Mr. Speaker, certainly after hearing the minister go through the bill part by part, we just do not have time for in questions and comments, which I will do in my speech. However, there are three specific issues I want to raise with him.

The first is this talk of this big open and transparent process, notwithstanding the criticism that came from civil society about the government's green paper being too focused on giving law enforcement more flexibility and powers and not protecting rights and freedoms. The fact is that at committee nearly all those amendments were Liberal. Two NDP amendments were adopted, one because of a symbolic preamble. The other after agreeing to Liberal wording. Zero Conservatives and zero Green amendments were adopted. Therefore, when we talk about 55 amendments, it is important to put that into context.

Speaking of amendments, a lot of hay is being made of this great amendment the Liberals have adopted that codifies in law ministerial directives related to the information obtained under the use of torture. If the Liberals truly believe that this is not the right way to go, I want the minister to explain to me why his Liberal colleagues voted against my amendment that read as follows. The establishment in this case is CSE, and I presented similar amendments for other agencies, and it is prohibited from:

(a) disclosing information obtained in the performance of its duties and functions under this Act, or requesting information, if the disclosure or the request would subject an individual to a danger, believed on substantial grounds to exist, of mistreatment; or

(b) using information that is believed on reasonable grounds to have been obtained as a result of mistreatment of an individual.

(2) For the purposes of this section, mistreatment means torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment within the meaning of the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, signed at New York on December 10, 1984.

If the Liberals truly think that we, as Canadians, believe it is fundamentally unacceptable to obtain information or to use information obtained in the use of torture, why did the Liberals vote on the record, in recorded votes, against every amendment I had that would read exactly like that, explicitly prohibiting the use of torture? Why do they settle for ministerial directives?

Matthew Dubé

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