Bill S-3 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Indian Act in response to the Superior Court of Quebec decision in Descheneaux c. Canada (Procureur général)

This enactment amends the Indian Act to provide new entitlements to registration in the Indian Register in response to the decision in Descheneaux c. Canada (Procureur général) that was rendered by the Superior Court of Quebec on August 3, 2015, and to provide that the persons who become so entitled also have the right to have their name entered in a Band List maintained by the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. This enactment requires the Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs to initiate consultations on issues related to registration and band membership and to conduct reviews on sex-based inequities under the Indian Act, and to report to Parliament on those activities.

Indigenous Affairs

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations]

Mr. Speaker, gender equality is a fundamental human right, and Bill S-3 eliminates sex-based discrimination from the Indian Act.

Ministerial special representative Claudette Dumont-Smith and departmental officials have held over 200 engagement sessions with communities and have received over 100 consultation reports from our partners on Indian Act registration reform, including recommendations for an implementation plan to remove the 1951 cut-off. She is currently finalizing her report. We look forward to her final recommendations, and I will be reporting to Parliament within the next couple—

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, provisions in Bill S-3 would eliminate the discrimination against first nations women and their descendants once and for all. All that is needed is for this self-proclaimed feminist Prime Minister to bring those provisions into force with an order in council. It has been 18 months since this bill passed, and there is still no action.

Will the Prime Minister get on with it and immediately enact recommendation 1.3 of the calls for justice so that the 270,000 first nations women and their descendants can finally be free of this sex-based discrimination?

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, the NDP sought to actually strike out every one of those provisions within Bill C-97 that undermine the refugee determination process. Witnesses at the committee were clear in saying that it was beyond fixing. That is what we did and the government failed to listen.

Back to Bill S-3, why has the Prime Minister, who claims that he is a feminist, not taken action to eliminate sex-based discrimination against indigenous people? It has been 18 months. All the government needs to do is to bring in an OIC to enact that, yet it has not done anything with respect to that. Where is the feminist Prime Minister who says that indigenous peoples and reconciliation is the number one priority? Where is the real action?

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the government appears set to ram through damaging changes to Canada's refugee determination system through the omnibus budget bill. Despite his self-proclaimed title of feminist, the Prime Minister has shown time and again that when push comes to shove, he will toss the ideals he claims to hold so dearly to the side for political gain.

Despite running on a promise to include gender-based analysis plus for all policies, we learned in February that fewer than half of government agencies and departments have a gender-based analysis plus plan. We certainly know that there was no gender-based analysis plus done on these changes hidden in the budget. If there had been, these provisions would not have been buried in Bill C-97. That is why 46 women's organizations from across Canada wrote an open letter to the Prime Minister to call out the fake feminism and identify the danger the changes will put already vulnerable women and girls fleeing gender-based violence in.

This is not the only time the Prime Minister and the Liberal government have, without hesitation, moved away from their self-professed titles and claims when politically convenient.

Bill S-3, an act to amend the Indian Act in response to the Superior Court of Quebec decision in Descheneaux v. Canada, received royal assent on December 12, 2017. Despite being in law nearly 18 months, the government has failed to bring into force all its provisions. This has allowed sex-based discrimination in the Indian Act to continue, and it is entirely unacceptable.

On May 15, the leader of the NDP and member for Burnaby South rose in the House to seek unanimous consent for a motion calling on the government to bring into force the remaining provisions in Bill S-3 to remedy this situation prior to June 21, 2019. It is absolutely astounding to me that it appeared that the government members in this place did not support that motion. Perhaps the politics of the day once again meant that those feminist ideals needed to be cast aside.

Yesterday Canada had a historic moment. The final report on missing and murdered indigenous women and girls was made public and provided to the Prime Minister. This historic report lays out a path for transformative justice for indigenous women and girls to, as the title states, “Reclaim Power and Place”. Within the report are 231 calls for justice.

Call for justice 1.2 reads:

We call upon all governments, with the full participation of Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people, to immediately implement and fully comply with all relevant rights instruments, including but not limited to:...All the recommendations of the 2015 UN CEDAW Inquiry Report and cooperation with the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women on all follow-up procedures.

That UN report recommends quite clearly the following: “To amend the Indian Act to eliminate discrimination against women”.

Bill S-3 has received royal assent, and the UN has called on Canada to do this work. The NDP has pressed the government to do this work, and now the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls report is calling on the government to do this work. Is it not time for the government to do what is right and eliminate sex-based discrimination against indigenous women once and for all?

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

I am the vice-chair of the indigenous committee. I know my colleague Mr. Kmiec has spoken to this particular section, but I want to reiterate that this is a significant change, when you take a long-standing government structure and create two new structures.

As he indicated, we specifically asked for witnesses to speak to this particular issue. We also asked the officials if there were any issues or concerns. I refer to Bill S-3, where we asked if there were any issues or concerns.

Once we had witnesses, we soon realized that this particular bill was a mess. I am very concerned that the government has embedded in an omnibus budget bill—something that they promised they would never do—something that is significant and that came to our committee. The Liberal members voted down the ability to have additional stakeholders as witnesses to talk about what was happening. Do you know what? Now we find some problems with the bill, and this is probably one of many problems that are going to be identified because of the sloppy process.

Presence in Gallery

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

There have been talks among the parties, and I am very hopeful that if you seek it, you will find unanimous consent for the following motion: That in light of the decision made by the United Nations Human Rights Committee on January 11, 2019, which ruled that the ongoing sex-based hierarchies in the registration provisions of the Indian Act violate Canada's international human rights obligations, this House calls upon the federal government to bring into force the remaining provisions of Bill S-3, an act to amend the Indian Act in response to the Superior Court of Quebec decision in Descheneaux v. Canada, which would remedy the discrimination no later than June 21, 2019.

[Robert-Falcon Ouellette, Liberal, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you. It's just a really interesting aspect.

I'm kind of confused. You've come and given testimony that—I wrote it down—it's not distinctions-based, yet we had the Inuit who say it's distinctions-based. We had the Métis who say it's distinctions-based and the first nations that feel it's distinctions-based.

Also, then, we talk in the court cases about how we're trying to look at the Métis receiving services as well and whether they shouldn't, and then we now have Bill S-3. This is in flux. From a lot of the testimony we've heard, this is just a first step of where we're trying to go.

We heard lawyers, constitutional lawyers, previous to this. I can list off the names. I wrote down all their testimony here. Is this not just an ability to move in a way forward and trying to come up with a better path forward to give indigenous communities control? Even under clause 22, it says literally.... I'm sorry. It's clause 18 and then there's clause 22, which that says that all indigenous laws take precedence if there's a conflict. If there is an indigenous nation—Treaty No. 1 territory, Treaty No. 4 territory—that decides to pass legislation, then, under subclauses 22(1) and 22(3), their jurisdiction takes precedence over federal or provincial law. It's written right there.

[Dr. Pamela D. Palmater]

Fair point. However, you have to keep in mind how many non-compliance orders were issued after that decision by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal—seven, I think—and they're still in court debating whether this is going to apply to all kids, especially under Jordan's principle.

Right now, the legal issue is the federal government not providing Jordan's principle funding to non-status Indian kids who should in fact be status but for the ongoing discrimination in Bill S-3.

You have multiple acts that are working together to disadvantage, so that would be hard.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the officials.

I want to put on the record that this piece of legislation is buried in an omnibus bill. The finance committee so far has heard from over 100 witnesses. They have not had any opportunity to look at this particular aspect of it or bring in witnesses regarding that piece. We asked this committee to have one extra hour so we would have an opportunity to bring some witnesses other than department officials. I want to note that the committee refused to take one extra hour to bring in some organizations that might be impacted by this legislation, to get a sense from them of what's happening and how it's happening.

I want to compare that to Bill S-3, which was a stand-alone piece of legislation. When the officials came to us, they guaranteed that everything was fine. I'm hearing today that everything is fine without the opportunity to have witnesses. We heard through our witnesses that there were flaws. Amendments were needed. We are very uncomfortable with both the process and the fact that there has not been any ability for our committee to give it due scrutiny. Certainly philosophically we believe that the separation of the departments is a good move. The fact that we are not able to do our jobs is, I think, quite shameful.

I know that's not your responsibility. It was the decision of the current government to do what they said they weren't going to do: bury things in omnibus legislation and not allow committees to do the work they were supposed to do. When issues are pointed out down the road I think we can come back to not allowing proper process.

I'm going to start with a quick question. Hopefully you have it right there.

The FTEs for the two departments with health, pre the change, and the FTEs now.... Again, I want a combined total; it should be at your fingertips, including health because we acknowledge the transfer.

[Judy Hughes, President, Saskatchewan Aboriginal Women's Circle Corporation]

Tanshi and good morning, Madam Chair Mihychuk, committee members, elders and colleagues.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify on Bill C-92. My name is Judy Hughes. I am a Métis citizen and I am the president of Saskatchewan Aboriginal Women's Circle Corporation, out of Saskatchewan, of course.

I appreciate the opportunity to gather on the unceded and unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin people.

Meegwetch to Georgina Jolibois for recognizing that SAWCC needed a voice at this table. We had to corner her in Meadow Lake, but we got it.

The Saskatchewan Aboriginal Women's Circle Corporation is the provincial not-for-profit voluntary indigenous women's organization. We're celebrating 16 years of providing programs and resources in education, advocacy, research and economic opportunities to all nations of indigenous women, their families and the LGBTQ2S+ community.

Our governance includes a provincial president, directors from the six regions of Saskatchewan, a kokum and a youth advocate. SAWCC is one of the 13 provincial-territorial member associations, or PTMAs, of the Native Women's Association of Canada, which is the largest indigenous women's organization in Canada and boasts a PTMA in every province and territory of Canada.

My comments today are specific to all Métis children and families. Our children are our essence of being. Who will be administering the services and the funds? I'm thinking about the jurisdictional gap that may arise if services are only provided to members of one Métis national organization or government.

How are Métis children going to be identified? I do not want any Métis child left out, as it is with status first nations with Bill S-3, where people are put into categories and then it's decided whether or not they deserve a service. Not all of us are members of the Métis National Council, or in Saskatchewan, Métis Nation Saskatchewan. It's our choice whether we want to be part of that organization. I'm not saying anything negative about it, but it's our choice.

As an example, someone who is not a member of those organizations, such as my niece who has autism, would not be able to, and cannot, access any services that are provided by them, because her mom and dad choose not to be registered members.

It is long overdue for us, as Métis citizens, to have an opportunity to build our child and family services from a blank page and do it right. Why? Because, from my perspective, there is nothing more beautiful than our Métis values, teachings, cultures, language, protocols and ways of being. It would be free of all this systemic discrimination that we find in all of the institutions in Canada.

Growing up, I wasn't able to exercise my right to practise and be proud of my Métis culture. Because of this discrimination, we were forced to pass ourselves off as white. In my younger days, which was quite a few decades ago, I lived in a mixed community of people who were considered white, half-breed and Indian. That's in Bertwell, Saskatchewan, on Highway 23. I was called a “koo-bah squaw” in school. This referred to my being of Ukrainian and Dene heritage.

Regarding Bill C-92, what I see as a significant limitation is that it is missing the voices of the women of many nations—the grandmothers, the kokums. We know that boys and girls have different needs and we want to put it on the record that culturally appropriate gender-based analysis still needs to be done on any legislation, programs and services.

The Métis citizens of Saskatchewan deserve time to understand the implications of Bill C-92, if the legislation passes, and also, the patriarchal approach needs to change. We need to do more research on successful child and family models, and we do have one with the Manitoba Metis Federation model established in 1982, which I think is quite successful. We need more communication and we need to involve the matriarchs.

We have abilities within our communities to develop and implement legislation and reparation programs, versus a top-down, “Here, this is in your best interests” approach. We need to be the ones saying, “This is in the best interests of our children.”

We need partnerships with all levels of government. We're willing to work with all levels of government, including our own indigenous governments, and Canada must be willing to enter into a sincere working relationship with us.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child said that every child has every right, and we must ensure that every Métis child has every right.

Meegwetch. Thank you for listening.

Indigenous Languages Act

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

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to stand and speak to Bill C-91, the indigenous languages act, at third reading.

It is important for people who might be watching to note that we just had a vote at report stage, and there was unanimous support in this House to move this bill forward. That in itself speaks to how important this particular bill is.

Having said that we see it is important to move the bill forward, the expression “The pursuit of perfection often impedes improvement” is very appropriate. This is by no means a perfect bill. There are many things that will still be looked at in more detail in the Senate. I certainly perceive that we will be seeing more amendments coming forward. It was seen as a really important step. It was seen as something that we should all support, at least as a movement in the right direction. It is an improvement, for sure, but does it get us where we need to go? Absolutely not.

I was just talking to my colleague, who was at a dinner last night with the ambassador for New Zealand. There was a delegation here from New Zealand. I understand there was some drumming and a welcome in Cree at this particular dinner. What was more interesting was when he described to me how the entire delegation that came, MPs from all parties, spent over a minute or so talking in Maori. All the people in that delegation had some grasp of the indigenous language of that country.

I thought that was a very interesting story. I know we have a few indigenous language speakers in this Parliament, but we are a significantly long way from anything that resembles what my colleague described. Obviously, with its many languages and their many dialects, Canada is in a very different position.

This bill is important. Many witnesses came to the heritage committee and shared how vital the protection and revitalization of languages was for them. As they spoke, they shared research in terms of the importance of language; they shared lived experiences, and they shared suggestions for how we could make this bill better. I would like to thank them all for taking that time to come to committee to share their thoughts about this bill. We know that some of the suggestions were taken into account. At this time, others would be difficult. This needs to be an evolving process; it needs to be a bit of a living tree, and it is certainly a framework.

To go back a little, in the debate at second reading I shared a personal story. I would like to share another story in terms of what I witnessed back in the 1980s: elders who were very fluent in their language at that time, and how destructive some of the government policies had been, not only in terms of the residential schools and the loss of language.

I can remember visiting an elder who was very fluent in her language and being told that I was not supposed to visit this elder because she was no longer one of them. She had married a white person who had passed away. I thought that was strange, because she was of the community; she spoke the language and she was emblematic of the culture of the community. However, the government had decided she was no longer a status Indian, because she had married a white person who had since passed away. She could not ever retrieve that status.

It was a really unusual circumstance. That was one of the first times I saw the impact of government policies. As a nurse I was not supposed to visit an elder, because at the time I was called “the Indian nurse” and in the communities I was allowed to be responsible only for people who were status Indians. We all ignored those rules, and those rules certainly made no sense.

If we look at all the elders at the time and their fluency in speaking and we compare them with the children who had returned home from the residential schools, who at that time were in their fifties and sixties, we would see that very few of them could converse well with their parents with the language skills they had, and many of the elders were very limited in their English. Imagine how difficult that was for the communities.

To look back, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was part of the 2007 Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, which recognized that the school system had a profound, lasting and damaging impact on aboriginal culture, heritage and language. At that time, the Right Hon. Stephen Harper and the previous Conservative government acknowledged these harms and delivered a formal apology in the House of Commons to the former students and their families and communities for Canada's role in the operation of these schools.

Again, this was a time when Parliament came together. We were government and we delivered the apology, but I remember NDP members were instrumental in that and I also know that the Liberals welcomed that particular day.

At the time, he said:

The Government of Canada built an educational system in which very young children were often forcibly removed from their homes and often taken far away from their communities.

Many were inadequately fed, clothed and housed. All were deprived of the care and nurturing of their parents, grandparents and communities.

First nations, Inuit and Métis languages and cultural practices were prohibited in these schools.

Tragically, some of these children died while attending residential schools, and others never returned home.

The government now recognizes that the consequences of the Indian residential schools policy were profoundly negative and that this policy has had a lasting and damaging impact on aboriginal culture, heritage and language.

As we all know, the commission did its work across this country and delivered its calls to action. Calls to action Nos. 13, 14 and 15 specifically looked at the issue of language, and that is part of the reason we are seeing unanimous consensus in the House to move forward with this bill.

This is an important bill. We have said it is not perfect. I am going to talk about some of the challenges and concerns that I continue to have about the technical pieces of the bill, as opposed to the more aspirational component.

My number one concern is about something I have never seen before in all my time as a parliamentarian. Committees hear from witnesses, who make suggestions. Then we have the opportunity propose amendments to the legislation to improve it or to fix errors. Amendments typically are introduced in time for all members of the committee to reflect on them and make decisions about whether these amendments make sense, where they are supportable, or whether they might have other implications.

We went through that process. Many amendments were submitted. They were submitted from independent members as well, and there was a good opportunity to reflect on what those amendments would mean in the context of the whole bill. Then there was clause-by-clause consideration, when we looked at the clauses as they existed and the amendments that were proposed.

The current government table-dropped 23 amendments. In all of my time as a parliamentarian, in considering many bills in clause-by-clause study, I have seen independents table-drop amendments and other parties have table-dropped amendments, but I have never, ever seen a government having to drop 23 amendments to its own bill with no time for consideration. Essentially, we had to make a decision on the spot, on the fly, in terms of the ramifications of these amendments.

That is what I consider to be an incredibly sloppy practice, and it is a serious concern. As the Senate looks at this amended bill, I am hoping that it will be able to catch any challenges that were left there as a result.

The other thing that is particularly interesting about the bill is something that Canadians might not be as aware of. There are two bills before this Parliament that are in some ways partner bills. One is the bill we are talking about today, and the other is Bill C-92, which is the indigenous child welfare legislation. In both these bills—and for the first time ever, as was confirmed by Ms. Laurie Sargent from the Department of Justice—Parliament has decided to speak to the recognition of section 35 rights in legislation, as opposed to going through a court system.

As Conservatives, we have often said that we should be the ones legislating and the courts should be interpreting. To some degree it is very appropriate that in consultation and collaboration with indigenous peoples in this country, we try to do some work in relation to section 35 rights.

The unanswered question is still about our Constitution, which is absolutely a work that includes our provinces and territories. For the federal government to be addressing section 35 in a language bill makes sense, because it is not going to impose on the provinces; however, in Bill C-92, the child welfare bill, the government is again defining some section 35 rights but is also going to be asserting to the provinces some paramountcy. It has been unwilling, so far, to talk to the provinces about that. When we are talking about putting some definition to some issues in the Constitution, not having conversations with the provinces is going to lead the government to some real challenges, particularly in the next piece of legislation we are going to be debating. I am very concerned that the government has taken such an approach.

I do not think I have ever seen things so bad in my time as a parliamentarian in terms of provincial-federal relationships. Things seem to have broken down, and I hope we can retrieve the situation. To propose legislation on which conversations have not even been had with the provinces is a challenge we need to deal with.

As I was going back in my notes, I noticed another interesting thing. This bill was originally tabled on February 5. At that time, the Minister of Heritage gave his speech, and I congratulated him on his speech and on this particular piece of legislation. However, February 5 was a very interesting date: it was the day a Globe and Mail article gave the first inkling of the SNC-Lavalin scandal.

I can remember the article had just come out, and I asked the minister a question about that, of course, and for the next two months we never did get satisfactory answers to any of those questions. What we learned in that particular article and in the two months that came afterward was that the government speaks many fine words about its commitment to indigenous relations and reconciliation, but that far too often its actions fall far short of what is expected.

I know that the former attorney general of Canada, who is now sitting as an independent, feels particularly concerned about what the government is doing and where it is going in terms of its commitments and in terms of the indigenous file.

We also saw how willing they were to throw a female who was the first indigenous attorney general in Canada under the bus. How quickly they did that, just two months later, to someone who was well recognized and well respected. We need to call them out on that particular piece.

Bill S-3, a bill about gender equity, is another piece of legislation that was tabled in the House that is related to this file. We had department officials come to our meetings. It sounded as though they had responded to the court decision in a reasonable fashion, yet the first witnesses and then other witnesses were able to point out serious flaws in the bill that the department officials had not noted. The minister had said everything was fine and that the government was taking care of the court decision, but the bill was so bad that they had to pull it and go back to the starting point. Then they had to pass a flawed bill, and we have been hearing recently that there are still concerns that the issues around gender equity have not been resolved.

Those are my particular concerns over the legislation that the current government has tabled. We have Bill S-3, which was flawed and had be to be pulled back. We have Bill C-91, which required 22 amendments to be table-dropped. In the case of Bill C-92, there are only six weeks left in this Parliament. The Liberals made significant commitments that they have not been able to meet, so they are in a rush, and particularly with Bill C-92, the child welfare legislation, they are trying to rush things through.

When I started my speech, I talked about things not being perfect but moving in a good direction. However, there might come a time when, in the Liberals' rush to get things done, things will be so flawed that they will just have to backtrack, as with some of their other bills. Unfortunately, we will have to see if they can get through it in time.

In conclusion, it is heartening to see unanimous consent in this House. It is heartening to see the work that has been done, although it is only a step. I am optimistic that there will be new technologies. One of the witnesses talked about how artificial intelligence can help with some language preservation.

We need to work soon and we need to work hard, so we are very happy to support this bill in terms of moving it to the next step.

Status of Women

[Sheri Benson, NDP, Saskatoon West, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to join with first nations women's groups and first nations women across Canada to once again call on the government to end gender discrimination in the Indian Act.

For decades, the Government of Canada has been causing undue harm to first nations women by removing or denying their status simply because they are not first nations men. This past January, the United Nations Human Rights Committee said that Canada is still discriminating against first nations women and their descendants by denying first nations women the same entitlements under the Indian Act as first nations men. This discrimination causes women to be disconnected from their communities, breaks up families and causes greater disparity in the rights and benefits accorded to first nations women and men.

It is beyond the time for the government to act on the calls from first nations women and the organizations they represent. I call on the government to act immediately on Bill S-3 and do everything within its power to end the discrimination against first nations women in Canada.

Bill C-92—Time Allocation Motion

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

Mr. Speaker, there is a very appropriate quote, “Poor planning on your part does not necessitate an emergency on mine.” Perhaps we should say that the government's lack of planning should not constitute time allocation every time it is in a rush.

Whether it was Bill S-3, which had major flaws, or the indigenous children's language bill, for which the government had to table drop 20 amendments at clause-by-clause, Bill C-92 is another bill that will not get proper debate. The government is rushing it through the system because it just could not get it done.

Why is the government not willing to provide the appropriate time for us to identify what I am sure will be significant and major flaws in this legislation?

An Act Respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis Children, Youth and Families

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

Mr. Speaker, I hope that in their haste to move it through the system, they make sure that we have the opportunity to do our due diligence. As I indicated, with Bill S-3, we were reassured that it was going to fix the court-imposed decision. It was going to fix the issue that had been identified. However, it took only the first two or three witnesses before we saw that this would not fix the problem.

Again, we have an important piece of legislation in terms of what it needs to accomplish and what we should try to accomplish. Have they actually accomplished it? We will need to see.

Child and family services in the area we represent in terms of shared territory is a group that is doing a really good job, both on and off reserve. They have a partnership. They have been moving along. I see this legislation perhaps giving them the next nudge in terms of what they are doing and where they are going. However, we need to hear not just from chiefs and national organizations but from people on the ground who are delivering services to make sure that the bill would do what we want it to do.

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

Mr. Speaker, when we have heard the government proclaim in the past that it consulted properly, it has turned out to be an absolute mess. I look at Bill S-3 as an example. We can also look at the Trans Mountain pipeline. In this case, the Liberal government claimed that it would do a better job than the Conservatives had done and that it was going to do that job properly, and what happened? There was a court decision, and the Liberal government absolutely blew it.

Again, I will wait to hear what is said by the many groups at committee as they bring their expertise to the table and tell us what was done properly and what was done improperly. Forgive me if I do not have full confidence that the Liberals have actually done what they said they would do. It is because I have looked at their history in this Parliament in terms of their government's legislative and consultative process.