Mr. Speaker, I would like to pick up on a few things my colleague said about importing the language from the convention and do a little follow-up on the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands' comments.
From legal counsel the comment in committee was it is very difficult a lot times to use treaty language because the words mean very different things.
When we started, we started with the cluster munitions convention. In this particular case, we took the language of the convention as a starting point and then we had to look at how we would blend this into Canadian criminal court law.
As I said earlier, stockpiling became possession because, in fact, they said there is really no way without defining it what an offence of stockpiling would be. If we criminalize possession, then we have caught somebody who has one cluster munition or 10,000. It does not matter. It is a broader offence, so it is much more collective than the munitions treaty.
He also talked about transfers. What they had to do in the convention is more of a state to state, as opposed to in the criminal court.
While I respect his opinion, I differ. That is why the government is going forward with the legislation.
Does he not also understand that legally, we are required to pass laws in this place which are applicable in a criminal court in Canada? In this case, he must agree that the convention does not adequately address coverage in a criminal court.