Mr. Speaker, like my colleague, I also saw myself as a member of Parliament from the time I was about 15 years old, so it is an honour to be here today speaking to this elections act.
The hon. member mentioned a couple of things I want to clear the record on. First of all, the Canadian charter guarantees Canadians the right to vote. It does not say that one has to live in Canada. It is a charter right to be able to vote. That is really important to recognize.
Second, he called it a voter identification card. It is not. It is a voter information card. All it is is proof of residence that must be used with another piece of ID. Those are really important things to make sure people understand. This is not a card we would get in the mail that could be used as identification. It would still have to be used with something else.
In the previous election, there were so many people who were not able to vote because they did not have something with their address on it. I am going to use as an example a senior woman who lives with her husband and does not get a bill in her name, because bills come in her husband's name. She does not drive and does not have another piece of ID. This would just be an information card that could be provided with another piece of ID so someone could vote. It is really important that we make those clarifications.
The hon. member had some great comments about the building, and that is wonderful. I really appreciate his speech on the history. However, I think it is important to make the point that when we are talking about bills we have put forward we actually stick to the facts.