Thank you very much for the question.
I agree wholeheartedly with you that this is a very emotional issue. It's also a very troubling one. I know there are few things I value as much as my Canadian citizenship. It's a great privilege to be Canadian, and it's certainly not something I would ever want to lose or have in jeopardy. That's why we've taken such strong clear action to help these individuals where there is doubt, whether it's the border babies or the war brides or people who have failed to retain their citizenship. But I think that with the privilege of Canadian citizenship come responsibilities as well.
I believe that if one is far enough removed that one doesn't have an attachment to Canada, or one doesn't have any meaningful relationship with Canada, I'm not sure that—Let's say someone is third generation—two generations, they and their parents—neither of whom has ever set foot in this country or made any contribution to the country. I'm not sure that by the third generation they have any real interest, other than perhaps the convenience of being Canadian. That's why we're proposing to limit it to the first generation born abroad. Otherwise, we would be devaluing Canadian citizenship.
The proposals that I'm looking to put into legislation for the fall do not, by the way, preclude any input from this committee. I would welcome it if the report can be presented and there's unanimous agreement on it prior to the tabling of the legislation. I'm always willing to make it better, if that's possible. But in the absence of such a report, I felt it was important to act, that we take action to correct as many of these situations as possible, as readily as possible and as soon as possible. That way we can avoid the problem for people in the future, and that's why we're doing this. It will not help everybody, there's no question about that, but it certainly will help the vast majority of the cases with which we've had to deal and most of the witnesses who have appeared before this committee on this issue.