Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the hon. member for Churchill for allowing me to speak and, through the Chair, let me say that I have nothing but the utmost respect for the Chair, and I thank you for this opportunity, Mr. Speaker.
I certainly agree with a lot of what was said earlier by the member for Churchill. Canadians take a lot of their rights for granted. We seem to be living in a world where we just assume that all the rights we have had in the past will simply continue in the future. Bill C-55 speaks to some degree, perhaps, about the impacts on some of those rights. I think it is very important that not only do we have the debate today but that we continue with the debate and certainly with the ultimate opportunity of either changing the bill or not having it come forward, because it is a very dangerous bill, which in my opinion certainly presents the opportunity for impacting on civil liberties and rights. We are becoming too complacent. We are putting too much faith in the government, which is unfortunate because the government certainly has not done anything to allow for that faith to be put in it.
There are a number of areas in the legislation which I want to talk to, but first I think it is necessary to say that all of us in the House abhor terrorism. We abhor what we see going on around us right now and we certainly abhor what happened on September 11. We understand that there must be certain laws and opportunities for our police and governments to take swift action when necessary, but there has to be a check and balance. There has to be a piece of legislation that is well balanced and which absolutely ensures that our civil rights as Canadians are protected when we are trying to control terrorism around us.
We have had the piece of legislation that came forward as Bill C-42. We on this side suggested at that time that Bill C-42 was nothing more than a knee-jerk reaction of the government. After September 11, a whole bunch of people cloistered themselves in some smoke filled room and decided to put forward legislation that would allow the government to go forward, with an impact on all our rights and civil liberties.
When it went to committee, Bill C-42 got no support. It had no support from any of the witnesses who came forward. It had no support from any of the stakeholders. In fact, not only did it have no support from the opposition, but there was no support from government benches. Bill C-42, which the ministers on that side of the House had argued was absolutely, functionally necessary in order for the government to do its job, was simply pulled from the order paper.
Why, then, should we believe the government today when it says that Bill C-42 was flawed but Bill C-55 is absolutely perfect? I can assure the House that Bill C-55 is not absolutely perfect. If anything, it probably is no better than the Bill C-42 legislation that has been pulled by the government. I assume Bill C-55 will be pulled as well at some point and, thankfully, will not be passed by the House.
Those people who had the opportunity to listen to my leader, the right hon. member for Calgary Centre, heard him make the argument that in fact we already have legislation in place in the House with the government and it does have that balanced approach with respect to terrorism and civil liberties. That obviously is the Emergencies Act, a 1998 act that speaks to the necessity to have legislation and to have legislation that still protects the rights of individuals.
There are four areas I want to talk about. The first area, in which there has been a correction, is the fact that Bill C-55 was to go to the transport committee. It was our belief, and ultimately the belief of the rest of the House, that the transport committee was not the right place for a very serious piece of legislation to end up. By unanimous consent of the House it was agreed that it should go to a special legislative committee, a committee that will be struck simply to look at this piece of legislation. As a matter of fact I am told that the Speaker will be appointing the chair of that legislative committee. As far as I understand it, the chair will be an individual respected by all of us in the House, although the chair probably has not been named yet since this was just put in place yesterday. It will be a good first step to have the bill go to the legislative committee, not the transport committee.
The second point, which I have already alluded to, is that the legislation is absolutely not necessary. We currently have the Emergencies Act to fall back on, in which the police are given the proper powers and the civil liberties of Canadians are still protected.
The third, and probably the most poignant, point of this legislation is the amount of power it puts in the hands of individual ministers, heaven forbid. I know that Canadians have a great deal of respect for politicians: A recent poll has shown that 70% of them believe we are corrupt, but the Prime Minister has sent out his little minions to tell them politicians are not. However, we lead by example and unfortunately the example at the top, the current government, has a tendency to show that corruption pervades it.
I say that not necessarily in a derogatory way. The fact is that Canadians do not trust politicians. Seventy per cent of them have already said that by poll. Why would Canadians trust one minister to be able to put in interim orders with no checks and balances and which parliament will not be required to debate and agree to? Both the minister of defence and the transport minister will be given powers that are not seen today in this legislative government.
The Minister of National Defence has not really endeared himself to the Canadian public. They do not see him as a terribly competent individual and they do not have a lot of trust in him, but this man would be allowed to file an interim order that would be in effect for 23 days without anybody knowing about it. It could be in effect for 45 days without any cabinet approval. This interim order, unless specified in the order, could be in effect for one year. A minister of this House would have that power.
As the member for Churchill said, honest Canadians will ask themselves why they should have concerns about this power. I am sure that each and every one of us in the House believes that we are honest people, but that still allows the minister to put an interim order into effect that could affect each and every one of us. I find that absolutely abhorrent and certainly I feel that it is way beyond what people in our country really need.
The legislation itself is a grave danger. It is an abhorrence to me and to my party. We will fight this every step of the way, not because we do not believe there is a need to control terrorism but because we seriously believe the legislation is already in existence in the House, legislation with checks and balances.
The privacy commissioner has already fired off alarms about the legislation specifically with respect to the area of airline travel, but there are many more areas within the legislation that we have to deal with. I am glad it is to go to a legislative committee. I really wish and I hope beyond hope that all stakeholders will make their voices heard. I hope they come to committee and put forward their concerns about how they see a government out of control.