Justice Committee on May 10th, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

That's what it would now say.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Well, no, it says “the manner in which to clearly specify”.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Mr. Chair, I can't propose subamendments, of course, but for linguistic purposes, we could replace the first “manner” with “way”, which wouldn't change the meaning and would read better.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Yes.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

You could just delete the words “which are to include the manner in which to”, so delete the phrase from the word “provided” and go straight to “clearly”.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

I'd like to move that subamendment.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

Before that happens, maybe we can replicate our success from earlier and take two minutes off-line, rather than going back and forth, subamendment after subamendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Yes, I think that would be great.

Do you want to walk over and see how you can clarify that, with Mr. Rankin included?

We'll take a one-minute break.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

I congratulate everyone, again, on the collaboration. Who is going to read it out?

Ms. Khalid.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Starting from the top, for clarity's sake: “The Minister of Health, in cooperation with representatives of the provincial governments responsible for health, may establish guidelines on the information to be included on death certificates in cases where medical assistance in dying has been provided, which include the way in which to clearly identify medical assistance in dying as the manner of death, as well the illness, disease, or disability that prompted the request for medical assistance in dying.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Basically we're changing the word “manner” to “way”?

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

That's a subamendment.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Hold on, I think Mr. Genuis wants to speak.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

On a small point of clarification, Ms. Khalid, when you read it out, I don't think you said the word “may” before the word “include” in line 9.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Right, it's “may include”.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I just want to make sure that you're not meaning to remove that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

The only change we're now making, because that was already there, is changing the word “manner” in line 9 to “way”.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

That's the subamendment that you're putting forward, Ms. Khalid.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Let's vote on the subamendment.

(Subamendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Now we come back to the principal motion as amended by both subamendments.

Is there any further discussion on the principal motion? Not hearing any, let's vote on the principal motion, amendment CPC-27 as amended.

(Amendment as amended agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Excellent. That's a good, collaborative job.

Amendment LIB-10 is combined now with amendment CPC-27, so it goes away. Amendment CPC-27.1 is withdrawn. Now we move a vote on clause 4 as amended.

(Clause 4 as amended agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

That's well done, everyone.

We move to clause 5.

(On clause 5)

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Mr. Chair, may I ask the department to give their input on this clause and any thoughts they may have on its effect?

[Joanne Klineberg]

I'd be happy to briefly explain it to the committee.

You will recall that in subsection 241.4 (2) is a new offence for destruction of documents related to medical assistance in dying, with a specific mental intent to do a couple of things, either intend to impede someone's access...and so on.

This would amend that offence. Once the monitoring regime comes into force, it would add the specific intent of someone who destroys a document with intent to interfere with someone's compliance with their monitoring obligations. The rules related to monitoring are set to come into force on a day to be determined by order in council, unlike the rest of the legislation, which comes into force on royal assent, to allow time for the Minister of Health to develop the regulations.

This one would only come into force when the regulations are ready, because only when the regulations are ready will physicians and nurse practitioners have the obligation to report. Interference with their obligation would be an amendment made to this offence when those other provisions come into force.

It's definitely complex.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

All of the members of this committee can clearly understand complex issues, so everybody has grasped that, I'm sure.

Is there any debate on clause 5?

(Clause 5 agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Now we move to clause 6.

(On clause 6)

Amendment CPC-28 is not receivable. Again, it's the licensee thing that we've ruled out of order from the beginning.

Amendment CPC-28.1 is again related to the nurse practitioner, so it's withdrawn.