Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-36. I am disturbed that the government has introduced another piece of legislation that is well intentioned but poorly drafted, defined and implemented. Once again the government is ramming legislation through the House without respecting input from parliamentarians, particularly opposition parliamentarians and members of the justice committee.
We must ask ourselves why the government is introducing this legislation in the first place. It is to defend free society against terrorism, but how can the government crush debate to defend freedom? The fact that the government is crushing parliamentary debate ostensibly to defend freedom should raise questions.
It reminds me of the Woody Allen quote that fighting for peace is like making love for virginity, if I can bring a bit of levity to this sad situation. The government is demonstrating near toxic levels of hypocrisy by crushing debate to introduce legislation which will supposedly defend freedom.
The government has not earned the respect and trust of Canadians in these areas. We have seen APEC where the government used measures that went well beyond what was necessary to preserve peace. In defending the interests of foreign dictators the government quashed the democratic freedoms of young Canadians.
With the Shawinigan affair the government has taken every step it can to twist and manipulate the facts and defend the untenable. In every case the government has covered up and manipulated the process. It has even gone beyond cabinet and used the highly centralized power of the Prime Minister's Office to run roughshod over ordinary Canadians.
The government uses every power at its disposal to run over the powers not only of ordinary Canadians but of members of parliament. If the government is capable of ignoring the rights of members of parliament who are elected by ordinary Canadians we should think of what the government is capable of doing with a piece of legislation this powerful in terms of running roughshod over the rights of ordinary Canadians.
The New Democrats had legitimate concerns and would have had amendments to make at this stage. Instead the entire New Democratic Party was disqualified because it was participating in an annual party meeting in Winnipeg. It is a great day for democracy when the government introduces a piece of legislation to fight terrorism and defend freedom and it attacks one party more severely than the rest.
My colleagues in the Canadian Alliance, the Bloc Quebecois, the NDP and the PC/DR have expressed reservations about the bill. Every opposition party has expressed reservations. We have heard backbenchers on the Liberal side express serious reservations.
I do not think anyone doubts that the government should be trying to introduce legislation to fight terrorism and ultimately defend free and democratic institutions. We all agree with that. We disagree with a government that in trying to fight for freedom is denying parliamentary input and compromising parliamentary representation in Canada.
The solicitor general has all the cards. He has all the power. He is not accountable to anyone in terms of who goes on the terrorist list. In response to questions today the solicitor general said he would review the list every two years as per the legislation. This means that people could face two years of persecution and have their whole lives destroyed because they were put on the list unfairly.
The solicitor general has said that he would not put somebody on the list without some reason and that he would not take it lightly. How can we trust a solicitor general who has not demonstrated accountability to parliament to be accountable to Canadians in general? He has said that an individual Canadian can appeal to the solicitor general directly. When individual members of parliament lack accessibility to changing legislation of this nature, how can we expect Canadians would have any success in convincing the solicitor general that they in fact should not be on the list? I doubt if the solicitor general would be any more accountable them than he is to this parliament. In fact he would probably be less accountable to ordinary Canadians who had the misfortune to find themselves on the list. Of course, that would be catastrophic.
I have expressed concerns about the legislation and about the way the government has once again run roughshod over parliament. It has, through its fancy footwork in introducing the legislation at a time when it can minimize legitimate input and amendment, not earned the trust of parliamentarians and of Canadians. In denying that input it has said that it does not care if anyone trusts it or not, that it will go ahead with this anyway. In fact it does not even want our input.
A government that does not actually respect parliament and parliamentary input, clearly does not respect Canadians and individual freedoms. I think it is absolutely unconscionable that the government is again moving forward with such important legislation without listening to ordinary Canadians and the parliamentarians who represent those Canadians here in the House and in the justice committee. I think it is a very sad day for democracy in Canada.