Mr. Speaker, the primary thrust of the hon. member's remarks had to do with the question of oversight mechanisms and the issue of our support for legislation which may not, at the end day, have such an oversight mechanism.
The point is that we are hoping that there will be not only oversight mechanisms but review and accountability mechanisms as well. That is why we are proposing them.
I was one of a number of Canadians who signed on to a statement that was published on February 19 in The Globe and Mail. This statement calls for just such an integrated series of oversight, review, and accountability mechanisms, with Parliament at its core. I would hope that the government, which looks to public opinion and finds that some 80% of Canadians are in support of this bill, will also look to the fact that two-thirds of Canadians also want a robust and integrated oversight mechanism system that has a parliamentary review mechanism and parliamentary oversight at its core as part of overall accountability.
This is something that was called for in the Arar commission, which we as a Liberal government set up. We tabled legislation in 2005 calling for such an oversight mechanism. All parliamentarians agreed to it. We lost the election, and for the last 10 years, the Conservative government has done nothing about implementing that mechanism. I hope the Conservatives will do it now.