Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for his and his party's support for the legislation.
Once again, the member made reference to the exception that he and his party were taking to the use of the word “cultural”. The fact is that in some families, and I need to point that it is not specific to one culture because it is many cultures that this can happen in, it is a tradition to force marriage on their children.
I know of one family in one particular community, and this was 25 years ago, that took its teenage daughters out of high school because it had found husbands for the daughters. They were two years apart. This took place over a two-year period. The girls were left with no high school education and were not happy with the fact that their parents were doing this. It was one of those stigma situations. They did not want to go against their parents or their family.
These kinds of practices that are rooted in culture in some families are not conducive with Canadian values. Could the member perhaps rethink the way he is interpreting the word “cultural” in the title of the bill?