Mr. Speaker, I would like to wish my colleague a happy anniversary. June 28 will be his 15th year in the House. I have often enjoyed our differences and sometimes our similarities when speaking to issues.
However, he is right on the account that the government is such a pale imitation of what it purported to be back in 2015. I remember, as all Canadians do, the government and the Prime Minister talking about a new era in Canadian politics. They said that there would be collaboration on the floor of the House of Commons, that there would be democratic reform, that there would be housing for people dealing with housing issues, that there would be pharmacare and that the government would attack climate change. Instead it is giving all the big emitters a get out of jail free card when it comes to climate change emissions. The government made all kinds of commitments that it has sadly failed to meet.
The most egregious is the refusal to work with the opposition. Every member of the NDP caucus takes his or her work seriously. In every case, when a bill has come before the House, the NDP has offered very thoughtful amendments to improve legislation. I could give a 14-hour filibuster on all the improvements suggested by NDP members. We did the work, gave it to the government and recommended it be incorporated in legislation. Witnesses agreed. The said to take the NDP amendments to make the legislation better so it would do what it purported to do. After four years, it has been a complete and abject failure. The government refuses opposition amendments; it is just what it does.
The Conservative government before it did the same thing. A dozen times legislation was rejected by the courts because the Conservatives refused the NDP amendments. Now we have bad legislation pushed through like a bulldozer by the Liberals again, without taking the amendments that would have made that legislation more sound, better and actually do what it purported it would do. It is sad.
It is a sad commentary on the government. However, as I mentioned before, on October 21, Canadians will judge it on that record.