Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address this bill which has significant merit. I should like to give an example from my own life of what the bill would mean.
I had an opportunity to hear a story which troubled me so greatly that I told it to probably 1,500 high school students over my time in parliament. The reaction of the kids in high schools when I tell them this story is dismay.
A young woman was attacked, traumatized and hurt by a sexual predator, a rapist. Luckily her assailant was captured fairly quickly. That capture resulted in his being in custody. The young woman had some medical background and knew she was at risk for infection. She asked the officers who had made the arrest what provisions would be made for the individual to be tested for the diseases that she could be infected by.
The officer said that if the individual agreed, they were fine. The individual did not agree. She said that her rights as a citizen who had been attacked were impacted upon by the individual's rights as a perpetrator.
I have told that story to young people in and outside my riding. I asked them this question. When the rights of the victim and the rights of the rapist collide, whose rights should take precedence? I have yet heard one single youth say that the rights of the rapist should be equal to the rights of the poor victim.
I take that as an endorsement from young people who are not sophisticated in legal matters. They are not lawyers but they have common sense. That common sense is one that I recommend to my colleagues across the way who say they support the concept of looking after the good Samaritan but follow that with a but. That but means the support for firefighters, paramedics, police officers and good Samaritans. It is not going to cut it in the groups I speak with.
I wish to give a more personal example. For those watching television, I have been a practising physician for 25 years. I came to parliament with very specific goals. One evening I was coming home from the hospital on a slippery road and I came across a severe motor vehicle accident.
Prior to my reaching the accident, a young RCMP officer had arrived on the scene. I knew him and I enjoyed his company. We played sports together. The victim of the accident was trapped in the vehicle. He did what he could to get her out. In order to successfully pull her from the vehicle, he cut himself on the broken window. In doing so, his blood came in contact with an open wound on the accident victim's forehead. He told me that he was in trouble because he thought that he could be infected.
Under normal circumstances, we would ask the poor victim to give a blood sample and everything would be fine. There is a period of time when the antibodies are not evident if someone was recently infected. However, somebody like that would never be recently infected. This victim refused. This took me aback. I could not imagine why that would happen.
She happened to confide in me the reason why she refused. She said that when she was young she had done some things with illegal drugs that may have infected her. She said she could not have that known because it would affect her ability to work. It would affect her ability in the community. It would also affect some of the things she did. The victim left the police officer exposed. In my mind, at that instance she completely forgot about a good Samaritan.
Would the bill have an impact on many individuals? It would not. It would have an impact on those individuals who for whatever reason would not willing to be forthcoming with their medical histories. Usually these individuals would be criminals or people with vindictive attitudes. Surely my colleague across the way with his but would not want those individuals when their rights collide to take precedence over the victim.
The bill is such common sense that it should be supported by everyone, even those individuals who say that it is an invasion of privacy for the individual who is the victim. In a case where it is an individual who benefits from the good Samaritan activity, there is an invasion of privacy. Is it an invasion that is too great? In my view it is reasonable, constrained and balanced.
I have watched private members' business since 1993 when I came here. I have watched which proposals from private members that get voted on freely. For those watching in the gallery, the bill will be voted on freely in the House when it finally gets to voting time. Occasionally the government will support a private member's bill that comes from across the way or from its own members, then send it to committee and have it die in committee.
Very seldom does a private member's bill get passed in this place. Perhaps I understand when it is for partisan reasons, but surely there cannot be a partisan reason in terms of this bill. The member and two other members said that the proposals could be improved upon in committee if there are overriding reasons.
This makes such good sense that surely we could set aside those partisan considerations and consider it in committee. For that reason, at this point in time I suggest that we have unanimous consent of the House to send the bill to committee. It is something that happened in the last parliament. The sky did not fall. The bill went to committee and there was some discussion.
I ask for unanimous consent to send Bill C-217 to the justice committee to have it reviewed and for members opposite to improve it if that was necessary.