Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to the amendment to Bill C-55 put forward by my hon. colleague from the Conservative Party.
Bill C-55 has been discussed a lot over the last few weeks. The more we look at that bill, the more we get into debate and the more we realize that we, on this side of the House, were right to speak up and oppose the bill.
From day to day, reports from international organizations are showing that there are countries, that we will name later on, and Canada is among them, that have abused a number of powers to violate freedom of speech and individual freedom.
This debate on Bill C-55 today comes at the right time because, a few days ago, Amnesty International published a rather revealing report on the measures taken by some countries with regard to the situationsince September 11. Some countries have made adjustments following that situation, but often at the expense of what is the most essential in a civilized society and a democratic society. I am referring here to human rights and freedom.
Amnesty International's report tells us that countries such as Great Britain, Canada and others have used special measures that show a total disregard for individual freedoms and human rights. Canada is on that list of countries. Some have said that Canada could even be regarded as a totalitarian country, if one looks at the essence of the bill before us. I am saying this without any fear of being judged since it is the privacy commissioner who said nearly a month ago, on May 2, with regard to Bill C-55, “Some measures are similar to those that exist in totalitarian states”.
This opinion expressed by the commissioner regarding Bill C-55 is important. A country that claims to be a champion of rights and freedoms is using situations like the one we have been experienced since September 11 as an excuse to impose coercive measures. It is a sad thing. We know that this country wants the international community to believe that it has the utmost respect for human rights.
Tuesday, we will debate a motion that I have brought forward. It will be votable, as decided by the sub-committee on private members' business. This motion asks the Government of Canada to ratify the Inter-American Convention to Prevent and Punish Torture.
I am making a point of indicating that we will have this debate in the House of Commons on Tuesday. I remind members that, during the first hour of debate, the government rejected the arguments presented by the Bloc Quebecois and Amnesty International, even though we had gathered 75,000 signatures of Canadians on a petition asking the government to ratify the convention.
Why I am saying that it is crucial that we ratify these conventions to protect human rights? It is so that the measures we take within our borders do not violate individual freedoms.
For many years now, Canada has behaved much too much like its neighbour to the south. For example, nine out of 34 countries--let us say 34 and not 35 because we will not include Cuba--have not ratified the Inter-American Convention to Prevent and Punish Torture, and two of those nine are Canada and the United States.
There is a good reason why this morning, an editorial in Le Devoir , reminded us that Canada has been refusing for many years to sign these conventions. Let me quote the article by Serge Truffaut published in Le Devoir this morning. The title of his editorial was “Security vs. freedom”.
At the end, he says:
For good measure, Canada has also developed a complete series of measures. The Canadian branch of Amnesty International said it was concerned about the policies on refugees and the cowardly concurrence of Ottawa with the judicial status given to prisoners of war by the United States. Most of all, Amnesty International stresses the fact that eleven years after becoming a member of the Organization of American States, Canada has still not signed one of the six regional treaties on human rights.
On the international stage, the Prime Minister boasts about being an advocate of human rights; Canada is about to become part of the free trade area of the Americas; therefore, I think that we should respect fundamental human rights.
Too many countries are still going this way, which is, to me, totally unacceptable. That is why this morning, as my hon. colleague from Champlain said, Michel C. Auger, among others, felt compelled to speak out about the deplorable current situation in Canada.
By the way, Canada is not the only country going this way. There are, naturally, our neighbours to the south and Great Britain, which are taking coercitive measures that violate freedoms.
In his editorial this morning, Michel C. Auger says the following—and I will read only the introduction:
National security and the fight against terrorism are becoming, just about everywhere in the world, the best excuses to violate fundamental rights.
In his article, he alluded to Amnesty International's report, and he added:
This is a warped sort of logic, as if we were saying that the best way to guarantee freedoms was to restrict them.
Since I have only one minute left, I want to add that we must have a global vision of the situation relating to the events of September 11 and we must go beyond these events. We must establish a real balance in Canada between freedom and security, but Canada has yet to understand that.
There is still time, since we are still considering Bill C-55, to take measures to fully reach this fundamental objective which is, obviously, to guarantee the national security of Canada while respecting individual freedoms and fundamental rights.