Mr. Speaker, let me get this straight. The same government that brought forward the brilliant and diabolical kill-a-trade-unionist, pay-a-fine provisions of the current Colombian agreement is now saying that the Colombian government can basically report to itself on its own human rights violations.
The problem all along has been the Colombian government's complete lack of ability to deal with these major human rights violations with its connected paramilitaries and its own military arm. To say that the government has the magic bullet, because it is now asking the government to report on itself, is absolutely shameful. Two years ago, at the time when there was a much more progressive Liberal leader, the trade committee said very clearly that there needed to be an independent and impartial human rights assessment of the effect of this agreement. That is what the NDP stands for.
Putting in place an independent human rights assessment would allow the government to perhaps defend this agreement, but it cannot. It cannot and it will not because it knows that every human rights organization in the western hemisphere opposes this agreement and knows that it will increase human rights violations in Colombia.