Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  That's right: how is it contributing? Many of the human rights treaties that we have signed deal with areas of social economic rights. How are we contributing? For example, to reduce child poverty, how does this proposal contribute to that? That kind of an assessment is not done.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  As I mentioned in my submission, I think that having some kind of accountability to Parliament is an essential piece of the reform. I think that's where putting it into law and having some accountability to Parliament would help. Canada was asked to table the report from the UPR in Parliament.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  For children's rights, we've asked that the reports be given to MPs so they can see what is being said about Canada and about Canada's children. I don't believe that's happened. So there needs to be a greater engagement of MPs. I know you have many things on your plates, so you'll have to structure that properly, but there should be accountability to Parliament.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  My comments in this regard resulted after the Senate did the three-year study on children's rights. The government responded and said, “But we do look at children's rights.” I said, “Well, then, I want to know where.” We looked at it, and there are two places under Treasury Board guidelines for policy formation.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  They're not experts in the subject area. In other words, they review documents in a range of areas, so they're not experts necessarily in children's issues and children's programming.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  That's right.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  They are lawyers in the human rights division, so they certainly have some expertise about human rights law, but I think my bigger concern is that it's primarily a negative screen. We asked; it's to show that we aren't violating something, and it's--

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Yes. When I refer to the report, I'm referring to Canada's third and fourth reports on implementation of the convention, which was submitted to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child on November 20.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you. I appreciate that. I too heard those comments about the review of Canada at the universal periodic review. Of course, the great hope was that this mechanism at the UN Human Rights Council would be a little more free of those kinds of political factors than the previous commission was.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you for those questions. I would certainly agree with you that the questions with regard to aboriginal children, who are a direct federal responsibility, are one of the primary concerns we have, but there is also a federal government obligation to look at equitable treatment of children across the country.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I have reason to believe there is more recent data in existence than is in the report. It seems to stop at 2006. Now, some of the federal-provincial agreements were changed such that there's less incentive for provinces to submit data to the federal government than there was prior to 2006.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you. I don't think there's any one mechanism, but I'm hoping I pointed to some of them. I think start with being clear in law. We don't have clarity in the law right now on what is the status of these commitments. So I think some enabling legislation that clarifies what their status is in Canadian law would be a first step.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I think technology can, but it's really important also to have some face-to-face discussions around these matters. In terms of the universal periodic review, the process that was used by the United Kingdom in terms of the engagement of civil society was quite good. Just in the area of children's rights, I know there were extensive discussions across the country, including with young people, as to what some of their priorities were.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Sorry.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you very much for this opportunity to discuss with you what is an important subject. Let me begin with appreciation for the motion that's under study. It's important. It's timely. Those who work on children's rights and other human rights are pleased that this committee is going to propose alternatives to the current system.