Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Notwithstanding the comments across the table, I'm very uncomfortable with any of these amendments--B-6, L-2, and NDP-3. In fact, I sense there's considerable unease, even in the mind of our legal counsel here.
Having practised law for some 24 years, I had to deal with hundreds and hundreds of pieces of legislation. Quite frankly, what you commonly see is a superseding clause, in which you see “notwithstanding”, and we've seen that in the Canada Labour Code here. What you don't see is a clause like this, where you make the legislation that you're trying to pass subordinate to other legislation.
My question is this. Does Mr. Laframboise have specific concerns? And if so, at the very least, what we should be doing is focusing on the very parts of those other acts that he has concerns about, that he wants to make sure supersede this legislation, and then address them specifically. If we make this blanket statement that this act is subordinate to three other acts, we may regret that some day. We may be wishing that this act should supersede, in some cases, other pieces of legislation like the Labour Code.
I have great discomfort moving forward in this direction. Obviously we're trying to come to some consensus here, but I'm concerned. I wouldn't be proceeding along this road.