Of course. Every single member that voted “nay” no longer serves in the House of Commons. There are, however, some yeas that are still in the House.

I want to talk a little bit about some of the comments that happened during that time. And I am sorry, Madam Speaker; I’m getting a little confused as we go a little later into the afternoon here, and I’m going to snag a little bit of water.

That was actually a motion that was put forward here, in our chamber, and those members who are no longer here sat on this side of the House. So—

So let’s talk a little bit about the members that are still here. We have our Minister of Health, the member for Sarnia–Lambton, the member for Oxford and, of course, the member for Nepean who are still here from that 2008 election, even though the Liberals got voted out of office. And if you can believe it—here’s the interesting part, Madam Speaker—across the way, the member for Nickel Belt at the time, who still serves in this chamber, as well as the current mayor of Hamilton and former leader of the NDP Party, Andrea Horwath, voted in favour. They voted in favour of the amendment to make sure that a carbon tax was not going to unfairly penalize the people of Ontario, and I would hope that the NDP offers its support to this motion, Madam Speaker.

This motion is following the spirit of that 2008 amendment by exempting the carbon tax on Ontarians already overburdened by the cost of simply trying to eat. Or, to quote the former member for Timmins from an exchange in question period at the time, “the Dion Liberals want a carbon tax that will hurt hard-working Ontarians.” That was the former member from Timmins, who sat in this chamber for many years.

We will see which version of the NDP we get today. As several of my colleagues have pointed out, they have a role to play here as well. We urge the Ontario NDP to call on their federal counterparts, who hold the balance of power in Ottawa, to demand the federal government remove the carbon tax.

Speaker, as I want to conclude my remarks, I’d like to thank the member from Chatham-Kent–Leamington for bringing forward this motion. I would also like to congratulate our new Minister of the Environment, Conservation and Parks. She has spent years working to advance environmental issues while also protecting consumers, and if I can I’d like to borrow a line from the minister: We can fight for the environment—we can treat climate change seriously, we can work with industry, but we’ll not pass the cost down to the consumer.

It is in this spirit that I support this motion and I call on all other members here in the House to do the same.