Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Starting with what you find at the very end of the seizure and forfeiture section, we would be amending lines 26 and 27. Right now it reads, under the concept of return or disposal of goods, “Subject to any regulations, a preclearance officer may...return any goods that they have seized or dispose of any goods that they have seized or accepted.”
My amendment also suggests that once goods have been seized, accepted, or disposed of, at that point in pre-clearance the officer “allow the traveller to enter the United States if there is no reason to further detain him or her."
Somebody might wonder, if you've seized goods, why you would let someone in. There are all sorts of reasons in a pre-clearance area that goods might be seized and destroyed that suggest no criminality or other offence. No law has been contravened by the person trying to cross into the United States, but we haven't made that clear.
I offer, as an example, somebody who's brought along some fruit from home and doesn't realize that the United States agricultural rules will not allow you to bring in that particular product. It's taken out of your luggage and it's destroyed, but it's not clear in this section as drafted that you can, with no further reason for detaining someone, take their goods and dispose of them, and then say, “Welcome to the United States. Continue on your way now that we have taken away the goods that we don't want entering the United States.”
That's the purpose of my amendment. I don't think I need to read it into the record. It's before you as Parti vert-7.