Madam Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to speak today to my private member's bill, Bill C-473, An Act to protect insignia of military orders and military decorations and medals that are of cultural significance for future generations.
I also want to thank the members of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs for the steps they have taken to strengthen the bill.
As I have said at each reading of Bill C-473, and will now say again, it is time for our modern medals to receive the same protection accorded to our historic medals. This bill is about continuity and ensuring protection for modern military insignia.
Thanks to amendments adopted at committee, the bill will clearly protect those military orders, decorations and medals that are less than 50 years old. This and other amendments made to the bill would ensure that together it and the existing act work in concert to provide comprehensive protection for our military heritage.
I also respect the right of recipients to decide for themselves what to do with the medals, decorations and other honours that have been awarded to them. This is one of the difficult issues that the committee grappled with during its consideration of the bill. These insignia are given to recipients and they belong to them.
If recipients give away or sell any of their possessions, from a house to a car, that is perfectly legal. There are thousands of medal collectors in Canada and around the world. There is a legal domestic and international market for military insignia. Countless medals and other military items are bought and sold daily. Much of our military history would have been lost without medal collectors and dealers.
As the committee heard from witnesses, many collectors, in fact, are veterans who are driven by the honourable desire to protect heritage rather than collecting for financial gain. They have saved thousands of medals from being discarded. They have traced their history and they have carefully safeguarded them.
The committee took the approach of addressing the need to keep these important medals in Canada while still respecting the rights of recipients and their families. The bill now refers to export instead of transfers to non-residents. It continues to exempt transactions among close family members from its provisions while amending it to include spouses, common-law partners, and the children's spouses and common-law partners, which had not been included in the bill as originally drafted. It continues to have no effect on the transfer of medals that takes place inside Canada.
We should ensure that we are protecting the history we are making today as a proud nation sharing the struggle for international freedom and democracy with others on the world stage.
My inspiration for this bill comes from the veterans and future veterans from my riding who serve or have served our country. This bill will ensure that the accolades for their acts of bravery will remain on Canadian soil and will continue to honour them as part of our Canadian heritage.