That was one of the questions raised by the Senate committee and we have an answer. We were not informed that there had been a problem with enforcement of the law because of it. You can rest assured on that point.
However, it really is about being precise when expressing the rule. The current text reads as follows: “...on production of a copy of the bankruptcy order or the assignment...the costs of seizure are a security...ranking ahead of any other security....”
The costs of seizure are not a security. A security is a legal tool used to guarantee something. The correct way to express the rule would therefore be “...the payment of the cost of seizure is secured by a security”. The present wording of the rule is colloquial. In our opinion, this is the type of proposal that belongs in this kind of exercise.
In fact, short of waiting for a complete revision, for example, of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act—when we could try to suggest this correction—there is no other way to do it. That is why we use this exercise to try to reformulate the rule to be enforced with a high degree of precision of language. The costs are not the security; it is the payment that can be secured by a security. That is the correct way to express it.