I think Mr. Ménard's arguments actually illustrate why the proper wording is here now. He's illustrated and told us about Quebec's plan, and we agree with it. What this would do now is allow the federal government to promote that as a best practice across the country.
It's not intended to limit. It only talks about encouraging and promoting. My understanding is that all of the provinces have been consulted on the act, all of them are in agreement on it, and that there was a federal-provincial agreement in January of 2005 where these issues were addressed and agreed upon by the provinces.
If you look at the wording in the existing act, Mr. Ménard, I think what you see there is the federal government trying to bring the best practices across the country to the table, but not to impose them on anyone. The provinces have retained and continue to retain their own authority to have their own emergency management act and to address those issues. Quebec, for instance, may have experience in some areas that other parts of the country haven't but may be exposed to. We can use the best practices from Quebec and illustrate that and encourage other provinces to adopt those same policies.
I understand what you're trying to say here, but I think by doing that we start to limit the ability across the country to.... We take away that sort of freedom of the provinces, or opportunity, at least, to learn and to adopt best practices from one province to another. This act was never intended to take away any authority from the provinces, and I think that's the consistent message in it. It's the umbrella body that across the country.... From a federal perspective, ours is to provide training and commonality.