Mr. Speaker, our knowledge of history readily admits this fact. I say this with all due respect to my esteemed colleague, who made a reference that we have no right to make and that I will not make either.
Let's take a positive view, since that is the hallmark of the Bloc Québécois, and say that the Conservatives are well represented in the House. The Bloc's turnout is not so bad either, and I can even say the same for the NDP. However, there is one political party whose turnout is not as high, but perhaps its lack of presence can be put down to shame.
It is true that a letter from Robert Bourassa had been sent, and it is true that before accepting the proposal, then Prime Minister Trudeau did not want to do this at all. One fine morning, he came up with the idea that there might be an insurrection, which had been mentioned by someone who was advising the City of Montreal. Being an imaginative person, the then prime minister of Canada thought this was a good opportunity to crush the separatists once and for all. That is about the size of it.
I invite the members of the House to consult historians who are not card-carrying members of the Bloc Québécois. They will find very few who will say that an insurrection was apprehended. In fact, I have a feeling that they will not find any historians who have said that, including among contemporary observers, such as the RCMP, which said there was nothing resembling an apprehended insurrection, the legal threshold for invoking the War Measures Act.