Thank you very much, Mr. Falk.
Again, I go back to the very basics of what this is. This is the Minister of Health considering an exemption to allow an illicit drug to be used in a legal way within a particular establishment. It's very serious and I take the Supreme Court's direction very seriously. I think they dealt with the issue in a way that balances the public health impacts and, as well, the public safety impacts.
As I mentioned before, there are a number of ways in which stakeholders are going to be consulted. It is not just people in the community, which is most important, but law enforcement, municipal leaders, provincial leaders, and most importantly, like Minister Blaney said and as you said, Ted, local residents. But there's much more to this bill than simply consulting with the local community. I mentioned previously the criteria and I don't have an option in ignoring any of these factors. This idea that we would just put consumption sites across the country without following the Supreme Court ruling is obviously just a non-starter. The direction that was laid out by the court is what all health ministers must consider when they're looking at these applications. That is to assess whether or not such a site will have an impact on changes to the crime rate. Minister Blaney spoke to that. Also, it is to assess whether there are actual local conditions indicating that such a site is necessary, whether there's a regulatory structure in place to support the site, and whether there are resources available to actually support the maintenance of a site. And again—and you spoke to this—it means to assess the expressions within the community of support or opposition to a site.
All of these points are well represented in the bill. We think that we balance the criteria from the public safety side in terms of expressions of support from people like law enforcement. We also will obviously have an opportunity to hear directly from residents in the neighbourhood and municipalities in which this would be. This kind of information really needs to be provided. Along with the details of whether there are enough resources and there's evidence that this is the right place for this to be, it's also about whether the community will accept it and whether the community is opposed or in favour that this is the right place for this to be. That knowledge of the level of community opposition or support is important. It's important to me. It's important to Minister Blaney. And I guarantee you it's important to the local members of municipal council wherever this might be, the minister of health for that province, the chief public health officer, and more than likely the premier. There is a reason why the Supreme Court said that we should examine expressions of interest in opposition and support because everyone will have an interest in knowing what the local community thinks about putting something like this there. Obviously, in the event of an exemption, if an exemption like this is granted the site would also have to comply with clearly established terms and conditions and would be subject to compliance inspections. This is because, and again we go back to the basic issue, there is inherent danger in illegal substances. There are things that happen around illegal substances, and the fact that these are dangerous substances.