Mr. Speaker, my colleague, the previous speaker, said it all. He outlined his concerns about it, as I have. I imagine many have. The government continues to use important communities like this as nothing more than wedges to divide communities, not build them.
We have to understand what our role is as parliamentarians. It is about uniting people. It is about helping communities to get strong and build. It is about helping communities to go forward. It is about celebrating special days within that community. The way to do that is by consultation, and that means thorough and proper consultation.
As my NDP colleague has pointed out, the bill would divide the community immensely. Rather than have it united, as my Conservative colleague, the mover of the bill, would have us think that everyone was in agreement, if everybody were in agreement, then we would all be very happy today to deal with the bill at this point. The problem is that all are not happy.
We never get 100% at any given time on an issue, but there are as many people against this as there appear to be for this. Those of us who represent a large Vietnamese community in particular have been bombarded with all sides of this issue. When I speak to it today, it is of mixed feelings on both sides because it is a community that I represent.
I happen to work a lot with the Vietnamese community, and I support it immensely. People are flagging all these issues about not voting for Bill S-219 because it is not the right day. The senator changed the title, which the people were satisfied with, but there was very limited consultation. I believe there was one day of debate at the Senate level and when it came here, it was again very limited debate and discussion at committee.
Many of the people who have written to me and talked to me have said that they wanted to get to the committee when it came up, but it was not even listed on the parliamentary agenda. It suddenly appeared on the agenda and they did not have time to get here. When some of them did come very quickly for the meeting, they were denied the opportunity to speak because there was only so much time.
That is the way the government plays the wedge politics of pitting one part of a community against another. It does not give time for full discussion. What is the problem with taking extra time to ensure that as parliamentarians we get it right so we can support a bill that unites a community? The goal may have been right, but more time was needed to ensure that we had it right, which is why it gives many of us such difficulty trying to figure out how to deal with the bill.
I want to recognize my colleague, who is the party's critic on this. Again, we all try to do what is right but what is right for everyone, not just what is right for a handful of people who suit the government's requirements. We want to do something that is right for everyone.
As I said, I have had so many emails, petitions and so on, asking that we recognize it as a day of celebration, but not April 30. There has been a lot of correspondence for everyone in this. As their MP, I have come to know the people in the community very well and I want to honour them as we go forward.
I will be part of a special commemoration this coming Saturday at Nathan Phillips Square. I have attended it for may years. I speak to hundreds of veterans to remember that day, and we remember the over 250,000 Vietnamese who died fleeing that regime. They died of starvation, or in the ocean or wherever. It is a commemoration like Remembrance Day. It is a day of sadness to remember what happened.
The people that I am talking to in the community want to see a day that is a celebration of all the positive things that have happened as a result of the Vietnamese community coming to Canada, the successful families that they have raised, the businesses that are now operated by successful Vietnamese members of the community. They think it is a great honour to have a day to celebrate all of their achievements in this country that they now call home.
April 30, as the senator initially had for the name of the day, is a black day because it is a day of sadness. April 30 is not a day to celebrate all the great things that people in the Vietnamese community have done in Canada. It is a day on which they remember the fall of Saigon and the ultimate exodus of thousands and thousands of refugees from Vietnam. It is a day that we always recognize at Nathan Phillips Square and other places as a day of sadness and a day of acknowledging the many men and women who live in Canada who were part of the military that fled. They stand in uniform and remember that day as a day of sadness. I believe what the community would like to have is a day to celebrate the Vietnamese community. That is a day that I would love to see happen. That is where the concern is, that the day is seen as being a black day rather than a day of celebration.
That is why I have tremendous concerns about how to deal with this issue. This is a private member's bill, so we are able to represent our constituents as to how they feel and what they want us to do. A lot of the people in my riding are not happy with going forward with the date of April 30, but as my colleagues indicated earlier, that is the only date on the bill. The bill says very little. It has three lines. It would not achieve anything except to possibly allow the government to continue its wedge politics, which is dividing communities in saying that they are with them or they are not with them, even though their concerns are very legitimate as we move forward.
Most people who are concerned are saying that this is a day of sadness. It is like Remembrance Day for us here in Canada. It is not a day to celebrate all of the great things that the Vietnamese community has done and has worked for.
The Vietnamese community in Canada is made up of people who are fiercely and rightly proud of their history. They work hard and in many cases continue to fight for the true freedom and democracy in their homeland. I attended the human rights subcommittee yesterday and heard the head of the Viet Tan organization talk about the atrocities that continue to happen in Vietnam. They talk about human rights violations. They talk about the amount of human trafficking going on in those communities. Those are issues that we need to be pushing forward and moving along, to ensure that we are helping a community that we very much respect in a tribute. However, is April 30 the right day?
I would prefer the bill to have been sent back to committee and have allocated more time to hearing from more witnesses on all sides of the issue, and do what we are supposed to do in Parliament on issues like this, which is to find a way to bring the community together to unite it. I have no doubt we could have done that, but unfortunately because there was insufficient time, that did not happen.
April 30 is widely seen by the Vietnamese Canadian community as a dark day, like November 11, Remembrance Day, is for us. I would like to have a day to celebrate the Vietnamese community and the wonderful work that the people continue to do to build and strengthen our community, and help us continue the positive things we are doing.
We are going forward with the difficulties of legislation that is tearing apart the community on all sides. I would like to have gone back, if that were an option, but the procedures may not allow that to happen at this particular point. As we move forward and see what else we can do to assist here to take away the difficulties between the two sides of this issue, as to how we get them all to agree, that is going to be difficult to do. I am not sure where we would have to go from here to make any corrections. For the bill to go forward in its current form is a disservice to the Vietnamese community and leads us into a difficult position.
However, this is a private member's bill and we will all have our opportunity to reflect our community's wishes at the time it comes up for disposition.