Mr. Speaker, I am speaking to the motion. I am showing to what extent it could impact on other areas of legislation if the ability to provoke libel chill and SLAPP suits is kept.
It is, Mr. Speaker, as you well know, completely relevant to raise those issues. Whether we are talking about the railway industry or business aircraft, a company could choose to bring a spurious lawsuit when we raise, for example, the escalating number of accidents we have seen with business aircraft since SMS were brought into that sector.
A company could follow the Conservatives' example and put in a libel chill, a SLAPP suit. Then what happens to my ability as a member to speak out against the increasing number of derailments we have seen in railways under SMS, to speak out against the increasing fatality rate that we have seen in business aircraft since SMS were brought in, relating it of course to what would happen if we brought it in for commercial airlines generally? My ability to speak on those issues would be impugned.
It is very relevant. I know you understand that, of course, Mr. Speaker. The Minister of Natural Resources obviously does not.
I would like to flag that at the end of my speech I will be offering an amendment to this excellent motion that has been brought forward by the member for Scarborough—Rouge River.
I spoke about the libel chill, the SLAPP suit that was essentially put in by the Conservatives. The attempt then, with this definition, is that once a lawsuit is brought in, essentially that parliamentarian has handcuffs around his or her arms. The deaf community likes to use handcuffs to signify that a person using American sign language is essentially stopped from communicating.
I have a great many deaf constituents in Burnaby—New Westminster. There are two schools for the deaf. I think the American sign language term is a very appropriate one for this: essentially handcuffs are put on the arms so that the deaf cannot communicate. With the SLAPP suit, the libel chill, it is the same principle: the ability to speak is impugned. That is the essential problem.
We have seen this type of libel chill used in other countries. It is used very deliberately to try to shut down opposition politicians. We can think of a number of Asian examples where lawsuits have been brought in and have essentially stifled an active and democratic opposition from being able to speak out on important issues: issues such as rail safety, for example, or business aircraft safety, commercial aircraft safety and the use of self-serve safety systems and how much that would impact on the public's ability to travel safely in Canada.
Those kinds of issues would be stifled if we had the principle that a libel chill or a SLAPP suit could simply shut down a member's ability to speak. These are fundamentally important issues.
Now I would like to come back to what I mentioned at the beginning of my speech before I was interrupted, inappropriately in my mind, by the Minister of Natural Resources.