Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member from Winnipeg for pointing out a typographical error in one of the motions in the last grouping. The word “alternative” appears in the phrase “alternative resolution”. It should read “affirmative resolution”. In all the similar resolutions it was written as “affirmative”.
The way this was organized by the government, report stage was scheduled to come up next week. We found out on Tuesday afternoon, a couple of hours before the deadline for submitting resolutions, that the government had bumped report stage up to Wednesday afternoon. At the same time, the Minister for Citizenship and Immigration was in committee, where many of us expected we could speak to the report stage motions. Because of that rush, we did not see the error. I thank the member for pointing it out. I hope the error can be corrected as it would be consistent with the other motions presented.
We are dealing with only two motions in Group No. 4, Motion No. 9, presented by the Bloc critic, and Motion No. 23, presented by a Liberal member.
The Bloc motion suggests that along with the citizenship certificate given out at the ceremony, there would be some information from the Government of Quebec given out as well. It is really interesting that we have a party, which wants Quebec to separate from Canada and wants more authority given to the Quebec government, that is now asking the federal government to intervene and ensure that it can hand out this information with the certificates.
The province can decide in any way it wants and in any form it wants to hand out this information if it feels it is something its citizens need to have. It really does not make any sense at all having that included in this bill. I know I certainly will not be supporting this motion. It really does not make any sense.
What we are talking about in this bill is Canadian citizenship, something that most Canadians value very deeply. I would also suggest that it is something most Canadians from Quebec value at a very high level. When we have a citizenship ceremony, we should be accepting certificates that we can proudly display indicating that we are citizens of Canada. I therefore cannot support the motion.
Motion No. 23, which was presented by a Liberal MP, calls for a change to the proposed new citizenship oath. I do not have any particular disagreement with the oath that is in the bill. What is really wrong is the process. How many Canadians were ever asked to take part in developing the oath? The minister said that there were some. I would like to ask Canadians if they were asked to take part. I know I was not.
I do not believe the oath is the real issue. The member is proposing an alternative oath but I do not think it is any better. In fact, it is less acceptable and does not fix the problem. The government thinks it can present an oath that has had no support or input from Canadians. I think the member is taking the same position. He, as a government member, seems to think he knows better than Canadians what should be in the oath. It really is the process that is at issue here. I certainly will not be supporting this motion. I do not think it improves the oath nor does it improve the process.