Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the position he is taking on this bill. It is completely in keeping with what I have been told by the aboriginal community where I come from.
What deeply concerns me is the superficiality of the action taken by the government, and we see this over and over again. It is one thing to pass a bill in theory that gives a right to an aboriginal woman to go to court. However, how many of those women are living in isolated communities where there is a dearth of safe housing for anyone, including men, women and children? They cannot afford the bus fare, let alone have an available bus to go to town to hire a lawyer, let alone have the resources to hire a lawyer to fight these matters in court. Can the member speak to that and elaborate on the fact that the offer of the extension of the right is an extremely superficial one?