Oh, very good. Thank you. I don't think I'm going to need to take all of colleagues' minute-and-a-halfs.
I do want to make one or two comments. The first is that we did hear evidence from Theresa McClenaghan of the Canadian Environmental Law Association--I practised alongside her in Waterloo region for many years--and also Professor Stewart Elgie of the University of Ottawa. Although I did not agree with much of what they said, they did get it right on at least this point--namely, that the information rights referred to exist under other broad federal access to information provisions.
You can see that for Professor Elgie in the blues of October 27, 2010. Theresa McClenaghan appears in the blues for November 1, 2010.
But one thing they did miss...and I almost missed it, actually, until I read this section again carefully. As I said the other day, every time look at this section I see some new time bomb waiting to explode.
Mr. Armstrong mentioned that the government may have to reveal to Canadians negotiating positions. It's even worse than that. If you look closely at clause 10, you will see that it begins by referencing “the protection of the environmental rights of residents of Canada and entities”. As we know from the definitions section, an entity doesn't have to be a resident of Canada; it can be any foreign agent that opens an office in Canada.
This clause then goes on to say that we have to make “such information available to the public”. I'm not a judge, but if I were, I would assume, in interpreting the word “public”, that I'd be going back to the beginning words of the clause, where it includes not only residents of Canada but also entities.
So probably for the very first time in history, this act would give the right to foreign agents to directly access the negotiating positions of the Canadian government in environmental matters at least.
Maybe it'll turn out that way, maybe not, but I think that's another one of these little time bombs that this act contains. We'll all look forward in ensuing years to see whether it's an unfortunate Conservative government or an unfortunate Liberal government that has to deal with these little time bombs, if this act is enacted.
Thank you.