Evidence of meeting #11 for Justice and Human Rights in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was terrorist.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10:05 a.m.
NDP
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dave MacKenzie
Well, the clerk will do it, if that's your wish.
(Amendment negatived: yeas 5; nays 6)
10:05 a.m.
NDP
Françoise Boivin NDP Gatineau, QC
It is not going to be complicated. As always, it will be the Conservatives versus everyone else.
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dave MacKenzie
Shall clause 4 carry?
(Clause 4 agreed to)
We now have Liberal amendment number 6, in clause 5.
Mr. Cotler.
(On clause 5)
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
Irwin Cotler Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Mr. Chairman, I have a series of amendments, as you can see, that hereafter follow. Let me just say that they all relate, in effect, to the same situation, so you don't have to go through them one by one, because if they're going to vote it down, they'll vote it down as a whole.
Let me explain it, because I suspect they will vote it down. To try to save the committee time, I will explain the objective of the series of amendments that follows, because they're part of a package.
Basically, Mr. Chairman, these amendments seek to remove the discretion of the government to list the state sponsors of terrorism and to allow the victim of terror to make his or her determination as to which sponsor of terrorism they wish to sue. Regrettably, the legislation as it now stands limits the victim's suit to only those countries that the government will list as state sponsors of terrorism.
Now the problem we have...and the government's own witness, Victor Comras, the U.S. State Department official who appeared earlier when this bill was heard before the Senate, and then appeared again before us, said earlier, and repeated again, “Don't go there”--we did that in our American legislation and the result was by doing that in effect we ceded the right of the victim to the determination by the government as to who the victim could sue. The U.S. government, for example, listed four governments as state sponsors of terrorism. Now, if government 5 or government 6 was not listed, but they committed a terrorist act or their proxy committed a terrorist act, the victim in Canada would not be able to sue because the government, for whatever reason, would not have put that government on the terrorist list. We believe that it's the victim who should be able to make that determination, not the government.
Now, I know what the government may say, so I want to conclude by saying the following. I know that the government has a legitimate concern with frivolous and vexatious suits that may be taken against our allies, so my amendment provides for that. What it says is that a civil remedy will not lie against a country with which we have an extradition treaty or a government in respect of which a remedy will lie in that government's own domestic courts--in other words, the United States, whatever.
The purpose of the amendment here is to broaden the number of state sponsors that the victim believes should be the object of a suit, but to guard against frivolous and vexatious suits by saying that no suit will lie against a country with which we have an extradition treaty, that country being deemed to be one that protects the rule of law, has an independent judiciary, and the like.
So through this series of amendments that follows.... And that's why you don't have to take them one by one; if this is going to be defeated, then you can defeat them all at the same time. I just want to put forth what the objective is here. It is to give the victim of terror the option of determining against whom the suit will lie, rather than have the government arbitrarily determine against whom the suit will lie and arbitrarily limit the remedies that can be exercised.
The government's executive exercise of discretion is being preferred in the government's legislation over the victim's capacity to exercise his civil remedy with respect to acts of terror. Again, Mr. Chairman, it's somewhat anomalous because we are here speaking for the victim and the effectiveness of the civil remedy.
I take the government at its word that it's seeking to protect the victim, but it is doing so in a way that will provide less effective protection for the victim. So I'm not questioning their legislative intent and their motives. I'm saying that we both agree that the overall import of the legislation is to give an effective civil remedy to victims of terror.
We are saying that the nature of the legislation as it now stands will unduly circumscribe that civil remedy by unnecessarily limiting the action that can be taken by arbitrarily investing in the government the discretion to choose against whom the civil remedy can be exercised, rather than vesting it in the victim, with the caveat that it should lie only against states with which we do not have an extradition treaty.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dave MacKenzie
Would you clarify, Mr. Cotler? You indicated that you were speaking to a number of your amendments. Would you clarify for us what those--
10:15 a.m.
Liberal
Irwin Cotler Liberal Mount Royal, QC
I'm really referring, Mr. Chairman, to the rest of my amendments.
10:15 a.m.
Liberal
Irwin Cotler Liberal Mount Royal, QC
It's referring to the amendment on page 5, the amendment on page 6, the amendment on page 7--
10:15 a.m.
NDP
10:15 a.m.
Conservative
10:15 a.m.
NDP
10:15 a.m.
Conservative
10:15 a.m.
NDP
Jack Harris NDP St. John's East, NL
He said pages, not numbers. There's a confusion between amendments L-6, L-7, and L-8, and page 6, page 7, and page 8.
10:15 a.m.
Conservative
10:15 a.m.
Liberal
Irwin Cotler Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Mr. Chairman, the specific amendments that fall under the question of the executive discretion in the delineation of the list of state sponsors would be those that appear on page 5 and on page 6; those are the two, Mr. Chairman.
