Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Crystal Springs United Church Women on their support for the ban of the manufacture, use, exportation or stockpiling of land mines.
In January I received a letter from Daisy Reid, secretary-treasurer of the UCW, in which she urged the government to take a leadership role on this issue, especially in the eradication of anti-personnel mines which are truly nefarious devices that are designed, as Daisy explains in her letter, to injure and maim but not to kill.
Mrs. Reid writes on behalf of the UCW that they wish to join the international campaign to ban land mines: "We feel that Canada should give leadership to the world in this terrible way of using our fellow man".
I am pleased to inform the UCW that our foreign affairs minister has recently been nominated for a Nobel peace prize in recognition of his efforts to rid the world of land mines. Also worthy of recognition are the thousands of individual Canadians like Daisy Reid, Bernice Bird, Evelyn Reid, Maxine MacLeod and Fern Horley of the Crystal Springs UCW who take the time to support these important efforts and to prove that one person can make a difference.