Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today in support of a bill that I believe would restore some accountability around this place. I thank the hon. member across the way for having raised it.
When members of the House crosses the floor, I believe they break a contract, not with their political party but with their constituents. When a member of Parliament is elected to this place, he or she is elected with a party label, having made a commitment to serve with party's label attached to his or her name. Members of the public make their voting decision based on that commitment. Therefore, a contract is formed between the constituent and the member of Parliament.
As was the case for the member for Newmarket—Aurora, when a member crosses the floor, in particular to receive an inducement and be placed into cabinet and be given a promotion and a raise, that is an example of a broken contract with the constituents with whom that person was elected to represent. For example, in this case, the constituency elected a Conservative and it got a Liberal. That contract was broken with the constituents in Newmarket--Aurora.
I want to take this logic further. I have a private member's bill of my own before the House which would further tighten the bond between the constituents and the member of Parliament. It would allow constituents to fire a member of Parliament if that member of Parliament broke his or her word, lied, cheated or stole. It would be conducted through a petition system and would require that 50% of eligible voters sign the petition, in exchange for which the member of Parliament would have to resign his or her seat and the riding would reopen for a byelection.
It would be a very difficult process. We have 87,000 eligible voters in my constituency. That would mean one would need roughly 44,000 signatures on that petition, meaning the individual would have to have engaged in a massive violation of trust. But still, that resource should be there. Why? Because everyone else in the country has to be accountable for the job they do for their employer. All my constituents go to work in the morning and if they lie, cheat or steal, they are fired. For elected officials, it is four years. In what other field could an employee lie, cheat or steal and then be fired only four or five years later? Why should we in the House of Commons, the House of the common people, live above the basic norms and rules that other employees live up to in their work? We should not. We should live by the same guidelines as everyone else.
Let me give a few examples of how this would make a difference.
We have a government across the way that came into office making certain promises. One of them was to protect agriculture. Yet, we see, with the upcoming summit before us in Hong Kong, the World Trade Organization conference, that Financial Secretary Henry Tang of the Hong Kong government has announced his support for eliminating all forms of supply management. The government has not responded. Nor has it made clear what its position would be at that WTO summit in Hong Kong. That means dairy producers across the country, who may have been duped by Liberal promises in the last election, now have at this point no recourse to hold the Liberal government accountable for abandoning them.
The reality is my constituents, who are dairy producers, rely on supply management for their security and their prosperity. That is why our party passed into its policy book the following policy on supply management:
The Conservative Party of Canada believes it is in the best interest of Canada and Canadian agriculture that the industries under the protection of supply management remain viable. A Conservative government will support supply management and its goal to deliver a high quality product to consumers for a fair price with a reasonable return to the producer.
The government has not stated what its negotiating position will be going into these meetings. It is incumbent upon the agriculture minister and the trade minister to indicate clearly to this House and to all producers what they intend to do to uphold our system of supply management at those critical meetings. There has been nothing done so far. The producers are waiting and they have been given no assurances whatsoever.
This is a critical issue. Canada's dairy, poultry and egg farmers indicate that we in this country allow more imports of these supply managed products into Canada than the United States does. We also allow more of these products into Canada than the European Union permits.
Canada has already done its part to open its borders. It is now the responsibility of the United States, Europe and other countries, that are engaging in massive market distorting subsidies, to do their part. Yet, we do not see anything from this government advocating that position and defending Canada's national interest as it relates to agriculture.
For example, if we take the issue of child care. We have a Liberal government that claims it believes in human rights. Yet, the government is enacting a state controlled day care scheme that undermines basic human rights.
