Bill C-12 (Historical)

Quarantine Act

An Act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases

This enactment repeals and replaces the existing Quarantine Act.
Its purpose is to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases in Canada. It is applicable to persons and conveyances arriving in or in the process of departing from Canada.
It provides measures for the screening, health assessment and medical examination of travellers to determine if they have a communicable disease and measures for preventing the spread of communicable diseases, including referral to public health authorities, detention, treatment and disinfestation. Provisions for the administrative oversight of the detention of travellers are also included.
It provides for additional measures such as the inspection and cleansing of conveyances and cargo to ensure that they are not the source of communicable diseases.
It imposes controls on the import and export of cadavers, body parts and other human remains.
It contains provisions for the collection and disclosure of personal information if it is necessary to prevent the spread of a communicable disease or, under certain circumstances, for law enforcement purposes.
It also provides the Minister of Health with interim order powers in the case of public health emergencies and enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance with the Act.

[Susan Kadis, Liberal, Thornhill, ON]

Thank you.

I'd like to clarify if our panel agreed with the original act as it currently stands, if they provided input, and if they supported it initially--Bill C-12.

Quarantine Act

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin my remarks by mentioning the beautiful light that shines on this side of the House. This is not a coincidence. The sky is blue and God is a sovereignist. We are going to take advantage of this light to enlighten our colleagues, the members opposite, who form the government. I hope they will be wise enough to listen.

I could not help but smile when I saw that this legislation was coming back here to be amended. Let us not forget that, at the beginning of this session, a bill was rammed through the House, namely Bill C-2. We felt that this issue had not been debated long enough to ensure that this legislation would provide measures that could be implemented, and that it would be responsible and meaningful for our fellow citizens, whom we represent here.

Today, I see that we have to go back to Bill C-12, which was passed in 2005, when I was still a new member in this House. In fact, this bill was my first experience with the legislation here. I had to learn how to debate it in the Standing Committee on Health, along with my colleague, the member for Hochelaga, who was then our party critic on health issues. Even at that time we had serious reservations about the provisions that the government wanted to include in the bill, because we often felt that they were too intrusive or not logical enough to allow for concrete, easy and effective implementation.

We have to be very cautious and serious when we talk about infectious and communicable diseases, about viruses and bacteria that proliferate. We have to take our role seriously. At the time, we deplored the fact that people would be accountable to an authority designated by the Minister of Health, because we felt that this was a somewhat complex process that would prevent the bill from being an effective piece of legislation.

When I saw the bill and saw that there was a move to amend this section, that is, section 34, I thought to myself, “Two years later, people are finally seeing that, once again, the Bloc Québécois was right.” Naturally, it was members of the Bloc Québécois who were the first to oppose that part of the legislation, which called for an authority designated by the minister. We did so because we believed that the bill encroached too much on provincial jurisdictions, especially in the area of health.

In Quebec, our department of public health is very effective and takes great care to protect us against all communicable and infectious diseases. I know that this is not necessarily the case everywhere. A hospital in Vegreville had to close its doors this week. Also, in Loyds, hundreds of patients had to be informed that they had probably contracted HIV or hepatitis, because the doctor had not reported, as one must, these diseases to public health authorities.

It is not enough to simply enact legislation. That legislation must be respected, obeyed and enforced, and we must be able to use that legislation effectively to protect ourselves against what we could call barbarian invasions. Any mention of tuberculosis, west Nile virus or SARS is sure to arouse fear. I would remind the House that the original Quarantine Act was drafted around 1872, if I understood my hon. colleague from Richmond—Arthabaska correctly.

We know that diseases crossed borders with the influx of pioneers who came here to start a life for themselves and become proud citizens of what was then Lower Canada and Upper Canada, in other words, the Quebec and Canada of today.

Infectious diseases did not stop crossing our borders just because we passed this legislation in 1872. In the early 1900s, around 1910 or 1918, right here in Hull, on the other side of the river, a very serious Spanish influenza outbreak killed many people. It decimated entire families. We still see traces of those families today in the names of the hon. members sitting in this House and the people nearby, who live in Hull, in Gatineau. These people probably have in their lineage, among their ancestors, people who died from the Spanish flu. At the time, even though the legislation existed, we did not have the means to enforce or apply it.

As far as such epidemics are concerned, we have to think about all these soldiers we send abroad. Often we pay more attention to what is going on over there in terms of equipment, tools and armament, and not pay much attention to what they might be bringing back with them when they come home. This can be very dangerous for them. These days, a number of women take part in these missions. Many of them come back and can also spread infectious diseases to their families and children because they did not receive the necessary care when they were abroad on a peacekeeping mission or, unfortunately, at war.

It is not enough to have laws, we also need the political will to apply them. We have to start resolving the problems in our own backyard. We currently have tuberculosis epidemics in a number of our first nations communities. It is unthinkable that in 2007 there are still people suffering from tuberculosis. That is the direct responsibility of the federal government. It is a responsibility that it neglects far too often and which it has not respected because the epidemic is spreading, not stopping.

In Kashechewan, people may be forced to leave their homes and to be relocated because their water is not potable. However, they cannot do it today because there is no money. If we have billions of dollars to invest in arms, we should at least have a few million to invest in providing safe, healthy housing where individuals can live with dignity and respect. At present, this is not the case. It is much easier to adopt a laissez-faire attitude. Hundreds, even thousands of individuals will suffer from these illnesses, including tuberculosis and other diseases. They will contract them because of unhealthy living conditions. Nothing is being done about that.

The previous government ratified the Kelowna accord. We all voted in this House to honour that accord. However, the government decided otherwise and is not making any further commitments. That is most unfortunate.

First nations communities, Inuit communities, all these communities find it difficult to carve out a place for themselves in our society. It is difficult for them to have access to adequate health care, appropriate education, and affordable, healthy, safe housing. It is difficult for them, but they have been abandoned even though it is our first responsibility to help them. We abandon them, we do not invest in these societies. Why? Why is there constant encroachment, to the tune of millions of dollars, on provincial responsibilities and jurisdictions when we do not even take care of our own responsibilities?

I do not understand. And yet, some small countries who have very little do much more for their citizens. I regularly visit Cuba, because I love the island and the people. Someone will say to me that they do not have a great deal of freedom, but I sometimes wonder which one of us has more freedom. I know that they have first class health care. All Cubans can study as much and as long as they wish. Education is free. Later, the government assigns the doctors it has trained to various countries to work for humanitarian causes. These doctors are very well trained.

Whenever I go to Cuba, I am never afraid of getting sick. I know I will be taken care of. When we went to Taiwan last fall, my travelling companion got a toothache on Taiwan's national holiday. The person I was with had a toothache. We had to go to a hospital because there are no dental clinics. At the hospital, two doctors took care of us. In under 10 minutes, my companion was in a chair and personnel had administered a sedative and something to take away the pain, and all of this happened on Taiwan's national holiday. Of course, thousands of people live there and their hospitals do not have all the equipment we have here. But their government chooses to invest in human resources to provide a standard of care and services that we rarely find here.

That service standard is rare here largely because of our provincial governments. Why do our respective governments not have enough money? Because previous federal governments cut transfer payments. Beginning in 1994, cuts to provincial transfer payments, including payments to Quebec, resulted in the sorry state of our health care systems today compared to those of some small countries that have much less than we do, but that care about their citizens' health.

We support the principle underlying this bill. We are not against it. Obviously, we cannot be against what is right, but today, as we study this bill, we must ask ourselves a question. Will this bill provide enough money to train quarantine officers? Will enough money be invested in training customs agents and all of the front-line staff who meet people at the border?

That was one of the concerns expressed by the Standing Committee on Health in 2004-05. We were not certain that all steps would be taken in order to enforce Bill C-12. After two years, we see that enforcing it is very difficult indeed, and that it was not really being enforced because there were flaws in the bill. In the years to come, we will likely find other flaws in the bill, given that the Standing Committee on Health had considerable reservations about approving the bill, which was adopted on division.

If we all minded our own business, there would likely be fewer bills of this kind to review. For example, despite what the government thinks, Bill C-2 was adopted very quickly, and a number of its sections are still not in force.

Why are we asked to debate bills that seem so important to the government, only to then have it dismiss everything we determined, everything we decided, everything we wanted to be able to give to our citizens as members of Parliament here in this House? We wonder why.

I do not know. I only hope that, in the future, we will be more careful. If it is true that Bill C-42 is crucial to the proper enforcement of Bill C-12, through the amendment of section 34, it is also true that there are several other sections of the bill that should be reviewed. In enforcing—

Message from the Senate

[The Speaker]

Order, please. I have the honour to inform the House that a communication has been received as follows:

Government House

Ottawa

May 12, 2005

Mr. Speaker,

I have the honour to inform you that the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, Governor General of Canada, signified royal assent by written declaration to the bills listed in the schedule to this letter on the 12th day of May, 2005, at 4:10 p.m.

Yours sincerely,

Barbara Uteck

Secretary to the Governor General

The schedule indicates that royal assent was given to Bill C-33, a second act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 23, 2004--Chapter No. 19; Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases--Chapter No. 20; and Bill C-45, an act to provide services, assistance and compensation to or in respect of Canadian Forces members and veterans and to make amendments to certain acts--Chapter No. 21.

Quarantine Act

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Marcel Proulx)]

Pursuant to the order made on May 6, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion in relation to the amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-12.

Call in the members.

(The House divided on the motion which was agreed to on the following division:)

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is certainly the big question that has been raised by a number of members. It has a great deal to do with the rights of the individual and Canadians at large covered under the charter and the responsibilities of a government and health authorities to protect us against something that the consequences of which could be enormous. The consequence could be a pandemic that could kill hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people if not checked and dealt with at its early stages.

When the member read from clause 22, he may have misspoke himself when he said that it would require a traveller to undergo an investigation. The bill in fact states “medical examination”.

If we are talking about a quarantine officer, a medical officer, a doctor, a nurse or whoever is going to be responsible for making these assessments, I do not believe they are there to do harm. They are properly training and are there to protect Canadians. They will not detain someone for some personal whim, personal bias or whatever it might be.

In clause 26, the member said, “if the quarantine officer has grounds to believe”. This is not a matter of frivolous grounds. In a matter of emergency someone has to make some serious decisions and we first need to ensure that those who are put in those positions of authority have the tools to do these things, are properly trained and are acting in the best interests of Canadians.

The member kind of asked the questions almost in the context of what if we get somebody who maybe is not doing things in good faith and is just doing it to somehow disrupt the rights and freedoms of individuals, of travellers or to be invasive.

Medical examination is one thing but a medical examination does not tell us where the person has been, who the person has seen and in which place where there were problems has the person been. Those things are not part of a medical examination. A medical examination is with regard to that individual and the individual's own condition.

If there is some basis for looking at people's travel documents, or whatever it might be, and it would be helpful to get information to do an investigation, then I would say that it is a proper thing to do and a responsible thing to do because individuals themselves coming into a country who have gone through a medical examination may not even know what exactly has been going on, what the problem is, what the disease is or what causes it. There is an awful lot of information, much of which is not readily available through simply the process of a individual screening or maybe some sort of a medical exam.

This is a very good example of where parliamentarians often get into the situation where we have conflicting interests, and sometimes people will describe it as the lesser of evils, but in this particular case the act is prescribing the tools to be used by properly trained medical professionals who are prepared to take on the responsibility and to discharge that greater responsibility, which is to protect public health. It is in the best interest of not only that individual, it is also is in the best interest of the country at large, which is the greater question. We do make these tough decisions. In this regard I would say that the provisions, in my opinion, within Bill C-12 are fair and reasonable.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the behaviour by the Bloc Québécois has been going on for some sitting days and it is quite disruptive to the operations of the House.

The particular provisions within the bill to do with rights of individuals will be sensitive issues to a number of members who have been active in the aspect of basic human rights and the rights and freedoms of the individual. When we consider the conflicting interests here, the rights of the individual and the responsibility of the health authorities to protect the health and well-being of Canadians, it does raise some important questions about whether there is a demonstrably justified infringement on the rights of the individual.

I recognize there are some conflicting interests here, but members know that there is a responsibility of discharging the health measures provided by the Quarantine Act to ensure the health and well-being of all Canadians. We had the example with SARS. We now have discovered and learned that the disease is a communicable one. Also, some evidence shows that it could be transmitted through the air.

Let me make a few other comments on the implications of the bill and its scope.

First, because the bill has not been modernized for many years, we have to take into account, as legislators, that over time things change. There are emerging and re-emerging health threats and SARS is certainly one example. The most important part of this is that these communicable diseases do not respect borders. It is much like pollution. For instance, we know that in the 401 corridor of Ontario, going from Windsor down to Toronto, the major source of pollution, of poor air quality and particulate matter, comes from the Ohio Valley in the United States, which is densely populated with coal-fired hydrogenerating stations.

Similarly, we have a situation where problems in Canada are not necessarily domestically sourced. Taiwan had a very similar problem with regard to people coming into Taiwan from mainland China.

Countries have to take important steps to ensure that we take all the defensive measures necessary and the best possible course to ensure that communicable diseases do not become a serious problem as they have in the past, particularly with SARS.

The advances in technology and rapid air travel is now a reality in the daily lives of Canadians. It replaces the long days that people used to travel on ships or by rail. The new age of jet travel has paved the way for increased population mobility. This is a very important issue. There are so many people coming and going. We are not just talking about people who are coming to visit Canada. We are talking also about Canadians who have travelled abroad in some affected areas and who come back. It is important that we take all those precautions as well. This does not just affect people who are visiting our country but also those who are returning from trips abroad, for whatever reason. An enormous number of people travel through the airports of our country.

Members may recall when the mad cow crisis was at its peak, travellers coming to Canada had to walk on a mat to disinfect their shoes. We were not sure whether they may have somehow picked up some materials that may have been a threat to the agriculture industry. This is yet another instance where defensive measures are extremely important.

We are told by experts that a serious communicable disease can spread to any part of the world within 24 hours. We know some of the impacts of these diseases, but we do not know anything about them. SARS was an excellent example. When it hit, we did not know what it was. We did not know how it acted. We did not know how it was transmitted. What we did know was that a large number of people with a common bond of association, whether it be from a nursing home or a hospital ward, all of had the indicators that there was the starting of an epidemic.

It required the immediate mobilization of a large number of people. It goes without saying that we are very grateful to the health care providers, the doctors and the nurses and all the other important health care providers, who literally put themselves in harm's way to help those who were afflicted by these diseases, without knowing. It is much like firefighters. Firefighters run in while others flee to save themselves. We saw that in 9/11.

Let us not forget the importance to the caregivers who tried their very best under situations of very little information on how to deal with it.

The new reality regarding the health of immigrants is becoming a growing transborder problem as well. Members of Parliament have an important responsibility in their ridings to deal with people who are being sponsored by constituents to come to Canada, either to obtain landed status and perhaps ultimately to become citizens.

We all know the health requirements to enter Canada are extremely rigorous as well. It is important that they be enforced. This is also a very important issue because of the transborder problem.

This entire situation has many health ramifications. This is one reason why we now have a public health representation in the cabinet. We also have the chief public health officer, both of whom have important roles to play in addressing any future disease outbreaks, such as SARS. We also have established a centre in Winnipeg similar to the Atlanta centres for disease control. Things are happening. Bill C-12 is part of that process.

The existing health protection system has served the interest of Canadians well. Obviously we have to update our laws to take into account the new reality of the mobility of our own population and the expanding numbers of people who are visiting Canada from other lands. It means that the policy and procedures we use in Canada must reflect and be updated to reflect this new reality.

The member for Oakville previously mentioned that Dr. David Naylor prepared the main report on this. The report contained some very important recommendations. Those recommendations have been well taken into account, not only in this legislation, but in other activities.

I also want to comment on a couple of other aspects. Bill C-12 serves to modernize the Quarantine Act, but it is only one of the tools in our health tool box. As I indicated, we now have the public health agency with the appointment of Dr. David Butler-Jones, Canada's first chief public health officer, and the Canadian pandemic influenza plan. All are essential elements in the government's strategy for strengthening Canada's public health system.

As I indicated, the existing federal powers under the Quarantine Act are basically outdated. That is the reason why this legislation needs to be passed by Parliament. I hope the legislation will have the support of all hon. members in this place.

That is why we are moving forward quickly with the legislation. It will give the government the means to cope with and control disease outbreaks and ensure better communication, collaboration and cooperation among public health partners. This aspect was very evident during the SARS outbreak. There were more questions and answers, as can be appreciated, and there was a lack of coordination of the public health bodies across the country. Although there were regular press conferences to assure the public, the public also had an important need to know about how they could safeguard themselves.

In those types of serious circumstances we all need to be well informed so we can be part of the preventative measures to ensure a communicable disease outbreak does not spread any further and is in fact wrestled to the ground. The collaboration and cooperation that were necessary was demonstrated even within the government departments. An issue such as SARS touched virtually every department.

I recall the bulletin that came out informing the public about SARS and suggesting that if people had some questions or wanted further information they could go to a website or two but there was no website or two. There were about 21 different website addresses and they were all to different areas of the government, all of which, in their own way, had a reference to SARS as it related to their department.

With the creation of this new cabinet post, that will not happen any more. There will be a central communications point in which important information on a comprehensive basis can be communicated to all stakeholders, all interested parties, Canadians, caregivers and others who may be affected or involved in this.

The scope of the new act is limited to ensuring that serious communicable diseases are prevented from entering Canada or being spread to other countries. It will also mitigate the risk of future threats to public health at home and beyond, to our international partners.

Because of our experience in the SARS epidemic, Canada continues to be a leader in terms of being a model for other countries in terms of addressing matters such as this. I know the World Health Organization has taken great interest as have other countries. We have also had many visitations to Canada with regard to the way in which we have set things up.

With the proposed changes to the Quarantine Act, which I am sure will be passed by this place, I think Canada will finish the loop in terms of providing the best possible protection and prevention for Canadians as it relates to communicable diseases.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this morning we are debating the Senate amendments to Bill C-12. I have had an opportunity to review the prior debates to try to ascertain some of the concerns of members. I see in the House this morning a number of members as well as the previous speaker who have all worked on this legislation.

The member for Oakville said something that I think is worth reflecting on. It is that these health issues transcend partisan interests. I think all members would agree that when it comes to the matter of public safety and public health it is the number one priority of Canadians and certainly of the Parliament of Canada.

I also want to say I am delighted that we are back debating important legislation, which has progressed for some time. As we know, there is much speculation about an election and what the consequences might be. Most are political, but in the reality for Canadians we are talking about the work of Parliament over the past months.

We have a large number of bills, much legislation and other initiatives at various stages throughout the legislative system. I am aware of a number of them. One is even one of my own initiatives on fetal alcohol syndrome. An election call would kill all these bills and the other legislation, as well as an enormous amount of work done by I believe some very talented people in the committee and legislative system and by parliamentarians at large. I just want Canadians to know that we are trying very hard to have important legislation passed in this place as quickly as possible because it is in the best interests of Canadians.

Bill C-12 is an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases. This enactment repeals and replaces the existing Quarantine Act, which has not been modernized since 1872. The purpose is to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases in Canada.

It is applicable to persons in conveyances arriving in or in the process of departing Canada. It provides measures for the screening, health assessment and medical examination of travellers to determine if they have communicable diseases and measures for preventing the spread of communicable diseases, including referral to the public health authorities, detention, treatment and disinfestation. The provisions for the administrative oversight of the detention of travellers are also included in the bill.

It provides for additional measures such as the inspection and cleansing of conveyances and cargo to ensure that they are not a source of communicable diseases. It imposes controls on the import and export of cadavers, body parts and other human remains.

It contains provisions for the collection and disclosure of personal information if it is necessary to prevent the spread of communicable disease and, under certain circumstances, for law enforcement purposes. It also provides the Minister of Health with interim order powers in the case of public health emergencies and enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance with the act.

Excuse me, Mr. Speaker, but there seems to be a fair bit of noise in the House right now.

[Bonnie Brown, Liberal, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the legislative design of Bill C-12 supports a prudent approach consistent with responsible government spending, that is, to determine an appropriate level of compensation only after an incident or an outbreak. It does provide the flexibility to provide compensation to industry in the event that quarantine facilities are required to isolate at risk travellers.

It does not speak directly to the issue of compensation for travellers detained under quarantine powers, but the Government of Canada could provide assistance to travellers who are inconvenienced by such measures.

In the event of a public health crisis, the government has the ability to, first, assess the situation and determine the need for an appropriate level of compensation based on the merits of each case, and then determine the possible means of compensation.

[Bonnie Brown, Liberal, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today on Bill C-12, the new Quarantine Act. We are updating the Quarantine Act because the piece of legislation we are working with is absolutely antiquated. It has not been significantly modernized since 1872.

The purpose of the Quarantine Act is very clear and straightforward. It offers protection to the Canadian public at our border points of entry by authorizing the use of public health measures to prevent communicable diseases from entering the country and spreading throughout the population. Our recent experience with SARS has not been forgotten. With the global threat of avian influenza and the heightened risk of a human pandemic, health experts and the public are acutely aware that new diseases can swiftly emerge and change in such a manner that all governments require a modern set of tools at their disposal to ensure rapid and decisive action.

Many of us will remember the important work undertaken by Dr. David Naylor, chair of the national advisory committee on SARS and public health. The newly proposed Quarantine Act reflects action taken by this government in a direct response to the recommendations put forth in the Naylor report and later echoed by the Senate committee.

In a modern era, diseases do not arrive by boat on transatlantic voyages. They arrive by plane and present themselves at our doorsteps within hours. By moving forward this important piece of public health protection legislation, the Government of Canada will have the authority to address immediate concerns related to global disease transmission, a cross-border issue of growing importance.

As members may recall, Bill C-36 was the first attempt to modernize the Quarantine Act. The bill was introduced in the last parliamentary session on May 12, 2004, but died on the order paper when the election was called.

Last fall, Bill C-12 was reintroduced. This revised bill reflected the comments of many stakeholders including provincial and territorial public health experts. After an extensive review process, including witness testimony and amendments adopted by the Standing Committee on Health, the bill was passed by the House of Commons on December 10, 2004.

Recently, the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology underwent a similar examination process of Bill C-12. Amendments were adopted by committee members specifically related to the tabling of quarantine regulations. The House committee on health had asked that these regulations be tabled, so that it could review them. The Senate saw that amendment in the bill and decided that it would like to see the regulations as well.

If the House concurs today in the proposed amendments, the tabling of regulations under Bill C-12 will reflect the role of the Senate of Canada by reinforcing the equivalent authority of this chamber in the parliamentary legislative process.

Canadians want protection. They expect government to draw upon an array of modern tools to manage future risks to public health. The revised Quarantine Act before us complements provincial and territorial public health legislation, for each jurisdiction is responsible for maintaining public health.

The federal Quarantine Act will operate as the first line of defence. It will play a mitigating role in protecting the health of Canadians from the importation of disease. The importance of jurisdictions working together is paramount when protecting public health, even more so when health threats emerge. The complementary legislative design of Bill C-12 helps to create a web of protection for Canadians.

Indeed, we do not need another health crisis to reinforce the critical importance of working in concert with our provincial and territorial partners.

After the SARS crisis, the Government of Canada moved immediately to strengthen public health. This act would become an important instrument in carrying out that commitment for it would add another tool in the pan-Canadian toolbox for public health. The newly created Public Health Agency of Canada and the appointment of the Chief Public Health Officer will serve in the management of any new infectious disease outbreak.

It is not only our obligation to Canadians that we need to consider. Currently, the World Health Organization is undertaking revisions to the international health regulations. Canada is a major player in that process.

Bill C-12, our new Quarantine Act, complements this effort. It is compatible with global public health efforts. This new legislation appropriately balances individual rights and freedoms in the protection of the public good. In a globalized world, it reflects the increased complexity in public health, making linkages with other authorities to support a coordinated response capacity, and including local and provincial partners, customs officials, the RCMP and the World Health Organization.

Revisions to Bill C-12 would ensure better communication, collaboration and cooperation among partners, as well as better clarity about who does what when. It would build on the expertise and the strengths already in place in the disease management spectrum to ensure that Canadians are safeguarded by a seamless public health system throughout this country.

Once enacted, our new Quarantine Act would ensure that the Government of Canada has the proper legislative tools to respond rapidly and effectively in the event of our next public health crisis.

In the spirit of collaboration, it is my wish that House members demonstrate ongoing support for the work and contributions made toward strengthening this bill on behalf of the Standing Committee on Health of this House and the Senate of Canada.

[Don Bell, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome your ruling as it enables us to carry on with the debate on this important piece of legislation. To try to use a procedural opportunity for what I would call partisan politics to delay debate on this important bill is unconscionable.

Dealing specifically with Bill C-12, the public health system in Canada is central to maintaining the health and safety of our population. Public health is the science and the art of protecting and promoting health, preventing disease and injury, and prolonging life. It is the public health system that will identify and monitor health threats and invoke appropriate interventions to mitigate the risk at hand. Ultimately a strong public health system will improve the health status of Canadians. In the context of emergency preparedness and response, our public health system is often the first line of defence against emerging and ongoing threats.

As we know, diseases do not respect borders. In today's global village they arrive by plane and they present themselves at our doorstep within hours. This is why Canada's public health system must be equipped with an array of modern tools to maintain a state of readiness to effectively manage the next wave of disaster, and we have no idea what or when that is going to be.

There is an intricate web of protection in place that is invisible to many, but it reflects the tireless efforts of those on the front line and those who support local response capacity in public health. When the public health system is working well, few take notice, but in the event of a new emerging disease like SARS, the role of public health is captured in the public's eye.

The country's response to SARS highlighted the urgent need for national leadership and coordination of public health activity across the country, especially during a health crisis. Rapid decision making, decisive action, and effective response measures are critical to managing future threats to public health.

Many of us remember the important work undertaken by Dr. David Naylor, chairperson of the National Advisory Committee on SARS and Public Health. Examining the events surrounding SARS, the Naylor committee made recommendations for change, including the need for legislative reform in the area of public health management.

In support of these recommendations and the vision that inspired the Naylor report, the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology was also authorized to examine and report on the infrastructure and governance of Canada's public health system.

In addition, the Kirby committee examined Canada's ability to respond to public health emergencies arising from infectious disease outbreaks. In the Kirby report, initial steps were identified to facilitate the renewal and reform of health protection and promotion in Canada, including the creation of a new health protection agency to be headed by a nation's doctor, a chief medical officer of health.

Public health is a shared responsibility in this country. While provinces and territories bear primary responsibility for protecting public health within Canada, the federal government provides quarantine services at Canadian points of entry, the oldest health measure to date.

Once a traveller passes through customs, each province and territory has its own public health legislation to contain and to control the spread of a communicable disease within its own jurisdiction. Recent experiences in the global public health arena, including SARS, mad cow disease, West Nile virus, and the arrival of avian influenza, have underscored the urgency for updating public health legislation across Canada. To date, many health protection laws are woefully outdated, including the federal Quarantine Act which has been largely unchanged since 1872.

The need for a legislative overhaul in public health is required to manage contemporary public health threats with local, provincial, national and international ramifications. Action now in terms of legislative renewal will help ensure that Canadians feel confident once again that their governments are indeed protecting them from future health threats.

The Government of Canada has moved swiftly to strengthen public health by establishing the newly created Public Health Agency of Canada and the appointment of the first chief public health officer. The modernization of the Quarantine Act will complement the government's strategy in strengthening Canada's public health system and serve in the management of any new disease outbreak that might threaten the health and safety of Canadians.

The revised Quarantine Act, Bill C-12, was designed to complement existing provincial and territorial public health legislation. It offers protection at Canada's international borders and ports of entry by controlling the import and export of a communicable disease. Simply put, this bill will add another layer of protection in public health. In the pan-Canadian toolbox for public health, this legal instrument provides the federal government with the authority to detect public health risks at the first point of contact when travellers, conveyances, goods and cargo are entering the country.

The Quarantine Act is one of Canada's oldest pieces of legislation and, as I have stated already, it has not been significantly modernized since 1872. Once enacted, a modernized Quarantine Act will ensure that the federal government has the enabling authority to mitigate the risk and threat of global disease transmission.

It is not only our obligation to Canadians that we need to consider. Public health protection must be a global effort. Currently, the World Health Organization is initiating revisions to the international health regulations to ensure that countries around the world are doing their part to support rapid, decisive action to stem the spread of disease.

There are a number of important features of Bill C-12 that make it truly useful in the disease management program. It is very powerful legislation for the Public Health Agency that requires due diligence when administered.

With quarantine officers stationed at major international airports, Bill C-12 provides these federal agents and the Minister of Health with the authority they need to marshal a comprehensive and immediate response capacity at points of entry. Bill C-12 does not affect the interprovincial movement of travellers and conveyances but complements existing provincial public health legislation.

Recognizing the need for ongoing collaboration with our partners in public health, the newly proposed Quarantine Act will streamline the process embedded in public health by eliminating the distinction between listed and other diseases. It will modernize enforcement powers, including ministerial authority to divert air carriers to alternate landing sites or indeed to prohibit entry into Canada. Further, it gives authority for the procurement of quarantine space anywhere in Canada, including the ability to compensate the owner of a facility in a manner consistent with responsible and prudent government spending.

What about human rights under this new quarantine legislation? Bill C-12 will also ensure that human rights are adequately protected for providing the right to legal counsel, an interpreter and a second medical opinion. It will clarify authority to collect and share personal health information for the purpose of protecting public health.

The new bill appropriately balances individual liberty rights in the need to protect the public. It also respects the jurisdictions of our provincial and territorial partners, clarifying roles and responsibilities in the shared public health domain.

The Public Health Agency of Canada has engaged many shareholders in the development of Bill C-12, including the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology. The final product enables the federal government to carry out what is essentially a responsibility to the citizens of Canada and further to the international community.

We also cannot ignore that in addition to the serious and significant health issues obviously related to the passage of this bill, I would like to remind all members of the House that there are also severe economic impacts of infectious disease issues. I would remind members of the disastrous economic impacts of the SARS outbreak which occurred in Toronto. The public concern translated very quickly and definitively into an economic slowdown, both in terms of retail sales and, more important, also on tourism.

I should note here that as a result of that impact on Toronto and the impact on tourism and to the economy of Toronto and Ontario, our government decided to show confidence in Toronto. Our Prime Minister called what I understand was the first federal cabinet meeting ever held outside of Ottawa. This was a show of confidence not only in Toronto and Ontario but in Canada, and showing us to the world.

The economic impact of SARS affected tourism travel around the world, not just Canada. I do not need to remind my colleagues in the House about how important tourism is to the economy of Canada, and not just to a city like Toronto because it could be any major Canadian city that has an air travel hub to other parts of Canada. The negative economic impact on tourism is not just related to the city with an international airport, but to all areas of Canada to which tourists are attracted. Tourists travel through those hubs to the various parts of Canada, from sea to sea to sea.

This is important to all of Canada, and I can speak for my province of British Columbia and in particular the greater Vancouver area. As members know, Vancouver has both an airport and a busy seaport and is recognized as the gateway to Asia Pacific. We know and have discussed in our various committees in Ottawa and in the government about the importance of the emerging Asia Pacific market and Canada's role in that.

Of recent note, I could talk on the issue of tourism. We are now in the process of finally securing approved destination status for travellers from China. This has long been an issue that has been recommended to us by tourism groups across Canada. These tourists will come through either Vancouver or in some cases directly through Toronto. This has the opportunity to significantly increase the number of tourists, particularly from China.

The kinds of fears that occurred during the SARS outbreak were such that they had a very serious potential impact on travellers who wanted to come from Asia Pacific. I can tell members of personal knowledge relating to Japan where parents were afraid either to come or to have their children come to Canada because of the SARS impact. In China, which has a one child policy, they are very nervous about sending their children here to learn English or to experience Canadian culture because they only have one child.

Regarding the impact on my region of greater Vancouver and British Columbia, we have over 20,000 foreign students currently engaged in some kind of English second language training in the greater Vancouver area, and the effect of SARS was dramatic. My riding of North Vancouver has an international college that relied heavily on Japanese students. It had a dramatic reduction in the number of students to the point that it caused it to have to refocus and change the way it operated. The college has now varied its program to include other adult students as well. In the end there was a positive impact and net effect, but we still have not regained total confidence in terms of some of these Asia Pacific countries with the fear of having their young people come to Canada.

The benefit of having them come here to be educated is they learn about our Canadian way of life, our Canadian democracy and our values. When they go back to their countries, they are some of the best ambassadors we could have as they grow up and take a role in their countries.

I would mention also the port of Vancouver. It is the second busiest port in North America after Louisiana, which is mainly an oil base port. It is not only the busiest port in Canada, but the second busiest port in North America. The movement of goods and services, which can be affected by an infectious outbreak or the discovery of some substance, such as a powder, can have a huge impact which can shut down that port.

Recently, as a government, we decided that we would lend support in recognizing the growth of the port trade to Canada and to British Columbia, which is the new container port in Prince Rupert. Forty million dollars of federal money will be flowing to help the economy in that area. This provides us now with a second major rail connection for goods into Canada.

The port of Vancouver, for a variety of reasons like rail capacity, is struggling to handle the container capacity. Some of those goods are going past British Columbia, either flowing through American ports and in fact going all the way around Panama to come up on the east coast, which adds costs and time delay and makes us less attractive as a country.

COSCO, the Chinese overseas shipping company, in the last few years named Vancouver as its first port of entry in North America, which was a huge economic advantage to us.

We have the ability now, with the port of Prince Rupert, to have a second major rail connection that will benefit Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and all of Canada. Importers now can bring goods both into Canada and flow them through to the United States.

All those issues can be affected by a serious health outbreak, an infectious disease outbreak, which can come in the form of product into Canada as well. As we know, there is the risk of the West Nile virus, which is not coming from west to east, but coming from east to west across North America.

Last weekend, when I was in my home riding of North Vancouver, I read newspaper articles and heard radio accounts of the preparations that were being taken for West Nile, which had not yet arrived visibly in British Columbia and the greater Vancouver area, but it was felt it was just a matter of time.

The potential impact and the effect this will have on municipalities with the spraying program, with the proximity of the spraying to school children and to recreational areas, which are very important, is of huge impact.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure the hon. member will be paying close attention because we do talk about relevance in this place. As I said earlier, we are going to do things so much differently than the way they were done in the past. We will not even bother to comment on the relevancy of what just happened. I will continue with my riveting remarks.

It was in 1872 when the Quarantine Act was created. What we are trying to do with Bill C-12 is to make sure that it is a modernized Quarantine Act and it is designed to work in lockstep with provincial public health legislation to make sure that the legislation is an effective tool for the challenges we face today.

Bill C-12 offers enhanced protection at Canadian points of entry but outfits the minister with additional authorities to ensure rapid and decisive action to prevent the spread of disease, and as was said earlier, to take into the account the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It will give the minister authority to issue emergency orders which is consistent with the Public Safety Act.

It will enable the minister to administer exit control measures, divert air carriers to alternate landing sites, restrict travel into Canada, or even close Canadian border points in the event of a public health emergency. It will also allow the minister to establish quarantine facilities at any location in Canada if it becomes necessary to isolate travellers infected and/or exposed to a serious communicable disease.

The proposed act lists many more communicable diseases for which Canadian officials can detain departing passengers. It ensures that the administration of quarantine powers is carried out by qualified professionals and that control measures are tailored to the present circumstances.

Bill C-12 will also clarify respective enforcement roles under quarantine powers and, as I and other speakers on this side of the House said earlier, guarantee that human rights are adequately protected. While the updated act authorizes the collection and sharing of personal health information, the authorization to do so is limited to what is required to protect the health and safety of Canadians in the name of public health.

Bill C-12 protects privacy rights and maintains an appropriate balance between individual liberties and the public good. The Public Health Agency of Canada has engaged many stakeholders in the development of a modern Quarantine Act. Bill C-12 also reflects the efforts and commitment of dedicated members of this House and the Senate.

During the examination process the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology adopted an amendment to strengthen Bill C-12. The new amendment will enable members of the Senate to play a role in the making of quarantine regulations by requiring the tabling of regulations before both Houses. This seems to be a very reasonable amendment. Even the official opposition members agreed, after a little haggling on the procedural rules, with this piece of legislation.

Overall, this legislative renewal initiative reflects the government's commitment to strengthening Canada's public health system in addition to meeting our international obligations. In the spirit of collaboration, federal, provincial and local public health authorities have a significant role to play in protecting public health. Enhanced uniformity in public health legislation equipped with an array of modern tools and emergency measures will enable Canada to effectively prepare for and respond to the contemporary challenges in today's globalized world.

By introducing Bill C-12, the Government of Canada is responding to the call by public health experts and Canadians alike. Once enacted, the new Quarantine Act will ensure an effective response capacity in the event of our next public health crisis. This federal legislative tool is a critical piece in the establishment of a comprehensive public health system.

I will close by saying that it is our collective responsibility to pass this bill. it is our collective responsibility in terms of making sure that our citizens are protected from the spread of disease. As other members said earlier, I also would like to express my strong support for Bill C-12. I hope that all members of the House see the merit in this new health protection legislation and support this very important piece of legislation in terms of preventing the spread of communicable diseases in Canada.

[The Speaker]

I hesitate to interrupt the hon. parliamentary secretary, but I do have a ruling to give which I think may be of interest to her and other hon. members. This will not detract from the time that she has, but it does interrupt what I am sure was an erudite explanation of whatever technicalities there were in the bill before us and the amendments. I will proceed with this ruling if that is satisfactory with hon. members.

I am now prepared to rule on the point of order raised earlier today by the hon. Deputy Leader of the Government in the House concerning the admissibility of the amendment to the motion to concur in the Senate amendments to Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases.

I would like to thank the hon. minister for raising this matter, the hon. House leader of the official opposition, the hon. member for St. John's South--Mount Pearl, the hon. member for Kelowna--Lake Country and others for their comments.

As hon. members know, it is well-established in our practice that an amendment must be relevant to the motion it seeks to amend. This is notably the case when the House considers amendments made in the other place. I refer the House to page 674 of Marleau and Montpetit. It states:

When the House receives amendments to a bill from the Senate, the amendments are then submitted to the House for consideration...it is for the House itself to decide whether it accepts or rejects the amendments...The motion must relate exclusively to the Senate amendments, and not to other provisions of the bill that are not contemplated by the amendments.

It seems to the Chair that the proposed amendment strays quite far from the original Senate amendments before the House and introduces elements entirely extraneous to the debate at hand.

I might also mention that there is a technical difficulty with the amendment in that it does not express a decision with regard to Senate amendment No. 1.

As Marleau and Montpetit explains at page 674, “The motion may at the same time reject certain amendments made by the Senate, and concur in or amend others”.

One concludes from that citation that the House may hold differing views on different amendments and may so inform the Senate in its message. However, it cannot remain silent on one portion and respond only to another.

Accordingly, the Chair concludes that the amendment to the motion for concurrence in the Senate amendments to Bill C-12 is not in order because it is not relevant to the main motion it seeks to amend and because it is technically flawed.

Debate, therefore, may resume on the main motion. I call on the hon. parliamentary secretary to resume her remarks and apologize again for interrupting, but I thought the House would want a decision on this matter.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Social Development (Social Economy)]

Mr. Speaker, it is truly a pleasure to rise to speak to Bill C-12 today.

I have to say right off I find it deplorable that we have a fairly important piece of legislation in public health terms and, because of the official opposition, are obliged to play very political and partisan games. It is unfortunate because the public has long been awaiting a review of such a bill, which is very relevant, as all my colleagues in this House have already said.

I remember that when the former opposition party was known as the Reform Party and it came to the House, it came to do things differently. Well, we have seen how it does things differently in terms of blocking government legislation and also playing very partisan political games in order to stall.

Bill C-12 is an act to prevent the introduction and spread of a communicable disease. It comes to us from the other chamber and it speaks about migration health and its relationship to the rapid spread of disease in today's globalized world. As other speakers before me have said, we do live in a global community where the spread of disease can happen very rapidly.

With advances in technology and rapid air travel, which is now a common practice in the daily lives of individuals replacing the days of long voyages on ships, this new age of jet travel is paving the way for increased population mobility and subsequently accelerated rates in the spread of disease on both the domestic and international fronts.

From a pan-Canadian perspective, migration health and its related consequences pose a threat to the health and safety of all Canadians. A serious communicable disease can now spread to any part of the globe in less than 24 hours, which is less time than the average incubation period for most diseases. We know this firsthand from our recent experience, and as other speakers have said on this side of the House, through SARS.

This means a person incubating an infectious disease can board a plane, travel 12,000 miles, pass unnoticed through customs with no visible signs of illness, take several domestic carriers to their final destination in Canada and still not develop symptoms for several days, thus infecting many other people in their journey before the conditions becomes detected. This was the case in terms of SARS.

The concept of superspreading events further illustrates the magnitude of concern of public health experts. This concept has been used to describe situations in which a single person has directly infected a large number of other people. For example, 103 of the first 210 probable cases to be reported in the Singapore SARS epidemic were infected by just five sources.

This new migration health reality is becoming a cross-border issue of growing importance with numerous ramifications for public health, including implications to the social and economic fibre of our society. Further, the international community remains at risk if the appropriate measures are not administered to stem the spread of disease.

With the looming threat of an influenza pandemic, the impact to the global world may be catastrophic. The nature of this outbreak has the potential to be exponentially worse than SARS in its capacity to cause human suffering. In Canada alone, it is estimated that 5 to 10 million people could become clinically ill.

Once inside Canada, this public health emergency will place enormous strain on our front line workers and the local delivery of health care services. Economic and social upheaval will ensue as provinces and territories are stretched beyond their jurisdictional capacity.

While the principle of uncertainty prevails in global health care, officials do know that economic and psychosocial upheaval is contingent on how virulent the virus is, how rapidly it spreads from one person to another, the capacity for early detection, and how effective and available preventive and control measures prove to be.

The challenge is containment. How do we keep this confined to a small group, which was not the case as we know with the SARS epidemic? Mitigating the threat at hand will depend on vigilant border control activities, often the first line of defence in public health.

It will also rely on the collaborative efforts from cross-jurisdictional partners to stop the spread of disease, including the hospital isolation of infected people, voluntary home quarantine of close contacts, and the quarantine of anyone potentially exposed.

To manage emerging and re-emerging public health threats, legislative measures need to be considered across all levels of government. There is an urgent need for updated legislation to mitigate the heightened risk of global disease transmission and support modern public health practices in times of crisis. Legal preparedness remains a critical component when managing migration health related consequences.

In his report on Canada's recent experiences with SARS, Dr. Naylor highlighted the limitations of Canada's current quarantine legislation and health surveillance. The report recommended that Canada's governments seek to harmonize federal, provincial and territorial public health legislation with specific attention to health emergencies.

To date, existing federal powers under the Quarantine Act are limited in scope and do not reflect the changing face of emergency preparedness and response in the 21st century.

The Quarantine Act prevents the importation and spread of a communicable disease at points of entry. However, it does not address the domestic spread of an infectious disease once inside Canada.

The modernization of public health protection legislation so that it reflects today's realities is an ongoing Government of Canada objective, most recently demonstrated by the creation of the Public Health Agency of Canada, the appointment of the first Chief Public Health Officer last fall, and the commitment to support the work of the agency as found in this year's budget.

Another important step is Bill C-12, the modernization of the Quarantine Act. The Quarantine Act was created in 1872. As we know, much has changed in the last 133 years, including the mode of disease transmission. Problems in the current act include many outdated and redundant provisions, and the lack of harmonization with proposed revisions to the international health regulations.

Further, an order in council is required to amend the schedule of listed diseases, which hinders the ability of the minister to act--

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for that because I think it is a very important issue in the context of, as I said, examples at which we have looked. Especially during the crisis of SARS, there were questions about employees who were in quarantine.

Those employees obviously could not work. They could not have employment benefits because they were under quarantine. I am sure the hon. member would like to let the House know that there are provisions within the legislation. The Senate has taken into account in studying the legislation what happens when one is put under quarantine and his or her livelihood or employment is affected by it. Is that covered by Bill C-12?

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Social Development (Social Economy)]

Madam Speaker, I listened with great interest in what the hon. member for Peterborough had to say. There was one area that the hon. member perhaps would like to address, and that is what happens, in our zeal to protect the public, to individual rights? Is there any question in Bill C-12? There is the question of the charter. I can give a perfect example of what happened recently in Montreal.

It was in the news that in Montreal a package was suspect. Immediately when the authorities came in, to protect the public, people were stripped and hosed down. Should we be concerned, with what is provided in Bill C-12, that the Charter of Rights of individuals will be protected? I am assuming this is the case after having read the bill. I am sure the hon. member will let the House know that protection does exist within Bill C-12.

[Peter Adams, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to join in this debate on the quarantine legislation.

It really amazes me that anyone in this House would try and block quarantine legislation in this day and age. The world as we all know is getting smaller and smaller.

We have the most diverse country in the world, so we have people, on a daily basis, with actual physical links with not tens but with hundreds of countries. In the province of Ontario, for example, we have people from 211 different countries, first generation Canadians, who have relatives coming and going and they travel. They are moving all around the world.

It is quite clear, under those human circumstances, that we need quarantine regulations. The idea of trying to block that at this time is really quite extraordinary. In addition, and I do not really know the statistics, we have daily trade with scores or hundreds of countries. We have products of all sorts, plant and animal products, moving across our borders.

We are a great trading nation. Among the G-8, we are the nation which depends most on trade around the world. If we send our goods elsewhere, other people are certainly sending their goods here. If ever there was a time when we needed quarantine legislation, this is it. And if ever there was a country which needed quarantine legislation, this is it.

I would have thought that the members of the opposition who are blocking this bill and slowing it down would have learned from the signals which we have been receiving in recent years. These are not just hints that there are problems in the area of quarantine, and of screening people and products as they come across our border. These are major signals of what is happening.

We think of SARS. In Ontario, particularly in southern Ontario, the the city of Toronto was affected just like that by the SARS epidemic. It also spread out to the hospitals and nursing homes in my riding of Peterborough.

Then there is avian flu, which we escaped, but my colleagues on this side from the west coast experienced it. I went to one of the ridings out west soon after the first avian flu epidemic. Hundreds of thousands of birds were slaughtered. The effect of that was staggering not just on the economy but on the morale of the people living there.

We can all recall the hoof and mouth disease from some years ago. We were all very concerned about that. We had a hoof and mouth free environment and here was a risk of it coming into our country. We remember walking across mats in the airports with disinfectants on them. Our farms were surrounded by fences and again, we had to go over disinfected barriers to enter the farms.

Madam Speaker, I know that you have many deer in your riding. People think of hoof and mouth disease as a cattle problem, but in fact, if that had skipped into the area of wildlife in our enormous country, it could have disappeared into the bush, be gone for generations, but be there for generations, and come back into our fields and into our herds and flocks.

I have not yet touched on BSE. We talk about screening for various things, but in the case of BSE, it is a little different than some of these other diseases. Here we have a disease which comes from contaminated food. It has now closed the border for years. In my riding 1,000 farm families are affected. Cattle, sheep, a large bison herd, they are all affected by BSE.

Then all over the country, and not just in British Columbia, people talk about the beetles and bugs that have come in which are affecting our trees.

Our maple trees are being affected. There is nothing more symbolic of Canada, as my colleague will note, than the maple tree and it is being affected by a beetle, which could result in the destruction of all the maple trees in the country.

We have already had Dutch elm disease and there is another tree in southern Ontario that is being affected. We are cutting a swath across the province to try to prevent the spread of it.

I have beekeepers in my riding. Bees are not a large part of the agricultural economy in my riding, perhaps $250,000 a year, but in counties around me the bee industry represents millions of dollars. We have to import queen bees from New Zealand and places like that because our own queen bees have been affected by some exotic disease.

I started off with quarantining for human beings and then I mentioned trade. I then mentioned some examples, which were only the more familiar examples that our colleagues here know. The fact is that the two are linked. Increasingly, it is becoming clear that there is no real difference between animal disease, human disease and plant disease. There are crossovers from them all.

We can have a diseased animal, which is the case in BSE. If we eat the meat from that diseased animal there is another disease that we can get. There are crossovers when we think of SARS. We can think of the links between mosquitoes, the dead birds which are the indicator of SARS, and the dead human beings who eventually succumbed from SARS. Think of the fear in South Korea at the present time for avian flu skipping into human beings.

In this important matter of quarantine, which the opposition has been blocking here, we are talking about a serious increasingly complex matter. It is complex in terms of what is crossing our borders, human disease wise, animal disease wise and plant wise, and it is complex in terms of the crossovers between plants, animals and human beings.

I think we need a quarantine system that truly addresses that. It does not say that this is what we do for plants, this is what we do for animals and this is what we do for those other animals which we call human beings. Somewhere in the sophisticated computer system, which is screening for these things, it tells us about a plant disease that can affect animals and a plant disease that can affect human beings. It then tells us about a human disease that can affect animals and plants. This is the sort of sophistication we should be at in this modern day and age.

Let us think now of quarantine for human beings, although it would work just as well for all animals. One of the difficulties with any quarantine system is that if we are not careful, if we wait until the animal or the human has the full blown disease, it is too late. Therefore if a person or an animal is coming through one of our airports or getting off one of our ships and they are already very diseased it is too late.

We need to develop quarantine systems that will get in front of that so that we will detect people, animals or plants, if we can because it is more difficult with plants, before the disease becomes impossible to control. There are various ways of doing that and one of them is to detect symptoms.

Let me do this from the point of view of, let us say, Peterborough county, and then we can think of it in terms of Canada as a whole. If Peterborough county had a tracking system in the hospitals, the doctors' offices, the nursing homes, the seniors' homes and the schools where they have nurses who are doing check-offs of children, it could input people's symptoms, which may include high temperatures and fever, or instances of vomiting and diarrhea.

As we all know, a variety of diseases have different symptoms but let us say we had tracked 10 or 20 of those symptoms. From the Palm Pilots in the schools, from the doctor's office computers, from the emergency room of the hospital, or from people checking on residents of seniors homes, if we discovered that in Peterborough county there were spikes in two or three of these twenty symptoms, this would be a signal to us that something is happening.

It would be checked and we might discover that in a particular seniors' home there might be food poisoning or it just happens there are more people with fevers than usual. However if in fact we discover that in all of those places, two or three of these symptoms are showing up at the same time, we might say that here is something that could be an epidemic, here is something which worldwide could be a pandemic, and we are catching it at the symptom stage.

That is why, in terms of a quarantine system for the airports and for the docks, among other things, as well as looking for the obvious signs of diseases, such as spots on people's faces or that kind of thing, we can scan for high temperature. We can have people watching for individuals who look as though they have a fever, take them to one side and see if we can check it. We can then input that very quickly to discover whether it is something that is nationwide, not something that is local to a family or to a particular airport.

There is one more thing about this that has human rights implications and ethical implications. It has to do with tracing human beings and animals. We know that the biggest scientific breakthrough of this century is DNA. Each of us, each plant and each animal is perfectly identifiable from DNA. Let us take the case of BSE. If an animal has BSE, from a sample of its blood that was given at birth or when the animal came over the border, we would know with absolute certainty which animal it was. When a problem occurs it can be traced right back with DNA.

One of the interesting examples of this lately is Maple Leaf Foods which is now taking DNA samples of all its hogs. What this means is that if we find something wrong with a piece of bacon it would be possible from the DNA to identify the hog from which that bacon came.

I mentioned the ethical implications and I will come back to that in a moment, but if we are going to have a quarantine system, particularly tracing human beings coming in but also animals and plants coming in, it is not just enough to say that a certain animal in a certain condition passed through the border at Windsor the other day. We have to know first of all where the animal is going, and hopefully we know that already, and then if there is something wrong with it we have to know where it is coming from so we can address the source of the actual problem.

When we think of human beings, including sick human beings, the DNA analogy applies at the same time. We have to remember the ethical aspects of that but it is extremely important to be able to trace a very sick individual to his or her original environment.

I would go back to what I said at the outset here. I do think it is of the greatest importance that this House, including the opposition parties, move as quickly as we can, bearing in mind the ethics that I have mentioned and the complexity I have mentioned, to a deal with the management of emerging and re-emerging threats to public health.

I have been mentioning animals and plants all the time but I do not see any difference between monitoring human beings for public health reasons and monitoring animals and plants for public health reasons.

At every point of entry to Canada we need to invest money, technology and creativity to protect our population. It is our duty as members of the House of Commons to do that. Those border points are our first line of defence as long as we can trace the products and the people that I mentioned earlier. There are other things we can do, such as the symptoms analysis in Peterborough county that I described before, but the first line of defence is the quarantine system around this wonderful huge country.

This legislation would provide the Government of Canada with truly modern, 21st century tools to screen people and products coming across our border. It would also give the Government of Canada the capacity to respond once it had evidence that something is going on.

In the case of this bill, it is not as though we are dealing with something that someone has just dreamt up or something that has just appeared out of nowhere. The Standing Committee on Health made significant contributions to the bill and strengthened the legislation. I certainly acknowledge its efforts and commitment.

The Senate of Canada recently completed its legislative review. As a result, the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology adopted amendments pertaining to the tabling of regulations before Parliament.

Bill C-12 was passed by the Senate of Canada on condition that the proposed quarantine regulations be laid before both Houses. Constitutionally, that has to be done. This amendment reflects equal status for both chambers in parliamentary oversight of the regulation making process. Furthermore, the governor in council may only make a regulation under section 62 of Bill C-12 if both Houses concur.

From time to time I have been critical of the other place but I respect its jurisdiction and I respect the individuals who operate there. It is my hope that members of the House of Commons will find merit in the work previously undertaken by the Senate of Canada and concur with the Senate amendments to Bill C-12.

I wish to express my strong support and the government's strong support for this important piece of health protection legislation. I urge all members to give third reading to the bill in the interest of global public health and the health and safety of all Canadians.

I am delighted to have participated in this debate. I urge all members to move rapidly on this matter. It is urgent and it is something which responsible members of Parliament should do.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Madam Speaker, I had not really intended to rise to address Bill C-12, but I have been moved to do exactly that given the events of today.

I certainly support the earlier comments of our public health critic, the hon. member for Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, and the comments she made in support of this legislation.

Having said that, given the present situation not only in the House of Commons but indeed in our country where we have a corrupt government in office that should not be in office for one day longer, I find that I simply must move the following amendment. I am pleased to have this seconded by my seatmate, the whip of the official opposition, the member for Niagara Falls. The amendment is self-explanatory.

I move that the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “that” and substituting that a message be sent to the Senate to acquaint their honours that this House disagrees with amendment no. 2, made by the Senate, to Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases, because the passage of the amendment may be construed that this House has confidence in the Government, which is in dispute, and the adoption of this motion should confirm that it does not.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Madam Speaker, we are still confident that, while it did not fully meet our expectations, Bill C-12, as considered clause by clause by the Standing Committee on Health, can be amended through its regulations so that our needs are met.

But, as my hon. colleague indicated, the message from the Senate, asking that the bill be amended by specifying that the governor in council may only make a regulation under section 62 if the minister has caused the draft regulation to be tabled before both houses of Parliament, is simply unnecessary.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Madam Speaker, even though I do not have the witty eloquence of the hon. member for Hochelaga, who discussed this issue earlier, or the clarity of the hon. member for Verchères—Les Patriotes, or the poetic skills of the hon. member for Saint-Lambert, I am very pleased to rise in this House to address Bill C-12 once again.

It was a few months ago that we conducted the clause by clause review of Bill C-12. The Standing Committee on Health worked very diligently on this legislation. Indeed, it is important for Canadians and Quebeckers to have an act that is very effective in containing the dangers of communicable diseases, particularly in this age of supersonic jets, as the member for Hochelaga so aptly pointed out. People travel from country to country much more rapidly than in the past.

A few days ago, white powder spilled from a suspicious parcel found at Montreal's airport. Those who had been in contact with that parcel became sick and had to be taken to hospital. About 20 people were affected. We are not exempt from biological terrorism. Therefore, we have to be very careful and ensure that we have good legislation to deal with these problems.

Not long ago, I had the pleasure of going to South Africa with you, Madam Speaker, in order to attend the third session of the Pan-African Parliament, which is made up of 46 of the 53 countries on the African continent. Before that trip, I had no idea of what danger some people face. When we are safe at home, we do not realize the grinding poverty of certain countries and the huge shortage of drugs to combat certain diseases.

Recently, the Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association discussed HIV-AIDS. Efforts are being made to halt the spread of this disease, but it is still far from being eradicated.

Sometimes we have an opportunity to see such situations first hand. You know that, Madam Speaker, because we both visited an orphanage in Bedoni, where one extraordinary woman cares for 105 children aged 2 to 16, whose parents had AIDS, and who are HIV positive themselves or have other problems. We saw the living conditions there, which were very rudimentary and difficult. Up to 18 children shared a small room chockablock with beds, measuring 7 by 10 feet. This woman and her few helpers look after all those children. We could feel the love and joy that surrounded them despite the circumstances.

When we are dealing with a bill that relates to the problem of transmitting disease, we also need to think of the human beings who will be protected by it. That is what I learned from my experience, to always think of the human beings.

My colleague from Nanaimo—Cowichan has dealt very well with several of the points of concern to us in connection with this bill. I hope that the regulations will also address them.

When people travel, they have to have a number of vaccines. Before we went to South Africa, we had to have a whole series of immunizations. When we leave here, we can be pretty well sure that we will come back healthy. But if someone's journey starts out in a country where vaccines are virtually non-existent or harder to obtain, or perhaps have to be paid for, the situation becomes a bit more complicated. This is the case in the poor countries where medicine is not well developed. Even if it is, there is not always the money to deal with all the diseases that afflict the inhabitants, such as Ebola fever.

Recently, in one of the African countries, there has been a reemergence of a fever caused by a virus that is even stronger and more difficult to fight. In addition, with all the antibiotics we are taking even for small infections, there is no doubt that our immune systems are weakened.

It is clear that a bill like this one can pretty much ensure the continued safety of those we want to protect.

I think we have been very diligent, during the clause by clause study, in protecting ourselves against actions taken too hastily by the Minister of Health or anyone wanting to work with those capable or suspected of introducing any such disease or virus in this country.

We do not need, however, yet another procedure or the approval of another house to protect ourselves and take appropriate action, where new regulations would have to be considered and studied. There are enough adults in this place to decide whether the regulations we take are the right ones. We do not need another house for that.

Our friends the senators are also very diligent. They have no doubt done their homework. But once the bill is passed, I think that we can rely on ourselves to implement it properly. It is very important to us that, with respect to this legislation, theinterested political body be this House, and not the Senate.

I hope that the hon. members of this House will think twice before approving these amendments to the bill and that they will object to having to seek the approval of the Senate again.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP will be supporting Bill C-12, but I need to emphasize the fact that there are some issues which continue to need to be addressed. Whether they are addressed through the mechanism of this bill or through other mechanisms, I think it is important that we are on record.

A great deal of information has been left up to the minister to develop through regulations. As recent experience has shown with the Chrétien bill for Africa, which was Bill C-9 in the last Parliament, developing regulations can be an incredibly slow and tedious process. We cannot wait indefinitely for these kinds of regulations to be developed.

There is one area of concern in the report that came back to the House. It specifically indicates that the proposed regulations or any version of the amended regulations should come to both the House and the Senate. We are concerned that it will delay the process if regulations must be approved by both the House and the Senate. We would urge expediency in looking at this, because we are often dealing with issues that are in the nature of a crisis when we are talking about quarantine.

I have addressed this issue before, but I feel compelled to raise it again: the use of screening officers is a major concern. It appears that we will be forcing customs officers to take on another role, that of medical professional. This is on top of their already substantial duties, which include enforcing the Customs Act, looking for potential terrorists and stopping materials that could harm our flora and fauna. This is far too much to expect one group to enforce. We must take that into consideration when we are asking our customs officers to take on these duties.

Other organizations, including the Canadian Nurses Association, have pointed out some concerns. They have pointed out that emerging diseases often have unique symptoms. Screening officers will have to be continually trained and supported to ensure that they know what they have to watch out for. A bad cough is not only the sign of a potential epidemic; it can be the sign of some other things. They must be able to determine what the differences are.

Bill C-12 does not explain how this system will be supported over time. We must address this in order to protect the health and welfare of Canadians.

One of the lessons learned from the SARS epidemic was about the lack of coordination and official communication responsibilities during the crisis. Again, the Canadian Nurses Association recommends that the Chief Public Health Officer and the Public Health Agency of Canada have a critical role in any epidemic or suspected epidemic. They were not included in this bill because enabling legislation to create that position and organization is still being written. This is a serious oversight. We urge the government to act quickly on that legislation. Everyone who spoke to the committee emphasized how important it is to have one clear authority during a health emergency.

It is our hope, however, that we never need this bill, but if we do, we must make sure that the sweeping powers given to the minister to detain people, to use privately owned facilities and to force people to accept medical assessment or treatment, are not unchecked. There are not enough assurances in this legislation that the minister will act in a reasonable manner and that people's rights to privacy will be respected or that workers affected by the quarantine will actually be protected. My colleague from the Bloc spoke quite a bit about this.

Some of these areas of concern are going to be dealt with by regulation. We have already indicated how important it is that the government act quickly in this area.

There is one other area for which we know this government will soon bring forward legislation, especially around protecting workers, and that is a quick response during a health emergency to such issues as employment insurance claims, medical leave and health and safety standards for front line workers. It is absolutely critical, if we are asking front line workers to put their lives on the line for things like this, that we ensure there is a social safety net to protect them.

Another omission that was identified during the committee stage was that the bill covers travellers and materials in and out of Canada but has no provisions for interprovincial travel. Considering that it takes longer to fly to Vancouver from Halifax than it does to fly from Europe to Halifax, the possibilities for communicable diseases being transmitted from one end of the country to the other are quite available.

I also want to briefly mention the Canadian Medical Association “SARS in Canada” report. A couple of key issues the association brought forward are not specifically dealt with adequately in this bill. They include communications.

As we saw during the SARS crisis, and I will quote from the report:

Without a coordinated system to notify acute care facilities and health care providers of global health alerts, front line clinicians often have no prior warning of new emerging diseases.

One of the things that became apparent during the SARS crisis was the lack of a list of current fax numbers or phone numbers of family doctors. There was an inability to communicate with physicians in real time. We must ensure that a communication system is developed to allow us to deal with emerging crises. Many crises emerge very quickly and an early response time is absolutely essential.

One of the other issues that was raised by the Canadian Medical Association was the fact that there was no system. Again I will quote from the report:

There was a lack of a system to distribute protective gear to health care professionals in the province. Once this became apparent the OMA [Ontario Medical Association] identified suppliers and manufacturers and offered to undertake distribution of masks to physicians in order to protect them and their patients.

It is absolutely essential when a crisis emerges that we have lists of suppliers and that we have communication systems in place so that we can adequately protect not only our front line workers, but also the Canadian population as a whole.

Although we will be supporting Bill C-12, I would urge that we quickly address some of these glaring omissions and gaps in the legislation.

(Bill C-282. On the Order: Private Members' Bills)

Second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Health of Bill C-282, an act to amend the Food and Drugs Act (export permits)

Business of the House

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, for the rest of today, tomorrow and early next week the order of business will be the consideration of the Senate amendments to Bill C-12, the quarantine legislation; followed by third readings of Bill C-9 respecting economic development in Quebec; Bill C-23, the human resources bill; Bill C-22, the social development bill; and Bill C-26, the border services bill.

We would then consider second reading of Bill C-45, the veterans bill; and then Bill S-18, the census bill.

Tomorrow the government will introduce a companion bill to the budget implementation bill. We hope to debate second reading of this bill by Tuesday or Wednesday of next week.

We will then also resume consideration of Bill C-43 which is the budget implementation bill.

To assist members in their planning as well, I wish to inform the House that on the evening of May 18 the House will go into a committee of the whole on the citizenship and immigration estimates, and on the evening of May 31 on the social development estimates.

My hon. colleague across the way asked about opposition days. As the rules provide and call for, six opposition days are required before the end of June. Certainly our focus will be on moving the budget implementation bill forward. I would expect that we would do that.

As far as courage, I am not sure I see very much along the way certainly across the floor when in fact we have people on this side of the House who are prepared on behalf of Canadians to ensure that this Parliament works, but I see no evidence of that from my hon. colleagues across the way.

Quarantine Act

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

A pleonasm, indeed. Let me reword that. This is almost like in a courtroom, with all the objections. I am happy to have an attentive audience.

We were concerned about the possibility that a person placed in detention could be detained for more than 48 hours. We had concerns about the principles of natural justice and, basically, the fact that these individuals could not seek legal advice and that the reasons for detaining them were not clear, especially since, initially, the bill did not really provide for the possibility of appealing decisions.

We know the importance in law of the ability to review decisions. All my colleagues in this House are indignant about the fact that the Immigration Act passed last year abolished the refugee appeal division. It should be recalled that the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration at the time, the member for Bourassa, promised that the situation would be corrected. Another minister has now moved to immigration. We are on our third incumbent in this position, and the right to appeal to the refugee division still has not been re-established.

All my colleagues share with me the deep indignation of these people over such a violation of a principle of natural justice, namely the right to appeal a decision and have it reviewed.

Immigration is not an unimportant matter. There are four great immigrant countries in the world: Canada, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. Immigration is important. This issue brings us back to our national sovereignty project. In immigration, there are two great problems, two great visions of the integration of Neo-Quebeckers.

We in the Bloc Québécois have always felt that the future had to be built with immigrants. I would like to take advantage of this opportunity, by the way, to pay tribute to our critic for immigration, the member for Vaudreuil-Soulanges.

I would like to finish by saying that the immigration issue takes us back to the two major ways of integrating people. There is Canada's multiculturalism model, where people are led to believe that we can keep our own culture, regardless of our country or place of origin. Then there is the Quebec model with its shared public culture. Gérald Godin, formerly the member for Mercier, used to say, “There are 100 ways to be a Quebecker, but the important thing is to be one in French”. That is why, in Quebec, French plays an integrating role in regard to the shared public culture and why we had Bill 101. The father of Bill 101, the former member for Bourget, Camille Laurin, occupies a special place in our hearts.

That said, all my colleagues will understand that the connection I wanted to make between immigration and quarantines is the following. In a country that welcomes a lot of people—on October 1 every year, Canada announces its immigration plans and last year the figure was 248,000—it is very important to ensure that the most judicious measures are taken but not measures that infringe on human rights. That is why the Bloc Québécois tabled amendments to Bill C-12, because it seemed to us that we should seek a better balance.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have been dying for a long time to speak to Bill C-12, the Quarantine Act. I would like to thank my party's whip for enabling me to speak to a bill as fascinating as it is scientifically interesting.

We spent several committee sessions studying this quarantine bill. We were generally in favour of modernizing an act that dated back to the 19th century. It had been passed at a time when methods of transportation were developing especially quickly, including ships, which played a major role. Over all the years since then, new transportation methods have developed and new technologies have emerged. Nowadays, there are trains, airplanes, and even high-speed trains.

When one speaks about globalization and the heightened, ongoing and increasingly worldwide contacts among people, it becomes apparent that travel is no longer a marginal phenomenon. If we were to do a little poll here by show of hands to determine how many of us have visited one, two, three or four continents, we would soon see that travel is not unusual. People are obviously in closer contact than in the 19th century. There was an urgent need, therefore, to modernize the Quarantine Act.

Throughout the committee hearings, my colleague, the member for Laval and I were concerned about how frequently the wording of act left a lot of discretionary room to quarantine officers. For example, there were often no references to notions of time and accountability. The amendment that was clearly most often formulated by all the parliamentarians in committee had to do with the fact that there was no mention of the expression reasonable and probable cause, which is well defined in law.

We therefore tabled several amendments. We made the bill more acceptable and were in favour of its general arrangement.

Before going into greater detail about this bill, it should be recalled that we had two major reasons for concern.

The first was that the Minister of Health can designate the quarantine zones. This means that if there is an epidemic or pandemic, the Minister of Health can designate an area to be quarantined on his own without referring to his counterpart responsible for health and social services in Quebec, New Brunswick or any other province. The Bloc Québécois introduced an amendment on this matter, but it was unfortunately not accepted by the government.

We were disappointed to see that the government had not read our study asking for a quarantine zone. Of course, quarantine zones are often located in places such as airports, which do not pose any problems, because these come exclusively under the federal government's jurisdiction.

However, if a quarantine zone were established in a location that does not come under the federal government's jurisdiction, our critic on intergovernmental affairs would surely rise in this House and say that the government does not respect jurisdictions. He would be justified to do so. I should add that he is a vigilant person with a very keen mind, and we would never want him to be placed in quarantine.

So, we were concerned that the federal government might decide alone to designate a quarantine zone, without consulting authorities in the provinces affected.

We also had concerns about the medical technology. The real novelty in this bill is that the minister will designate certain persons. We wondered who these persons would be. Would they be doctors, nurses or health care professionals? Currently, it is primarily those who make initial contact with newcomers, such as customs officers and others. It is mostly they who control access at our borders when people arrive here.

We wondered what skills and conditions would be required to exercise the powers provided under Bill C-12. I will read clause 14, which is probably the most important provision in this legislation:

Any qualified person authorized by the Minister may, to determine whether a traveller has a communicable disease or symptoms of one, use any screening technology authorized by the Minister that does not involve the entry into the traveller's body of any instrument or other foreign body.

Of course, I sensed for a moment that all sorts of fantasies had gone through my colleagues' minds, but let us keep things at a medical level.

The expression “any...person authorized” was too vague and it was important to be more specific. As for the expressions “any screening technology” and “entry...of any foreign body”, hon. members will admit that they are very general. The Bloc Québécois, ever mindful of its responsibilities, tabled an amendment to refer instead to “appropriate medical technologies”. This amendment sought to set some limits.

The bill proposes a number of new points. For example, a new requirement applies to the operator and crew of conveyances. These may be planes, boats or land vehicles. They are required to report all cases of illness or death on board before their arrival in Canada. It is understandable that those responsible for these means of transport might be able to identify possible sources of infection. It is an act of civic duty—the obligation to report them—now enshrined in the law. The aim of the mandatory reporting is obviously to prevent the spread.

Clause 15 is also of some importance. It concerns the obligation on travellers who believe themselves to have a communicable disease or have been in contact with a person with a communicable disease. They must present themselves to a quarantine officer on arrival or departure. Initially it was felt that this should be a voluntary measure and not a requirement. A person who thinks they have malaria, German measles or measles is required to present themselves to the quarantine officer on their arrival or departure. Obviously, the quarantine bill concerns people from outside coming to Canada.

This is a fascinating bill. We have studied it for two weeks.

[Carol Skelton, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Mr. Speaker, today I rise on behalf of my constituents and the Conservative Party of Canada to speak to the amendments to Bill C-12, the Quarantine Act.

We have passed a series of amendments from our colleagues in the other place with the intent of approving the bill we sent to them. We have reviewed these proposals and agree with them. The amendments will bring additional oversight and accountability to this important legislation, which was lacking in the version the government has sent them before.

For the benefit of those who do not have the bill text before them, I will get to the heart of these amendments.

The original bill did not call for the oversight of both Houses of Parliament, but the proposed amendments would correct this. Should the Quarantine Act need to be enforced, this extra layer of prudence would be essential in ensuring the proper application. In addition, the amendments also call for and facilitate the ability to have public meetings and hearings regarding the act and its applications.

Once again, I welcome this change. It adds an extra layer of protection for Canadians affected and also allows for a broader consultation process. I would expect that at these hearings, if ever held, it would allow experts and affected Canadians to be heard. I support this approach.

I have been hearing many things regarding our preparedness for such a situation and the news at times is not encouraging. Recently I met with firefighters who informed me that over 70% of them do not have the necessary nuclear, biological and chemical emergency training. This worries me greatly, especially as I have had emergency preparedness training and know how important it is for first responders to have the training and tools to do their jobs. If they fail, so do those who follow.

I call upon the government to step forward and ensure that this training takes place as soon as possible. The next pandemic can take place at any time, and this training takes time. Such emergency training also needs to take place for those in our hospital emergency rooms.

Recently I met with our next generation of doctors. They have said that they would welcome this training, but believe that it is also essential. They and I agreed that if medical students were paid to take the training during their academic recess, they would graduate with proper training. What would be better than having our next generation of doctors enter service fully trained and without reducing current staffing levels in the process?

The legislation is just a piece of paper. It alone cannot protect Canadians. It is the people behind it who need to be prepared. In a pandemic situation, running through the streets and waving copies of this bill will not make us safe. Proper training and resources will. My colleagues and I will support the amendments, but we also will do so at the same time that we call for further action; action, not words.

SARS proved that hindsight is twenty-twenty. SARS has also proved that pandemics can cost human lives. Let us not repeat those mistakes.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Minister of State (Public Health)]

Mr. Speaker, increased population mobility and its relation to the rapid spread of disease is a heightened concern in today's globalized world. Our recent experience with SARS, the arrival of an avian influenza, and the looming threat of the influenza pandemic are stark reminders that public health is a cross-border issue of growing importance. A serious communicable disease can now spread to any part of the globe in less than 24 hours.

Although the principle of uncertainty prevails in global public health, officials do know that economic and psycho-social upheaval is contingent on how virulent the virus is, how rapidly it spreads from one person to another, the capacity for early detection, and how effective preventive control measures prove to be.

The challenge is containment, and the ability to block the disease in question will depend on vigilant monitoring activities at the borders. We will also have to depend on efforts by out-of-country partners for such things as health care delivery, hospital isolation of infected persons and quarantine of potentially exposed individuals.

Although the present public health system has served Canadians well, the time has come to update our legislation so that it better reflects the changes required for preparation and emergency intervention in this 21st century.

In response to this new risk and this threatening environment, the Government of Canada has moved promptly to modernize the Quarantine Act, which is one of the oldest pieces of Canadian legislation.

Bill C-12 plays a paramount role in the management of emerging and re-emerging threats to public health. Administered at Canadian points of entry, it is the first line of defence in protecting Canadians from the importation and spread of a communicable disease. It provides the Government of Canada with modern tools and additional authorities to ensure a rapid and effective response capacity in the event of our next public health crisis.

Members may recall that the Standing Committee on Health made significant contributions toward strengthening this bill. During the examination process members listened to the issues raised by external stakeholders and put forward amendments to reflect their areas of concern. Acknowledging the efforts and commitment of our committee members, the House passed Bill C-12, as amended, on December 10, 2004.

In keeping with the parliamentary process, the Senate of Canada recently completed its legislative review of Bill C-12. As a result of this process the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology introduced amendments pertaining to the tabling of regulations before Parliament.

Simply put, the Senate of Canada passed Bill C-12 on the condition that the Minister of Health lay proposed quarantine regulations before both chambers. This amendment reflects equal status for both Houses in parliamentary oversight of the regulation making process.

Further, the governor in council may only make a regulation under section 62 of the newly proposed quarantine act if both Houses have concurred in reports from their respective committees approving the proposed regulation, or a version of it amended to the same effect.

In the spirit of collaboration, it is my hope that members of the House of Commons will find merit in the work previously undertaken by the Senate of Canada and will concur with the adopted amendments to Bill C-12.

With this said, I wish to demonstrate continued support for this very important piece of health protection legislation. Today I stand before my fellow colleagues imparting that it is our collective responsibility to move Bill C-12 forward in the global interests of public health and the health and safety of Canadians.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

moved the second reading of, and concurrence in, amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases.

Presence in Gallery

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, we will continue this afternoon with second reading of Bill C-38, the civil marriage bill. This will be followed by consideration of Senate amendments of Bill C-29, the patent bill, and Bill C-12, the quarantine bill.

We will then return to second reading of Bill C-43, the budget bill, and eventually the third readings of: Bill C-23, the HRDC bill; Bill C-22, the social development bill; Bill C-26, the border services bill; and Bill C-9, the Quebec development bill.

Tomorrow we will begin with Bill C-43. If this is completed, we will then return to the list just given.

Next week is a break week. Since it happens to coincide this year with Passover, I would like to take this opportunity to extend to Canadians of the Jewish faith best wishes on this holiday.

After today there are 35 sitting days for the House before its scheduled adjournment on June 23. The government hopes that the House will be able to complete all stages of Bill C-38 and Bill C-43 by that date, which means that the bills will have to go to and be reported from committees in time for report stage and third reading in that limited time. That is why we have given priority to these bills in order to arrive at the supply votes.

The government is obliged to designate by that date 6 of those 35 days as allotted days or opposition days. Since we do not face the logistical and timing difficulties that I have just described vis-à-vis these two major bills, it seems logical and sensible to ask the House to deal with those second readings before proceeding with business such as opposition days, which are not followed by subsequent legislative stages.

If the members opposite would not be so sneaky in trying to change the Standing Orders, in fact, we could perhaps have the kind of dialogue that the hon. member is suggesting we have.

Patent Act

[Jerry Pickard, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, it is important for me today to thank all of the different parties in the House. There was strong cooperation in committee from all parties in the House and that was very much respected.

This is a significant time to move forward and to move forward quickly. My colleague across the way has been instrumental in bringing forward the issue of disease and the help that we can bring forward with the patent changes so that generic drugs can flow to Africa and help people there.

Does my colleague see ways that we can expand that cooperation so we can meet our humanitarian challenges around the world? Every party worked together very carefully and has been supportive with respect to Bill C-12.

I wonder if the member has some views about the way we could extend the opportunity to work in humanitarian ways in all other conflicts or problems around the world. That is critical today. The Canadian government has been called upon to do things that are humanitarian in nature. We have reached out to other countries as we saw with the tsunami. We saw it in this particular case. We see it all the time. How can we work together better and achieve the goals we need to achieve?

Quarantine Act

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to congratulate the member for Hochelaga on his excellent speech. I would like to say that as the Bloc Québécois's health critic, he always works very hard. It was a pleasure for me to work with him when I was the NDP's health critic. A newly elected member is now assigned to this task, the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan. She is very interested and has a lot of experience in this regard. I think that the members will work very hard together.

I have two questions for the member regarding Bill C-12. First, I would like to know whether the member thinks that the government learned any lessons from the SARS crisis two years ago.

Second, is it certain Bill C-12 provides protection for workers who are quarantined without any compensation when such crises break out?

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

It is exactly 71.6%, I am informed by the member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, who knows the Criminal Code backwards and forwards and who is as knowledgeable about opinion polls.

That said, the Jean Charest government is challenging the reproductive technologies bill in court. This is nothing to sneeze at, for this is not a government particularly known for standing up for the interests of Quebec. WIth all due respect, one might in fact call it somewhat spineless.

This is a kind of repeat tendency by the federal government to wish to interfere in areas not under its jurisdiction. It is not surprising to see them doing so in connection with health, since that is still the area of most concern to our fellow citizens.

I do not want to stray off topic, so let us get back to Bill C-12. As I have said, when it was introduced by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, it was Bill C-36. This bill concerns both human rights and public facilities.

It has been clearly established that the way people move around has changed, and people are in closer contact, so the potential for infection is greater. I am talking about mere proximity, nothing extreme. In public places, even this one, we are seeing requests to wash our hands.Every time we go in or out of the House, we take great precautions. We now realize that even shaking hands can transmit certain things, though not the flu. According to scientific knowledge, influenza is not transmitted by human contact, but is a virus that can remain active a long time.

Let me not get off topic again. Back to the bill. It will give the minister the authority to designate quarantine areas anywhere in Canada. We in the Bloc Québécois, our colleague from Laval in particular, brought in a dozen or so amendments so that the government would never be able to do this without consultation and input from the health authorities, those of Quebec in our case, but those of the other provinces as well.

Unfortunately, I regret to inform the House that our amendments were not adopted by the parliamentary committee. I do regret that. The bill would have been strengthened, without our challenging the federal government's jurisdiction, if a real partnership like that could have been established.

The bill contains another important provision: it creates quarantine officers. These are people found often, but not exclusively, in airports. They will carry out investigations and verify whether someone is a source of infection. I will come back to this issue later, but it looks like an intrusion. The potential for violations of privacy in this bill was quite real. It was so real that the members of the committee felt the need to have the Privacy Commissioner testify. That was the Conservatives' idea. It was not a bad idea and we supported it. We did obtain a number of amendments, particularly concerning detention periods.

Happily or unhappily, I shall conclude by speaking of the number of quarantine officers and we will also look at some criminal law concepts. The hon. member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin will have some good memories of that.

The House will be pleased to learn that there are two quarantine officers in Halifax, four in Montreal, three in Ottawa, six in Toronto, three in Calgary, two in Edmonton and five in Vancouver, for a total of 25. The committee had this confirmed. We had debates on the issue. For example, the Association des infirmières et infirmiers du Québec could have seen health professionals as quarantine officers. Nurses could have performed the function, since they are familiar enough with the early signs of an infection.

In the bill, the minister chose to state that quarantine officers must be physicians. Is that a corporate bias? I shall refrain from judgment and each member can make up his or her own mind on this. Still, the fact is that quarantine officers, in terms of professional qualifications, must be physicians recognized by their own provincial governing body.

There also will be officers of various kinds, including environmental health officers. We understand that the Quarantine Act obviously applies to people entering or leaving Canada.

There will be an obligation, which already exists and has been confirmed, for all Canadian airports to be equipped with a site for examining people who may be infected or contaminated. This is nothing new. It is and will be the responsibility of airport authorities to provide space for this purpose.

At first glance, one might think this is a technical bill that has nothing to do with human relations or rights and freedoms. One might think the bill is not covered by the charter. We know we have a system that protects human rights. In 1982, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms was adopted in Canada. René Lévesque was opposed to this charter for two reasons. I do not want to get off topic, but Mr. Lévesque said that section 27 on the enhancement of multicultural heritage went against our plan for integration. Quebec has always believed in a common public culture, which, incidentally, began with the late Gérald Godin, MNA for Mercier. Mr. Lévesque was opposed to the charter, the constitution that was imposed on us. Remember the unilateral patriation, the night of the long knives, and all that? The constitutional context is indelibly marked on the collective memory of Quebeckers.

Mr. Lévesque was opposed to this charter, specifically section 27 on the enhancement of multicultural heritage. However, he feared for the linguistic rights of Quebeckers. When we look at the Ford ruling and all the rulings—let us be frank—the Quebec clause has been invalidated. That is what happened with the charter.

Potential access to school was expanded for minorities, but not only for minorities. When a parent did his or her primary school in English in Canada, it was the Canada clause that applied, not the Quebec clause enacted by the National Assembly.

Mr. Lévesque was a visionary. I ask my colleagues to applaud Mr. Lévesque for, without his visionary side, without this grasp he had of the Charter, I think that the history of Quebec would have been different.

Let us not digress, however: back to the quarantine bill. This is a bill which concerns human rights. Why? Because the quarantine officer, to be designed by regulation, will have a power of detention. We know that he will have to be not only a health professional but a physician. In a certain number of cases—I grant you that this will have to be with court authorization—he will be able to detain for several hours, or several days, persons who he has reason to believe are infected to some degree. It is here that the parliamentary committee has shown vigilance in adding the legally sanctioned notion of reasonable doubt.

As the hon. member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin knows, it has been clearly established by the courts that one cannot cause bodily harm to a person. One cannot even compel a person to receive medical treatment. With regard to the Rodriguez case—whose connection to the Quarantine Act will be clear to everyone—and the issue of assisted suicide, it is important to know that the Supreme Court has said that section 7 on the right to life, liberty and security of the person does not imply the right to quality of life. The Supreme Court refused to declare invalid section 241 of the Criminal Code concerning persons who assist with a suicide.

Let us not forget the essential thing: all of this is to point out that Bill C-12 allows considerable powers of detention. The committee wanted to mark out those powers to some degree, and to ensure first of all that the trigger mechanism can be activated only on the ground of reasonable doubt and after an investigation.

A final note on travellers. To make it very clear to everyone, clause 28(1) of the bill creates very specific obligations for travellers. Indeed, under the Quarantine Act, when on Canadian soil, a traveller arriving from Paris, London, Berlin or anywhere else around the world, will be required to undergo a health assessment. This traveller will have to agree to the treatment identified by the quarantine officer. This is still subject to the qualifications I made earlier.

Let us look at another aspect of the bill, namely the whole issue of compensation. As we know, this issue took up a lot of the committee's time.

As I have less than a minute left, I shall conclude. In a nutshell, Bill C-12 is constitutionally valid, because it falls under the government's jurisdiction. It is a technical bill which, in some regards, should raise concerns about human rights.

We would have liked the BQ amendment calling for provincial jurisdictions to be respected and for no quarantine areas to be established without the prior consent of the province concerned. We would have liked a little more compensation. But, overall, this is a bill that deserves to be passed. The Bloc Québécois will support it.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Canoes are not used quite so much.

All that to say that the SARS crisis was a real revelation. We did not realize that there could still be major sources of infection, and that virology could attain mass proportions.

The minister responsible for the Public Health Agency of Canada—which we will fight to our dying day because of its intrusions into provincial jurisdictions— knows that one of the characteristics of the public health variables at the present time is that 85% of new illnesses discovered have an animal connection. It is important to keep this in mind.

That said, Bill C-12 enables the Government of Canada to do certain things without its jurisdiction being contested. I must digress for a moment, because there is a problem, unfortunately, with the Public Health Agency of Canada in regard to jurisdiction. The officials and even the minister, my friend the member for St. Paul's, know very well that there is a potential for intrusion because public health, on the face of it, is under provincial jurisdiction.

If we are talking about care for Native peoples or veterans, then we acknowledge that there is no possible encroachment. Constitutionally, this jurisdiction is valid, recognized by the courts.

Let us talk about patents, for example. I hope that, one day in this House, my colleagues will realize just how much I have considered this matter, just how balanced my opinion is and just how important it would be, before long, to be able to have a debate on the new realities with regard to evergreening.

As a result, when it comes to quarantines, patents, veterans and aboriginals, for which the federal government is the trustee, there is no problem with infringement on areas of jurisdiction. When it comes to public health, there is a real potential for this to happen, so the Bloc Québécois will have to be extremely vigilant.

Before I come back to the Quarantine Act, I want to provide a little background.

I mentioned earlier, with a certain amount of pride, that I was the senior member of the Standing Committee on Health. I thank my leader, my whip and my House leader for entrusting me with this responsibility. We considered the bill on new reproductive technologies, to which our Conservative Party colleague alluded. When I read the first version of this bill, I immediately sounded the alarm, since this seemed to me to be a clear case of infringement. In fact, where are infertility treatments provided? Obviously, in clinics and hospitals. This was a clear infringement.

We must remember that 71% of Quebeckers are dissatisfied with Jean Charest's government.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it will be my pleasure, in the next 20 minutes, for this is in a way the mandate I have set for myself, to speak to you about this exciting Bill C-12, the first version of which had been introduced by the minister of Foreign Affairs and used to be known as Bill C-36. Our television viewers—and we know that there are many at this hour—will no doubt be happy to learn that the number attached to bills corresponds to the order in which they are introduced in this House. So that means that this is the 36th bill being introduced by the government.

Those clarifications having been made, let us talk about the Standing Committee on Health. And I will take the opportunity here to thank my party for entrusting me with responsibility for health. After all these years, I derive a certain satisfaction from being the dean of the Standing Committee on Health. I believe I am the youngest in terms of age, but the dean in terms of seniority, since I have been there since 1999. As the hon. member for Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher knows, I have been through the great debates on labelling, tobacco products and so forth. So I have some experience, let us admit, on health issues.

The quarantine bill is rather technical, and we might think that it does not have much to do with human rights. But that would be wrong for, as I will show, the committee wanted to amend some 30 clauses—now I am getting the attention of the member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin—to introduce a concept that has a very specific legal meaning, namely reasonable doubt.

The member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin used to be a penal law professor at the Université de Montréal. I know that his courses were popular: just one exam, no term papers, reasonable jurisprudence. He was a sought-after professor and he also served Quebec well in his various ministerial capacities.

That said, in regard to the quarantine bill, legislation from the 19th century—I think that only the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell could actually refer to this period from memory—the legislation has not been reviewed very often. The way diseases are spread is no longer the same. We will remember that ships were the main means of transportation in the 19th century. Now, as our transport critic knows, people travel by plane. There are trains, too, maybe, in some places, but the main means of transportation remains—

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Minister of State (Public Health)]

Madam Speaker, in today's modern era, emerging and re-emerging public health threats do not respect borders. This we know first hand from our recent experience with SARS.

With advances in technology, rapid air travel is now common practice in the daily lives of individuals, replacing the days of long voyages on ships. The new age of jet travel is paving the way for increased population mobility and has accelerated the rates in the spread of disease on both a domestic and an international front.

A serious communicable disease can spread to any part of the world within 24 hours, which is less time than the average incubation period of most diseases.

This new reality regarding the health of migrants is becoming a growing transborder problem with many public health ramifications, including effects on the social and economic fibre of our society.

While the existing health protection system has served the interests of Canadians well, the time has come to update our laws and to integrate them into a public health system that is stronger, more comprehensive and more flexible, precisely as recommended by Dr. David Naylor and the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology following the SARS crisis.

Lessons learned from SARS forced Canada to face the fact that our current Quarantine Act is outdated in the public health realm. The existing legislation had remained largely unchanged since the adoption of the first Quarantine Act in 1872. Hence, there is an urgent need for updated legislation to mitigate the heightened risk of global disease transmission and to support public health practices in modern times.

Although Bill C-12 serves to modernize the Quarantine Act, it is only one tool in Canada's public health toolbox. The creation of the Public Health Agency, the appointment of David Butler-Jones, Canada's first Chief Public Health Officer, and the Canadian pandemic influenza plan are all essential elements of the government's strategy for strengthening Canada's public health system.

Public health is a shared responsibility. While the provinces and territories bear the responsibility for protecting public health within their borders, the federal government has a constitutional authority for quarantine at Canadian points of entry and departure.

Existing federal powers under the Quarantine Act are outdated. They do not reflect the changing face of emergency preparedness and response in the 21st century. That is why we are moving forward immediately with new quarantine legislation that will give the government the means to cope with and control disease outbreaks and ensure better communication, collaboration and cooperation among public health partners.

The scope of the new proposed Quarantine Act is limited to ensuring that serious communicable diseases are prevented from entering into Canada or being spread to other countries. It will also mitigate the risk of future threats to public health at home and beyond to our international partners.

The new act respects shared federal, provincial and territorial responsibilities in public health. Further, the Government of Canada will continue to work with our provincial and territorial partners to prevent and control the spread of communicable diseases within and between jurisdictions.

The modernized act we have proposed has a new focus on airline travel and will provide the Minister of Health with additional authority. For example, Bill C-12 would enable the minister: to divert aircraft to an alternate landing site if necessary to isolate and contain a public health threat; to establish quarantine facilities at any location in Canada; to order a carrier to not enter Canada if there are serious concerns that the arrival may threaten the public health of Canadians; or to close Canadian border points in the event of a public health emergency.

The proposed legislation offers greater flexibility with respect to the types of communicable diseases for which travellers coming into or leaving Canada may be detained by Canadian officers.

Bill C-12 protects privacy rights and maintains an appropriate balance between individual freedoms and the public interest. While the amended act allows the collection and sharing of personal health information, this is limited to what is necessary to protect the health and security of Canadians.

In addition, the bill enables Canada to assume its responsibilities as a partner in the area of global public health. The amended act is aligned with Canada's obligations under the World Health Organization's International Health Regulations.

Overall, this legislative reform initiative reflects the government's commitment to strengthening Canada's public health system. By introducing Bill C-12, the Government of Canada is responding to the call from Canadians to do more to protect the public from unnecessary health risks.

Further, the newly proposed quarantine act is responding to the calls of experts in the public health community to modernize the legal tools for preventing the import, export and spread of serious communicable diseases, while affording individuals full protection under the Charter of Rights.

In conclusion, I wish to express my gratitude for the hard work of the Standing Committee on Health. As the Minister of State for Public Health, I strongly support Bill C-12. This, as a federal legislative tool, is a critical measure in the establishment of a comprehensive pan-Canadian public health system and paramount to protecting the health and safety of Canadians.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

moved that Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases, be read the third time and passed.

[Joe McGuire, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

moved that:

Bill C-12, as amended, be concurred in, with further amendment, and read the second time.

[Rob Merrifield, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the people of Yellowhead and as vice-chair of the House of Commons health committee, it is a pleasure for me to speak at report stage of Bill C-12.

Bill C-12 is an important piece of legislation. It deals with individuals who may be carrying a communicable disease, travellers who are arriving by airplane or ship. It also deals with conveyances.

We have not really dealt with the Quarantine Act since 1872. This is the first time we have looked at it since that period of time, which was certainly long before air travel. We can imagine some of the changes that have transpired in our country since that time.

Bill C-12 is very important. The alarms went off with the spread of SARS in our country. When SARS first came into the nation we really did not know what it was. Canada was the nation that actually alerted the world to the threat of SARS. There was no name for it at the time; we really did not know what we were looking at.

It is interesting now when we see what actually transpired. We were very quick to realize that we are only a plane ride away from any communicable disease that perhaps is ravaging the world at any particular time. It is very important that we have a piece of legislation that can protect the nation from an onslaught of this type of disease.

There are other diseases such as the avian flu. We understand it began in poultry. I was at the agriculture committee yesterday. We had a review of the avian flu in birds which devastated the province of British Columbia. The World Health Organization is very concerned about the avian flu. It has now mutated. Dozens of deaths have occurred due to the avian flu in southeast Asia. We understand the potential of a global threat and perhaps a pandemic coming from a mutation of this one disease.

In light of SARS and in light of the advent of the onslaught of this disease around the world, it is very important that we look at this legislation. It was very important back when SARS hit, yet the government tabled the bill shortly before it decided to call an election. It was more important to play politics than it was to protect the nation.

My party believes that the number one thing a government can provide for its citizens is protection. That did not seem to be a priority back then, but it is a priority now. I am pleased that the health committee was able to seriously look at the legislation, review it, update it and offer some necessary changes.

There was good cooperation in the committee. I compliment the parliamentary secretary for his cooperative work on our concerns. The committee was able to achieve many amendments to this piece of legislation prior to report stage. From that aspect I think we are quite pleased with some of the things contained in Bill C-12. I am quite concerned with a couple of amendments that were deemed out of order.

For example, in clause 6 the bill talks about compensation for airports. I believe that after royal assent six airports will have to provide space for use by a quarantine officer. The airports will be obligated to provide not only the space but also all the fixtures to go along with it, such as heating and electricity, free of charge.

It is interesting that the government would put this kind of an onus on the airport authorities across the country. At one time the airports were federally run and controlled but now that is not the case. The airports are controlled by airport authorities. The airport authorities are paying a significant amount of money into the federal coffers. It is actually a tax upon our airport system and there is a real debate in the country as to whether that is fair. It puts our airlines at a considerable disadvantage to other airlines and airports around the world.

I believe that last year alone the airport authorities paid $235 million in rent for those facilities. As part of that rent they are providing services to the Canada Border Services Agency, the Department of Citizenship and Immigration, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Health Canada, Transport Canada, the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority and the RCMP. That is part of the arrangement that is included in the package.

Now six airports will be called upon to provide extra space. They will have cough that up without being able to recoup the cost. We all know there is only one way to recoup the cost and that is to raise the price of airline tickets. We are quite concerned about that.

The Quarantine Act is used very seldom, and rightfully so. It should be used very seldom. It removes a tremendous amount of rights and privileges that citizens of this country have. When the act is applied and those rights are removed, they are being removed for a greater good, which is the safety of the nation.

We believe the act should be applied very seldom, but when applied it should be applied very aggressively. The Quarantine Act will only work as long as it is complied with. It is very important that be the way we proceed.

Another amendment we put forward addressed the issue of a hotel being quarantined and everyone setting up shop in it. The hotel owner would not be compensated under this piece of legislation. In fact, the legislation indicates that it may or may not be compensated. It is purely at the discretion of the minister. We think that is a power we could have addressed in the regulations.

We will certainly be looking at the regulations when they come forward. We want to make sure there is as strong an indication as possible that the “may” will be more than just a suggestion and that it will compel the government of the day to be fair with its citizens. We do not believe that any one individual should be on the hook for protecting the nation. When an individual protects the nation, the nation should also protect the individual. That becomes a principle of fairness which we believe the legislation should reflect.

I am quite disappointed that a few minutes ago the Speaker ruled these amendments inadmissible. We were not allowed to present them in committee. We wanted to present them at report stage. We think they are valid and would be accepted by individual members of the House. The parliamentary secretary and I have talked about this and he actually agrees with me.

It was the department that had difficulty with the wording. It did not want its hands to be tied behind a “may”. We felt that the wording should be “shall compensate in accordance with the regulations” and have those details worked out in the regulations. I am quite disappointed, but we will look at the regulations when they come forward.

In conclusion, the security of citizens is paramount. We in the House and the federal government can undertake to look after our citizens and keep them safe. The avian flu and SARS are, and will continue to be, serious threats. Perhaps the largest threat is yet to come. Hopefully we have learned some lessons over the last couple of years as we have dealt with some of the issues that have impacted our country and the world and we will be prepared for what is perhaps coming down the road.

This legislation is very timely. It is very important. We have worked collectively as a committee to provide the best legislation possible for the citizens of Canada. I am a little disappointed that some of the amendments have been deemed out of order, but I support the legislation. We will do everything we can to make sure the regulations are appropriate and in the best interests of the people of Canada.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois on Bill C-12 to update the Quarantine Act. Since this act dates back to the 19th century, the proposed amendments will modernize it and make it workable and more in line with today's various epidemiological contexts.

The Bloc Québécois supports the principles behind the bill, and raised a number of questions in committee. We need to realize first the ways epidemics spread in the 18th and 19th centuries are completely different the way they spread today. People were far less mobile, and if they did travel it was mainly by train. Nowadays, the major vectors in the transmission of epidemics include means of transportation such as aircraft. Certain provisions of the act will require all carriers to report any illness or death occurring on board before they arrive in Canada.

It is important to understand that the Quarantine Act has nothing to do with control mechanisms within the country. Those are the responsibility of the various public health agencies. Its purpose is rather to focus on the transmission of epidemics at the various Canadian entry and exit points.

In its present form, the bill requires travellers who have a communicable disease, or who have been in close proximity to a person who has a communicable disease, to present themselves to a screening officer or quarantine officer, so that a number of controls can be performed.

I must say that, throughout its proceedings, the Standing Committee on Health was concerned that the travellers who will be checked by a screening officer or a quarantine officer should have various forms of recourse available to them. For example, a number of committee members proposed amendments that were adopted to ensure that the controls performed by quarantine officers are carried out within a reasonable period of time. We felt that this period should be less than 48 hours.

As we know, the Quarantine Act gives to the Minister of Health the power to establish quarantine zones. We may think that these quarantine zones will be created primarily in airport facilities, but they will not necessarily be limited to these areas. If the Bloc Québécois has one regret, this is it. Even though we worked in relative harmony in committee, and even though the Bloc Québécois supports the objectives of this legislation, we would have liked the bill to clearly state that a quarantine zone and perimeter cannot be established without the approval of the health authorities involved.

Let us take the very specific example of the Dorval Airport. If, among a group of travellers arriving from Sri Lanka—I am giving this example to illustrate my point—a source of infection is identified, in this specific case, we would have liked the quarantine zone to be established only with the approval of the Quebec health and social services department.

This is why the Bloc Québécois proposed amendments which, unfortunately, were not adopted by the committee and, consequently, by the government.

We had many debates in committee, including on SARS. Although it is particularly relevant to Toronto and Ontario, the committee members asked specific questions. It is true that this bill will enable the minister to make regulations concerning a number of very important definitions and questions.

We considered whether it would be relevant to be able to offer compensation to people held in a quarantine zone and possibly prevented from returning to their work or families for 24, 48 or 72 hours. We wondered if it might not be a good idea to compensate those people.

Of course, it is not easy to set a standard. Some colleagues mentioned the average industrial wage. I think the minister should look into the question again.

Being in quarantine does involve some restriction of personal freedom and possibly being deprived of the right to work. However, the amendment on this was not adopted by the committee. I believe the chair did not want to agree to this kind of amendment in case it would commit public funds and thus require a royal recommendation.

We also looked at the responsibility of the operators of facilities, for example, an airport where quarantine has been declared. Obviously, an emergency is involved. The parliamentary secretary reminded us in committee that the Quarantine Act has not been used in the past 100 years. It is not therefore a everyday measure.

However, to the extent that the Quarantine Act is invoked, what responsibility should this government and Parliament assign to those running such facilities? In fact, they will have to give up their space, their equipment and collaborate with the government as is to be expected in socio-health crises. Personally, I must say that I agree with the idea of granting some type of compensation.

This is the fear, among others, of airline representatives. It must be recognized that often the airlines and their staff are the ones coming into contact with the passengers arriving at their facilities. Airports could be induced to give up part of their facilities. We are comfortable with the idea that there would be some compensation for this.

There is another provision in the bill, a schedule that cabinet will be able to review. This schedule lists a number of diseases that could result in quarantine. Some of the ones identified are viral. Others were added to the list based on changes in medicine.

In committee, we made sure, if it ever became necessary to add a disease or infection to the list in Schedule I of the bill, that the conditions were in place to allow this to be done quite quickly.

We therefore believe this is an exceptional bill in that it should be used in unusual situations. The aim of this bill is to make the Quarantine Act even more effective.

The Bloc Québécois will support this bill and the main amendments included in the notice paper . I believe that all the members did a good job in committee. In fact, we clearly understand that such a bill was essential in a world where germs and diseases can assume proportions that, today, require our vigilance as citizens and as parliamentarians.

[Robert Thibault, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I not only stand corrected, but I stand before the House to present Bill C-12, as amended and reported by committee. As members may recall, Bill C-36 was the first attempt to modernize one of Canada's oldest pieces of legislation, the Quarantine Act. This bill was introduced in the last parliamentary session on May 12, 2004, but died on the order paper when the election was called.

On October 8 of 2004, the Government of Canada introduced Bill C-12 into the House of Commons, the newly proposed Quarantine Act, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases arriving into Canada.

The Quarantine Act is an essential tool to prevent communicable diseases from entering the country, spreading throughout the population, and from spreading outside of our borders. That is why these amendments to the act, which have not been significantly modernized since 1872, are a priority at this time.

During the clause by clause review, members of the Standing Committee on Health made significant contributions toward strengthening the bill. During witness testimony, committee members listened to the issues raised by external stakeholders and put forward amendments to reflect their ideas or concerns. Common themes emerged throughout this process and in the spirit of collaboration, resolution was achieved, meeting the expectations of all parties. This comprehensive bill reflects the efforts and commitment of dedicated members and responds to the modern challenges of public health in the 21st century.

As we know, report stage provides the House with an opportunity to further refine Bill C-12. In response to this legislative review process, the Government of Canada has taken the liberty to introduce report stage amendments to the bill. These amendments are minor and technical in nature, but critical in terms of producing an optimal piece of legislation to protect the health and safety of Canadians. They will add clarity to the bill and remedy drafting oversights largely due to the accelerated pace of this examination process.

In the spirit of collaboration, it is my wish that House members demonstrate ongoing support for the work and contribution made toward strengthening the bill on behalf of the Standing Committee on Health.

[Joe Comuzzi, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

moved:

Motion No. 1

That Bill C-12, in Clause 5, be amended by replacing, in the French version, line 15 on page 3 with the following:

“professionnel de la santé qualifié à titre d'agent de”

Motion No. 5

That Bill C-12, in Clause 20, be amended by adding after line 7 on page 7 the following:

“(1.1) The health assessment shall be undertaken as soon as reasonably practicable but in any case within 48 hours after the quarantine officer requires the traveller to undergo it.”

Motion No. 6

That Bill C-12, in Clause 23, be amended by replacing line 6 on page 8 with the following:

“this right.”

Motion No. 7

That Bill C-12, in Clause 26, be amended by replacing, in the French version, line 1 on page 9 with the following:

“ordonner de se soumettre à un traitement ou à toute autre mesure visant à prévenir”

Motion No. 8

That Bill C-12, in Clause 33.1, be amended by replacing line 12 on page 12 with the following:

“authority of any province concerned if”

Motion No. 9

That Bill C-12, in Clause 33.1, be amended by replacing, in the French version, lines 35 and 36 on page 12 with the following:

“d) la façon dont il aurait contracté la maladie transmissible ou serait devenu infesté”

Motion No. 10

That Bill C-12, in Clause 40.1, be amended by replacing lines 28 to 30 on page 15 with the following:

“40.1 No person is required”

Motion No. 11

That Bill C-12, in Clause 40.1, be amended by replacing lines 28 and 29 on page 15 with the following:

“40.1 No operator of the conveyance, employee of an owner of the conveyance or employee of any person using it for the”

Motion No. 12

That Bill C-12, in Clause 40.2, be amended by replacing line 37 on page 15 with the following:

“public health authority of any province con-”

Motion No. 14

That Bill C-12, in Clause 57, be amended by replacing, in the French version, lines 11 and 12 on page 22 with the following:

“f) la façon dont le voyageur aurait contracté la maladie transmissible ou serait devenu infesté”

[The Speaker]

There are 14 motions in amendment standing on the notice paper for the report stage of Bill C-12.

Motion No. 2 will not be selected by the Chair as it is similar to an amendment defeated in committee.

Motions Nos. 3 and 4 will not be selected by the Chair as they require a Royal Recommendation.

Motion No. 13 will not be selected by the Chair as it could have been presented in committee.

All remaining motions have been examined and the Chair is satisfied that they meet the guidelines expressed in the note to Standing Order 76(5) regarding the selection of motions in amendment at the report stage.

Motions No. 1, 5 to 12 and 14 will be grouped for debate and voted upon according to the voting pattern available at the table.

I shall now propose Motions Nos. 1, 5 to 12 and 14 to the House.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address Bill C-12, the new Quarantine Act.

Members may recall—no one here was alive at the time, but I am making a historical reference—the first Quarantine Act dates back to the 18th century, more specifically to the year 1794. It is important that all countries have provisions allowing them to tale swift action when infectious diseases are discovered or anticipated.

As the hon. member for Laval—who was making her maiden speech in this House on Friday—aptly pointed out, the Bloc Québécois supports the principle of the bill. We will suggest a few amendments to the Standing Committee on Health. However, as regards the principle of this legislation, we agree of course that taking action in such circumstances is a federal responsibility.

I would like to mention the main focuses of this legislation. If Bill C-12 is passed, carriers would be required to disclose all cases of disease or death occurring prior to their arriving in Canada. This means that it will be mandatory for a ship, a railway company or an airline to report diseases discovered onboard.

This bill would also make it possible to require travellers who have a communicable disease or have been in close proximity to a person who has a communicable disease to present themselves to a screening officer or quarantine officer. My colleagues will agree that this is more than reasonable.

As well, the use of screening technology would be allowed at the entry point into Canada. This may seem equally reasonable but we have a small question on this.

I see that clause 14 of the bill allows “any person authorized by the minister”— this being the Minister of Health—“to use any screening technology that does not involve the entry into the traveller's body of any instrument or other foreign body” in order to determine whether a traveller has symptoms of a communicable disease.

That strikes me as a bit general, an opening to abuse in certain circumstances. I wonder whether it might be replaced by the wording “any medically appropriate technique”.

In passing legislation, we must not betray the intent of the legislator. As much as possible, therefore, where appropriate, the bill needs to be precise so as not to allow any openings for abusive interpretations or confer upon the Minister of Health any powers we do not wish to confer upon him.

This bill would also permit the inspection of any conveyance arriving in Canada, and the disinfection and decontamination of the conveyance, its contents and cargo, if necessary.

This bill, which appears highly technical, certainly forces us to reflect a bit about globalization. When the first quarantine laws were enacted, back in the 18th century, 1794 to be precise, hon. members will agree that people's mobility was relatively limited. Travel was not without discomfort; the means were not as highly developed as they are now.

I would like to make a quick aside here, to indicate that I strongly encourage the hon. member for Outremont to reintroduce former Bill C-26, which conferred powers of mediation on the Canadian Transportation Agency. I cannot understand that member's lack of backbone. We need him to show a little more gumption in defending the interests of Quebec. This is very important.

Yesterday I was speaking with a woman mayor who sits on one of the committees of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, a very important lobby group. I believe that the leader of the NDP has had connections with this in the past. Railway transportation is an extremely important problem.

I have been told that the railways run through some 1,400 communities in Canada. It is quite incredible to realize that CP and CN are acting like railway delinquents.

In my riding, Hochelaga, CP works 24 hours a day, because it serves the port of Montreal. Some of our constituents, who live in residential areas near the tracks, find their peace is disturbed at all hours of the day and night, morning and afternoon.

I think the hon. member for Saint-Lambert has a similar problem. As I said, it affects 1,400 communities in Canada. We do not yet know what number the new bill that deals with this issue will be given; the previous one was Bill C-26. Our constituents know that the number of a bill corresponds to the order in which it is introduced in the House, and we do not know when this bill will be introduced. Nevertheless, I am not explaining myself very well with respect to the dithering by the member for Outremont. I hope he is not one of those servile ministers who blindly follow orders from the lobbyists for CP and CN, whose power all of us on the Hill are familiar with.

Luckily for consumers, there is someone like the hon. member for Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, our transport critic, who is shrewd enough to understand the negotiations required in such circumstances. I hope that the Minister of Transport will soon introduce a new bill identical to Bill C-26 so that the Canadian Transportation Agency can intervene. As we know, it is a quasi-judicial body that issues official rulings.

We will recall that citizens of Oakville, Ontario, asked the Canadian Transportation Agency to make regulations allowing it to intervene in the operating conditions of the major national carriers such as CN and CP. Since the carriers have the funds needed to contest legislation, both the constitutional and more practical aspects, they contested the power and prerogatives of the Canadian Transportation Agency and they won in a Federal Court ruling, in 2001, if I remember correctly. Once again we are in a situation where, unfortunately, the railway companies have total control unless we, the legislators, can intervene.

That is the end of my digression, which was brief and really timely in this debate on quarantine and intended to remind hon. members that the mobility of persons is a consequence of globalization. One of our colleagues in this House looked into that matter. We are not talking about just an opinion. Our colleague gave it some thought and realized that the political boundaries of a state do not necessarily match its economic boundaries anymore.

Naturally, the mobility of capital, people and goods creates a flux, a constant movement of our fellow citizens. The border between the United States and Canada, for example, is one of the most open. The hon. member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles could perhaps remind me who said, “Geography has made us neighbours; history has made us friends”. This is how the relationship between Canada and the United States was described. I think it was by former Prime Minister Diefenbaker.

I will conclude, because I have only one minute left, by saying that we will support the bill in principle. While we understand that it is the role of the federal government to look at potential areas of infection, we are concerned because the federal government is trying to claim certain prerogatives.

For instance, I read in the bill that the federal government planned to deal directly with the authorities. These would be health officials. Clearly, that is not desirable. But, in principle, we will support the bill.

My hon. colleague from Laval and I will put amendments forward at the Standing Committee on Health. We will work with the sense of responsibility that has always been the trademark of the Bloc Québécois team.

[Carol Skelton, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it is indeed my pleasure to rise today to speak on Bill C-12, otherwise known as the Quarantine Act.

Canada has had a Quarantine Act for decades, but it has not been updated since 1872 to properly reflect the changing needs of today's world.

No longer do we rely on slow-moving ships to move people. No longer do we trade mainly with cities just down the road. Today's world has millions of people moving across continents every day of the year. Containers by the thousands arrive on our shores with goods destined for every corner of Canada.

But it is not just goods, animals and people coming into Canada that we need to be concerned with; we also need to be concerned with what goes out of Canada. Whether it is the famous rabbits of Australia or the zebra mussels of the Great Lakes, we are all aware of several major problems resulting from careless trade practices. In addition, we all remember SARS and the avian flu problems in British Columbia. Canadians and their economy were devastated by their effects.

Some Toronto businesses say the effects of SARS still linger, and we do not know the actual dollar figure for what SARS cost the city of Toronto and the province of Ontario. In fact, there is a belief that SARS is still affecting the Toronto area.

Bill C-12 is legislation which, for many reasons, could be called a response to SARS. In the wake of SARS, Dr. David Naylor, chair of the National Advisory Committee on SARS and Public Health, made a number of important recommendations.

One of the major recommendations has already moved ahead, with the creation of the Public Health Agency of Canada. The agency has opened and Dr. David Butler-Jones has been appointed the first chief public health officer in Canada.

Another observation by the Naylor advisory committee was that there were insufficient quarantine officers sent to screen air travellers and provide information so that travellers were aware of the situation. Dr. Naylor also stressed that he felt the quarantine officers were sent into the situation with little information and inadequate support materials.

Unfortunately, the agency is not much good until we provide it with some authority, that is, legislation that lets the agency do its job. This is why the legislation before us is so important.

The Naylor advisory committee also said, “The Government of Canada should ensure that an adequate complement of quarantine officers is maintained at airports and other ports of entry, as required” and they should be “fully trained and informed”.

Bill C-12 would give the minister the power to designate a wide range of people as officers, which does not necessarily mean that they would be suitably trained for a quarantine emergency.

Canada needs an updated Quarantine Act and trained professionals to meet challenges in our new world. That also means we must have our present medical officers and health care professionals state their opinions on this new bill.

The new act goes a lot further in granting health officials the powers needed to properly contain and address threats to public health from new and re-emerging infectious diseases.

Unlike the old legislation, the bill focuses on airlines as the primary mode of transport, instead of marine vessels.

The proposed act contains powers not seen before in the hands of health officials. Under the bill, they could commandeer any location or facility of their choosing for use in enforcing the Quarantine Act. Most times, this likely would mean the commandeering of a hotel for use as a containment facility for large numbers of people, but it could be anywhere. This in fact is one part of the legislation that concerns me.

The new legislation says market-based compensation will be provided for anyone who is affected, such as a hotel owner. This is similar to what has been promised to other sectors of the economy before, specifically, cattle producers in the wake of the BSE problems. Unfortunately, it was the political arm of government that decided what they were to receive for compensation. As well, I have watched as the CFIA has taken farmland out of production, causing producers great financial difficulty. The government waited until the market fell out of the specific industry and then compensated them based on new, lower market prices.

A key issue in the bill, which needs to be addressed, is the issue of compensation for conveyance owners. While it is somewhat addressed, there does not seem to be anything definite for individuals and their related expenses during the quarantine period.

Following the SARS crisis in Toronto, the cost of hotel rooms dropped drastically. One would expect the hotelier to be compensated for the cost of a hotel room prior to the outbreak. Do we really think customers will race back to a hotel after the quarantine is lifted?

Compensation must be based on the market price before the problem, not after, and that rate must be decided by an independent group, away from government control.

This legislation as proposed does not adequately address the mechanisms that would be used to access such issues and I hope the government will use some of its time to better explain its position and intentions.

As well, I want to make sure that in the government's efforts to address one crisis, it does not create another. We need to have assurances in place ahead of time or else people may not be willing to cooperate.

The new legislation does for the first time provide some initiative to cooperate. There would be severe penalties and jail sentences applicable to those who make disease management much tougher. I believe this is another good step in giving tools to our health officials to do their job effectively.

While health officials would have more rights and powers, so would the people affected the most. The protection of human rights while carrying out quarantine measures has also been of some concern to me. For example, the bill does not specify what individual or agency would determine the symptoms of each of the diseases listed or what symptoms the individual must exhibit in order to be detained by health officials. It should be noted that clause 62 would give cabinet the broad power to make regulations respecting health assessments and physical examinations.

The new legislation would give those being examined and detained more of a say. When and where reasonable, interpreters will be provided. If possible, people will have the ability to request a medical examination by a physician of their preference.

These types of measures are in keeping with the charter, but I believe they do not handcuff our medical officials from doing their job effectively.

Part of doing their job effectively would be the ability to redirect passengers to other locations as necessary or to detain passengers as needed, and even to prevent travellers from leaving from Canada if necessary. They would be able to screen, vaccinate, disinfect, decontaminate and examine goods, animals and people as needed.

All these measures are designed to meet the new standards of the World Health Organization.

Last week I spoke on the need to be better prepared for emergencies in Canada. The proposed act would better address a problem when it arises, with better surveillance measures and better staffing.

We will be going through the bill thoroughly during committee and I will be bringing forward any necessary amendments at that time.

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for giving me the opportunity to address my honourable colleagues concerning the Quarantine Act, Bill C-12.

As members of Parliament, we all have a particular interest in the renewal of our health protection legislation that the government has just undertaken. As was mentioned, Bill C-12 would replace the current Quarantine Act, one of Canada's oldest pieces of legislation. It has remained largely unchanged since the Quarantine Act came into effect in 1872.

I am very proud, and I commend the Minister of State for Public Health for moving quickly with the recommendations of Dr. David Naylor from the University of Toronto. I also want to take this opportunity to congratulate and thank all front line workers from the cities and also the provincial and federal government front line workers. They all worked together during a very difficult time of SARS.

I also want to share my experience, not just as a member of Parliament but as a Toronto city councillor, at that time, representing the same area of Davenport. Toronto went through a very difficult time with SARS. Our hospitality industry was greatly affected by SARS. Many individuals throughout the world assumed that the city of Toronto was under quarantine. We were getting calls from people all over the place asking if they could leave their houses, or take the train or go to shopping centres. There was a certain hysteria created through the images that were not connected to the reality of what was happening in our city.

There was no question that we were living in difficult times and there was a certain sense of fear. Luckily, the people of Toronto had the good sense to go out and continue on with their lives. We would also like to offer our congratulations to those individuals as well. It was a very difficult time, and our front line staff did extremely well. Our medical officer of health, Sheela Basrur, is now the Ontario medical officer of health.

We at the federal level have done the same thing with the initiative of wanting to protect the public. We also have appointed a chief public health officer for Canada. I want to congratulate the government for moving quickly with that recommendation. It is very important legislation. All of us can be proud of the work we do here as parliamentarians.

I want to mention a quote from the minister for public health. She states, “Infectious diseases move like wildfire across the planet today”. That is very true. As we know, we are a mobile society. People pick up and leave. They travel to other countries. We have to be aware that there is a new reality in place that was not there when the act came into being in 1872. This is the new reality for Canada and throughout the world.

The new act will help ensure Canadians are better protected against the import of dangerous communicable diseases by: requiring carriers to report all instances of illnesses and death on board before arrival in Canada; requiring travellers to report on arrival to screening officers or quarantine officers if they have a communicable disease or have been in contact with such a person, the method used is screening technologies at Canadian ports of entry; and requiring those travellers arriving in Canada who are suspected of having a dangerous communicable disease to undergo an initial health assessment and a medical examination if necessary.

I want to let the Canadian public know that these changes to the legislation conform with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

As with other Canadian laws, the charter always applies. However, special protections are provided in the bill, such as the right to an interpreter, the right to have a medical examination conducted by a medical practitioner of a traveller's choice, the right to be informed of all decisions, the right to regular medical examinations during detention and the right to have detentions reviewed.

That is the way we in Canada protect ourselves, but also we protect our fundamental rights and principles. We do not want to live in a society of fear. We understand the importance of public health and we want to protect Canadians. At the same time, we want to give them the assurance that we will not suspend the charter. We are protected with the charter and we are protected with this legislation.

An updated Quarantine Act will address the urgent issues with respect to the spread of communicable disease. It is also the first step in a series of legislative initiatives that will establish a comprehensive framework for public health, including the creation of a public health agency and new Canada protection legislation.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, let me begin my remarks by congratulating the front line workers in health care, who during the SARS crisis not that long ago put their health and regrettably even in some cases their lives at risk for the benefit of other citizens.

We lived through an episode at that time in our country that was very difficult. Not only were there the victims I have just described, but as well there were the patients themselves who suffered from the disease. Regrettably, it even in a way victimized a segment of the population along ethnic lines. A number of people assumed, largely erroneously, that this segment was made up of carriers of the very serious disease that we had in Canada at the time.

The Quarantine Act that we are revising today is one of the oldest in the country. That was mentioned a while ago. It has been largely the same since 1872. I am sure other members will speak glowingly about the modernizations of 1972; nevertheless, it is largely the same as it was in 1872

I noted that in her speech the member for Laval reminded us that laws on quarantine have existed since 1377. As far as Canada is concerned, the member indicated that such legislation existed in Lower Canada as of 1832. Most probably there was similar legislation in Nova Scotia at about the same time, given the fact that two major quarantine stations existed, one on an island close to Halifax and the other one on Grosse-Île, near Quebec City.

I would like to spend a few minutes on this issue because I have a special feeling for that place. Actually, as my wife is of Irish descent, we have had the opportunity to visit Grosse-Île, where her ancestors arrived in 1846. They were among the first refugees fleeing the potato famine, which worsened significantly in 1847 and 1848.

It is easy to imagine that there must have been people on the shore watching the arrival of these refugees, most of whom were extremely thin because of what they had been through and often, in deplorable health, all with very short red hair, which distinguished them from the others. The bystanders probably asked themselves just what the government was admitting to Canada. Yet, these newcomers built our country and, of course, in my own case, they were the ancestors of my children and grandchildren, because I am a grandfather. That was no doubt the welcome they got when they arrived, at least the ones who made it to Canada.

At the time, Ireland had lost some two million inhabitants, of which one million had perished before being able to leave or during the voyage. The others went, mostly, to North America and Australia, new lands for the refugees from the famine that caused terrible sickness.

In my opinion, most Canadians, particularly those who have some Irish blood, thought, until recently, that this was something that had occurred a long time ago and that could likely never happen again. After all, living in modern times, such as we do now, it was thought—even though we now know better—that with all the medication and the means available, such diseases could never strike again. We had probably forgotten that, in the twenties, the Spanish flu killed a large number of Canadians, particularly in eastern Ontario and in Quebec. We also forgot other incidents less dramatic than the one to which I referred initially, but they nevertheless involved serious incidents of infectious diseases in our country.

I remember that when I was a child, there was a period during which they ran these tests on us at school to see if we had tuberculosis or anything associated with that disease. If, by accident, a child rubbed the area on his skin where the test had been done, this would cause a minor irritation, but the child would quickly be sent home to protect other children's health, even though it was often just a minor skin irritation.

All this to say that this is not a new issue in our country, but an old one.

I said at the beginning that the bill has not been modernized since 1872. Maybe I should start by reassuring the House that I was not involved in the debate in 1872. I was not even a member at the time. I want to assure the House of that as well, even though it is quite well known that I have been around this place for quite some time, but not that long yet, Mr. Speaker. I am working on it.

I would like to add my recognition of the important work of Dr. Naylor, Chair of the National Advisory Committee on SARS and Public Health. I was speaking of SARS in the past, but I wanted to take a moment to pay tribute to Dr. Naylor's work. On behalf of all my colleagues on this side of the House, and I am sure, all members, I would like to congratulate Dr. Naylor. He looked into the events that happened during the SARS crisis and he made recommendations for changes. One of these recommendations concerns the need to amend public health legislation.

Bill C-12 before us today is the result of the work the government has done in response to Dr. Naylor's very enlightened recommendations and proposals.

Before I finish, I would like to return to something mentioned earlier by two of the hon. members. They said that the minister's powers should not be too broad. I do not share this opinion. I would ask my colleagues to be prudent with the language they use in parliamentary committees.

I would be the first to say that a minister should perhaps not be given too much power to make amendments to legislation. In individual cases, I think the approach should often be the opposite.

I would like to remind all our colleagues of the famous, not to say infamous, Immigration Act and how it is administered. We are the first to call on the ministers to make changes. In fact, only last evening, I was invited to a demonstration in Ottawa. I was unable to go but the New Democratic Party member of Parliament for Ottawa Centre did attend this demonstration in favour of relaxing the law in a particular case.

We therefore have to exercise caution when it comes to calling for limits on powers. We must not restrict the minister's ability to administer the legislation. We need to exercise caution. If limits are required, let us keep them very broad. This is very important.

Say a plane is stuck somewhere and a binding decision is required from the executive branch to allow the passengers to disembark for various reasons. Sometimes, if legislation is too inflexible, our hands will be tied unless the minister can intervene.

This is what I wanted to say. I thank my colleagues who, without a doubt, will support this bill enthusiastically.

[Susan Kadis, Liberal, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to see here today the Minister of State for Public Health and the Parliamentary Secretary for the Minister of Health debating the motion to refer this bill to committee.

When the recent SARS crisis hit this country in 2003, a powerful realization hit home to everyone. The days of having ample time to prepare for the arrival of infectious diseases are gone. A great deal has changed in 132 years since the Quarantine Act was first established. We have cars, we have planes, et cetera.

The bill is one part of the federal government's comprehensive approach of improving the health care of all Canadians. Bill C-12 recognizes that our health care system is a shared responsibility in the country. The importance of all jurisdictions and various organizations involved working together is critical, particularly when public health threats emerge as they do today.

Experts talk about control, the good kind, infection control and caring properly for persons who are hit with infection in such a way that no one else can become infected. Our public health agencies create guidelines for how to control infectious diseases so that a public health nurse in any community, big or small, will know what to do.

What this act does is simply add another important tool to our toolbox. It will allow us to detect threats to public health at the point when they are actually entering our country. Bill C-12 takes into consideration very importantly the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which obviously did not exist when the act was first established. Disease, as we have heard, knows no boundaries. There were no planes or cars when this act was first established many years ago. This is one of our oldest bills.

There are constituents in my riding who were hit hard by SARS. They were hit tragically. They need to know, as do all Canadians, that we have taken all the steps that we can possibly take to ensure that they are protected. This bill is another example of how our government believes strongly in breaking down barriers when it comes to the best interests in the welfare and the well-being of all Canadians.

Bill C-12 appropriately balances the public good and the individual's right to privacy. It respects the jurisdictions of our provincial and territorial colleagues and in fact builds on all the very excellent work being done by all local public health officials. Bill C-12 will better prepare us to better protect Canadians. It is of course our collective responsibility to move this bill forward swiftly for our entire public health worldwide.

[Robert Thibault, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, let me assure the previous speaker that all members of the House were riveted by her comments. She mentioned that she wished to deliver a riveting speech.

We all share her concerns and we look forward to having a discussion at the committee level on some of the areas that have been raised, not only by the previous speaker, but by all the other speakers. I think that is the role of the committee.

We have an agreement on the bill which is the main thing. As Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, I have a particular interest in the renewal of health protection legislation that the government has undertaken. The modernization of the Quarantine Act is the first step in this renewal, one that will establish a comprehensive framework for public health in our country.

In light of the lessons learned from the SARS crisis and the recommendations made by Dr. David Naylor, a earlier version of the bill was tabled in the House on May 12, 2004. Unfortunately, this bill, Bill C-36, died on the Order Paper when the federal election was called.

Since then, the public health system has undergone major changes. Among other things, the Public Health Agency of Canada has been created and the first Chief Public Health Officer has been appointed.

In the wake of these important events, the government has introduced a newly proposed quarantine act. Bill C-12 will replace the current Quarantine Act, one of Canada's oldest pieces of legislation, which has remained largely unchanged since the adoption of the first Quarantine Act in 1872.

The Quarantine Act is a crucial piece of legislation. In a world where disease knows no borders, the act is the only federal statute concerned with preventing and controlling the introduction and spread of infectious diseases.

This legislation offers safeguards at the Canadian border and points of entry to Canada by screening for the import and export of infectious diseases. It complements provincial and territorial public health laws, given that each province and territory has adopted its own such laws to contain infectious diseases within its own borders.

However, one can see that the current law poses certain problems. For example, it includes numerous outdated and redundant sections. It requires that an order be issued to add an infectious disease to the list, thereby reducing our capacity to react quickly to a public health emergency. It raises some concerns with regard to the Canadian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. It is not consistent with the suggested amendments to the International Health Regulations. It does not deal with interprovincial travel.

I believe that the proposed legislation would help address these problems. Once enacted, the new Quarantine Act would ensure that the federal government has the proper legislative tools to deal effectively with the next public health crisis.

Bill C-12 would provide many advantages over the current act. It would streamline the emergency response process by eliminating the distinction between listed and other diseases. It would clarify the respective roles of officers, operators and the courts. It would ensure that human rights are adequately protected, giving people the right to legal counsel, interpreters and medical examinations. It would facilitate linkages with other authorities, such as provincial health authorities or the RCMP in the case of suspected terrorism. It would clarify the authority to collect and share personal information. It would give authority to the minister to issue emergency orders consistent with the Public Safety Act. It would modernize enforcement powers, such as the authority to divert carriers and secure quarantine space.

Naturally, we will need to hold further consultations with provincial and territorial governments regarding the federal role. We need to clarify the matter of federal assistance for controlling and managing the outbreak of infectious diseases in Canada.

For example, as the Naylor commission pointed out, we must give thought to the need to give the federal government the necessary powers to limit or prohibit the interprovincial movement of people, vehicles and goods during a public health emergency, and we must also give thought to the need for the power to declare a national public health emergency.

We will also need to clarify if the federal government has the authority to provide certain legal and economic protections for travellers who are detained for public health purposes, such as preventing someone from losing their job, as well as other things that have been mentioned by previous speakers.

We want to be ready should the unthinkable happen. The Minister of Health, the Minister of State for Public Health and I are extremely proud of this legislation. It is a critical important first step forward in a series of improvements the Government of Canada is making to strengthen our public health system.

In passing this legislation, we will be sending a clear message to Canadians that their health and their safety are a priority for this government.

[Bev Desjarlais, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-12. My first foray into talking about the Quarantine Act was a few years back when the new public safety act was coming into place. The Quarantine Act is not something one would normally talk about in everyday life in Canada. Nobody thought a quarantine would ever be put in place in Canada until the SARS epidemic.

It is good to see this new bill before us. I have listened to my colleagues from all the parties who have spoken today. It is interesting to note that all of us seem to be highlighting the same concerns. We all seem to want the bill to go to committee where we will be able to ask questions regarding the areas of concern.

For those people who may be watching this debate on TV and have not heard about the bill, I will highlight some aspects which may have been highlighted by others as well. If my colleagues on the government side are wondering whether I will be making any riveting remarks on the Quarantine Act, and I can assure them I will be.

As has already been mentioned, the old Quarantine Act has not been updated since 1872. Bill C-12 would apply to people coming into Canada and leaving Canada. It would not apply to people moving between provinces because the legislation respects their jurisdiction and the right to public health in their own areas.

Conveyance and transportation organizations would be subject to the proposed legislation. We can understand why, considering the traffic going back and forth between Canada and our southern neighbour. Literally thousands of vehicles and different modes of transportation such as air traffic move across our borders. It is important that transportation be included in the Quarantine Act.

My colleague from the Conservatives indicated the cost to travellers with regard to a quarantine and possible medical examinations. I have to admit he did not appear to be overly sensitive to the fact that travellers would have to pay money for that and there may not be anything wrong with them. He was much more concerned about getting the dollars from them. On the contrary, I am concerned because refugees and immigrants coming into Canada have already paid a fair amount of money to get to our wonderful country and they may not have a lot of resources available to them. They will face additional costs.

I hate to say this but I have become a bit skeptical about the government wanting to be a money making operation. A good example of this is when a person applies for a passport. A person applies for a passport and pays the required fee. Should something be wrong with the application, the person applies again, pays the fee again, and it goes on and on. It becomes a cash cow. I have seen that happen with visas, passport applications and numerous other areas in the government. My party does not want that to happen. I hope it is taken into consideration because we do not want to increase financial hardship on travellers coming to our country.

I want to highlight what my colleague from the Bloc mentioned about the minister's over-reaching authority. I am a little concerned in that a quarantine officer could put a quarantine order in place but it could be overruled by the minister. I would hope that it would be a medical quarantine officer who would make the decision rather than the not necessarily medical minister making the decision. I would hope that would be brought into question at committee. Possibly the head of the new public health agency, or the head of the public health agency in individual provinces in order to recognize jurisdiction, would be the only individual able to overrule a valid quarantine order.

There were a number of areas I wanted to mention, but those were the most important.

My colleague from the Conservative Party did mention the cost to business. Certainly, if a business were to be affected, there should be some understanding as to the costs that would be incurred and every effort should be made to keep those costs down.

We can all imagine if a transport truck came across the border and for some reason it was found that the driver could not get rid of whatever toxin and it was quarantined. If the toxin could not be done away with, then this vehicle would have to be disposed of, which seems to be the farthest stretch of the imagination. We must take into consideration inflicting orders as well as the business people and their costs.

I look forward, as my other colleagues in the House have mentioned, to the bill going to committee. I know that our health critic has done a thorough job of ensuring that our caucus was informed about the Quarantine Act. I know he will also do a thorough job of bringing our concerns forward in committee.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to outline our position on Bill C-12, which sets out to prevent the introduction and spread of highly communicable diseases that can have a devastating effect on the people of Canada and Quebec, such as the Ebola virus, anthrax, and SARS.

The concern about the spread of communicable diseases is nothing new. The first Quarantine Act was enacted in 1377 by the Republic of Venice.

In 1832, the Parliament of Lower Canada passed legislation making Grosse Île, Quebec, a quarantine station in order to prevent the spread of cholera.

This station was under the jurisdiction of the Government of Lower Canada from 1832 to 1841, of the Province of Canada from 1841 to 1867 and of the Government of Canada from 1867 until it was closed in 1937.

Between 1867 and 1918, until this responsibility was turned over to the Department of Heath and Welfare, in 1919, the Department of Agriculture was in charge of the quarantining of immigrants. Given the casual attitude of the Department of Agriculture and Agri-Food on the issue of mad cow disease, I am glad to know that this department is no longer in charge of quarantines.

While we agree that Bill C-12, which improves the 1970 act, should be sent to committee before second reading, we must keep in mind that health is the exclusive jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. However, we recognize that infectious diseases, such as SARS and the West Nile virus, do not stop at the borders. This is why we agree that Bill C-12 should be sent to committee, as long as the measures do not duplicate those that may have been taken previously by Quebec.

However, there are several of these clauses that concern us and for which we would like to suggest some changes or additions.

When the first International Sanitary Conference took place in Paris in 1851, the basic principle of protection against international propagation of infectious diseases was outlined: maximum protection with a minimum of restriction.

Here, the current Quarantine Act was designed when maritime transportation raised more concern than air transportation. However, in the last few decades, air transportation has increased much more than maritime transportation. As evidence of this, last year's events—SARS, the West Nile virus and the flu—showed that outbreaks of infectious diseases are increasing more rapidly than ever.

You will agree that to continue to abide by the principle stated at the 1851 Paris conference, we need to react more quickly, methodically and appropriately to the introduction and spread of communicable diseases. Such a reaction must be supported by fair and adequate legislation.

The existing Quarantine Act was promulgated in 1970. It was passed for the very first time, however, in 1872. It helps protect Canadians and Quebeckers from the introduction of dangerous, infectious and communicable diseases. It prevents those diseases from spreading beyond Canada.

While the existing act is somewhat flawed, we must first ensure that the new act will not ignore basic values such as human respect and dignity.

For instance, whereas under the 1970 act an officer had to have reasonable doubt regarding the health of a traveller before having the individual undergo medical screening, clause 14 of Bill C-12 provides for a completely different mechanism.

Any person authorized by the minister may, to determine whether a traveller has a communicable disease or symptoms of one, use any screening technology that does not involve the entry into the traveller's body of any instrument of other foreign body.

This clause provides for efficient screening methods for all travellers, whereas under the existing act, screening can only take place if there are reasonable doubts.

This authority appears quite broad at first glance. It should be limited through the addition of something like “any medically appropriate technology”.

As far as data management at the first screening stage is concerned, the identity of travellers should be protected. If a traveller were found to have the symptoms of a communicable disease, he would be the only one to be advised. It would only be when such symptoms are detected that personal information could be obtained.

Also, with regard to the disclosure of personal information obtained, clause 56 should contain provision requiring the minister to seek assurances that such information would be held in confidence and that it will only be used for the purposes of the act.

We also have problems with certain clauses which are liable to lead to incursions into provincial areas of jurisdiction, in particular the one allowing the Minister of Health to enter into an agreementwith a public health authority, particularly if this refers to medical personnel.

Then we have clause 30, which states: “The Minister may, on the Minister’s ownmotion, review any decision of a quarantineofficer to detain a traveller and orderthe traveller’s release”.

It would be appropriate to delineate this power in such a case, for instance that the minister's decisions could be based on reports by a committee or group of experts.

Finally, we also have some misgivings about the concept of interim orders, just as we did before when the government wanted to make them part of the Public Safety Act in connection with the infamous military zones.

We need proof that this approach is necessary, particularly since the bill appears to already cover a broad range of possibilities and sets out the powers for those it designates as screening or environmental health officers.

As you can see, we are not spoilers, contrary to what many people might think. We have made a careful and comprehensive analysis of Bill C-12, and it is both our right and our duty as members of Parliament to make sure that decisions made here are an appropriate and respectful reflection of the needs of our fellow citizens in Quebec and Canada.

In conclusion, despite the concerns I voiced earlier, we should not forget that all of this must be put in context with the purpose and the schedule of the bill. The list of diseases it contains is impressive. They are extremely contagious and could have a devastating effect on the public in Canada and in Quebec.

To deal with this kind of disease, precautionary and public health measures should be upgraded from time to time. We must remain alert. Bill C-12, which will supersede the former Quarantine Act, promotes a good principle, even if parts of the bill should be examined in committee to make sure we do the utmost in the fairest and most efficient way.

Health is an exclusive jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. But the Bloc admits that communicable diseases such as SARS and the West Nile virus do not stop at our borders. That is why the Bloc will support the referral of Bill C-12 to committee, with the caveat that the measures taken must not duplicate those in Quebec.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-12, which as the House knows is a piece of legislation that repeals and replaces the existing Quarantine Act. As the House is aware, the Quarantine Act has not been significantly amended since it was introduced in 1872.

An effective Quarantine Act is an important component in our ability to deal with outbreaks of infectious diseases. The changes we are examining now emanate in part from the lessons learned from the SARS outbreak and the recommendations of Dr. David Naylor, chair of the national advisory committee on SARS.

The Naylor report noted that travel has become a key means for transmission of infectious diseases. SARS was introduced through air travel by a passenger who brought the disease with him from Hong Kong. Many of us will remember the panic Canadians felt as people got sick and died from a mysterious respiratory ailment.

As a community, Toronto was hardest hit with this disease. At the peak of the outbreak, over 6,000 people were quarantined in the Toronto area alone. However, it was our front line health care workers who carried the heaviest burden of dealing with the disease. More than 100 Canadian health care workers became ill with SARS and three died.

Canada was not in a position of being prepared to deal with SARS, despite the fact there had been earlier warnings. Colleagues may recall during the Ebola scare of 2001, when it was thought a woman who had arrived in Canada had the deadly disease. Fortunately, the woman did not have Ebola and recovered from her illness, but this incident clearly demonstrated that we were not ready to deal with a communicable disease outbreak or epidemic.

The bill before us today will provide the government with the legislative authority to deal with travellers coming into or leaving Canada. Travellers can be ordered to undergo medical examinations at their own cost. I am not certain what the government will do if the people cannot pay or refuse to pay for their health examination. Will we, for example, be sending collection notices to travellers throughout the world? This is not clear in the package.

The bill defines conveyances as a watercraft, aircraft, train, motor vehicle, trailer or other means of transportation and includes a cargo container. Conveyances can be diverted from the planned entry point in Canada by the legislation if there is concern about the spread of a communicable disease. The proposed bill also creates the authority so that an order can be given to disinfect or even destroy the conveyance if there is belief that the conveyance is the source of a communicable disease.

The bill would give the minister very wide powers to appoint screening officers, quarantine officers and environmental assessment officers. Doctors or other medical personnel can be designated as a quarantine officers. The minister can establish quarantine facilities anywhere in Canada and take temporary possession of a premise to establish a quarantine facility.

If cabinet is concerned about a severe risk to public health, it can establish an emergency order prohibiting people from entering Canada if they have been in a foreign country that has seen an outbreak of a communicable disease. Items being imported into Canada can be blocked for the very same reasons.

The proposed bill authorizes a peace officer, at the request of a quarantine officer, to arrest people who refuse to be isolated or comply with measures that have been put in place to prevent the spread of disease. There are significant offences outlined in the bill. People convicted on indictment of wilfully contravening the act resulting in death or bodily harm can be fined up to $1,000,000 and/or face up to three years in jail.

There are some items that will need to be examined closely in committee. How, when and what personal information is to be disclosed and shared with other countries need to be examined. In terms of property rights and business interruption, the bill states that compensation may be provided to owners of conveyances that are destroyed. However, says nothing about business losses that are incurred as a result of being detained.

In addition, we must ensure that adequate resources are in place to carry out the legislative powers in the bill. The national advisory committee on SARS recommended that Canada ensure that an adequate complement of 14 officers be maintained at all ports of entry and that better collaboration with port authorities and personnel be established to clarify responsibilities in the event of a health threat.

The Conservative Party supports the bill, in principle, as it is an important component of public health. We look forward to hearing from witnesses at committee.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Minister of State (Public Health)]

Mr. Speaker, in the Speech from the Throne, the Government of Canada's objective was to modernize the legislation on health protection.

From the Naylor report to budget 2004, from the creation of the Public Health Agency, to the recent first ministers and health ministers meetings, the government has demonstrated its clear commitment to enhancing and protecting the public health of Canadians.

While the current health protection system has served Canadians well, the time has come to update and integrate our existing laws into a stronger, comprehensive and flexible public health system, precisely what Dr. David Naylor, as well as the Senate committee which studied SARS, recommended we do.

The amendment of the Quarantine Act is the first of a series of improvements such as the public safety agency act that the Government of Canada wants to introduce to reinforce our public safety system.

With the SARS crisis we had to face the fact that our current legislation is outdated. The existing Quarantine Act has remained largely unchanged since the adoption of the first Quarantine Act in 1872, a time when automobiles and jetliners were the subject of science fiction.

Needless to say, times have changed. We live in an age where people move from continent to continent in hours and days rather than weeks or months, often in airplanes and ships whose confined spaces provide a perfect breeding ground for highly communicable diseases to spread.

We now acknowledge that our planet all of a sudden has become very tiny. Infectious diseases move like wildfire across the planet. Germs do not respect borders, so we know that we will face repeated threats to public health in the future.

Among the many hard lessons learned from the experience of SARS is the need to strengthen our quarantine legislation to help prevent the introduction and spread of both emerging and re-emerging communicable diseases.

As a response to concerns about the spread of communicable diseases, we decided to move forward immediately with new quarantine legislation. The legislation before the House today delivers on our pledge to correct many of the problems brought to our attention by the recent events such as SARS which underscored how fast and how hard diseases can hit our health care system and our economy.

The government understands how important it is to address the gaps in readiness. In budget 2004 we pledged $165 million to establish the health emergency response teams and enhance surveillance. We have also created a new department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.

Now, with Bill C-12, we will replace the outdated quarantine legislation with an improved and modern Quarantine Act so that we can better protect Canadians from the importation of dangerous communicable diseases and ensure Canada can meet its international obligations to help prevent the spread of diseases beyond our borders.

The modernized act we propose has a new focus on airline travel and would provide the Minister of Health with additional abilities. For example, he could divert an aircraft to an alternate landing site if it is necessary to isolate passengers. He can establish quarantine facilities at any location in Canada and order that carriers from certain countries or regions of the world not enter Canada if there are serious concerns that such an arrival may threaten the public health of Canadians. He would be able to close Canadian border points in the event of a public health emergency. The proposed act also lists many more communicable diseases for which Canadian officials could detain departing passengers.

While these measures would only be used in rare instances where circumstances warrant, these changes are essential if we are to keep pace with emerging infectious diseases and protect the health of Canadians.

I want to ensure parliamentarians that Canadians' privacy rights are guaranteed. While the updated act authorizes the collection and sharing of personal health information, the authorization to do so is limited to what is required to protect the health and safety of Canadians. That is what citizens clearly want. They want the assurance that we are taking every possible precaution to prevent the spread of communicable diseases that could put their personal health and the welfare of their communities at risk.

The new version of the Quarantine Act will give us an additional level of protection by providing solid, flexible and updated legislation that will allow us to react more efficiently to current and future health risks, while ensuring adequate protection of human rights.

The scope of the Quarantine Act is limited to ensuring that infectious diseases are prevented from entering Canada or being spread to other countries. It will not affect interprovincial movement. We continue to work with our provincial and territorial government partners regarding the quarantine measures that can be taken to control the spread of infectious disease within and between provinces. In this regard, I would like to express our appreciation for the FPT special task force on public health which models a clear approach to mutual aid, information sharing and collaboration.

Canada is a responsible partner of the global public health arena. The updated act is aligned with Canada's obligations under the World Health Organization's international health regulations. The updated act, the creation of the public health agency of Canada, the appointment of the first chief public health officer and the Canadian pandemic influenza plan are all complementary steps in the Government of Canada's strategy for strengthening Canada's public health system. These innovations ensure better communication, collaboration and cooperation among partners as well as better clarity about who does what and when.

They will build on the expertise and strengths we already have in many areas of public health and communicable disease control to ensure Canadians are safeguarded by a seamless public health system throughout this country. Taken together, they will help ensure that Canadians are fully protected from the outbreaks of emerging diseases such as SARS and whatever else awaits us in the future.

Given that we cannot predict what the next infection will be or when it may surface, we need to be ready. We need this improved legislation now. By introducing a new and modern Quarantine Act, Canada will be better positioned to respond to any and all potential for threats to the health and well-being of our citizens.

It is clear that the health and safety of Canadians is a priority of the government. Canadians expect no less. I look forward to the work of the parliamentary committee to listen to the stakeholders and experts to help us make the bill as good as it can possibly be.

By passing the progressive bill that we are discussing today, within a larger public health strategy, I am convinced that we will not disappoint Canadians.

[Pierre Pettigrew, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I move:

That Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases, be referred forthwith to the Standing Committee on Health.

Criminal Code

[The Deputy Speaker]

I declare the motion carried. Accordingly, the bill stands referred to the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.

(Motion agreed to and bill referred to a committee)

(Bill C-12. On the Order: Government Orders)

October 8, 2004--the Minister of Health--Second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Health of Bill C-12, an act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases.

Business of the House

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, we will continue this afternoon with the debate on the Conservative opposition day motion.

On Friday we will debate a motion of reference before second reading of Bill C-10, the mental disorder legislation. We will then turn to a motion of reference before second reading of Bill C-12, the Quarantine Act amendments. We will then resume this debate commencing on Tuesday and follow it with second reading of Bill C-7, the parks reorganization, and Bill C-8, the public service human resources agency bill.

We would then turn to second reading of Bill C-14, the Tlicho legislation. This will be followed by reference before second reading of Bill C-13, the DNA bill, followed by Bill C-9, the Quebec regional development bill.

Next Thursday will be an allotted day.

On Monday, instead of a normal sitting of the House, there will be an address to both Houses by President Fox of Mexico. This will take place at 2:15 p.m.

With respect to my hon. friend's last question, that legislation will be coming forward in due course.

Canada Shipping Act

[John Godfrey, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to inform the House that pursuant to Standing Order 73(1) it is the intention of the government to propose that Bill C-12 be referred to committee before second reading.

Criminal Code

[Gurmant Grewal, Conservative, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise on behalf of the constituents of Newton—North Delta to speak to Bill C-2.

Bill C-2 is a recycled bill. It was Bill C-12 and Bill C-20 in the past. I have spoken to this bill in the past and my colleagues have contributed quite a bit on the issue of the protection of children.

The Liberal government continues to recycle this bill but it has not taken the appropriate action. Much public pressure and public outrage made the Liberals drop the term “public good” as a defence for the possession of child pornography. They have now replaced “public good” with the new defence of “legitimate purpose”. Legitimate purpose is defined to include, among other things, art.

The bill's criteria for evaluating whether a relationship is exploitive is vague and subjective, and by not raising the age of consent from 14 to 16, the Liberals have put Canada's children at risk.

Since 70% to 80% of Canadian prostitutes enter the trade as children, we as lawmakers have the moral responsibility to protect children. Children deserve nothing less than full protection from child pornography.

The legislation that is before us is simply smoke and mirrors. The Liberals ignored the evidence from child advocates and front line police officers who came before us with lots of information to make the legislation effective.

The important mechanism that should be in place to protect children is not there. One is in the definition part, and rather than public good or whatever the legitimate purpose or for the sake of art, that is not good enough.

The second component is the age of consent. Because the Liberals have failed to prohibit all adult-child sex, children will continue to be put at an unacceptable risk. Only by raising the age of consent will young people be truly protected under the Criminal Code.

As was the case with Bill C-12 and Bill C-20, Bill C-2 fails to raise the age of consent for sexual contact between children and adults. In all western democracies the age of consent is at least 16. In Denmark, France and Sweden the age of consent is 15. In many other countries, including Australia, Finland, Germany, Holland, Israel, New Zealand, Norway and the United Kingdom, the age is 16. Despite all the premiers agreeing unanimously that the age of consent should be raised from 14 to 16, the Liberal government failed to provide that protection to our children. The age of consent could have even been raised to 18.

The Liberals have simply ignored the mounds of evidence that came before the committee in the past demanding that children be protected from child predators. The Liberal government has failed to provide our children with that protection. Children are our future and they are vulnerable. They need and deserve nothing less than full protection from child predators. We, as lawmakers, should provide that protection to children, otherwise we are failing in our duty.

I have been here since 1997 and I have listened to the Liberal government dither and be indecisive when it comes to providing full protection for family values, whether it is age of consent or providing protection to children.

As lawmakers, we need to make laws with teeth, and increasing maximum sentences does not help. We need mandatory minimum sentences for criminal offences, such as the possession of child pornography, so we can secure the protection of children. This is the place where we must do our best to provide protection to our children.

[John Maloney, Liberal, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to rise to speak to Bill C-2, an act to amend the Criminal Code (protection of children and other vulnerable persons) and the Canada Evidence Act.

Bill C-2 proposes a broad package of criminal law reforms that would significantly improve the criminal justice system's protection of children and other vulnerable persons.

The key elements of Bill C-2 are: strengthening the existing child pornography provisions; providing increased protection to young persons against sexual exploitation; increasing penalties for offences against children; facilitating the receipt of testimony by children and other vulnerable victims and witnesses; and creating new voyeurism offences.

This is positive legislation which can be supported by all parties and I urge all members to do so.

I would like to focus my comments on the proposed amendments relating to child pornography, an issue that is very much in the minds of hon. members, my constituents in the Niagara region, including the Catholic Women's League and their White Ribbon campaign, and indeed all Canadians.

Child pornography is an issue on which we find almost daily accounts of new charges and prosecutions in Canadian newspapers as well as those around the world. To my mind this demonstrates two very important factors. On the positive side, our existing child pornography prohibitions are working. On the negative side, we need to do more to combat the sexual exploitation of children through child pornography. This is exactly what Bill C-2 does.

Bill C-2 proposes to broaden the existing definition of child pornography to include audio format. Specifically, it would include audio recordings that advocate or counsel unlawful sexual activity with a child as well as such recordings that have, as their dominant characteristic, the description, presentation or representation, for a sexual purpose, of unlawful sexual activity with a child.

The existing definition of written child pornography would also be expanded to include written material that describes prohibited sexual activity with children where that description is the predominant characteristic of the material and it is done for a sexual purpose.

Bill C-2 would also create a new prohibition against advertising and possession for the purpose of advertising child pornography. This new offence would be punishable on indictment by a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment. This is a wake-up call for the predators that their criminal acts will be vigorously prosecuted and severe sentences imposed.

Bill C-2 also proposes significant reforms relating to sentencing in child pornography cases. First, it proposes that the maximum penalty for all child pornography offences, on summary conviction, be tripled from 6 to 18 months. Second, it would make the commission of any child pornography offence with intent to profit an aggravating factor for sentencing purposes. In other words, those who seek to profit by sexually exploiting children through child pornography will get a tougher sentence.

The intent and impact of these child pornography specific sentencing reforms are further underscored by the fact that Bill C-2 also proposes two amendments to the Criminal Code's sentencing principles.

In particular, in cases involving the abuse of a child, Bill C-2 directs courts to give primary consideration to denunciation and deterrence of such conduct in determining the appropriate sentence to be imposed. Bill C-2 also requires a court to consider the abuse of a child as an aggravating factor for sentencing purposes.

In addition, Bill C-2 proposes to replace the existing defences of artistic merit, education, scientific or medical purpose and public good with a two-part, harm-based legitimate purpose defence. This new defence narrows the existing defences and replaces what had previously been proposed as the public good defence in Bill C-12 in the last session of Parliament with a clear and more easily understood defence. This new defence incorporates the harm standard adopted by the Supreme Court of Canada when it upheld the constitutionality of the child pornography provisions in 2001.

Under Bill C-2, a defence for an act in relation to child pornography would only be available where the act in question has a legitimate purpose related to the administration of justice, science, medicine, education or art and does not pose an undue risk of harm to children.

Under this new defence, the availability of a defence does not change the child pornographic nature of the material. Material that has been found to constitute child pornography as defined by the existing Criminal Code provisions or as expanded by Bill C-2 would remain child pornography.

Instead, Bill C-2 would require the court to consider whether the use made of the material in each instance is protected by the defence. For example, possession of child pornographic photographs by police for purposes associated with the investigation of a child pornography case would benefit from the defence, because the act of possession of the photographs is for a legitimate purpose related to the administration of justice and does not pose an undue risk of harm to children. Possession of the same photographs by a child pornographer for his personal use would not be protected by this defence.

As I said at the outset, Canadians want us to do more to combat child pornography and I am pleased to see that this is what Bill C-2 delivers. In addition to the new reforms proposed by Bill C-2 in May 2004, the government launched a national strategy to protect children from sexual exploitation on the Internet.

This new national strategy is providing just over $42 million to expand the RCMP's national coordination centre against child sexual exploitation and provide law enforcement with enhanced resources to investigate Internet-based child sexual exploitation, including child pornography. Funding is also being used to enhance public education and to nationally expand Cybertip.ca, a 24/7 public tip line.

Together, Bill C-2 and the recently enhanced resources send a clear and strong message that we condemn the sexual exploitation, abuse and neglect of children and other vulnerable persons. It sends a message that we have declared war on child pornography. I call upon all members of the House to support the bill and I ask that it be given quick passage.

[Nina Grewal, Conservative, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today on behalf of the constituents of Fleetwood—Port Kells to participate in the debate on Bill C-2, the child protection bill. This bill is almost identical to previous legislation, Bill C-12 and Bill C-20. They were primarily intended to address concerns regarding Canada's child pornography laws.

Canadian children deserve nothing less than total protection from child pornography. This legislation, however, is little more than smoke and mirrors. As lawmakers, we have the tough task of weighing the protection of children from sexual exploitation against the protection of free speech and free thought protected in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

On this question, I agree wholeheartedly with Cheryl Tobias, a lawyer from the Department of Justice, who said, when appearing before the Supreme Court during the John Robin Sharpe case that if pedophiles have a constitutional right to free expression, “it is dwarfed by the interests of children in our society...We ought not sacrifice children on the altar of the Charter”.

What we need are laws with teeth. Toothless laws will only hamper police and crown attorneys as they try to catch producers of child pornography.

Children should not be sexually exploited, but it continues to happen thousands of times a day. There does not seem to be the political will to stop it by the weak and arrogant Liberal government.

The Department of Justice proposed Bill C-2 and its predecessors to expand the offence of sexual exploitation and the definition of pornography, and to eliminate the defence of artistic merit in child pornography proceedings.

As well, the bill would increase maximum sentences for people convicted of these crimes. If passed, the bill would create a new offence of voyeurism and the distribution of voyeuristic material.

Bill C-2 is a reaction to the case of John Robin Sharpe, a child pornographer charged with possession of child pornography. Sharpe was initially found guilty of possession of child pornography, but on appeal, two lower courts acquitted Sharpe citing the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Sharpe had as many as 400 images of boys younger than 14 engaged in sex and a collection of his own stories entitled “Kiddie Kink Classics”. In March 2002 Sharpe's conviction concerning the images was upheld by the Supreme Court; however, he was ultimately acquitted of related charges that had been filed against him in connection with stories he had written, specifically because those writings were deemed to have artistic merit.

This ruling resulted in the current legal status of child pornography in Canada which is too permissive and threatens the safety of children. Earlier forms of Bill C-2 sought to close the loophole that allows people to create child pornography using artistic merit as a defence by establishing a standard of public good.

The Liberals have now been forced by public outrage to drop the term public good as a defence for the possession of child pornography. They have replaced public good with a new defence of legitimate purpose. Legitimate purpose is defined to include, among other things, art.

The Conservative Party wants the elimination of all defences that justify the criminal possession of child pornography. There is nothing artistic about child pornography. It is wrong and has been shown to lead to the sexual abuse of children.

Police and prosecutors still do not have the tools to deal with child pornography cases effectively or efficiently. In the first three years that members of the Toronto child exploitation unit spent tracking child pornography, they made 27 arrests and seized 84 computers with millions of images, but the police have been frustrated in their attempts to get jail time for these offenders. Most get conditional sentences or house arrest. The police frequently spend more time investigating the cases than offenders will spend in jail. This is the case for other crimes as well.

In my riding of Fleetwood—Port Kells marijuana grow operations are a significant concern. The RCMP recently announced that there are 4,500 marijuana grow ops in the City of Surrey. That represents about 6% of the city's households.

There will be 2,000 to 3,000 grow ops raided and shut down this year in the Fraser Valley. Across the border in Whatcom County there will be less than 10. The difference can be explained by the tougher sentences handed out in Washington State. There, operators of a grow op with more than 100 plants face an automatic five years in jail. For the first offence it is three months in jail and seizure of assets. In B.C. a person can be charged seven or eight times and still not be incarcerated.

The judiciary must hand out tougher sentences that better reflect community values. The higher maximum sentences contained in Bill C-2 for child pornography and predation will not be effective unless the courts enforce them.

Increased maximum sentences are meaningless if the courts do not impose the sentences, and we know by experience that when maximum sentences are raised, there is no corresponding pattern in the actual sentencing practices. What is needed are mandatory sentences, truth in sentencing, and no conditional sentences for child predators.

Conditional sentences which allowed child sex offenders, murderers, rapists and impaired drivers the opportunity to serve their sentences at home rather than in prison must be eliminated for serious offenders.

In 1999, 66,000 pornography images were found in the home of convicted pedophile Tony Marr. Police spent a year preparing the case against him, but Marr ended up with a conditional sentence and probation. One of the conditions of his probation was that he not use the Internet and computers except for medical purposes or work. Recent surveillance video showed him apparently working around a computer and exchanging CDs. This shows the absurdity of conditional sentences.

It is estimated that there are more than 100,000 child porn Web sites on the World Wide Web. A research group at the University of Cork in Ireland that studies child pornography is seeing an average of three to four new faces of abused children each month. About 40% of the girls and 55% of the boys are between the ages of 9 and 12. The rest are even younger. The group estimates that there are 50,000 new child abuse images being posted to newsgroups every month. Various studies have shown that about 35% to 50% of child porn collectors have a history of abusing children.

In the past three years 44% of the people arrested in Toronto for possessing child pornography have also been charged with or convicted with sexually abusing children.

The landslide child porn bust in the United States provided Canadian authorities with 2,329 Canadian leads, but almost 2,000 have never been looked at by police. That is because most communities simply do not have the will or resources or the officers who are trained to do the job.

Child killer Michael Briere admitted that he had been aroused by watching child porn on his computer just before he kidnapped, sexually molested and killed Holly Jones.

At present, the age of consent for sexual activity is set in the Criminal Code at 14 years of age. There have been recent reports that cross-border pedophiles are luring vulnerable children by way of the Internet. This cross-border pedophile activity into Canada has been enhanced by two factors: first, Canada's age of consent for sex is set at only 14 years, being one of the lowest of all western nations; and, second, Canada is one of the world's most wired countries; there are more than 10 million Internet users in this country.

According to a study by Microsoft, 80% of children in Canada have computers in their homes and 25% of them had already been invited to meet strangers that they had chatted with on-line.

The Internet has become a massive vehicle for criminals to lure and abuse Canadian children and to distribute illegal material. Research shows that pedophiles will often manipulate young children by showing them pictures on the Internet making them believe that sex with adults is acceptable.

Amendments were made to the Criminal Code in 2002 to make the luring of children through the Internet an offence. Although that was an important step to protect children--

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment]

Mr. Speaker, as a former educator it saddens and disturbs me to know that there are individuals in our society who exploit and take advantage of children. Therefore, Bill C-2 is important in terms of addressing issues that I think are of concern to all of us in the House, that is, issues involving the welfare of children.

Bill C-2, and in particular the part dealing with the protection of children and other vulnerable persons under the Evidence Act, is important legislation. It is also important that we move on this legislation as quickly as possible.

I believe that this legislation also reflects the importance of the issue for Canadians in general, because it is something that I think all of us can agree on. No one can tolerate or condone the exploitation of young children. Bill C-2 has a number of key elements that I believe do address that issue.

One is the strengthening of existing child pornography provisions. It would broaden the definition to include audio recordings as well as written material describing prohibited sexual activity with children where the description is the predominant characteristic of the material and pornography.

The legislation would create a new prohibition against advertising child pornography, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment on indictment and would increase the maximum penalty for all child pornography offences, on summary conviction, from six to 18 months. As well, Bill C-2 would replace existing child pornography defences with a narrower, two-pronged legitimate purpose defence that incorporates a harm-based standard.

Bill C-2 would strengthen the protection for young persons against sexual exploitation. It would increase the penalties for offences against children. The legislation would also facilitate testimony by children and other vulnerable victims and witnesses. It also would create new voyeurism offences.

I want to clearly indicate my support for Bill C-2. The reforms that it proposes are all welcome indeed. However, I would like to focus the remainder of my remarks on the bill's proposals to better protect youth against sexual exploitation.

Bill C-2 proposes to create a new category of prohibited sexual exploitation of a young person who is over the age of consent for sexual activity, that is, who is 14 years of age or older and under 18. Under this offence, the courts would be directed to infer that a relationship with a young person is exploitive of that young person by looking to the nature and circumstances of that relationship.

The bill directs the court to consider specific indicators of exploitation. They include: the age of the young person; any difference in age between the young person and the other person; the evolution of the relationship; and the degree of control or influence exerted over the young person. Bill C-2 provides a clear definition to the courts to infer the relationship is exploitive of a young person after examining the nature and the circumstances of the relationship.

In my view, this direction recognizes that all young persons are vulnerable to sexual exploitation. It also recognizes that the particular circumstances of some youth might put them at a greater risk of being exploited. As a result, the bill directs the courts to consider the nature and circumstances of each relationship and includes a list of factors that I think reasonable people will readily acknowledge are typical indicators of exploitation.

We often hear concerns about youth being approached over the Internet by persons who would prey on their vulnerability. Let us take, for example, a case where the young person secretly and quickly enters into a relationship over the Internet. Bill C-2 tells the courts to take this into account as a possible indicator of exploitation.

Another example that we often hear concerns about is the one where a young person is in a relationship with another person who is significantly older than the young person. Bill C-2 tells the courts very clearly to take this into account.

Bill C-2 would recognize that a young person can be sexually exploited not only by someone who is much older, but also by someone who is a peer and again close in age. Bill C-2 would apply to both situations because the government recognizes that both situations are wrong and should be prohibited.

I appreciate that there is a diversity of opinion as to whether and when young people should engage in a form of sexual activity. The reality is, though, that adolescents do engage in sexual activity. It is also a fact that the prohibitions against sexual activity with persons below the age of consent are very broad. They do not differentiate between sexual activity that consists of kissing and sexual activity that involves sexual intercourse. I do not think Canadians want to criminalize a 17 year old for kissing a 15 year old, but Bill C-2 would not do that.

I agree with the focus of Bill C-2. It focuses on the wrongful conduct of the offender and not on the consent of the young person. That is in fact the way the criminal law responds to sexual assault in general, namely, by focusing on the wrongdoing of the offender and not the victim. In my view, the focus of Bill C-2 on the exploitive conduct of the offender is both the right focus and the right response.

I would also note that Bill C-2 proposes to double the maximum penalty for sexual exploitation of a young person, including for this new proposed offence, from 5 to 10 years when preceded by indictment. Together, the creation of this new offence and the doubling of the maximum penalty underscore the seriousness of the form of sexual exploitation.

In addition, Bill C-2 would increase the maximum penalty on summary conviction for child specific sexual offences of sexual touching, invitation to sexual touching, and sexual exploitation from 6 to 18 months. These reforms were previously welcomed by the Canadian Bar Association as part of former Bill C-12 from the last session of Parliament.

Bill C-2 would require sentencing courts in cases involving the abuse of a child to give primary consideration to the objectives of denunciation and different proposals to consider such conduct an aggravating factor for sentencing purposes.

Bill C-2 is important because of the initiatives in it. There are welcomed reforms to the criminal law to protect the most vulnerable members of our society. The time has come to deal with this issue effectively. I believe that the minister, in proposing this legislation, is addressing the concerns that we have heard both in the last session of Parliament and in this one. The time for action has come.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-2, an act to amend the Criminal Code in regard to the protection of children and other vulnerable persons.

First, I want to be very clear that there are some aspects of this bill that are worthwhile. I applaud those measures. For example, Canada is in need of legislation to deal with voyeurism and the distribution of voyeuristic material. As a matter of fact, there is a lady from my home province of New Brunswick, Julia Buote, who has helped to lead the fight for tougher laws on voyeurism. I commend her on that effort. We also need legislation that helps to facilitate the testimony of child victims and witnesses and this bill provides a step in that direction.

Unfortunately, as we have seen in the House before, these worthwhile measures are thrown in with a bill that still falls far short of what Canadian children require from this government. In short, this legislation allows for the continuation of a dangerous loophole that will allow for child pornographers to continue to possess what should be illegal material.

Much of the controversy over Canada's child pornography laws dates back to the court case of John Sharpe. In the Sharpe decision, the Supreme Court of Canada said that the Criminal Code defence of “artistic merit” should be interpreted as broadly as possible. This helped shape the decision that allowed Sharpe to be acquitted on two counts of “possession of child pornography with the intent to distribute”. The material in question contained violent writings targeting vulnerable children; however, the judge ultimately found that this material had artistic merit.

All across Canada, child pornography cases were put on hold while the Liberal government did nothing as the Sharpe case wound its way through the courts. For two years Canadian children effectively went without legal protection against child pornographers as police were compelled to put investigations on hold pending the appeals.

The Supreme Court held in Sharpe that artistic merit should be interpreted as including “any expression that may reasonably be viewed as art” and that “any objectively established artistic value, however small”, would support the defence.

When the Liberal government finally reacted to public outrage over the Sharpe decision, the response was woefully inadequate. Three times now, first with Bill C-20, then Bill C-12, and finally Bill C-2, which is before us today, the government has attempted to appear tough on child protection, but in reality is not closing loopholes that threaten Canadian children.

Actually, the government has now come full circle and is still including a type of artistic merit defence for the possession of child pornography.

Under Bill C-12 from the 37th Parliament, the existing Criminal Code defences for child pornography, which included artistic merit or educational, scientific or medical purpose, were reduced to a single defence of “public good”.

Despite the Liberals' attempt to sell the bill on the basis that the artistic merit defence had been eliminated, the former justice minister admitted in the justice committee that it was still included under the broader category of public good. He stated, “Artistic merit still exists in the sense that a piece of art will have to essentially go through the new defence of public good...”.

Interestingly, in the Sharpe decision the Supreme Court also briefly considered the defence of public good. The court found that public good has been interpreted as “necessary or advantageous to...the pursuit of, among other things...art or other objects of general interest”. Again, when Canadians discovered this loophole they were rightly outraged.

The Liberals are now proposing, in Bill C-2, another brand new loophole. This time it is called “legitimate purpose”. The new legislation replaces the term public good with legitimate purpose. The defence would be available if the act in question has a legitimate purpose related to, among other things, art, and if the act does not pose an undue risk of harm to children. The loophole for artistic merit has therefore not been closed and what constitutes “undue risk of harm to children” remains open to interpretation by judges.

In its 2001 Sharpe decision, the Supreme Court of Canada stated that artistic merit should be given as broad an interpretation as possible, a strong signal of how the courts view these defences.

I feel the question that Canadians are asking is why the government is contorting itself to leave open loopholes for the possession of child pornography. I believe the problem is that the government's focus is not on doing all it can to protect children but on what the courts might say if we passed effective legislation.

In my opinion, establishing a test of undue risk is an insult to Canadians. Any risk to the safety of children should be met with the strongest response possible.

I ask the government to listen to the people who work on the front lines of child protection. Listen to police offices who have to deal with the tragedy of child abuse. I will quote from Scott Newark, vice chair and special counsel for the Office for Victims of Crime. He said:

Almost invariably, as in the Sharpe case, it gets down to a section 1 interpretation by the courts; and frankly, rather than having the courts determine Parliament's intent, in every single piece of legislation, in my experience, you should be expressing it, particularly where what's involved is choices between priorities.

Again, the Sharpe case is an example of that. There was an absolute recognition in the Sharpe case that child pornography in all forms represents a risk of harm to children.

Sergeant Paul Gillespie of the Toronto Police Service said:

We've seen what happens when police are left to define what is or isn't artistic merit. We'll be fighting about this one for years.

Now police will be left to determine whether something serves a legitimate purpose or poses an undue risk before proceeding further.

I also want to talk about some other changes in the bill, one being maximum sentences. Again there is an appearance to the Canadian public that the Liberal government is being tough on people who commit offences against children. However increasing maximum sentences is meaningless if the courts do not impose these increased sentences. We know by experience that when maximum sentences are raised there is no corresponding pattern in the actual sentencing practices. What is needed are mandatory minimum sentences, truth in sentencing, eliminating statutory release and no conditional sentences for child predators.

All across the country child pornographers are given conditional sentences for their crimes. These people are serving no jail time. Canadians may not be aware of that. How then is raising the maximum sentence going to help when the courts are not even approaching sentencing beyond the minimum sentences? Higher maximum sentences for child pornography will not be effective unless the courts enforce them.

The bill also fails to prohibit conditional sentences and child predators should serve their sentences in prison and not in the community.

I want to touch on the age of consent. The bill ignores the pleas of police groups, child advocacy groups and the provinces by failing to increase the age of consent. The age of consent for adult-child sex must be raised from 14 to 16. On this issue, 80% of Canadians polled have said that they want to increase the age of consent to at least 16 years.

In 2001, provincial ministers unanimously passed a resolution calling on the federal government to increase the age of consent to at least 16.

Like Bill C-12 before it, Bill C-2 fails to raise the age of consent. Instead, the bill creates the category of exploitive relationships. It was already against the law for a person in a position of trust or authority or with whom a young person was in a relationship of dependency to be sexually involved. It is unclear then now how adding people who are in a relationship with a young person that is exploitive in nature will add legal protection for young people.

I believe all Canadians care very deeply about our children. I believe that all members of this House sincerely want to protect children. However the Liberal approach to protecting children consistently fails to put the needs of children ahead of the rights of criminals. This needs to change.

We must act in the best interest for Canada's children and close all loopholes that allow for the possession of child pornography.

Quarantine Act

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, for the Minister of Health]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-12, An Act to prevent the introduction and spread of communicable diseases.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)