Citizenship and Immigration Committee on June 13th, 2013

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

At this point, I have.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Okay.

Mr. Weston, go ahead.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to start by acknowledging the great privilege it is to sit in this seat on a committee as part of the House of Commons.

So much of what you do in your position and what we do as parliamentarians in the pursuit of peace, order and good government is to balance competing interests. The competing interests we see here are, ironically, the right of a member to see his bill proceed in a normal process so that it is reviewed and receives the benefit of a substantive assessment, versus procedural fairness. In this case, the procedure threatens to suffocate the substance.

What we're arguing for here, Mr. Chair—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I'm sorry. Ignore my hand signals.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

It's okay.

I don't want to interrupt you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I apologize, Mr. Weston.

You have the floor.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Okay, no problem. We've been here for many, many hours, Chair, so a few extra minutes won't make a difference.

The proposal is to just breathe life into this private member's bill. As my colleague mentioned a few minutes ago, the right of a private member to bring a bill is something that all of us in the House need to protect and encourage. We need to make sure that our legislature is strong through the creativity and the genius that private members contribute when they do something like Mr. Shory has done by bringing this bill before us. After hours and hours of debate, which we would all concede has not necessarily been relevant to the substance of this bill, it's now time for us to look at making sure we can focus on just that.

I've seen a private member's bill through from the beginning to the end, and I know how many hundreds of hours might be contributed, how many stakeholders may have invested, how an MP may have consulted broadly within his riding and among the people who are affected.

In this case we have a member who is trying to speak to the importance of Canadian citizenship, the importance of peace and security within our borders. All of these things are threatened to be suffocated by a lack of opportunity for them to be reviewed by the House of Commons. I stood in the House quite recently to fight for the rights of members to do the type of thing that Mr. Shory has done, so I find it really ironic that any members of the House, in any party, would try to suffocate the substance of a bill through a procedure.

You're a lawyer, Mr. Chair, and you know that the courts are able to stop an action for want of prosecution, but at the same time judges are governed by a doctrine to keep alive the substance of a suit if they are able to do so. In this case what we're talking about is keeping alive the substance of a private member's bill, because if the amendment isn't passed, then the private member's bill will die. For all of those who have said in this committee that the private member's bill is really the result of third parties, government or otherwise, how ironic that is, because they are the same people who are threatening to rob the private member's bill of the real hearing, the hearing that comes in the House of Commons.

Mr. Chair, it's increasingly evident as we sit here that the time has come when we move ahead, we breathe life into this bill. We do what we can, not necessarily to pass it, but to give the bill the opportunity to be passed, to give the opportunity of legislators to reject it, but at least to make sure that the bill goes from life support into its healthy state that it needs to have in order for the debate to be fulsome, clear, and democratic, just the way Canadians want us to have a debate.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Mr. Weston.

Mr. Opitz has the floor.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This is a bill where my honourable friend has a right to have this on the floor. It deals with the Canadian Forces as well, and that's somewhere I have spent a great portion of my life, in serving not only in this country, but overseas, and in other places. When you have those experiences, Mr. Chair, you see first-hand the importance of a bill like this, because the Canadian Forces, as most recently seen in places like Afghanistan and places—

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

A point of order, Chair.

I believe that the member is speaking to the substance of the bill itself and not to the motion that is before us.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Okay.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Very well, Mr. Chair.

I was just leading up to explaining why this is a very important bill. We need to have those opportunities to bring it to the floor of the House so that all members of the House can examine the bill in its intimate detail and its component parts for the benefit of all Canadians, in particular, those witnesses who we had before us, like Bal Gupta, who is the chair of the Air India 182 Victims Families Association, and Maureen Basnicki, widow, and co-founder of the Canadian Coalition Against Terror. She, Mr. Gupta, and many others are victims, and they have a right to be heard. They have a right to have their testimony and points of view put before the House of Commons, as do all MPs on all sides of the House. It's the right of my honourable friend to have his private member's bill examined by all of his peers and voted on properly, and not held up by using various devices in order to keep it away from the light of day and from the light of the actual legislature, where all members of Parliament can fairly examine it, and then with their conscience, stand up and vote for or against it, Mr. Chair.

I believe that by doing so, my honourable friend's rights are curtailed in his ability to present a private member's bill that has the support of well over 83% of Canadians across the country. As well, there are those victims, Mr. Chair, who came before us to share their views on why the bill is important to them. It's why the bill is important to 83% of Canadians who collectively agree that this bill should be brought to the floor of the House of Commons, and in their view be passed by the House of Commons and brought into law. This would further protect them, Canadian families, and at the end of the day, help to stop the spread of victimization by people who would assault our way of life and our Canadian Forces, especially those who put their lives at risk every day not only in this country but in places abroad, Mr. Chair.

It's for those reasons, Mr. Chair, that I urge this committee to allow this extension, to allow this to pass, and allow this private member's bill to be brought to the floor of the House, and to allow all honourable members, who act on behalf of their constituents....

They are the same type of constituents I am now answering to. Where I once commanded troops, Mr. Chair, I now have over 113,000 constituents I answer to. I answer to them every day. They would want to see this private member's bill make it to the floor of the House of Commons to be debated there and voted on, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Mr. Menegakis has the floor.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Chair, I really welcome the opportunity to have a moment or two to speak in favour of this extension, in favour of the motion.

We are not actually speaking about the bill itself. What we are asking for is an extension of 30 days to allow for the appropriate period of time for debate on Mr. Shory's Bill C-425. He has made it abundantly clear from the outset that he would welcome all amendments. We have before us a number of amendments that require an extension of 30 days so that they can be properly debated, reviewed, and ultimately voted on.

I don't want to be repetitive with what my colleagues have already said, but as you know, Mr. Chair, there are a limited number of opportunities for a member of Parliament to put forward a private member's bill. This is one which Mr. Shory felt very strongly about and for which he openly solicited recommendations as to how he could make it better. I believe allowing just 30 days is giving the proper time and respect to Mr. Shory's bill so that he has the opportunity to put forth a piece of legislation which over 82% or 83% of Canadians agree with.

I don't want to get off the topic of discussion at the moment as we are only discussing the motion of a 30-day extension. Without delving into the substance of the bill itself, I think it is incumbent upon us as members of the citizen and immigration committee, and I appeal to all members on all sides in this committee and in this House, to allow an additional 30 days so that we can properly review, discuss, and ultimately exercise our right to vote on this piece of legislation, including its amendments. I think it is only fair. Any suggestion to the contrary would certainly, in my opinion, be putting procedure over substance, as Mr. Weston so eloquently put it. There is a lot of substance here that needs to be discussed and reviewed for its merit. Thirty days will allow that opportunity to happen.

Mr. Chair, I will conclude simply by saying that I am in full support of this extension as it respects the honourable member's wishes, the sponsor of this bill's wishes to move forward with this very important piece of legislation.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Mr. Menegakis.

Ms. James has the floor.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome back to our committee.

I have to say this is the first time in a week that I've actually had the option to be put on a list to speak to the original motion, because of what we experienced last week. I appreciate having the opportunity today, finally.

I have to tell you, when I was elected on May 2, 2011, I was elected by the law-abiding Canadian taxpayers in my riding. I was not elected by those who would seek to commit acts of terrorism. I have to tell you that—

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

A point of order, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

A point of order, Ms. Sims.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

It's the reference to terrorism and how it fits into what we're here to discuss right now, which is an extension, and with the contents of what's in Mr. Shory's bill. We're here on the main motion, and to start talking about terrorism I think is inappropriate and out of line.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Well, it's on the main motion.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

There is no reference in Mr. Shory's bill to terrorism.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

You're absolutely right, Ms. Sims.

She's right, Ms. James.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I wanted to let Ms. Sims know that when I was mentioning terrorism I was not making mention of it in reference to this bill specifically. I was trying to make the point that I'm here representing my constituents of Scarborough Centre. I want to point out that this particular bill, Bill C-425, has garnered more interest from my constituents than many of the other bills that we have done in this committee.

I actually highlighted it in my newsletter recently, and I received positive feedback on this particular bill. The resounding comments from my constituents were that they absolutely approved of this bill and they wanted it to go further. I have to let you know as well that almost a year ago our government cracked down on residency fraud—

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, I don't understand the relevance of the point the member is making. My understanding is that we're talking about the motion for a request for a 30-day extension. My colleague Ms. James is talking about things that her government has done on public safety, things that different constituents wrote to her about, saying they liked them. I don't see the links whatsoever.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, may I continue, please? Again, this is the first opportunity I've had to speak, so—