Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present two petitions.
The first petition is from many people in Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia. They point out that in Canada there has been a long tradition of freedom of conscience and religion and that this has been a historical fact in Canada.
They also point out that contributing to the Canadian military through payment of income taxes is an infringement of the freedom of conscience and/or religion of those citizens who conscientiously object to participating in any way in the military and its associated activities which train people to kill and use violence.
Therefore, they call on the Parliament of Canada to establish the peace tax legislation by passing into law private member's Bill C-348, the conscientious objection act, which I have had the honour to table. The bill recognizes the right of conscientious objectors to not pay for the military but to apply that portion of their taxes that was to be used for military purposes toward peaceful, non-military purposes within the powers of Parliament.