Madam Speaker, I want to make an observation about the debate in response to something the parliamentary secretary said earlier. He complained about the idea that there would be an amendment that would provide an instruction to the committee. He said that these are games and that we should let the committee make its own decisions.
I had a recollection and did some research on this. Do members know what was the Prime Minister's first act when he was elected to Parliament, in 2008? He drew first for the private members' bill draw, and the motion he put before the House, his very first act as a member of Parliament, was, if members can believe it, an instruction to a committee:
That the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities be instructed to consider the introduction in Canada of a national voluntary service policy....
Does this not suggest that the parliamentary secretary, while he would like to wiggle out of any accountability for how the government has failed consumers and taxpayers in so many ways, is hypocritically trying to say that we cannot instruct a committee? The first act of the Prime Minister in the House was to do precisely that.