Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague, the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay, for his sensitivity to this issue and for the way that he outlined the importance of culture and heritage in this context.
I would ask him if Bill S-37 does anything to address one of the most egregious examples of looting of cultural heritage and religious properties that has ever been known? The looting of the Iraq museum is second only perhaps to the property of the west coast Indian tribes in Canada, the Haida, and those tribes whose potlatch ceremonies were outlawed. Now there are huge efforts being made for the repatriation of these cultural and heritage properties.
Would the member agree with me, first of all, that the looting of these artifacts is an element of cultural genocide in this example and is there anything in Bill S-37 that will help with the repatriation of these artifacts, so that these societies can be made whole?