Mr. Speaker, with respect to consultation, that was one of the questions I asked the minister after his speech.
It will be interesting to see how the provinces react to everything that is thrown at their courts, especially since access to justice is not satisfactory across Canada.
With respect to how justice is perceived, it is a vicious circle. The wheels of justice are turning more and more slowly, and this certainly does not help convince the public that justice is served.
Thus, there is a great deal of work to be done. There is no way to be informed because this government does not provide details about its consultations. In any case, for the government, consulting means talking rather than listening.
With respect to compliance with the charter, every time the Conservative government introduces a bill, we are usually given this assurance. In fact, under section 4.1 of the Department of Justice Act, the government is required to ensure that its bills are charter compliant.
However, in light of the suit launched by Mr. Schmidt, the public servant who says that that is not exactly the order that the justice department is given, and the government's monumental losses of 7-0, 8-0 and 6-1 on criminal justice issues brought before the Supreme Court of Canada in the past year, we certainly have doubts. However, we will verify these doubts in committee.
If the Conservative government did not make sure that its bill was legal and charter compliant, we will do so in committee because this is a serious file that concerns our children. Let us at least have the decency to study the bill in committee.
I do not claim to be the greatest constitutional expert the world has ever known, so I have some questions. I do not have all the answers just yet, but we hope to get them in committee.