Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Thornhill once again, as some of her colleagues have done, expresses curiosity at why we should be discussing this motion here today, as though no one in the country, as the attorney general suggested earlier, is even discussing the question of the redefinition of marriage. We have plainly had it proposed right here in the House today by members of this place.
The hon. member went on to say at the end of her remarks that it was not the policy of the Government of Canada to change the legal definition of marriage, but eight or nine minutes of her ten minute talk was a lecture on the importance of judicial review.
No member of the opposition or nobody who understands the constitution would disagree with the necessity of judicial review, that is to say, the appropriate interpretation of statutes in light of our charter and constitutional framework. Objections are raised by us and others when the courts go beyond interpretation to legislate from the bench without an appropriate authority in the charter.
I see nowhere in the charter a basis for changing the legal definition of marriage. Yet we have recently seen a change in the legal definition of spouse, so this is a reasonable question. The hon. member said that the government does not have a policy on this. Her party does. I was at the Liberal Party convention last summer where a policy was passed that said:
Be it resolved that the Liberal Party of Canada strongly urge the federal government to recognize same sex marriages in the same way that it recognizes opposite marriages—
I simply ask the hon. member for Thornhill how this question is not relevant. How is it not a question of public debate when her own party introduced it as a matter of public debate and urged her government to change this policy?