Madam Speaker, I would like to start by repeating what has already been said in the House, which is that the government was obliged by the supreme court to ensure that both sides of the House could meet a court set deadline. This was not a deadline set by the government but imposed on us by the Supreme Court of Canada.
I would also add that in my view sufficient time has been allowed, both in the House and in committee, for opposition motions to be brought. Unfortunately, only one was received in committee. There was no discussion by the opposition on these motions. This is really stretching a point, because there was ample time available Wednesday evening for discussion and the opposition brought no amendments.
I would like to point out that we feel that, yes, the deadline is a little short. The deadline was imposed on us by the supreme court. It was not a deadline that we imposed on this House.
Second, there was ample time. The committee members on the government side were more than willing to spend more time discussing any motion brought forward by any member of the opposition. None of these motions was brought forward. There was discussion but none of the motions was brought forward to be discussed at the committee level. The opposition members decided to bring them forward in the House.
Fearmongering from the opposition by saying this will be unconstitutional is presumptive on the part of the opposition. We do not know whether this will be declared unconstitutional. We had no constitutional experts that came before the committee to to testify except a lawyer. I think that is an assumption that should not have been made.
The government is not able to support motion No. 1. This affects the very notion of practicability. The rule with respect to telewarrants is that the police are not in a position to meet a justice of the peace in person. This rule has been on the books for approximately 10 years. It is nothing new and it is seen as necessary to defend the constitutionality of the entire telewarrant scheme in the Criminal Code.
Motions 2, 4 and 6 all relate to the use of the singular to refer to dwelling house in the bill. Some have argued that in order to allow for warrants to apply to more than one dwelling house we need to refer to dwelling house in the plural. That is why we have the Interpretation Act. The Interpretation Act already provides that the singular includes the plural. All federal legislation, and this legislation in particular, Bill C-16, has been drafted with that rule in mind.
This amendment seems to undermine the way all federal legislation is drafted and would be a bad precedent in my opinion. It would make the interpretation of other statutes more difficult and uncertain in the future.
We are not able to support this motion as it is inconsistent with other provisions of the Criminal Code.
On Motion No 3, we are not able to support this motion either. The reason is that the motion addresses form 7 because it is a warrant for arrest. This warrant has been known to law for over 100 years and requires that the person be identified. If we cannot identify a person we should not be seeking a warrant for an arrest. That implies a person has been charged with a crime.
However, the government would be amenable for supporting Motion No. 5, and I will speak to that motion.
This amendment relates to form 7.1 and section 529.1 of the Criminal Code. The amendment would make it clear in the form what is already permitted by section 529.1. That section makes it possible to obtain a warrant for entry in order to arrest someone who is identifiable as opposed to identified.
I believe that if this form were amended as proposed by the hon. member we would be improving on the language in the bill by making it perfectly clear on the form itself that this is possible.