Madam Speaker, this is a really important issue for me, because I represent a riding in Calgary. Calgary has been basically one of the epicentres of this particular crisis in Canada. While we are seeing the impact of this crisis to a large extent in British Columbia and Alberta, it is really important to note that this is a problem that is going to affect every area of Canada in a very short period of time.
I cannot express strongly enough how concerned I am. “Concerned” does not actually carry the weight I want it to carry. I will say how deathly afraid I am that if we do not act quickly and in a very non-partisan way to manage this particular crisis and some of the key factors that are enabling this to explode, we are going to have a much larger and deadlier crisis on our hands and a lot of parents with dead kids who we will have to explain our actions to.
I want to speak to the bill and its structure from a point of gravitas and ask my colleagues on the opposite side of the House to consider some portions of the bill in that spirit.
We are here today, first and foremost, to do what we can to stop the flow of this particular substance, fentanyl, into Canada and to ensure that adequate laws are in place to stem the tide as much as we can. That is first and foremost.
I know that there has been a lot of talk today about why certain measures in this bill are so important. I agree with certain components of it. The component that would allow the Canada Border Services Agency to open packages that are under 30 grams is absolutely critical, because we know that the substance is highly potent. It is coming in from Chinese factories, for lack of a better term, or manufacturers, and because it is so potent, these manufacturers overseas are able to say not to worry about it, because Canada Border Services cannot open these packages. It is coming in inside things like cellphone cases, urine strip bottles, tiny packages. Because it is so potent, it can then be cut or mixed in larger centres and distributed. It is very lucrative, very easy, and so deadly.
I cannot tell the House some of the stories I have heard in my constituency office. In six years, I have seen a lot with the Calgary Police Service. The city has gone through a lot, but this is something that has first responders very unsettled. First responders in my city who have to deal with these deaths are really shaken up by this and are screaming out to us, telling us that we have to change some of these things.
There are measures in this bill that I strongly support. We need to pass them in the House and in the other place as soon as possible and without delay. Those measures would be things like the power to open packages under 30 grams, the prohibition of unregistered pill presses, and the illegal importation of precursors to the substance.
There are a variety of other initiatives in the bill, which include authorizing a minister “to require a person who may conduct activities in relation to controlled substances, precursors or designated devices to provide the Minister with information or to take certain measures in respect of such activities”; adding an administrative monetary penalties scheme; streamlining “the disposition of seized, found or otherwise acquired controlled substances”; modernizing inspection powers; and expanding and amending certain regulation-making authorities, including in respect of the collection, use, and disclosure of information.
All of these things are going to send a very strong message to the people making this, and it is going to stop a lot of it from coming in. These measures are a first line of defence. There is a broader problem to deal with, but this is low-hanging fruit that I do not think anyone in this place is going to argue with.
On that note, I will quote one of my Liberal colleagues from Vancouver, the member for Vancouver Centre. She stated, “I feel it’s something we need to be doing something about faster than we are doing it”.
There are components in the bill that are strong, smart, and should be supported. However, there is another component in the bill that requires a lot more debate and that I do not think should be fast-tracked through the House.
My objection to the bill is its structure. There are elements that I think require unanimous consent. They just need to be passed through as quickly as possible. However, there are some components that require further debate and that many Canadians would be unhappy about should we just let them go through. They are, frankly, the consultation process and the requirement for review criteria for the opening of safe consumption sites.
I know that this is a very controversial debate. As to how long and under what circumstances a community should be consulted in terms of allowing a safe consumption site, we had a very rigorous debate about this in the last Parliament. It took a lot of time. We heard from a lot of witnesses at committee. That debate should happen again. However, I do not want to be sitting here looking at the mother of a dead kid saying that we are holding the bill up because we have a debate component here.
The government has made a mistake in pairing these two issues. I do not understand why they are put together in the same piece of legislation. I could speculate on motive, but I do not want to, because it does a disservice to the gravity of the situation or some of the other measures that just need to pass as quickly as possible.
This component needs more debate. I do not want to get into the form or substance or reason for that, because it could take hours, but the reality is that there are 25 different criteria currently for the consultation process, very specific criteria, for opening a safe consumption site. In this bill, they are reduced to five. These criteria are as follows:
a) the impact of the site on crime rates;
(b) the local conditions indicating a need for the site;
(c) the regulatory structure in place to support the site;
(d) the resources available to support the maintenance of the site; and
(e) expressions of community support or opposition.
Regardless of one's personal opinion on safe injection sites and whether or not they are beneficial, my issue is that the bill does not adequately define these characteristics or these criteria. They are very vague. In this debate, we need to have community buy-in and social licence. Reducing these criteria from something that is so specific to something that is so vague and not defined is worthy of a larger and longer debate, regardless of what our position is. We should be bringing in witnesses and taking the time at committee to define these things, but this is time we do not have, especially for the Border Services Agency having the power to open packages of less than 30 grams. Let us just get that done.
My objection to this is simply that I do not understand why these have been paired together. If we want to make the argument about safe consumption sites being part of the overall fentanyl crisis, fine, but those two things can be done in separate bills so that at least we can get a stopgap measure on some of these things. That is what really struck me first and foremost. That was my first concern when I looked through the bill.
To drive home the point about how critical it is for us to get some of these measures through the House as quickly as possible, I want to give members some statistics from Calgary. This happened on December 29, 2016. There was a bust in Calgary, and it was a record. There were 35,321 pills in a home in Calgary. That is a lot of deaths waiting to happen. When I read this, my first reaction was, “Oh my God, how is this possible? How can this happen? What can I do as a legislator to stop the production of this so that this is not happening?”
We should not be relying on our first responders to find this before it goes out into the marketplace. We should be doing everything possible to make it difficult for this stuff to be created in the first place.
When we think about the potency and potential street impact of that number of pills, it should actually humble and just shock every person in this place. What does this mean? What is the human component of that? It is 193 deaths in my province between January and September of last year.
I implore the government to look at the two components of this bill and structure it better so that we can stop kids from dying.