Mario Laframboise

[Child Protection Act (Online Sexual Exploitation), November 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question. This will allow me to quote some of the recommendations made by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. Its recommendations for public awareness include the following:

The creation of educational materials for children 12 years and under in order to help young children recognize signs of the abuse process...

Collaboration between tiplines such as Cybertip.ca around the world to begin tracking infants and toddlers in child abuse imagery...

Creation of gender-related educational materials in response to the large percentage of girls depicted in abuse imagery.

Working with law enforcement and Internet service and content providers to remove illegal content from Canadian servers.

Establishing international standards for the personal information a registrant is required to provide when registering a new domain name [for the entire Internet].

Partnering with domain name registrants to have domains hosting illegal content discarded from use so new website owners cannot purchase domains known to host child pornography and reuse it for the same purpose.

Need for further research on the impact of child sexual abuse on victims and whether the Internet has changed the nature and extent of their trauma and healing process.

Collaboration and data sharing between organizations...

Research is needed to determine how words are being used on websites...

There are three other recommendations but I am short on time. We have to be able to foster awareness in the entire community. The sexual exploitation of children is a very serious crime, a horrible crime and a scourge that will only be eradicated by our entire society working together.

[Child Protection Act (Online Sexual Exploitation), November 26th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois to Bill C-58 on mandatory reporting of child pornography sites, which requires Internet service providers to report child pornography activities they are aware of.

I will start by saying that the Bloc Québécois supports this bill in principle. We will vote in favour of the bill at this stage so that it can be analyzed in depth in committee.

It is always necessary to examine Conservative bills individually, because of the Conservatives' approach to tackling crime. We have to be extremely vigilant. It is important that the men and women who are watching are aware of this. The government may want to crack down on crime, but it has decided to replace the judiciary with minimum sentences—that is its approach—instead of addressing the issue of judicial appointments. The government sees that people are very much opposed to this. In any case, should judges be replaced or brought into line with the right-wing Conservative philosophy? Yet the government has decided to introduce minimum sentences in bill after bill. Its goal is to increase sentences and fill the prisons with criminals, and yet it wants to abolish the gun registry.

What does this mean? It means that everyone could have hunting rifles at home, yet the government is going to try to fill the prisons with criminals and to increase sentences. I have a lot of trouble following the government's logic when it comes to issues like the gun registry. I just renewed my licence, because I used to be a hunter. I say that I used to be, because I do not have time to hunt now. I have other demands on my time. In politics, you often have to give things up. I do not have time to hunt now, but I still have my hunting rifles. I had to ask my wife to sign my licence form, but I did not have a problem with that. She was very proud to sign it, because she knew I did not have a history of violence or anything. She signed. I think that this is a good way to ensure that couples continue getting along and also that people who might be violent think twice about getting a licence. Obviously, if I had been violent, I never would have dared ask my wife to sign my form. I would have known she would refuse.

I cannot understand how anyone could be against the gun registry when one of its purposes is to prevent violence against women. I have difficulty understanding the Conservative philosophy. But again, only the Conservatives and their republican way of seeing things can answer my questions. Nonetheless, it is only logical that a spouse's signature be required on forms or applications for obtaining a firearms licence for owning a gun or maintaining ownership of a gun. I am having a hard time understanding the Conservatives' philosophy behind this.

Meanwhile, next week they will be all worked up in the days leading up to the national day of action on violence against women. Once again, they will get all dramatic and say that we must do something about violence against women. However, they are against the idea of getting the spouse of a prospective gun owner to give permission by signing a form.

That is why, every time the Conservatives introduce a justice bill, we have to ask questions. That is what the Bloc Québécois has done. We will not rely on the Conservatives' conclusions to support Bill C-58, but on statistics and studies conducted by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection.

We have to wonder how it is that today, in 2009, Internet service providers can allow themselves not to have a policy to prevent child pornography from ending up on their sites. It is scary, but that is what it boils down to.

I have had many discussions with my teenage son. He is an adult now. He is part of the Internet generation.

For this generation, all information should be available and accessible. The Internet is a global meeting place where anything goes. I have had some serious discussions with my son and I told him that even though all information is accessible, illegal information should not be on Internet sites, no matter their origin.

Even though it should not have happened, it has. I will give some statistics from the analyses and surveys prepared by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. That way we will have some benchmarks.

The following statement is found on the centre's website: “Parents list abduction and sexual exploitation as 2 of the top 3 concerns facing Canadian children.” Naturally, every good parent wants their children to be protected against exploitation or abduction. It also states that: “Most Canadian parents are using outdated and ineffective information to teach their children about personal safety.”

It is difficult for parents to be told by an organization such as the Canadian Centre for Child Protection that we are using outdated and ineffective information to teach our children. However, that is the reality. But why is that?

For one thing, I did not grow up with the Internet but my children did. Inevitably, parents of my age, in their early fifties, are not accustomed to this new technology. Because of my work I have had to learn quickly. But it has not been easy for some of my friends. Our children have learned to use this technology much more quickly.

The Canadian Centre for Child Protection is right: parents are using ineffective and outdated means to teach their children about safety, especially on the Internet. The following statistics are from its website.

Children account for 61% of all victims of sexual assault reported to the police and 21% of all victims of physical assault.

Thus, children are involved in many sexual assaults.

I will continue.

72% of Canadians feel that if someone wanted to access child pornography online, it would be very easy to do so.

92% of Canadians are concerned about child pornography being distributed on the Internet and 96% feel it is important to have a place to report child pornography online.

Cybertip.ca processes over 600 reports per month relating to the sexual exploitation of children on the Internet and receives over 800,000 website hits per month from people seeking educational information.

In homes without rules about Internet use, 74% of children report that an adult is never present when they use the Internet

Cybertip.ca is a tip line operated by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection.

According to a study conducted by the centre, parents are using outdated and ineffective information to teach their children about the Internet. Some 74% of children say that they are not supervised at home. Parents need to understand how important it is to supervise their children's Internet usage.

There is software that prevents certain kinds of data from downloading. Computers look harmless. They are just machines that we turn on, nothing more. But there is all kinds of information out there on the Internet, and more and more abusers. We have to take control of the situation.

Why does the House have to discuss Bill C-58? Because this is 2009, and website owners are still allowing child pornography on their websites. That is unbelievable, but it all comes down to money. Where there is money, there are humans, and where there are humans, there is human nature. People will do anything to make more money, so they allow child pornography on their websites, or they do not take necessary measures or spend money to keep it off their websites.

The purpose of this bill is to make the operators of these sites responsible. They will have to pay the fines because they were not vigilant and did not do their best to prevent this. Legislators are often accused of passing laws, putting up obstacles and going in circles. I am sorry, but these website operators have gone too far; it is over.

The Bloc Québécois wants this bill to be passed as quickly as possible. However, it must be carefully examined in committee, because this bill deals with parts of Canada's and Quebec's charters of rights and freedoms. We must ensure that human freedoms are being respected. But when we are talking about child pornography, rights and freedoms will have to take a back seat. We must carefully protect our children. Once again, we must hold those who run these sites responsible.

According to statistics from the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, 21% of children report having met someone in person they met first online. That is very worrisome. This study was conducted in 2005. This means that one out of every five children reports having met someone in person they first met online. Since we know that there are predators online, we cannot ignore this statistic.

My teenager would not like to hear me say this, but children are often naive. That is the truth. They think they are the best at everything. We must try to understand them and try to remember how we were at their age. They must all have their own experiences, but when we know that 21% of children report having met someone in person they met first online, that is worrisome. Good for them if they are meeting people their own age. But the problem with the Internet is that people lie about their ages and claim to be teenagers when they are really adults.

We know this, and we know that 74% of children use the Internet at home without an adult present, because as parents, we think that the computer on the desk is not that important or dangerous. We think all they do is play games on it. But that is not true; they do more than play games. They chat and talk, and can fall victim to online predators. More and more pedophiles are showing up on the Internet, to the point that now, we need to protect our children from sexual exploitation. That is what Bill C-58 would do.

I would also like to read part of a press release issued on November 18, 2009 by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. I hope everyone is listening, because this is important. It says the following:

“What makes this particularly concerning is the very young age of the children in the images [the child pornography sites were analyzed]. These children are most likely being accessed and sexually abused by someone they know. Not only is it devastating for a child to be abused, but to have the abuse recorded and distributed on the Internet adds another layer of trauma,” said Lianna McDonald, executive director of the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. “This is a call to action to all Canadians to learn to recognize the signs of abuse, and to report their suspicions of abuse. We need to disrupt and hopefully stop child sexual abuse and prevent it from being memorialized and traded on the Internet.”

This is important because it has become a money maker. That is what I was saying earlier. We might still wonder why, in 2009, the operators of these Internet sites have not resolved this problem. The answer is because there is money to be made.

I am not accusing them. I do not want to make any accusations, but the fact remains that technology certainly must allow them to block these images on their sites, to track down these people wanting to send them links to a website or images of child pornography, and report them themselves.

That is what should have happened. We should not have to legislate this issue. However, because of business and money, certain situations arise, and of course I mean exploitation. Any time there are images of young men and young women on the Internet, this generally implies sexual exploitation. We must track down all these exploiters, these abusers and these criminals, because exploiting children is a horrible offence. That is why the Bloc Québécois supports this bill.

I wanted to come back to the study done by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, which issued 12 recommendations in the areas of education and public awareness, technical and policy development, and research opportunities. This goes well beyond simply saying, fine, we will pass legislation in order to find the perpetrators of those horrendous crimes or we will impose specific fines on the operators of the sites that break the law. The fact remains that we all need to be more socially aware.

I would like to talk first about the importance of the bill, because it addresses situations that need to be addressed. First, under the bill, providers of Internet services—Internet access, email, hosting and social networking sites—will now be required to report to a designated organization any information they receive about websites or child pornography that may be available to the public. They will be required to do so once the bill is passed, because the bill still has to go through a few readings and needs some work, and it has to go to the Senate. I will not talk about how useless the Senate is, but once again, because the Senate has not been abolished, we will have to waste two or three months talking with the senators, when they spend half their time sleeping.

Now, operators who provide Internet access, email and hosting and networking sites will be required to report to a designated organization any information they receive about websites or child pornography that may be available to the public.

Second, they will be required to notify the police and preserve the evidence if they believe that their Internet service has been used to commit a child pornography offence.

Again, we should not have to pass this bill. They should be dealing with this themselves. But no, we will force them into it because they have taken this a bit too far.

Failure to comply with the duties under this act would constitute an offence punishable by graduated fines of up to $1,000 for a first offence, $5,000 for a second offence, and $10,000 for a third offence. Obviously, there is something in place for sole proprietors and corporations. For a corporation, the graduated fine scheme would be up to $10,000, $50,000 and $100,000. This legislation covers more than just Internet service providers, a term that is commonly used in relation to those who provide access to the Internet. The legislation would apply to all persons who provide an Internet service to the public.

Since I have just one minute remaining, I would also like those who are watching us to know that the Canadian Centre for Child Protection issues very important recommendations to all members of the community. Parents, families and friends have to take charge and educators and the entire system have to do whatever it takes to make sure these pedophiles who use cyberspace to commit their crimes are reported. The sexual exploitation of children is a horrible crime. Rest assured that the Bloc Québécois will support this bill.

[Royal Canadian Mint, November 25th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, to say the least, the minister does not seem to be in a hurry to find the lost gold.

Back in June, Deloitte & Touche recommended that the Royal Canadian Mint review its technical processes in order to ensure that the gold was not simply thrown down the drain during the refinement process.

Can the minister tell us whether that lead produced any results?

[Royal Canadian Mint, November 25th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the Royal Canadian Mint has lost track of large quantities of gold and silver. Over $15 million worth of precious metals vanished in 2008.

Deloitte & Touche is saying this is not an accounting error. The RCMP is saying it was not stolen. The mystery deepens the more it is investigated.

Can the minister tell us what happened to the Royal Canadian Mint gold, now that a year has gone by since it went missing?

[Grenville Canal, November 17th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, because of a wording technicality, a petition signed by over 2,700 people, prepared by the committee to save the Grenville Canal, could not be tabled in the House. Allow me to read a few lines:

Whereas the Grenville Canal is a significant historic heritage site for Quebec and Canada;

Whereas the retaining walls and shoreline of the Grenville Canal are currently in a serious state of deterioration that has led to the closure of the canal;

Whereas the federal government, which had assumed ownership and management of the canal for 161 years, is responsible for the country's historic sites and waterways.

For all these reasons, the members of the committee, who are here on the Hill today led by the Mayor of Grenville, Mr. Ronald Tittlit, on behalf of the petitioners, are calling on the federal government to assume the costs of restoring and repairing the shoreline and retaining walls of the Grenville Canal.

[Political Party Financing, November 16th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary can pretend to be a puritan, but the noose is tightening around Senator Housakos. I would remind the House that in addition to being involved in awarding a major contract to the Bridge Corporation at a Conservative Party cocktail fundraiser, he is also involved in questionable financing in Rivière-des-Mille-Îles and of Vision Montréal, where he was recommended by none other than Tony Accurso.

Will the Prime Minister finally resolve to shed some light on the schemes of Senator and bagman Leo Housakos?

[Political Party Financing, November 16th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, in the wake of the troubling revelations about the funding of Vision Montréal, the Conservative Party distanced itself from Giulio Maturi, one of Senator Housakos' cronies. Another friend of Leo Housakos, Dimitri Soudas, was recently relieved of his responsibilities for Quebec.

By distancing himself from Maturi and asking Dimitri Soudas to stay away from issues involving Quebec, is the Prime Minister not acknowledging that some light needs to be shed on the schemes led by the Maturi-Soudas-Housakos trio?

[Economic Recovery Act (Stimulus), November 16th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé for his question.

The newspaper articles are quite something. The Prime Minister is leaving. He probably will not be here today and for several days as he is leaving on a mission abroad. The media are reporting that he prefers to be outside rather than inside the House of Commons. That is obvious when he speaks in the House. Participating in the debates is not his cup of tea. That is a sign that governing with Parliament is not how the Conservatives want to do things. That is the political reality.

The weekend piece in Le Devoir was interesting. An increasing number of political columnists, those who follow politics, are beginning to notice that the Conservative Party will do anything to avoid any public debate. We had the saga of tough on crime bills that were presented outside the House. The Speaker even admonished them and told them to stop. The Conservatives are doing this more often and are copying the Republicans. They are trying to avoid any debate in the halls of democracy, and attempt to hold debates directly in the public arena because they can control the debate without being required to answer real questions.

[Economic Recovery Act (Stimulus), November 16th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I will give an example. This week, the Bloc Québécois leader and our environment critic held a press conference to say that our automobiles should go electric. This means that we would need to set up electric charging stations to plug cars in at service stations, in order to develop a vast network and a major industry focused on electric cars.

The leader of the Bloc Québécois called on the federal government to do its part for the simple reason that, for decades, it has been paying hundreds of millions of dollars to develop the oil and fossil fuel industry, among others. Quebec paid between 22% and 24% over the course of the development of Hibernia. Quebec paid its share to develop the oil sands through funds, tax credits and government assistance.

If Quebec had its own revenues and all of its own taxes, it could make investments and, for example, create a real network for the development of electric cars. If there is anywhere in the world that would be able to create a network of charging stations, it would certainly be Quebec, with its hydroelectric capacity. It could be a world leader in the development of electric cars.

This is a societal choice that needs to be made, a choice that is being discussed in Quebec, but not in the rest of Canada, where they are still working on developing fossil fuels. Investments are being made in automobiles with combustion engines, while Quebec would prefer investing in cars with electric motors.

[Economic Recovery Act (Stimulus), November 16th, 2009]

Mr.Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois about Bill C-51, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on January 27, 2009 and to implement other measures. It is important for those listening and for you, Mr. Speaker, to fully understand the situation.

First of all, for political reasons, the government decided to take part of what it had already announced in the budget and to make it a bill. We are talking about Bill C-51, which includes certain budget measures already adopted with the support of the Liberals.

Some may ask why the government decided to take certain provisions and create another bill. Quite simply because the government believed that it was very likely that an election would be held. It wanted to show that certain budget provisions had the approval of Parliament. It is always rather troubling to see the way the Conservatives manipulate public opinion. They have followed in the footsteps of the U.S. Republicans and they are good at it.

This allows them to shift the focus of debate. From the media's point of view, the debate is shifted to a new subject. We know that the latest budget adopted by the Conservatives contained important measures for the automotive industry. However, they have abandoned the forestry and manufacturing industries. In Quebec, there are a few automotive parts companies remaining but the only automobile plant, the GM plant in Ste-Thérèse—Boisbriand, shut down many years ago. The automotive industry was not a major player compared to the forestry industry, which affects 26% of the Quebec economy.

The Conservatives, in light of the Liberals' election threat, decided to take the most popular budget measures and create a separate bill to show that they were doing a good job of governing or that they had some interesting ideas. We will be reviewing them since the Bloc Québécois will support Bill C-51. It is a good way for our audience to understand this better.

Yes, a political party may decide to vote against a budget, even though it contains some worthwhile measures. Why? Because you have to look at the big picture.

The Bloc Québécois is the only political party in this House that defends the interests and values of Quebeckers, and we analyzed the latest budget brought down this past spring with that in mind. The government had ignored the forestry and manufacturing sectors and employment insurance in favour of the automotive industry. The latest budget did not contain any worthwhile employment insurance measures.

Why was this so important to Quebec? Because there had been many plant closures in the forestry and manufacturing sectors as a result of the recent crisis. In addition, the forestry sector had been hard hit for many years. Plants had been closing one after another in many parts of Quebec for the past three years. This crisis in the forestry sector has been going on for five years. Conservative members and ministers from Quebec said that the market was to blame for the forestry crisis in Quebec. The same was true of the auto sector. The North American automotive industry was ailing, primarily because it had not adjusted its products. Inevitably, the market for cars was affected as a result.

In a move calculated to win votes, the Conservative government decided to help the automotive sector and ignore the forestry sector. It is always disturbing to see Conservative members from Quebec make a show of saying that the forestry crisis will resolve itself and the market will recover. Meanwhile, the Conservative Party decided not to leave the market in the auto sector alone, but to help the industry. That is why the Bloc Québécois opposed the budget. All we wanted was for the government to invest as much money in the forestry sector as in the automotive sector—just over $9 billion.

We saw the numbers in the government's famous recovery plan, the famous incentive measures the Conservatives brag about. While it invested more than $9 billion in the automotive industry, money that was paid out in September, it earmarked only $70 million for forestry, and only $53 million of that money has been spent.

As members from Quebec, when we read these numbers, listened to the Conservatives' speeches and saw this inequity between the forestry and automotive sectors, we could not remain indifferent, especially since much of the forestry industry is in Quebec. The Liberals and the Conservatives could, but not the Bloc Québécois. We wanted to be comfortable when we met people on the streets of our cities, and we wanted to be able to tell them the truth to their faces. We have never been afraid to do so. That is why we stand up every day to defend their interests.

That said, because of the imbalance between the Conservative government's investments in the auto industry and the forestry industry, the Bloc Québécois was not in favour of the last budget. But that does not mean that there were not some interesting measures in the last budget. As I was saying, one morning, the Liberal leader arose and decided, at the last caucus meeting of the summer, that he was strong enough to trigger a general election. When the Conservatives saw that there was a threat of an election, they decided to take some measures out of the budget, which they put into Bill C-51, the bill before us today.

I will speak about some of these measures. Bill C-51 implements the home renovation tax credit, a measure inspired by some of the proposals in the Bloc's two recovery plans. Once again, the opposition parties can call us any names they want, but they will never be able to accuse us of not doing our job. Our party was the only one to release a recovery plan before the last budget, even before the Conservatives released one. They had the brilliant idea of asking the parties to make suggestions. Since the Bloc Québécois is always the first party to proudly defend the interests of Quebec, we proposed measures for the recovery plan. One of them was the home renovation tax credit. It is not surprising that this measure is in Bill C-51 and that the Bloc Québécois is supporting it. Since we suggested it to the government and included it in both recovery plans submitted to the government, we are very interested in supporting this measure in Bill C-51.

Bill C-51 introduces a tax credit for the purchase of a first home, a measure that was part of our platform during the last election. I am not making that up; it is available on the Bloc Québécois' website. A similar measure was in place in Quebec for a time under the Parti Québécois. The government did not reinvent the wheel. It just borrowed a good initiative, followed a good example. Quebec has come up with a lot of good initiatives. It is always disappointing to see how often Parliament ignores good ideas that come from the Government of Quebec, from Quebeckers, but we must not forget that there are six Canadian provinces and three territories. The territories are being given more and more powers even though they have fewer inhabitants than pre-amalgamation Montreal.

So there are six provinces and three territories with fewer than one million inhabitants. Our neighbours are nice people, and we like them a lot, but Quebec has made decisions based on its population and its economy to support, among other things, residential construction. Quebec society has the means to create programs to foster investment. At the time, the goal was to promote residential construction.

The Bloc included these measures in its platform, and now the Conservative Party is adopting them. I hope nobody forgets that the Bloc Québécois supports this measure. All too often, people come up with all kinds of excuses for ignoring Quebec. I want the members who make those excuses to listen up here. Conservative and Liberal members from Quebec all have excuses for ignoring Quebec's demands. Even so, Quebec has a very strong economy and has planned for the future with hydroelectricity and wind energy. Our society made this choice, and it will be a very profitable one if Canada decides to respect its international agreements.

If Canada had decided to comply with the Kyoto protocol, Quebec would already be collecting payments for its efforts. Many Quebec businesses have reduced their greenhouse gas emissions compared to what they were producing in 1992, in accordance with the Kyoto protocol.

Once again, Quebec has access to a little less than half of its resources. As we know, over 50% of the taxes paid by Quebeckers goes to Ottawa, because the federal corporate income tax rate is higher than that of Quebec, among other reasons. If Quebec had full access to all the taxes it collects, imagine what an economic powerhouse it could become in the context of a new, global environmental industry.

We are in the new, global environmental economy and Canada will always be dead last. Canadians have decided to put all their eggs in one basket: logging. They will pay a high price for this decision in the years and decades to come. We will see this very soon in Copenhagen.

We must show some foresight. In the years to come, some countries will penalize factories or businesses that manufacture products from countries that do not comply with new international environmental agreements, as they should. The European countries have decided to pay the high cost of reducing their greenhouse gas emissions, which Canada has not done and the Conservative government is not about to do. This government is earning more and more “fossil of the day” awards and ranks dead last in environmental rankings.

That was the government's choice, but it is not Quebec's choice. Quebec recently reached out to New Brunswick for its hydroelectric development and is really turning to energy sources of the future, to the economy of the future. Those who chose to follow Quebec's lead will do well. The others will be kicking themselves one day and will lose a lot of money because they made poor choices regarding energy development.

We can try to hide from this and tell ourselves that it will not happen in our lifetime. That is what some of our Conservatives colleagues are saying. But things are moving fast.

That is not how I want this planet to be left to my children and my grandchildren. I became a grandfather a few weeks ago and I am going to work hard to leave my grandson a healthier planet than we have now, the one the Conservative government is currently polluting.

We have to take up this battle because Quebec is still in Canada. One day, when it can take flight and be its own country, Quebec will be able to work with the new industries in Europe. It is up to Quebeckers to decide, of course. A new opportunity will likely come up in the next few years.

This is all because Canada lacks vision and does not listen to Quebec enough. Again, this House would do well to listen more and more to the Bloc Québécois.

I was talking about Bill C-51, which uses the measure that was in our platform, namely a first-time homebuyer's tax credit. The bill also implements Canada's international commitments to the International Monetary Fund that were signed in 2008. Obviously, we agreed with Canada's commitment. The government knew we would be in favour of that measure in this bill.

This bill also amends the Canada pension plan, from which Quebec is excluded because it has its own pension plan. For those watching us, Quebec has its own pension plan, the Quebec pension plan or QPP, and it manages its own pension fund. The rest of Canada's provinces have their program. The provinces, in consultation with Canada, who are under this Canadian plan, which excludes Quebec, have adopted certain measures and the Conservative government wanted to include those in Bill C-51. We have a lot of respect for our neighbours. It was their choice and we will not vote against a measure that was chosen after consultation with the federal government. We are in favour of this measure.

The fifth and last measure implements the report of a panel of experts, which included representatives of Nova Scotia and the federal government, on the dispute between those two governments dating back to 1984. Naturally, we will support these measures. Nova Scotia and the federal government have decided, pursuant to long discussions held since 1984, to implement the report of a panel of experts. We will support this in the hope that when the day comes for Quebec to hold negotiations, the other parties in the House will do the same for Quebec. It is not difficult to understand. On the contrary, the Bloc Québécois position is easy to understand. When the Quebec National Assembly adopts a unanimous resolution or motion, we are proud to defend it in this House. What we always find surprising is to see members from Quebec rise and vote against measures proposed by the Quebec National Assembly.

I was the president of the Union des municipalités du Québec in the early 2000s before being elected to this House. Given that I have two minutes left, I can tell you a story. I had the opportunity to take a poll. The question was simple. I asked people which area of politics would they like to see their children enter: municipal, provincial or federal politics. Only 11% wanted their children to be federal members of parliament. That is the reality for Quebeckers. The most important government for them is that of Quebec, followed by municipal government. The government of Canada is last. It is important for my colleagues to understand Quebec. The federal government, for Quebeckers, is not the most important area. I can definitely understand, as I was saying at the beginning, that the six provinces and three territories with smaller populations than the former city of Montreal need the federal government. However, the people of Quebec do not. All they need is to keep more tax dollars than they send to Ottawa to create their own programs and their own plans and to make the society they desire the society of the future, focused on reducing greenhouse gases and protecting the environment and benefiting from all of Quebec's investments in hydroelectricity and wind energy.