Mr. Speaker, we have a crisis in our country. Canada and the U.S. are the world's heaviest opioid users, with the rate of overdoses and deaths increasing dramatically.
In the past 10 months in British Columbia alone we have had 623 deaths. Of those, 322 have been related to fentanyl. In my home community of Kamloops there has been 33 deaths this year alone. It is devastating families and has taken far too many lives.
I would like to congratulate the Minister of Health on the opioid conference held in Ottawa last week. I was encouraged with the recent announcement that the RCMP had reached an agreement with China to try to halt the trans-Pacific flow of fentanyl into Canada.
I also hope that all members of the House will support the private member's bill, Bill C-307, at least at second reading, around tamper resistance, to see if it would be positive, and also call for the immediate ban on pill presses as an important next step in this fight.