Mr. Speaker, my colleague is right in pointing out that the idea of an appeal division is not new here in Parliament. In fact, when the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act was passed under the Liberal government, an appeal division was planned for. Two board members evaluated each case at the same time, and each made a decision. If one of the two members supported the claim, it was granted. Some said that was very costly and 95% of the time, the board members' decisions were the same.
So instead of having two board members evaluate each case, Parliament decided to have a first evaluation and a follow-up. It was decided that a single board member would rule in each case. If the member made the right decision, the case was closed and there was no need to get a second member involved. However, if there was an error, a second member could reconsider the matter. Unfortunately, neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives ever set up the appeal division. I introduced a bill to force them to set up the appeal division, but unfortunately, it was defeated at the final stage by a single vote in the House.
So the bill includes the appeal division, and I must say that it is even better than what was originally contemplated in the IRPA. This appeal allows for a new hearing if necessary and allows individuals to introduce new evidence if, according to certain criteria, things have changed since the first claim or it was not reasonable to introduce the evidence during the first hearing. We finally have the long-awaited appeal division, and it is even better than before. We must salute the minister and the committee for their work on this and for finally implementing the appeal division.