Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-12, which is what is listed today under Government Orders. We have a very strange situation at the moment in that the bill is substantially similar, with the same title and almost all the same sections, to Bill C-2, which remains on the Order Paper. I draw attention to that as I go over the rules only because this is, to me, an unprecedented experience.
I have not been in this place forever, only since 2011, but I have never seen the government introduce two bills that are substantially the same. Sometimes, there is a private member's bill and we look at the order of precedence. As I read the rules, I think the government is within its rights to have two bills that have the same title and are substantially the same, but at the moment that it chooses one to put forward for a vote, we will know that the other one is withdrawn, because we cannot vote on two bills that are the same in the same session.
As a member of Parliament, I wonder what kind of game the government is playing with this. These are both government bills. Why is Bill C-2 still in the order of precedence, and why are we getting nonsense statements from Liberal members, who have said Bill C-12 builds on Bill C-2? That is clearly not what is happening here.
Bill C-2 is an omnibus bill whose title is about stronger borders, and it references many other pieces of legislation within it. Bill C-12 does the same. As some of my hon. Conservative colleagues have already noted, the parts that have been removed are those that were the most obviously egregious. The idea that the Canada Post Corporation Act has to be changed is in Bill C-2, but not in Bill C-12. It would allow people to open our mail in case there might be controlled substances. There are also the parts that would allow information from our Internet accounts to be accessed and shared. This is a source of real concern for Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
Bill C-2 is an omnibus bill touching on 10 different bills. I think Bill C-12 is down to touching on eight different bills now. It would change the Customs Act, the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, the Oceans Act, the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Sex Offender Information Registration Act and the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act. I have not read all of them into the record.
Omnibus bills are a problem, because when we deal with subjects that may be somewhat related but are sufficiently different, they should be studied separately. They should not be put together and called an omnibus bill.
In this case, omnibus Bill C-2 attracted omnibus opposition. A broad coalition of over 200 civil society organizations put together a demand to Parliament before we resumed in September, as the original Bill C-2 was tabled in the spring. It attracted concern from civil liberties organizations, refugee protection groups and migrant protection organizations. I can mention some of the groups by name.
Specifically, over 300 organizations called for Bill C-2 to be withdrawn, including the Canadian Labour Congress, the United Church of Canada, the Migrant Rights Network, the Canadian Council for Refugees, Amnesty International, OpenMedia, Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights, Climate Action Network Canada, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers and the Canadian Muslim Lawyers Association. They all called for a full withdrawal of Bill C-2. I have not read all of the groups' names into the record.
Now we have Bill C-12. Have these groups said the government has heard their concerns and, obviously, Bill C-2 is going to be withdrawn? No. Bill C-2, as I mentioned, is still on the Order Paper. More than that, though, removing the parts that were in Bill C-2 from Bill C-12 does not make Bill C-12 acceptable.
I am going to quote Matt Hatfield, the executive director of OpenMedia, one of the many civil society organizations concerned about this bill. This is his position on privacy rights and other aspects of the way in which Bill C-12 is still offensive. He said, “The story of this legislative package is the same today as it was on day one of Bill C-2’s introduction; it’s about pleasing President Trump”.
Like the preceding speaker from Niagara, my riding is also a border riding. Saanich—Gulf Islands is on the Salish Sea, which is an ecological region shared with Washington state. The Gulf Islands referenced in the title of my riding, Saanich—Gulf Islands, are close relatives, one might say, to the San Juan Islands. They have the same ecosystem. The same endangered whales go through both waters of the Salish Sea, and whales and salmon do not carry passports.
The indigenous people of Washington state, the Lummi Nation, are relatives to the Saanich people I am honoured to represent here in this place. They are intrinsically linked, and our borders are strong in that we respect each other's nationalities. I have to say, there are certain strains when the Mariners are playing the Jays, but never mind. Let us set that aside. In my riding, we cheer for the Jays. This is clear.
On Friday last week, we had a cross-border forum and invited into Saanich—Gulf Islands representatives from local governments, indigenous governments, NGOs and civil society groups, and we all agreed that we are still neighbours and friends. We do not like Trump's tariffs and we do not want to kowtow to him, but we want to deepen the relationships that exist between us. We would really like to get our ferry service back, by the way, between Anacortes, Washington, and Sidney, British Columbia.
We can deepen relationships, but given the strong border language and the rhetoric around this, I have to agree with the comment from OpenMedia. The language in Bill C-2 and Bill C-12 is all about pleasing Donald Trump.
What gets offended in the process? I used to practise refugee law. I was a lawyer in Halifax, and in those days, the refugees I helped were mostly ship-jumpers. With nothing more than the clothes on their back, they escaped from eastern bloc and Warsaw Pact countries, like Romania, came to Halifax Harbour and found themselves a lawyer. Generally, that was me.
I was so grateful for this. It has been mentioned a few times in debates that Canadians would hate the idea that we provided hotel rooms, which we did. I will never forget the brilliant young man who called me, probably four decades later, after I got elected, and wanted me to know how he had done in Canada once I helped him get a hotel room in Halifax and start his refugee claim. He started and ran a small construction company and had a number of sons, who are still running his construction company. He was awfully glad we had immediate help for refugees and did not require that they cross at the proper border. Sometimes, a person crosses where they can, with the clothes on their back. This is why I am proud I was a practising member of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers. It is also absolutely opposed to what is being proposed here in Bill C-12, and remain so.
Going back to the fact that it is an omnibus bill, this means it is not going to go to the immigration committee for proper study with enough witnesses and experts brought to bear to say, “This is what is wrong with this bill, and this is how we might fix it.” The Green Party still maintains that these issues are not fixable and that both Bill C-2 and Bill C-12 should be withdrawn immediately. In the meantime, the greater likelihood is that they will not be. The Liberals have caved to what the Conservatives demanded in this place, and I thank those on the Conservatives benches who demanded it, but they are not demanding enough. Both bills should be withdrawn immediately.
Bill C-2 had egregious sections regarding the post office and the Internet, but Bill C-12 is still unacceptable. It has provisions that invade privacy and hurt refugees, with innocent people caught in the gears of what is now an increasingly Trumpian world. We do not have to accept that. We can make laws that work for Canadians and for those who legitimately need our protection. Canadians will always want to say “elbows up”, but with arms outstretched to the world.