Mr. Speaker, it is an honour for me to express my full and unconditional support for Bill C-293 introduced by my colleague, the member for Scarborough—Guildwood. This bill fully addresses Canadians' concerns about the international aid Canada provides. That is why we should not only salute the initiative by the member for Scarborough—Guildwood, but also support its implementation.
Because of my various parliamentary duties, especially on the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, I have long had the opportunity to talk with Canadians about this important issue, which concerns our country's commitments and responsibilities in the world.
Whether from members of the public who take the time to express their views individually or from associations involved in international aid and businesspeople, we always hear the same message, stated loud and clear. Our resources must be allocated with greater concern for effectiveness, transparency and good democratic governance.
In practical terms, this means that the vast majority of Canadians not only feel concerned by this major issue, but also demand that our international aid really promote the values that characterize our country. We must work to ensure that Canadian aid initiatives abroad are better targeted so that our country really attacks the poverty that afflicts so many peoples that are part of the human race.
Incidentally, young people strongly support this objective, as evidenced by the large number of international solidarity organizations that are found across the country, even in schools, and that youth intuitively gravitate towards, often very early in their education.
Our youth are therefore sending a very strong message that we as parliamentarians must listen to, because they represent the future of our nation and its role in the world.
In today's world, where so much economic, technological, scientific, cultural and democratic progress has been made, it is scandalous that peoples in whole areas of our planet still suffer such extreme poverty that they do not even have the bare necessities of life.
A long time ago, our government and others, as well as multilateral organizations such as the UN and many more, declared that they would work towards reducing poverty. However, as we have seen, it is not enough to make a declaration. Concrete action is required to achieve real results. In this regard Bill C-293represents a true step forward because it unequivocally states that “all Canadian development assistance abroad is provided with a central focus on poverty reduction”. This is crystal clear.
If passed in its present form, as I dearly hope, this bill will give us a legislative tool enabling parliamentarians to better oversee Canada's efforts to reduce poverty. This bill also seeks to provide better means of assessing the true impact of our international aid, in a context where accountability for management of public resources is increasingly important in the conscience of our citizens, and will lead to greater transparency.
Transparency is required for the Canadian government to provide its citizens with a clearer account of its management of international aid. I mentioned the goal of poverty reduction. However, there are other crucial aspects of this bill which make our support all the more important. These include the requirement to respect international human rights standards. Canadians are very clear on this issue: they do not want international aid to support oppressive political regimes that do not respect human rights, the rights of workers or the duty and obligations of any democratic country with respect to its citizens.
The state must seek to improve the well-being of its citizens. It must have no other purpose. Thus, international aid must never be used to line the pockets of tyrants who are incapable or unwilling to take on such a responsibility and one that we cannot shirk. This bill also requires the government to ensure that the criteria for Canadian foreign aid include respect for the principles of sustainable development.
Concerns regarding responsible management of natural resources and environmental conservation are also an important focus of our fellow world citizens, for today and the future, as well as the responsibilities they demand of their governments in those areas.
This is actually a matter of clarity or common sense. We see it all too often these days: the planet's ecological balance is seriously threatened by the destruction of resources and pollution has crossed our borders, only to now affect us.
In that sense, we Canadians are connected to everyone else on the planet, whether we like it or not. In terms of environmental degradation, the future of our entire species is at risk.
We must therefore take action in this area, as well, or we would be reneging on our responsibilities to future generations, who are just as entitled as we are to live in a healthy ecological environment.
This is why it is so important to include this element in Bill C-293, since we can no longer avoid this aspect of international aid. The issues inherent to human development are becoming increasingly interconnected, and resolving one depends more and more on resolving the other.
In conclusion, this bill contains an essential element of our international aid that not only must become an integral part of the responsibilities of any government in the world today, but that also addresses the concerns and desires expressed by so many of our fellow citizens. Accordingly, it is the duty of this Parliament to pass this bill and we should be privileged to do so.