Madam Speaker, I thank my friend for his speech and his commentary. Oftentimes when we are dealing with legislation in this place, we do not do proper justice in talking about people who are impacted by the legislation we are dealing with.
This bill is an opportunity for the government to correct a wrong. That is not just a wrong that has existed for the past three years since the current government formed office, and that it campaigned on and declared its intention to decriminalize marijuana possession, but also to look at past injustices, when the evidence was before all parliamentarians as to the need to decriminalize marijuana and the hypocrisy that legislature after legislature had shown in dealing with this.
I will ask for two comments: one is on the racial component. I represent northwestern British Columbia. It has approximately 35% to 40% indigenous communities. We know, through statistics, about the overrepresentation of indigenous people in our prisons. We know that part of that representation is due to possession charges. They are sometimes put together with some other charge where non-indigenous people would not face the same amount of incarceration. Therefore, I would like comment on the impact on indigenous communities. I know my friend is from Toronto, but he has studied this legislation and its impacts.
The second component is on the effects on all people. What is it to hold a criminal record? What effect does it have on the day-to-day lives of Canadians, whether they are seeking to volunteer for their kids' soccer camp or being able to cross the border for business or pleasure, to carry around this record and the threat of that record being reintroduced into their lives?