Madam Speaker, I will start by correcting the hon. member. The bill clearly does not abolish the do-not-call registry. In dealing with the issue at hand, one of the important points to be made is we have had the real opportunity to benefit, in the drafting of the bill, from the study of best practices around the world.
In dealing with the substance of the bill, I will talk a little on a personal experience. A lot of people think spam is nothing more than a nuisance. Previous to my being elected in 2006, I worked for the Edmonton Oilers Hockey Club. At one point I was the director of ticket sales and as such, I had my email address on the website for the Oilers. At some point someone harvested that email address and sold it to spammers and I began to get completely inundated by spam. It was so bad it eventually got to the point where I had to change my email address. Members can imagine what goes in to changing an email address. It meant changing business cards. It meant the people who had my email address could no longer reach me.
This happened to several people within the organization. It meant we had to hire additional IT staff or put our IT resources to combat this through measures to block spam. Significant resources had to be allocated to that problem. It is estimated that the cost of problem is $3 billion to the Canadian economy per year.
If we multiply the effects I experienced and the efforts we had to take for the Oilers with thousands and thousands of companies across the country, including many small businesses that do not have IT professionals, the cost is significant.
I look forward to the member's support.