Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a few remarks about Bill S-207, the Statutes Repeal Act. If all goes well today for Senator Bank's bill, this might be my last opportunity to speak on this matter. First, I would like to congratulate the original sponsor of this bill, Senator Tommy Banks, for this great idea and also for his perseverance. Senator Banks tabled the first version of this bill in 2002 and he has worked diligently over the last years to refine his proposal which became the version currently before us.
I could not agree more with the objective of this bill which is to prevent the government from delaying indefinitely the coming into force of legislation. It has been said many times in this House and in the other place that Bill S-207 provides a straightforward and flexible mechanism to ensure that Parliament's will is not ignored when the coming into force of some legislation is referred to government.
This bill would put into place an original process which has no equivalent, to my knowledge, in any of the Canadian legislatures. It is an innovative and efficient way to ensure the accountability of the government before Parliament for the coming into force of its legislation. Essentially, Bill S-207 would ensure that the government could not consider indefinitely when legislation should come into force. After 10 years the legislation would be repealed by operation of the law.
By repealing legislation after 10 years, Bill S-207 would ensure that the government seriously and regularly considered bringing legislation into force, or it would lose the power to do so. In addition, the reasons behind decisions not to bring legislation into force would have to be presented before Parliament in order for a resolution to be adopted deferring the repeal of the legislation.
As we know, the bill would not, however, allow the government to easily dispense with legislation that it does not intend to implement at any time. The report tabled annually by the Minister of Justice would put Parliament on notice that the acts and provisions it lists could be repealed at the end of the year. Any member of either house of Parliament could seek to prevent the repeal of legislation by proposing a resolution to that effect.
In short, the government would have to publicly account to Parliament for the way it has exercised the power delegated by Parliament. This new mechanism would improve our legislative process by implementing a mandatory parliamentary oversight nine years after powers had been delegated to the government to bring legislation into force.
Since this bill was first tabled in 2002, I suspect that the list of acts and provisions that would be subject to repeal under this new process must have evolved. Of course, the passing of time must have added new provisions to it, but it certainly gave time to the government to consider repealing or bringing into force some of those acts and provisions.
While I am saying this, I have in mind one rather well-known example. I refer to the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act which was finally brought into force in 2007 after at least 20 years of being on the books. Of course, this act was part of a larger scheme implemented by this government to protect the environment. Maybe good things just happen in due time. Or maybe Bill S-207 has already started to produce some positive repercussions by raising the profile of this issue since 2002.
I believe Bill S-207 will improve our parliamentary process and I want to thank Senator Banks one more time for all his efforts. It was worth it.