Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Canadian Bar Association is very pleased to appear before this committee today on Bill C-7.
The Canadian Bar Association is a national association with about 38,000 members across the country. The primary objectives of the organization are improvements in the law and improvements in the administration of justice, and it is in this light that we've made our written submission, which has been circulated to you in advance, and make our comments to you today.
The CBA has been engaged in consultation with the government on marine liability amendments since at least 2005 and we are pleased to see progress made on this issue. I'm going to ask Mr. Simon Barker, who is the chair of the maritime law section, to make substantive comments about the bill.