Madam Speaker, I want to thank the justice minister for coming down and giving a response to the throne speech. I feel the justice minister should have taken the opportunity to speak to the Prime Minister before the throne speech was given because when we go through the throne speech it would appear there is little dealing with judicial change that we need to see in the country.
This throne speech hurts many parts of the country. It hurts western Canada. There is nothing in the throne speech dealing with agriculture. There is no hope for the oil and gas industry with the expectations that the government wants to push ahead with Kyoto.
However I do want to question the minister on two points. First, by mentioning in the throne speech the potential of decriminalizing marijuana, is it not his belief that he is pre-empting and taking away from the work of the non-medical drug committee that is expected to have a report out at the end of November?
The non-medical drug committee at this point is questioning which direction we should go, not only with marijuana but with addictions, safe injection, harm reduction and all those things. For a throne speech to come out and say that the plan is to decriminalize marijuana completely pre-empts the work of the non-medical drug committee.
My second question is in regard to another area that was not specific in the throne speech and deals with the plan to forge ahead in the fall, in November according to some of the media, to make significant changes to the Criminal Code that would bring forward a race-based Criminal Code, a two tier approach to criminal law based upon colour of skin and race.
Could the Minister of Justice please answer these two questions?