Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs for being here this evening to answer my simple question.
Members have had the privilege of acting on behalf of their constituents when they needed urgent passports. These urgent passports were normally required when there was a sickness or death in the family and the passport was needed within a 10 day period. Individuals living in northern and rural areas however have no ready access to a passport office.
I know that individuals living in an urban area would normally receive their passport in 20 days, but this service is not available to those individuals living in remote areas. The government has set up an office through Service Canada in my own community. I am really concerned about individuals living in northern and remote areas who have to drive sometimes 8 to 12 hours to get to the closest passport office. These individuals can no longer get support from their members of Parliament.
I do not understand the change in policy that the government has brought forward. I wonder if the government understands the impact this policy is having and its discriminatory nature. I believe this is now creating a two tier system, one for constituents who live in large centres where there is a passport office nearby and one for constituents who live in northern and remote areas who do not have a passport office. Somebody in a big centre like Toronto can just jump on a subway, catch a bus or take a taxi to a passport office, whereas those individuals living in remote areas face greater difficulties.
I wonder if the parliamentary secretary could inform me as to whether or not the government understands the difficulty this has created. I wonder if it has come up with any resolution to this problem.
The minister suggested that I bring all of my cases to him, and I have brought a couple in the last few weeks. I was hoping, in the weeks since I asked my question, that perhaps there would be some clearer understanding and some policy changes made. I was also hoping some direction would be given to members who want to serve our constituents in this way.