Mr. Speaker, I think it needs to be acknowledged that the timeline we have is to a substantial extent manufactured by the government. The Liberals removed the direction to the expert panel to provide legislative recommendations, which would have sped up the process. They had an opportunity, as soon as the special joint committee reported, to bring forward legislation. They delayed and delayed, and now they want us to be concerned about the timeline.
They should propose a better piece of legislation. They should fix the problem and then we can work together to get it passed quickly, but there are no clear criteria. It uses phrases like “reasonably foreseeable”, which are neither medical nor legal terminology. This legislation provides no clear criteria. If it does not do the job that the court asks us to do, which is to create a system of robust safeguards, then what is the point of passing the bill? What is the value of passing a bill that does not actually, in any substantial way, improve on the absence of the bill.
Let us reject the bill and give the government a chance to try again.