Thank you to everyone for being here.
We're talking about the MSLA program, the miscellaneous statutes law amendment program, which I understand has been around since 1975.
I'm reading the briefing notes prepared by the Library of Parliament. They say that the miscellaneous statutes law amendment program is “a periodic legislative exercise to correct anomalies, inconsistencies, outdated terminologies or errors that have crept into the statutes.” They are all supposed to be “minor non-controversial amendments” that are not to “prejudicially affect the rights of persons”.
I looked at quite a few of the sections, and I would agree that they are completely non-controversial. The name of a port has been changed or the name of a tribunal has been changed, and we need to make consequential amendments.
I was a little bit surprised to see in a couple of sections that the French version was not amended. I'm looking at section 154 of the act, on the Safe Food for Canadians Act. I'm looking at pages 55 and 56 of the report.
For example, subsection 154(1) of this act would amend subsection 31(1) of the Safe Food for Canadians Act to change the name from “Tribunal” to “Canadian Agricultural Review Tribunal”. I have no argument with that. It makes sense to do that, but then subsection 31(2) in the English version does the same thing. It defines the “Tribunal” as the “Canadian Agricultural Review Tribunal”, but in the French version there's no change, although in the French version of the previous paragraph there is that same change.
I wonder why that is. I looked up the French version of subsection 31(2) of the Safe Food for Canadians Act. It has the same intent and purpose, but the wording is completely different.
Why would you not have taken the opportunity to amend the French version to align more closely with the English version?