Excellent. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And here I was thinking I would have only about 15 minutes to discuss this motion, when in fact I will have a half an hour on Monday and another half an hour today. I appreciate that.
I think I have basically covered the whole issue by now. Within the last hour, I received from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice a document on section 4.1 of the Department of Justice Act. I don't know whether this document has been distributed to all my committee colleagues. That would probably be useful to those who are interested in those operations. I have not had the time to study the document in order to figure out whether it truly meets the objective of my motion. I am not convinced that this is a real response.
I may instead wish to go over the point raised by my colleague Mr. Rathgeber.
We distributed some information to explain a bit of what was behind this. Again, I would just stress the point that it is not to have a huge inquiry. My colleague talked about the sub judice concept, which is not the case, because it's not about touching the case that is in front of the tribunal. Maybe not all of us, but a lot of us parliamentarians have been made aware because of that case of the obligation from
section 4.1 of the Department of Justice Act. That obligation is also set out in the Statutory Instruments Act and various other documents, and it is part of our role as legislators.
My intention here is simply to suggest that we hold a meeting. I understand that the agenda of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights is very full, and it will become more so with the study of bills that will be introduced. That's why I have not set a deadline.
However, it would be a good idea to study the matter in subcommittee or standing committee, so that we can have the opportunity to talk to Department of Justice lawyers in order to understand—beyond the terminology of section 4.1—how that applies to real life. They could provide us with some examples—not necessarily discuss specific cases, but provide us with some idea. It's one thing to say that the minister must ensure that all the provisions of the bill are consistent with the Charter, but it's quite another to explain how the process works and what kind of verification takes place. There are experts on the topic.
I don't know whether it has to do with the fact that I'm interested in this issue, but I find that there are so many experts. Among other documents, I gave my colleague an article by Concordia University's Professor Kelly titled
“The Canadian Charter of Rights and the Minister of Justice: Weak-form Review within a Constitutional Charter of Rights”.
Such statements worry me. I tell myself that I will at least be able to look people in the eye, tell them that, beyond politics, tests to ensure compliance with constitutional legislation and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms are carried out diligently, and explain to them what's involved in the process. So we can move on to the next topic.