On the issue of vehicle licence plate inclusion in the registry of vehicle descriptions, there are two legitimate perspectives. I think they're both legitimate. One is what you referred to, which addresses inclusion that the police say would be an aid to them. The other is the concern that by doing it through vehicle registration, you're casting the net potentially too wide.
Vehicle registration is not limited, and vehicle driving, as you know, is not limited, to the individual who's registered. Ownership is not limited to that. We are asking through these amendments to allow a more proactive use of the registry to prevent crimes from happening, meaning people may be stopped, asked what they're doing and the like, as part of police efforts to keep a community safe. You are extending that to potentially capture, in effect, people who are not the owners of vehicles.
Additionally, you are flagging for offenders that they have to register their vehicle and their vehicle description on a regular basis. So if somebody is a calculating sex offender, they may choose to ensure that their vehicle is, on paper, owned and registered by their mother or another family member, and thereby avoid the capture under the registration. Police already have access to drivers through licence information and to the sex offender registry in general. So that's the argument on the one side.
The legitimate argument on the other side, that you hear from law enforcement and others, is that the availability of that information consolidated in one place can be very helpful to them, that it may be able to, at the same time, in certain circumstances, allow them to deal with a situation quickly, while it develops.
I believe both of those arguments have merit. The decision I took in preparing the bill, having heard that evidence, being aware of it, being aware of those arguments on all sides, was not to include it. I understand that others on the committee may have a different view. I know that certainly the Conservative members of the committee have spoken to me strongly about their desire to have an amendment that would include vehicle information like that.
I'm quite fine with that. One of the roles of a parliamentary committee is to do that. This opportunity to deal with the bill clause-by-clause creates that opportunity, as I told those members, to bring forward an amendment like that if they believe it is important. The government is quite happy to have an amendment like that, if that is the will of the members of the committee. As I said, I know the government members, Ms. Glover, Mr. MacKenzie, Mr. Norlock, have all been very proactive on advancing those issues with me, and have advanced that process.
That's available to you. That's how a parliamentary committee works. I don't think we should have waited another year to have that go into law, because you still haven't finished your report.