Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his excellent speech, as well as for setting the stage for the debate we are having tonight.
Tonight, we were supposed to be once again discussing this government's efforts to raise taxes on Canadians. It is making the cost of living continue to rise and taking more money from the pockets of people who have none to spare. We wanted to use our opposition day to discuss issues that I, personally, think are of great concern to Canadians.
Opposition days are simple enough to understand. Over a given number of weeks during a parliamentary session, the opposition parties get certain days when they can choose the topic of the day and thus force a government vote on topics of the opposition's choice. Since we are coming to the end of this parliamentary period, we were entitled to two opposition days this week.
We used our first day to demand that Katie Telford and several other individuals appear before the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics to testify about foreign interference. The vote was scheduled for Tuesday. The opposition parties do not always work together, but it was expected that all opposition parties would agree that the Prime Minister's chief of staff should appear.
A lot has happened since then. I have to say that I am disappointed with the NDP's attitude.