Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's speech was good as usual, although this time I have some differences to take up with him on some of his points.
When people are victims of identity theft or credit card abuses, they are already under a lot of stress when they find out about this issue. Then when they go to the police, they are told that it is a civil matter, that they need to take a number and they will be dealt with at some point.
When the member suggests perhaps there is some body of evidence out there that perhaps civil courts could handle issues like this, in real terms people will not be encouraged or happy to be told that. They will have to take someone to small claims court, but if it is an identity theft situation, they may not even know the person who stole the identity in the first place.
Another issue is the credit card companies do not want to tell people what happened with their cases. They put the cone of silence around the situation and do not report back to them, so they may never know who used their cards. We should require credit card companies to report back to people and let them know who did what and give a resolution of the case.
It is very important we have this federal legislation so the police forces cannot step aside—