Mr. Speaker, I am disappointed that would be the first question my colleague would ask me. I am not surprised, but I am disappointed.
The fact is, as we have seen over this last week in Boston, as well as in London, Ontario, and there are other examples, we know that terrorism and the threat of terrorism is not something that only affects countries far away. It has had a terrible effect and terrible consequences right here in North America. Our neighbours have suffered terribly.
Our job as parliamentarians, and we as Conservatives take our job very seriously, is to make sure that Canadians are protected and to make sure law enforcement have the tools they need, whether it is CSIS, RCMP or investigators locally. That is the job that Canadians have asked us to do.
This is an important amendment. It is an amendment that was part of the original legislation. Again, the Liberals recognized that it was important. At this time, when a lot of the threats are not known, when police and law enforcement are investigating, they need these tools. There are strong safeguards, but they need the tools to be able to question potential threats. They need to be able to stop these potential threats, which is the recognizance with conditions portion, again, only with the approval and the consent of a judge, and they need other safeguards in place.
It is too bad that the NDP does not seem to understand that terrorism is a threat. We have seen it over this last week. It is not just a notion. It is not just something for academics to talk about.
It is time right now for parliamentarians to act, to give law enforcement the tools they need, to bring back important provisions into the Anti-terrorism Act, including the new laws that would make it an offence to leave the country to engage in or be trained in terrorist activity. These are important and timely measures. It is extremely disappointing that the NDP does not see this.
I am hoping I will hear that the Liberals will continue to support this. I know they have indicated previously that they would support it.
It is disappointing, not surprising, that the NDP will not support it. The legislation was before committee and we did study it thoroughly. I know that some of my NDP colleagues, and other colleagues, the critic for public safety, were there and they asked questions. We heard over and over that this was an important piece for law enforcement.
If the NDP members have more technical questions about the bill, we understand that. We would be happy to answer those questions. We are prepared, because we believe it is a good piece of legislation. However, to out and out say they are not going to support it then I would say that if they want to talk about who is politicizing something they need to look in the mirror.