Thank you, Madam Chair.
When I think about this, and there have already been some suggestions about what could potentially get added to it, I guess that is the question in my mind. What are we talking about adding? What is the scope that we're trying to expand?
The problem, the big thing, about unknowns is that they create fear. We all know that in all kinds of different aspects of life. That's kind of what's happening here. We have a lot of unknowns. We don't know what it is exactly that is being asked of us, what kinds of things. We don't know where this could all end up going, so I'm curious to know some of the ideas. I don't know if it's possible to let me know, but where do you want to go? Where would the member want to go with this in terms of the scope? Are we talking about a whole bunch of things, or are we talking about one thing? What's happening there? I think that's something that's concerning to me.
I think, at the same time, it has also been mentioned today that we have many people who want to see this problem resolved, at least to some degree, and there have been so many attempts that did not succeed. Reference is made to people who are even in this room right now who have been working on this for a long time. This is a very important issue to them, as it is to all of us, and this is just a way to almost ensure that this isn't going to happen, that it's not going to work.
This is very concerning to me. I want to see this problem solved. Many people have worked very hard to make some progress on this issue, and I recognize that it's not going to be perfect. We're not going to, once and for all, solve every single problem, but I believe that, in some of the discussions we've had, there are some very good solutions to this legislation. Maybe tweak it a little bit within the scope of the legislation to ensure that it accomplishes what it was intended to do and that it doesn't have unintended consequences.
We heard a lot about unintended consequences from the witnesses who were here, and that certainly goes back to the senator's original intent. She very clearly stated that she did not want to create unintended consequences and create new groups of lost Canadians.
I've heard some of the discussions we've had. There are some good ideas to maybe patch a couple of holes in this, which I think we're all very capable of doing, so then we can solve at least this piece of the puzzle. It will maybe not be all the pieces in this go-around, but at least we can get it through, move it back to the House, have the Senate approve it and then it's done.
If we don't do that, it's going to just keep ping-ponging back and forth, as Tom said, and it won't get resolved.
Those are my thoughts, Madam Chair, at this time. Thank you.