Madam Speaker, the amendment that the Bloc Québécois will put forward in committee aims essentially at abolishing the specified time period so people can discharge their student loans in the same way as any other debt.
The rationale for imposing this time period is not based on any studies that may have been done. It is based essentially on prejudice because some people think that bankruptcy is easy, even though we all know that a judge must render a decision on that. There are also other types of prejudice against students, or should I say former students. Indeed, after ten years they are no longer students, having been out of school for quite some time. Some believe that former students are more inclined to go bankrupt than people belonging to other social groups and that it is an easy way for them to free themselves from their student loans.
Nobody wants to do that. Bankruptcy is a difficult and very emotional process for those who go through it. It is not true that a former student will not hesitate to go bankrupt just to get rid of his or her student loans.
This is why we believe that the change from ten years to seven years is arbitrary. Why not six years? Or two? Or nothing? It is in that context that the Bloc will be proposing an amendment in committee.