As I mentioned in my opening remarks, the United States has had similar legislation since 1959. I would note for the committee's benefit that in 1959 the Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress, both the House and the Senate. The party that is most closely aligned with organized labour in the United States was the one that brought in this legislation.
In addition to the United States, the U.K. has it, and Australia has a version, which their labour party is in the process of strengthening. It's there, but they are going to do more to strengthen it. I'm also told that it is present in Germany and France.
We talked about charities having to disclose for 35 years, since 1977, and it's had no appreciably negative impact on charities. If anything, I think you could persuasively argue that it's increased the confidence that Canadians have when they donate to charities, knowing that the money they're contributing is going for the purposes for which it was intended.
That's the precedent I look to. I've already noted that right now Canadian labour organizations affiliated with the U.S. union have to disclose. You can go to the U.S. Department of Labor website right now and look up the United Steelworkers in Canada and see their transactions over $5,000. Basically all the items that my bill outlines are what's currently being disclosed by Canadian labour organizations affiliated with the U.S. organization.
My rationale is, why have different playing fields? Why have some Canadian labour organizations required to provide a certain level of disclosure, and other labour organizations not?