Mr. Chairman, I have to say that I don't understand the submission just made by the honourable member. If what he seeks is to allow the victim to have a civil remedy, why would he wish to immunize the state sponsor that directly commits that act of terror from being held liable? It seems to me somewhat absurd to say, okay, we will go after the proxy of that state sponsor of terrorism, but if the state itself commits the act, it's immune. That simply does not make any sense.
This has nothing to do with judicial determination or executive acts. This has to do with the whole question of how you provide an effective civil remedy for victims of terror. That's what this is all about.
You have a choice here. You either say that the victim has a civil remedy only against the agent or proxy of the state committing the act of terror, or it has a remedy against the state itself when it directly commits the act of terror. Otherwise, you're going to have a situation here where it simply won't act through its proxies: it can be encouraged to commit the act of terror itself and then be immunized against any civil liability from the victim.
It just doesn't make sense. I don't understand what the member is saying in terms of.... We support the bill. We want to make it effective. We want the victim to have a civil remedy. We don't want it to be immunized under the State Immunity Act. It takes away with one hand what it gives with the other.
It just doesn't make sense. From their point of view--forget about me moving the amendment--this is something the government should see. This is something the government should propose, not something that I should have to come before this committee to do. Basically we want to support the legislation, but we want it to be effective and we want that victim to be able to have a civil remedy against its state perpetrator directly. That's all.