Mr. Speaker, under the previous government, important steps were taken with regard to supporting Ukraine and addressing human rights issues in Russia, and there was a commitment to move forward with the Magnitsky Act. In fact, the parliamentary secretary's own party committed with respect to supporting a Magnitsky Act before the last election. I do not know the precise timelines when this was proposed. The idea of a Magnitsky Act is something that has been developed relatively recently. It is not a form of sanctions that has been around for decades. This is a new piece of political technology that was developed to deal with human rights abuses. It is innovative, it has been passed in the United States and it works very well.
Obviously the commitment was there. Had the Conservatives been re-elected, we would have seen the implementation of the Magnitsky Act. The parliamentary secretary's own party made this commitment. If this is so ambiguous and it needs more study, the Liberals should have done the study before they made this commitment. Let us get this done, let us pass this common sense initiative and let us make it non-partisan.