Madam Speaker, my colleague seems to be taking lessons from certain American politicians, and it is disappointing to hear him distort the truth and revise history as he sees fit and make wild accusations against his opponents. He spent 10 minutes talking about transparency and the fact that the Liberals have embraced proactive disclosure. He said there was some resistance.
I need to correct a few things my colleague said. The current system for disclosing expenses works consistently across the board; in other words, it applies equally to everyone. That is precisely what we were advocating for at the time. Under the current system, Financial Management Operations, which oversees members' expenses, has itself standards for the disclosure of information. I want my colleague to take note of that.
Also, he said at the beginning of his speech that this debate is unnecessary and a waste of time, and yet we are talking about a rather thick document in which the former commissioner of conflict of interest and ethics mentioned some very important things, particularly modernizing and improving the Conflict of Interest Act.
Is the member saying that there is no need to take time to talk about the Conflict of Interest Act in the House, in order to determine how to strengthen it and make it more effective and rigorous?