They brought witnesses who spoke nothing of this issue. If this were the seminal issue, those witnesses would have spoken about it. They spoke nothing of it. I asked the government witnesses whether they had a problem with this bill. They shrugged; they didn't say a single word. So now, at clause-by-clause on a private member's bill, when the clock is ticking, they bring this forward, and suddenly they're accusing the opposition of not doing our work.
I would say that either the government had this information and withheld it from our committee, which I take as very serious, or they were incompetent and didn't know, which I find hard to believe.
When the member first raised this on Tuesday, I said that if there are problems, then I'm certainly open to amending the language. If the issue is restitution, we can deal with it. But I have not seen a single move from the members across at any point to try to amend language so that this can be addressed. They have obstructed, they have talked out the clock, and now they're in a position in which they know that if we continue to talk this out without amending the bill, it will go back to the House without any amendments. So if there is any issue of risk or liability, I would say it lies squarely on the shoulders of the parliamentary secretary for not bringing it to us in advance.
And it's certainly hard for me as a member on this committee to take it seriously. If this were the fundamental reason for opposition, it would have been raised as a fundamental reason for opposition. I heard none of that from Minister Kenney; I heard none of it from the government witnesses. I find it very unfortunate that when I made the offer.... And I made the offer in good faith. This is not my private member's bill; I have no stake in the bill whatsoever. If there's language that has to be amended, I'm willing to amend it. That's what we do at clause-by-clause. What we don't do at clause-by-clause is start waving around a paper saying that if we go forward in any way the end of the world is nigh.
I would like it on the record that if this member and his party were serious about this, they would stop the filibustering games, stop playing with the clauses, and go through it, and we can talk about language that would have to be amended in order to bring this forward. Otherwise, I say they've acted in bad faith.
If we continue to talk the clock out, this bill will go back to the House unaltered.