Mr. Speaker, it depends on what the hon. member is asking. If he is asking whether the Supreme Court is supreme in rendering judicial decisions, I think its name answers that question. It is called the Supreme Court because it is the supreme court. If it were not the supreme court, it would not have been called the Supreme Court. People made that decision long before I or the hon. member sat here.
Was it at one point appealable? Yes, it was appointed to a judicial committee of the Privy Council. The decisions of the Supreme Court were not appealable to the House of Commons. I do not know if that is what he is suggesting today. I do not ever recall, in my limited knowledge of constitutional history, that there ever was an appeal to the Canadian House of Commons of Supreme Court decisions. That has never existed.
Is he asking that we restore the system that was there before, which means that we could appeal in England the decisions of the Canadian Supreme Court? I do not think that is what he is advocating. If he is saying that something was changed to create this and he wants to restore the condition that was there before, that is in fact what he would be asking to restore, which of course would not even do that which he is asking anyway, as I indicated.
I want to respond to the second part of his question, regarding the Sharpe case.
The legislative package, in other words Bill C-20 and other legislation, responds to the concerns about the defence of artistic merit and the definition of written child pornography. The defences that were there before have been reduced to a single defence of public good. As well, the definition of written child pornography would be expanded to cover material that was not even covered under the previous legislation, and would include material that contains written descriptions of prohibited sexual activity and all those kinds of things. That is all included in the legislation which the hon. member says he did not want, even though that was the legislation for which they asked.
What does the public good mean? The public good defence means that any material or act in question must serve the public good and not exceed what serves the public good. That means that unlike the defence of artistic merit, the one that was there before, the new subclause (6), I believe, the public good defence would require a two stage analysis: Does the material serve the public good on any of the recognized areas and, if so, does it go beyond what serves the public good. In other words, no defence would be available where it does not serve the public good or it poses a risk of harm that exceeds what serves the public good.
I believe I have answered his questions.