Mr. Speaker, the United Nations has released its draft report on the universal periodic review of Canada's domestic human rights record. Following our last review in 2009, Canada pledged to consider ratifying the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture, yet here we are four years later, and the Conservative government is still considering this very serious matter.
What this optional protocol does is to establish an international inspection system for persons in jails that is modelled after the European system that has been in place since 1987. In the current report, our allies, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Australia and the Netherlands, recommend that Canada join the civilized world and ratify this convention.
Considering that OPCAT was adopted by the UN in 2002, this means that Canada has had 11 long years, with first the Liberal government and now the Conservative government, to consider ratifying it.
Canadians are left wondering when the government will finally do the right thing and ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture.