Okay.
Again, this goes back to what I mentioned earlier when we said that this was going to be an issue back when we were discussing that very important piece of legislation. We agreed to the principles. We agreed with the vision. We agreed with everything in that UN declaration and the implementation legislation.
What we had an issue with was the definition, or lack thereof, of “free, prior and informed consent”, and we knew this was going to be a problem—maybe not right away but maybe years down the road. Sure enough, as I said earlier, Bill C-53 came along. Because that was not defined—and we heard it many times as witness testimony—nobody was really clear on what was going on.
I agree with Mr. Zimmer. We could be sending this into a battle in the courts at some point because a bunch of things, important terms, are not defined, especially “free, prior and informed consent”.
Again, I go back to Bill C-53. There are groups threatening court action on Bill C-53. I know it's in limbo right now, but at the same time, there are groups threatening court action. Why? It's because it was not defined at the time. We did not do our work. Of course, it was rushed through by the other parties. Nobody wanted to take the time to get it right.
Again, we're having major issues with some definitions. I would like to know, hopefully—or get a sign from someone in the room—that we will be getting to a definition at some point so that we know exactly what it is we are talking about, not some aspirational document that doesn't really define what source water protection zones are or what a protection zone is or what source water is. This is a piece of legislation that is severely lacking if we don't do our work here—absolutely severely lacking.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.