I would like to recognize my colleague Ed, which is why I am going to speak.
Mr. Chair, the government is entitled to take a certain amount of time and is right to do so. In light of what my colleague Olivia has just said, we cannot enact the regulations immediately because enacting them implies that they have to go into the Canada Gazette and that there is a consultation period.
The Liberal Party cannot vote for this because it is not accurate and it is not possible to enact regulations immediately. If she had said “in the next two months”, right away it would be possible to get it into the Canada Gazette. I don't feel that writing a regulation takes a lot of time. The problem comes afterwards. With the shortest consultation period for regulations—on security, for example—we have even got it done in 30 days because we knew that we could talk to each other quickly.
So we cannot move to enact these regulations immediately. It is not possible. Given what we know, and the fact that we have to fall in line with the Americans quickly, it would have been different if Ms. Chow had said ”by April 1, 2012”.
I can understand, given the lack of experience of the NDP members who have never held power. They do not know how a government works. But we can find the middle ground and come up with a practical way of doing it. May I make an amendment, Mr. Chair?
Listening to the two sides, I think we could have a compromise if we passed the following amendment:
That the government enact the regulations by April 1, 2012.
So my proposal is to remove the word “immediately”. As I see it, that reflects the position of everyone here.