This bill is from the 42nd Parliament, 1st session, which ended in September 2019.
Jody Wilson-Raybould Liberal
This bill has received Royal Assent and is now law.
This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.
This enactment amends the Criminal Code to, among other things,
(a) create exemptions from the offences of culpable homicide, of aiding suicide and of administering a noxious thing, in order to permit medical practitioners and nurse practitioners to provide medical assistance in dying and to permit pharmacists and other persons to assist in the process;
(b) specify the eligibility criteria and the safeguards that must be respected before medical assistance in dying may be provided to a person;
(c) require that medical practitioners and nurse practitioners who receive requests for, and pharmacists who dispense substances in connection with the provision of, medical assistance in dying provide information for the purpose of permitting the monitoring of medical assistance in dying, and authorize the Minister of Health to make regulations respecting that information; and
(d) create new offences for failing to comply with the safeguards, for forging or destroying documents related to medical assistance in dying, for failing to provide the required information and for contravening the regulations.
This enactment also makes related amendments to other Acts to ensure that recourse to medical assistance in dying does not result in the loss of a pension under the Pension Act or benefits under the Canadian Forces Members and Veterans Re-establishment and Compensation Act. It amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to ensure that no investigation need be conducted under section 19 of that Act in the case of an inmate who receives medical assistance in dying.
This enactment provides for one or more independent reviews relating to requests by mature minors for medical assistance in dying, to advance requests and to requests where mental illness is the sole underlying medical condition.
Lastly, this enactment provides for a parliamentary review of its provisions and of the state of palliative care in Canada to commence at the start of the fifth year following the day on which it receives royal assent.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Bill numbers are reused for different bills each new session. Perhaps you were looking for one of these other C-14s:
Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet NDP Hochelaga, QC
Mr. Speaker, the government had the chance to do things differently with Bill C-14, but it decided to ignore experts, not to work with the opposition, and to limit debate.
Warnings were coming in from all over. Quebec's health and social services minister called Bill C-14 unenforceable. He thinks that the notion of reasonably foreseeable death is medically unfeasible and he refuses to include it in Quebec's law.
Will the government finally realize that Bill C-14 must be amended?
Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister
Mr. Speaker, if there was ever an example of the reforms that the Liberal Party made to the Senate over the past years removing partisanship and patronage from that place, there is no better example than the NDP highlighting the great work that the Senate is doing weighing in on an important piece of legislation.
I thank the hon. member for her comments about the excellent work done by the independent voices in the Senate, and I look forward to hearing what the Senate has to say about Bill C-14 when it returns to us.
Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet NDP Hochelaga, QC
Mr. Speaker, Senate Liberal leader James Cowan has now joined the growing number of Canadians saying that Bill C-14 is likely unconstitutional. Cowan said that this government legislation is so flawed that Canadians would be better off with no legislation at all. This bill does not respect the Supreme Court's decision, and it will be tied up in courts for years.
Instead of ramming through Bill C-14, will the government listen to James Cowan and work on getting the bill right the first time?
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Mr. Speaker, with one more sitting day after today before the stay on the declaration of constitutional invalidity expires, it is now clear that the government cannot meet the June 6 deadline to pass Bill C-14. The Minister of Justice has rightly warned of a legal vacuum absent the legislation, and yet the minister could do something to stop that legal vacuum from arising, namely by applying to the Supreme Court for a short-term extension of the stay to allow time for Parliament to pass legislation. However, the minister has done nothing. She has been all talk and no action. As a result, on June 7, there will be no certainty for patients, no certainty for physicians, and no protections for the vulnerable.
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Mr. Speaker, over the past several months, the Liberal government has refused to amend Bill C-14 legislation in order to provide adequate conscience protection for medical professionals and health care institutions.
They also voted against our opposition day motion that would have guaranteed these professionals their charter right freedom of conscience. Repeatedly we have heard the government indicate that we can count on provincial regulatory bodies to provide conscience protection. However, as we have seen, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario and the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Saskatchewan have both indicated that there is an expectation on the part of their medical professionals to refer for the practice of physician-assisted suicide.
Enough is enough. Constituents in my riding have been crystal clear. This bill must include clear, ironclad conscience protections for health care professionals and institutions. I hope the Liberal government will listen to Canadians and do the right thing.
Karen Vecchio Conservative Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON
Madam Speaker, I am pleased to be here today for report stage of Bill C-10, an act to amend the Air Canada Public Participation Act and to provide for certain other measures.
Governments, and especially new governments, have to set priorities and decide what they want to achieve during the length of their mandate.
Each party campaigns on a platform that is expected to serve as a road map for its early days as a government. Over the course of the campaign, parties make dozens of commitments. Upon taking office, a government must decide which commitments it wants to prioritize. A government must make decisions on what it wants to do right away, what it will do in six months, in two years, and what it will never do. On occasion, the Supreme Court will force the government to introduce legislation, as has been the case with Bill C-7 and Bill C-14.
Other pieces of legislation, like the budget, are presented each year. Because new governments like to check items off of the list of fulfilled campaign commitments during the first year, we often see legislation that reflects their campaign commitments. However, Liberal campaign commitments, like restoring mail delivery, have been pushed back on the priority list with the promise of consultations. Additional funding for the CBC has been pushed down the list of priorities because of a lengthy consultation process. A response to VIA Rail's proposal to build a dedicated track between Toronto and Montreal will take three years due to consultations.
It took the Liberals seven months to create a committee to enact consultations on electoral reform that is effectively identical to every House of Commons committee, and whose recommendations will be both non-binding and, like the preferred option of the Prime Minister, a ranked ballot.
The Minister of Transport has decided to spend an entire year consulting on the recommendations of the Emerson report, which was itself the product of 18 months of consultations with the entire transportation industry.
On so many issues, the Liberal government has pushed back making a decision to a later date.
However, with Bill C-10, we have none of that. What we have is a bill that came out of nowhere and was not the product of any consultations. Why is the government being so inconsistent?
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport confirmed, during its second reading debate, that she was rushing this bill through so that the stakeholders could provide input during the committee stage. She was outsourcing her government's consultative responsibilities to committee. A parliamentary committee studying a bill is not a consultative body. Its purpose is to probe the bill for weaknesses and address these weaknesses through amendments if the majority of the members agree.
Witnesses at committee, including the Government of Quebec and the Government of Manitoba, highlighted a number of obvious weaknesses in the legislation. The opposition proposed amendments to address some of these problems. In the case of Bill C-10, the Liberal majority did not accept any of these amendments to the legislation.
If the purpose of sending the bill to committee so quickly was so that the stakeholders could provide input on the legislation, then why did the Liberal members ignore the recommendations? This illustrates more inconsistency on behalf of the government.
While all of us support a regulatory environment that allows for a viable legacy carrier in Canada and affordable air travel, I do not think a single Liberal candidate campaigned on reducing Air Canada's maintenance obligations as they are described in the Air Canada Public Participation Act.
Considering the government appears to be in no rush to do anything else, its incredible haste to get this legislation that came out of nowhere passed before the summer has opened up a Pandora's box of questions. By now most members are aware that in 2013 the Government of Quebec, with the Government of Manitoba as an intervenor, brought Air Canada to court to challenge the carrier's assertion that it was fulfilling its maintenance obligations under the Air Canada Public Participation Act. The Quebec Superior Court, presided over by Justice Castonguay, ruled on the side of the Attorney General of Quebec. Consequently, Air Canada appealed this decision to the Court of Appeal of Quebec, and that court upheld the lower court's ruling in November 2015. On January 5, 2016, Air Canada announced that it would challenge that ruling in front of the Supreme Court. Less than two months later, Air Canada began negotiating with Quebec and Manitoba to end litigation, starting with the signing of a letter of intent to purchase 45 C Series aircraft. Whether Air Canada decided it would lose its appeal in front of the Supreme Court or the Government of Canada prodded it to make a purchase of the at the time troubled C Series aircraft, the carrier started to propose real commitments to keep some of its overhaul maintenance work in Quebec and Manitoba.
As the Government of Quebec has recently placed over $1 billion U.S. into the C Series program, it was obviously pleased to see Air Canada make the first major purchase of the aircraft.
This point cannot be made clear enough. Air Canada was forced to negotiate a settlement with Quebec and Manitoba because the carrier lost in court.
What Air Canada has proposed to settle its lawsuit in the case of Quebec is the purchase of the C Series and a commitment to undertaking maintenance of these aircraft for 20 years in the province. Air Canada also proposed to create a centre of excellence in aircraft maintenance in Quebec. In the case of Manitoba, Air Canada announced a willingness to transfer about 150 jobs from other parts of the country to Winnipeg. It is worth noting that these are not new jobs, merely work that is being shuffled from one part of Canada to another.
These Air Canada commitments to do maintenance work on narrow body aircraft in Canada are good, but these are not listed in the act we are debating today. Air Canada is making these commitments because it lost in court on the Air Canada Public Participation Act.
The Provinces of Quebec and Manitoba understand that if the law is repealed, as is being proposed by the Liberals, then their negotiating position with Air Canada will be swept out from under them. That is why both provinces explicitly asked the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities during the study of the bill to only allow this legislation to pass upon conclusion of their litigation against Air Canada. These calls came on deaf ears.
None of the Liberal members at the committee questioned the statements by Manitoba's deputy premier or Quebec's minister of the economy asking for more time, or attempted to justify the prompt passage of this legislation. The Minister of Transport's own officials also confirmed at committee that there was no legal or technical reason why speedy passage of the legislation was necessary.
Therefore, here we are. We have a bill in front of us that two provincial governments have asked for its coming into force to be delayed, and there are huge questions concerning why it is being rushed through Parliament so quickly ahead of the rest of the Liberal agenda.
We also have the problem that the Liberals are missing an important opportunity to make Air Canada and the entire aerospace sector annually more competitive. The Emerson report, which I mentioned earlier in my remarks, made a number of good suggestions that would stimulate the aerospace sector while maintaining jobs in Canada. For example, the government could tie all airport improvement fees to specific projects, explicit sunset provisions, which would ensure that these fees are to fund a specific project and not the airport's overall operations. They could look at overhauling the airport security model to mirror those used at major international airports, like London's Heathrow or Amsterdam's Schiphol, which have clear customer service standards and much lower delivery costs.
However, the bill does not do any of that, and we have not heard any indications from the Minister of Transport that measures to improve the competitiveness of the entire airline industry are forthcoming.
I look forward to questions from the government and opposition members.
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to speak, perhaps for the last time, to Bill C-10, an act to amend the Air Canada Public Participation Act and to provide for certain other measures. There are very few other measures, as this is a small bill.
I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Elgin—Middlesex—London. I am sure that her speech will be very good and that she will have a lot to say about Bill C-10.
We have had many opportunities to speak to Bill C-10 over the past few weeks. We had the opportunity to hear the government say all sorts of things about the importance of Bill C-10 and the need to act swiftly. However, when we asked for the real reasons behind the urgency, which led the government to adopt a time allocation motion for Bill C-10, we got no response. The government says one thing and does another or, in many cases, does nothing.
From the beginning our only question has remained unanswered. We really wanted a justification for the time allocation motion. Why the need to pass Bill C-10 now, when at the beginning of this Parliament there was no urgency?
We asked the question in the House during question period and also in committee. We never received a single sensible answer explaining why Bill C-10 had to be passed so quickly.
I searched books, history, and everywhere in order to understand how the government could justify adopting a time allocation motion for a bill like C-10. I finally found the answer. It is in the Liberal Party of Canada's DNA that I found the reason for the urgent need to take action on Bill C-10.
The government says that it is open and transparent. That can be found in the Speech from the Throne, which states:
...the Government is committed to open and transparent government. ...[the Government] will promote more open debate...it will not resort to devices like prorogation and omnibus bills to avoid scrutiny.
A time allocation motion is a device. We have had the opportunity to look at the budget bill, which is also an omnibus bill. The government says one thing and does another, or does nothing at all. That is what I discovered when I analyzed the process for Bill C-10, which has brought us here today.
The government has adopted a number of time allocation motions. I am thinking of Bill C-10, Bill C-14, Motion No. 6, and the electoral reform that the government wants to unilaterally impose using its majority. So much for openness and transparency.
With regard to Bill C-10, in just a few months, we have seen the government, for no real reason at all, decide to lose some of its credibility with the provinces. How? The government announced on a number of occasions that it wanted to usher in a new era of improved relations with the provinces.
In the throne speech, the government also said the following three times regarding three files:
To give Canadians a more secure retirement, the Government will work with the provinces and territories.... To create more opportunities for young Canadians...the Government will work with the provinces and territories.... And to support the health and well-being of all Canadians, the Government will begin work with the provinces and territories...
Those three excerpts from the throne speech show the government's willingness to work with the provinces and territories and its interest in doing so. However, the government says one thing and does another, or does nothing at all. We are seeing it again. We saw it yesterday. The government has said a number of times that it is listening to the provinces and wants to work with them.
Yesterday, the Quebec minister of health and social services spoke about another bill, Bill C-14. What did Mr. Barrette have to say about Bill C-14? He said that it was unenforceable and that, given the current context, he would be very careful about going forward with Bill C-14. He added that, personally, for professional and governmental reasons, he does not think it is a good idea to go forward with Bill C-14. Mr. Barrette is a minister in a province with which the government wants to build good relations. However, the government moved a time allocation motion on Bill C-14. The government is not letting members of Parliament speak about it.
I have other examples, but I do not have the time to share them all in four minutes. When Bill C-10 was first debated in committee, Minister Garneau talked about good relationships with the provinces in his speech:
In light of this development [Air Canada's commitment to creating centres of excellence], the Government of Quebec and Air Canada announced an agreement to discontinue the litigation...
Given all these positive developments, we believe this is the perfect time to modernize the Air Canada Public Participation Act...
Minister Garneau said that this was what the provinces wanted, but that is not true. I do not want to say that it is not true, but it is misleading. This may appear to be the case, but that is my interpretation.
Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister
Mr. Speaker, Canadians understand that this is a big step in our society. It is one that must be taken responsibly and with full awareness of both the concerns around vulnerability and the need to defend Canadians' rights, freedoms, and choices. That is exactly what we put forward.
We understand that this is the beginning of a conversation that will go on for the coming years, as court cases, evidence, concerns, and doctors evolve in their thinking as we approach this.
However, this is a big step. It needs to be taken right, and that is exactly what Bill C-14 does.
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Mr. Speaker, they waited until April before introducing their bill. We all agree on that.
After the Liberals refused calls from the NDP to refer Bill C-14 to the Supreme Court, the Alberta Court of Appeal called out the Liberals for pushing a bill that flies in the face of the Carter decision. Now the Ontario courts are raising concerns about whether the bill respects the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
How many court decisions will it take before the Liberals finally admit they have made mistakes? Why would the Prime Minister prefer that suffering Canadians spend years in court fighting for their rights instead of getting his new law right the first time?
Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister
Mr. Speaker, first, Bill C-14 does comply with the Charter of Rights and the Supreme Court's rulings. That is exactly what we have been maintaining for a long time now.
Second, as of June 6, Canadians will not have the framework provided by the Supreme Court while we work on this bill. That is why it is so important to ensure that we have a framework on June 6 that will protect the vulnerable, while safeguarding Canadians' rights and freedoms.
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Mr. Speaker, once again, the government is refusing to work with the opposition to make Bill C-14 consistent with the Supreme Court decision and the Canadian Charter of Rights. The reality is that medical assistance in dying is currently possible under the Supreme Court's criteria.
Yesterday, a court granted a woman in Manitoba the right to seek medical assistance in dying. In the meantime, the government is insisting on limiting access to it.
Why is the government insisting on moving forward with this bill, knowing that it does not comply with the Charter of Rights?
Karen Vecchio Conservative Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON
Mr. Speaker, I am honoured today to present a petition signed by hundreds of Ontarians regarding Bill C-14, requesting consideration and accommodation for medical practitioners, stringent legislation, as well as sufficient time for consultation.
Robert Sopuck Conservative Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB
Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition on behalf of the Family Action Coalition, signed by citizens from right across Manitoba.
The petitioners request that the government allows sufficient time for broad consultation on Bill C-14, that there are sufficient protections for the vulnerable, and that conscience rights for health care providers are protected.
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Mr. Speaker, the other petition I present in the House today is a lengthy petition from members all across the province of Alberta, my home province.
The petitioners are coming forward with the Family Action Coalition with regard to Bill C-14. They are asking for stringent safeguards to be put in place on behalf of the vulnerable. They are asking for conscience protection for medical practitioners, and they are also calling on the government to consult widely with regard to Bill C-14.
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to present a petition on behalf of constituents right across British Columbia. The Family Action Coalition has put together a petition outlining that there should be adequate safeguards in any legislation, such as Bill C-14, that parliamentarians should seek to consult in a timely and robust way, as well as to make sure that conscience rights are protected.