Bill C-14 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make related amendments to other Acts (medical assistance in dying)

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.

Physician-Assisted Dying

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, as I said, and as we have done from the beginning, we have every intention of giving all members a chance to speak, given the importance and sensitivity of Bill C-14.

However, we also recognize that the Supreme Court has given the government and Parliament a deadline, which is June 6. We believe it is important to strike a balance between the need to hear from all members and the need to abide by the Supreme Court ruling and pass balanced legislation by that deadline.

[Denis Lebel, Conservative, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her answer.

Naturally, we all have very strong feelings about Bill C-14. Our constituents elected each and every one of us to this place to debate the issues that matter to Canadians. The opposition members have done important work. We produced a dissenting report that was heeded and respected. I thank the government. We need to continue and go even further.

Do the Liberals plan to give members who want to have their say on behalf of Canadians in this debate the opportunity to speak?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, it is no secret that we have been trying to extend the hours and allow for more debate on this very important issue. I think all colleagues will agree with the Leader of the Opposition that we recognize the importance and sensitivity of Bill C-14. It is an issue that touches the lives of many Canadians and all parliamentarians, and we will continue to look for a way to extend the debate and allow every member who wants to speak to speak.

However, we also respect the deadline that the Supreme Court of Canada has asked Parliament to respect and we think there is a proper way to balance those two interests.

Government Business No. 6

[Gord Brown, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we went from sunny ways to a dark week in Parliament. We had altercations on the floor of the House; chaotic scheduling of business without notice; the moving of dilatory motions by the government, delaying its own legislation; and the closing of debate on Bill C-14, the first time in history that such measures were used on a moral conscience issue.

Then we wake up Wednesday morning to Motion No. 6, a motion that proposes to legislate by exhaustion, offering unstructured, open-ended debate, potentially sitting 24 hours a day around the clock, all summer long, and when the government is satisfied it has forced through enough business, it can bail out without notice and without a vote.

Motion No. 6 targets the opposition and hamstrings its ability to hold the government to account. It disenfranchises the 60.5% of Canadians who voted for those opposition members. Even the 39.5% of Canadians who voted Liberal will not appreciate or be well-served by the crippling of the opposition.

Motion No. 6 must be withdrawn from the Order Paper and never repeated again.

Reference to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to share my time with the member for Lambton—Kent—Middlesex.

I am very troubled, like many today who have stood up to speak. What I would really like to do is perhaps set the table a bit on how we found ourselves in this position. I think more than one incident has created this really unfortunate position we are in today.

I would like to start with the election of October. The Liberals were given a strong majority. In part, their message to Canadians was that they represented change, a new voice, and a change in our democratic process. Canadians listened to that, they watched, and in October provided a strong majority for the Liberals.

I want to quote a part of the Speech from the Throne, which was just five months ago. It states:

Canada succeeds in large part because here, diverse perspectives and different opinions are celebrated, not silenced.

Parliament shall be no exception.

In this Parliament, all members will be honoured, respected and heard, wherever they sit. For here, in these chambers, the voices of all Canadians matter.

The Speech from the Throne is a very critical document. It is the road map that the government is providing and sharing with Canadians on what its plans are.

The speech also indicated, “give Canadians a stronger voice in the House of Commons, the Government will promote more open debate and free votes, and reform and strengthen committees”.

Those are very important commitments.

In every minister's mandate letter, this is included:

I made a personal commitment to bring new leadership and a new tone to Ottawa. We made a commitment to Canadians to pursue our goals with a renewed sense of collaboration.

Again, every minister has that in their mandate letter. It is in the Speech from the Throne. It is the tone that was committed to by the government to be set in the House.

The government is not very old. It is only six months. Of course, we did not sit until January. We had a small sitting in December and then we had a sitting that started in January after Christmas. Perhaps the first month or two, the Liberals lived up to the commitments they made to Canadians. However, starting in the last few weeks, there has been a significant and noticeable change. The hon. opposition leader, the member for Sturgeon River—Parkland, said it best when she said that the Liberals apparently now wanted to have an audience and not an opposition.

We can look at items like democratic reform, which is fundamental. The Liberals do not want all voices heard; they only want their voices to be heard. If we do not agree with them, they will do things like move opposition days to Fridays, which is a very short time and there is not much opportunity to debate.

Everyone in the House recognizes that Bill C-14 is very important legislation, and we need to look at this because it is very important. We returned on Monday, and the understanding was that we would spend most of the day talking about Bill C-14.

I have been in the House for seven years, and I have one of the furthest ridings, which is usually 12 hours door to door. I always make that trip on Sunday night so I am here ready to be present in the House when it opens on Monday.

It is also important to note that the House only sits 26 weeks of the year. There are 26 weeks where members can be in their ridings or cabinet ministers can do some of the important work they have to do outside the House. We know the government wants to get rid of Friday and does not want to show up to work on Monday.

It is very simple math. The government has 184 members, and they need to have 169 in the House on Monday morning. How many were here? There was 139. Even at 169, it means we can still have a few people who are away, or some ministers off doing some of the work they need to do. However, they need to have their people in the House. They were shy of that 169 by 30 members.

The fact the Liberals almost lost the vote is not the responsibility of the opposition; it is the responsibility of the Liberals and their need to show up to work.

Instead of debating Bill C-14, what did we do? With respect to Bill C-14, we hear from the Minister of Health that it has a critical time frame, that it has to get done. Did we debate Bill C-14 on Monday? No. We debated Bill C-10 all day. Although important legislation, it did not have the criticalness to it that Bill C-14 has.

What did we do Tuesday? We debated Bill C-6, the citizenship act, which is important legislation. All legislation is important, but it was not Bill C-14 with its critical timeline.

Then we went back to the debate on Bill C-10, the Air Canada Public Participation Act. Then we debated Bill C-11, the Copyright Act, again, important legislation.

Essentially, we offered to debate Bill C-14 until midnight for two days, but the Liberals had us debate other legislation instead. More important, not only did they have us debate different pieces of legislation, they failed to even provide a parliamentary calendar. That has never been done in the whole time I have been here. We are given the agenda for the week so we can prepare. The Liberals did not even have the respect to provide a parliamentary calendar. All of a sudden we were debating the Copyright Act. That is a profound disrespect to the opposition and it has never been done in Parliament.

Then we hit yesterday, which was Wednesday. We were again ready to debate Bill C-14, which had important amendments from the committee and we needed to debate them. It is important to debate. Debate matters, especially in this instance. At second reading, I had a profound compliment when one of my colleagues said, “Listening to your words in the debate changed my mind in terms of how I'm going to vote”. We are debating life and death. We are debating amendments. What did the Liberals do? They put closure on the debate, maybe one speech at report stage on something so critical. We could have been spending Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday debating the bill.

On top of that, the Liberals introduced Motion No. 6, which was so aptly described this morning as looking at every possible tool the opposition has and taking it away.

The member for Wellington—Halton Hills said:

The fundamental responsibility mechanism in the House is the confidence convention. The 20 or so members of Parliament who are part of the ministry who are the government sit there because they have the confidence of the majority of members of this chamber. It is that confidence convention that is undermined by the motion that the government has put on the paper.

By giving members of the ministry the unilateral right, at any time, to adjourn the House...

We can certainly see a whole host of measures. Certainly we were debating a closure motion. The NDP delayed things for, I understand, less than a minute when the incident happened where the Prime Minister lost control.

As I head toward the end of my time to speak to this important issue, there are a few things that I would like to see.

First, the Prime Minister's apology was appropriate. He also needs to look into his heart to see what created that anger within him and why he responded to it in such an inappropriate way.

More important, I think we all expect him to live up to those standards and commitment he made in the Speech from the Throne to respect all members of the House. This would include removing Motion No. 6.

[Brigitte Sansoucy, NDP, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith.

Before I comment on the matter before us this morning, I would like to make a comparison with the discussions we had about Bill C-14.

The discussion started off well enough. I am very happy to have been a member of the Special Joint Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying, where the quality of the debate was very mature. I really enjoyed collaborating with my Liberal and Conservative colleagues on our committee's work. We were all motivated by a desire to work together to get the best results for the people we represent. Even though we did not always agree, our discussions were always respectful.

Our life experiences make us who we are today. Personally, regardless of the situation, I always pay attention to the people around me. Someone just said that, when emotions are running high, our actions may be out of character. No. When my emotions are running high, I am always respectful of the people around me.

I was therefore saying that the Special Joint Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying managed to discuss the issue respectfully. Last week, I attended the first meeting of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights to examine Bill C-14 clause by clause. I think that may have been the beginning of what we saw yesterday. I did not get the impression that the Liberal members who were at that meeting were open to discussion.

My life experience has taught me that discussion and debate yield better results. I did not get the impression that the members at that meeting were open to debate. The members were there, but some of them did not even seem to be interested in the discussion. They were just there to obey the order they had received to vote against any amendments proposed by the opposition.

This week, time allocation motions were moved, motions that would prevent members from speaking in the House. One Liberal colleague made an interesting analogy. When I asked him why we could not have a discussion about Bill C-14, he told me that even he had tried, but it is as though the government is caught in a rushing stream moving toward the deadline, toward its goal, and going against the government right now is like trying to swim against the current at Niagara Falls.

When a government adopts the attitude of wanting to achieve a certain goal at all costs, it will run roughshod over anything standing in its way. In my life, there is something that I refuse to ever accept and that is the excuse that the end justifies the means. That should be unacceptable. I think that we were all able to see the result of that attitude yesterday.

We really need to ensure that our debates in the House are respectful. That is the only way that we will be able to honour the privilege that we have been given of being here to represent our constituents.

In her speech, I heard my Liberal colleague trivialize yesterday's behaviour, and we saw that attitude yesterday as well.

When someone witnesses an act of violence or intimidation and thinks that the victim is partially responsible, that should raise a red flag. That line of reasoning is wrong. Under no circumstances is a victim of an act of violence or intimidation ever responsible for that act.

Some Liberal members are trivializing what happened, saying that he is a good person. I too am a good person and I am never disrespectful towards anyone. I would never do anything that might hurt anyone around me. If genuine respect guides us in all our actions and in all situations, we can ensure that we will always be considerate of those around us.

In his apology this morning, the Prime Minister said that he did not pay attention to his surroundings. When the committee examines this matter, it will have to decide what the consequences should be, and then we will all know what consequences we can expect if we do not pay attention to our surroundings in the House. That is crucial.

What is more, people keep talking about bringing decorum back to this House. Unfortunately, since this government came to power, there has been plenty of lip service, but very little in the way of real measures. If it really wants to bring back decorum, the government should start by withdrawing Motion No. 6, which muzzles the opposition and limits our rights as parliamentarians. That would be far more meaningful as a concrete gesture than any empty rhetoric the Liberals could spew here today.

Some concrete action needs to come from this debate, and we must leave room for discussion. This morning the Minister of Health said that she hoped we would make a wise decision regarding Bill C-14. In order to do so, parliamentarians must be allowed to continue the discussion and debate.

Yesterday's incident occurred when the government was trying to curtail debate. It is the attitude that we saw this week that led to yesterday's actions. After the Prime Minister's apology, some Liberal MPs rose in the House to make light of the situation.

In the House, we must not make light of acts of violence and bullying. Yesterday, when I compared what happened to other acts of violence, that is exactly what I wanted to convey. We must not make light of acts of violence and bullying, no matter where they are committed. This belief must be very clear in everything that is said in the House.

We have the privilege of representing citizens. Consequently, we must rise above what we witnessed yesterday. Since yesterday, I have heard people say that we have to put things into context. The context and the facts are very clear, though, and we must not try to make light of them. It is important that there be very clear consequences for yesterday's actions. The best thing that the government could do about this incident is withdraw Motion No. 6.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to most of those comments while eating my lunch, and then I came back in here because I felt it was very important that we actually discuss this.

First, the member quoted many members of Parliament, but she did not actually quote the member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

Yesterday, I was sitting in this House and I said to my friend from New Brunswick Southwest, who is a member of the government, that I had to leave and take an adult timeout. I am a 45-year-old woman, similar in age to the Prime Minister. As an adult, I recognized that I was losing my cool, that I was not happy with the way things were going in the House. Therefore, I took a stance, removed myself from the House, had a breath of fresh air, and came back in.

I did watch what the Prime Minister did yesterday. Actually he and I had some words. Because I feel I can communicate with many members, I said to him that I saw the anger. That is something we have to look at. He is the leader of our country. He needs to be the leader of all Canadians. What I saw last night on Twitter was absolutely disgusting. I saw that the NDP member who had been hit—yes, by accident; I do agree it was an accident—was not just victimized about being hit, but her integrity was totally thrown overboard. No one really cared. They were saying that she was a drama queen, and this and that. That is not what this is about. Although I have great respect for the member for Hull—Aylmer, with respect to his comments about this being a soccer match, yes, it was a soccer match, and our Prime Minister should have been given a red card. His actions were out of line.

When I am not a member of Parliament, I am a mother of five children. I, too, have had to learn to take an adult timeout. The Prime Minister felt that he needed to go over there and say, “We need to do this”. He is not the king of the castle. We are members of Parliament and we need to all work together. If I as the member for Elgin—Middlesex—London recognized that things were getting out of hand, why could he not sit back, allow things to take place, and act as an adult, rather than interfering in something that he had no business interfering in, which resulted in where we are today? We can talk about wanting to talk about Bill C-14, because we all do, but unfortunately because of what happened we cannot, and those actions must be discussed.

[Brigitte Sansoucy, NDP, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Mr. Speaker, before I speak to the topic we are discussing this morning, I want to remind the minister that we are not debating Bill C-14 because of the government's actions and the Prime Minister's behaviour yesterday.

I agree with the minister that our life experiences shape how we deal with those around us. I commend her for saying that we must be respectful in our behaviour toward the people around us and in how we deal with others.

What really got to me in the exchange we had yesterday after the Prime Minister apologized was that a number of his Liberal colleagues rose to downplay violence and bullying. They even put part of the blame on the person who was subjected to this violence and bullying.

I would like her to talk about her contribution. What will she do to ensure that her colleagues no longer downplay violence and bullying?

[Jane Philpott, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for echoing my remarks about the very positive tone that we have had in this House on a number of occasions. I think it has set a good standard for us, a standard that hopefully we can learn to aspire to on a daily basis.

I look forward to hearing the hon. member's speech. I agree with her that we need to move forward as quickly as possible to discuss the important matter of Bill C-14. I will remind the hon. member that we have already had, I believe close to 24 hours of debate on the matter of Bill C-14 in this House. I know that there are more comments to come. I have enjoyed many conversations with my colleagues on all sides of this House about the matter, and I hope that we will soon be able to resume that discussion.

[Jane Philpott, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will abbreviate my further comments out of respect for my colleague. I simply want the House to understand, and to make a request, that we consider making wise decisions with respect to when it is appropriate for us to move on to debating the important legislation before us.

The only other point I want to add is that, on the one hand, I want to ensure that access is available and, on the other hand, we have a real responsibility to face that if that legislative framework is not in place in due time, there will not be adequate safeguards to protect Canadians.

I know that my colleagues opposite are concerned about that. I hope we can move forward on the debate of Bill C-14 as soon as possible, which I think is so important.

I will respectfully respond to questions in very short order. I am thankful for this opportunity to speak.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I find it very disappointing. On a day when we are speaking about something that is extremely important, the first time in Canadian history that a prime minister has been accused of something like this, and the Minister of Health is talking about Bill C-14. There are some relevancy questions here, and I would appreciate if she would bring this back to the topic we are talking about, which is the actions of the Prime Minister, not Bill C-14.

[Jane Philpott, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak this morning.

As members may know, I arrived in this House just over six months ago, along with many members here, as a representative for the first time. I represent the wonderful riding of Markham—Stouffville. It is a great honour to have the opportunity that we all have to represent the people of our own constituencies.

In that six months, I have learned a great deal from colleagues around this House. I have learned a great deal about parliamentary procedure, and I continue to learn on that matter. I have been encouraged by the professionalism and the high level of debate and discussion on issues that are so fundamentally important to Canadians.

I think about the times that I have spent in this House in that short time. One of the outstanding memories is of the evening that we sat late into the night on an emergency debate about suicide and mental health issues in indigenous communities. I remember hearing members who were moved to tears as they spoke, and seeing other members who were moved to tears as they listened to the comments that were made from all sides of the House of Commons. That was a proud evening for us as Canadians. We have debated so much important legislation, and we know that the things we talk about and the decisions we make in this House will have a fundamental influence on the lives of Canadians.

This has been a particularly challenging week for us all. It has been a week full of emotion. I certainly have had a span of emotions myself. We have had some real struggles together, and we have debated some very serious issues. Every single day, we, as parliamentarians in this House, need to live up to the expectations and the responsibility that we have to the people of Canada, the people we represent. Every day, we are put to the test to meet that challenge in the best way we can.

Today, I heard our Prime Minister deliver sincere apologies for what transpired yesterday, and that was the right course of action. To the members who have been hurt by the incident, I want to empathize and express my sincere concern for them. I trust that any comments that I or others make today would never in any way diminish the feelings of hurt that they have expressed.

We all have different experiences that we bring to the table and to this position. As a result, we experience events in our own unique and personal ways. In my life, I have had the tremendous privilege of working as a family physician. I spent almost 10 years working in sub-Saharan Africa, and then over 17 years working as a family doctor here in Ontario. I have had the privilege of being with people in some of the most vulnerable moments of their lives. I have sat with people as they have been challenged with facing recovery from illness and disability. I have seen so much generosity and so much strength of spirit and human character.

I have seen those same kinds of qualities here in this House. I have seen strength of character. I have seen resilience. I have seen compassion. I hope that, for my part, I will always be able to remain respectful and to enter into that level of conversation with members of this House. I hope that fellow members here have felt that I have provided genuine answers to sometimes challenging questions to the best of my ability during question period, and that I have endeavoured to enter into meaningful debate on these substantive matters. I have attempted to do this with respect for my colleagues and with an attempt to avoid untoward language. I hope I have succeeded, but the evaluations of my colleagues and Canadians will be the evidence of that. This is how I will try to proceed in my role as a parliamentarian.

In the atmosphere of an emotional House of Commons that we are experiencing this week, I hope that we will all, as parliamentarians, reflect on and remember the millions of Canadians who are looking at our proceedings and who will review them. I recently had a conversation with one of my staff members, who recounted the experience he had watching question period with his 10-year-old son, a delightful young man whom I have met. His son said to him that they would never be allowed to talk that way in school. That was a striking comment to hear from a wise young man.

Regardless of what transpires in this chamber, each of us has the ability to manage our own conduct. We must hold ourselves to the highest standards, and I believe we are all going to try to do that. Some days are more challenging than others, but we need to remember that we are here to advance the interests of Canadians. We are here to wrestle with challenging issues. We are here to represent the voices and the diverse perspectives of our constituents.

There are some very important issues at hand that we are going to continue to focus on. We have one legislative bill that I have been particularly involved in that is before the House of Commons. It will continue to be a focus of mine for considerable time to come. We have a responsibility to ensure that we find the solutions to the challenges before us. I look forward to continuing dialogue with members on the work that we need to complete in very short order.

I am pleased that we are having this meaningful debate on an important issue right now. I look forward to hearing from my colleagues about their perspective on determining when it would be appropriate for us to move on to discussing other important matters in the House.

I have been thinking a lot about what our constituents expect of us. They expect us to lead in the House. They expect us to make important decisions and to make laws. We do that on the basis of representing the people who have elected us. We do that on the basis of consultation and seeking the very best scientific evidence we can find. We do it on the basis of sound judgment. I trust that our judgment will be deemed to be appropriate.

I want to specifically encourage members to consider some other work that we have before us in the days to come. I had the privilege of speaking to this in responding to questions yesterday, about why I believe it is so important that we try, as soon as is deemed appropriate, for us to move on to discussing the matter of Bill C-14. This is a matter that I have been deeply involved in and for which we have been under a deadline, a deadline that has put us all in a challenging situation.

The Supreme Court of Canada has asked us, the representatives of the people of Canada in the House, to put an appropriate legislative framework in place around medical assistance in dying. It has been a challenging task, and we have had to do it in a short time period. My concern is that we must meet that deadline if it is at all possible. The reason I am concerned is because we need to make sure that Canadians will have access to medical assistance in dying, as the Supreme Court has made clear that they should. If we do not have a legislative framework in place, my colleagues who are health professionals have expressed to me their concern that there would be very few medical practitioners and nurse practitioners who feel they have the appropriate framework in place to participate in medical assistance in dying.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Good morning. This is meeting number 23 of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs for the first session of the 42nd Parliament. This meeting is being held in public. Our first item of business is the proposed change in Standing Order 28(3) concerning the meeting time of the House in an emergency situation. Members received a note on the subject, and on page 3 of the note there's a motion for consideration. Members working from their iPads can find the note with the documents for today's meeting.

The second item, then, will be the drafting instructions for a report on the initiatives towards the family-friendly House of Commons, which will be in camera.

The next meeting would be on Tuesday, May 31. The acting clerk and law clerk will return to answer questions on the question of privilege concerning premature disclosure of the contents of Bill C-14.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question and for making the point. That is exactly what is wrong with the motion. It, essentially, enables the government to steamroll its own agenda without respect for the normal process of the House, both in debate and in the manner that the debates would be held. I appreciate his remarks.

The government has said that it offered extended hours of debate on Bill C-14, for example. However, he is quite right that those extended hours, which we refused then, before the motion was imposed, could now be imposed on the House so that members who wish to speak to, as I said, one of the most important pieces of legislation that will be considered in the House in our parliamentary lifetime would occur in the dark hours, in a marathon vote, which is obviously intended by the government as a way of talking out the clock.

I believe that if we are to truly respect this institution, if the government is to truly respect the role of an official opposition, it must respect the ability of all members of the House who wish to speak on important legislation to rise in their places and speak to the issues of the day.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

We've seen the government bring some legislation to the House already. Some of it has been moving through the House pretty quickly, some on important issues, whether it's Bill C-10 on the aerospace industry in Canada or Bill C-14 on medical assistance in dying. Those are issues that I think are quite worthy of study, and yet the legislation has been passing quickly.

We've heard from the President of the Treasury Board that when it comes to access, they need to do more study and they need to have a two-step process whereby they bring in a few changes and see how those go, and then there will be a more robust review process and, ultimately, maybe something looking like a final draft of the legislation in 2018.

In your opinion—I think you started to speak to this but maybe you can just elaborate—if the government wanted to sit down tomorrow and begin drafting legislation, is there sufficient information out there to start in the fall with a comprehensive reform of the Access to Information Act, or is this something that really needs more study? What do you think the government could gain in its two-step process, and how do the reforms they are talking about making in the immediate term really speak to anything that would come later in the more robust reform they are proposing for 2018?