. Speaker, the irony of those comments by my colleague is that even if they allowed many more hours of debate, they did not accept any amendments that would actually have improve the bill to ensure that more Canadians would able to vote. In fact, they did none of that. They did not accept amendments and made it more difficult for Canadians to participate in our electoral process, which is something that this bill undoes, and rightfully so.
With regard to amendments that were made at committee, these came from all political parties. That is is very important. Furthermore, the amendments introduced by by the government side were based on recommendations by the CEO of Elections Canada and the Commissioner of Canada Elections to strengthen provisions in the bill. On this side of the House, we respect our independent officers of Parliament and we appreciate their advice in this process. That is exactly what we did following the intense study that was undertaken at committee and the advice of those independent officers of Parliament.
Therefore, I think that all Canadians can rest assured that this bill does good things for democracy. In fact, the CEO and the commissioner have both called for its speedy implementation to ensure that they have the necessary tools, which I might add are expansive for the commissioner but enable him both to compel testimony and prosecute these issues. Those tools would have been useful in previous scandals, which the other side of the House is quite familiar with when it comes to elections.