Click here to read about 4 Jewish Advocacy issues to watch this fall
House of Commons
Yesterday Minister of Public Safety Ralph Goodale announced changes to the Security Infrastructure Program (SIP). Over 2,000 members of the Jewish community had contacted Minister Goodale requesting these changes through a CIJA campaign. You can read our response here. Minister Goodale expressed his appreciation for CIJA’s work on SIP in the House and on social media.
Security Infrastructure Program
Question Period
Mr. Michael Levitt (York Centre, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, Canada’s diversity is a source of strength and pride. Sadly, minority communities are sometimes targeted for attack, including recent incidents in Toronto, Ottawa, and Regina.
Groups like the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs have been calling for improved support to help at-risk communities protect their institutions.
Can the Minister of Public Safety please tell us what the government is doing to ensure the safety of minority communities and to help us protect our schools, community centres, and houses of worship?
Hon. Ralph Goodale (Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the representations made by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, and the National Council of Canadian Muslims, and others. There is no place in Canada for racist and hateful conduct like we have seen, sadly, in recent weeks.
This morning, I announced a stronger security infrastructure program, which funds up to half of the cost of security projects for non-profit community institutions. The program is now more accessible and broader in scope to help protect Canada’s diverse communities. An attack on any one of them is an attack on all of us.
Senate
Bill C-16 – Transgender Rights
Second Reading
Hon. Grant Mitchell moved second reading of Bill C-16, An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code.
He said: Colleagues, Bill C-16, An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code, gender identity, is designed to support and facilitate the inclusion of transgender and other gender-diverse people in Canadian society and to provide them with enhanced protection against criminal aggression.
Diversity, inclusion, acceptance and understanding are core Canadian values. We believe that they define who we are, and we are very proud that they do. And yet, in what we all hold to be a remarkably open and inclusive society, transgender people face an extreme level of exclusion, discrimination, prejudice and violence.
Research demonstrates that many transgender and other gender-diverse Canadians are not able to fully participate in our society. They regularly face negative stereotypes, harassment, discrimination and sometimes even violence.
It is important to recognize the many members of the transgender community in this country who have advocated tirelessly and with unrelenting courage for the recognition of rights and protections for trans people. They have been assisted by organizations like Gender Mosaic, by family and friends and by many other rights advocates and other groups. I have to note the particular courage and persistence of young people like Jesse Thompson, a trans teenager who fought for and won the right to join his hockey team buddies in the locker room. And the courage and persistence of Charlie Lowthian-Rickert, a 10-year-old trans girl who has fought for trans rights with a strength, courage and maturity well beyond her years.
Jesse, Charlie and so many others are truly inspirational. I believe we are, all of us, a better people and society for their efforts.
Among the many frustrations experienced by transgender people, their families and their supporters are the seemingly endless delays in getting their rights and protections enshrined in legislation. It has not been for lack of trying.
MP Bill Siksay introduced a bill dealing with trans rights in the House of Commons in 2005 and then again in 2009. His Bill C- 389 was passed by the House of Commons in February 2011. It then arrived in the Senate, where it died on the Order Paper without coming to a vote.
In September 2011, over five years ago, MP Randall Garrison, whose determined leadership I would like to acknowledge, developed and presented Bill C-279 in the House of Commons. Bill C-279 is the most resent predecessor to Bill C-16. In 2013, Bill C-279 was passed in the House of Commons with Liberal, New Democrat and some Conservative MP support. Over the subsequent two years, it advanced to third reading twice in the Senate. Both times it died here, without even being allowed to come to a vote; put another way, it was adjourned to death.
The substance of Bill C-16 has been debated in Parliament for a long, long time. It has been supported twice by majority votes in the House of Commons, and it has been the subject of lengthy committee hearings with dozens of witnesses here and in the other place. So extensive has the committee review and debate been of the substance of Bill C-16 and its predecessor bills that the House of Commons passed it after a decision by all parties, including Conservatives, to expedite the committee review process. It recently passed third reading with Liberal and New Democrat support, and support from a very significant cadre of Conservative MPs, including their leader, Ms. Ambrose.
Over this long period — 11 years — Canadians have increasingly grown to understand and accept the need for protection and rights recognition for transgender people. It is fair to say that it is way past time to approve this bill in the Senate and to make it law.
Before explaining the bill, I need to define what is meant by a few key terms. The term “gender identity” refers to an individual’s internal and personal experience of gender — their sense of being a man or woman, both, or neither.
For most people, the sense of self as being a man or woman aligns with their anatomical and biological characteristics. For others, it does not. These people are referred to as transgender or trans people.
“Gender expression” refers to how people publicly present their gender, through behaviour and outward appearance such as clothing, hair, body language and chosen name.
“Gender identity” refers to who a person is in their very soul. “Gender expression” refers to how each person publicly presents their gender identity. A transgender person simply knows they are of a gender different from the one assigned to them at birth, the one indicated by the physical and physiological features of their body. They cannot live honestly or comfortably in their birth- assigned gender, where they are literally and profoundly uncomfortable in their own skins. If they can overcome their fear, they transition to their true gender identity. To do otherwise is to live in a continuous, often agonizing, confounding and alienating condition. In some sense, it is to live a lie. No one should ever have to do that.
To be transgender is not a choice. Trans people do not make this up or fake it. Why would anybody want to inflict upon themselves the stigma, discrimination and suffering that almost always inevitably follow the transitioning?
As Oscar Wilde once said, “Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.” This bill will go a long way to helping this vulnerable group of people — trans people — to be who they are and to be themselves without fear.
What does this bill do? Bill C-16 will make a number of changes to the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code designed to protect transgender people.
First, let’s look at the Canadian Human Rights Act. This act applies to the federal government in its role as employer and service provider to Crown corporations, the postal service and the federally regulated private sector, including telecommunications companies and charter banks. Bill C-16 will amend the Canadian Human Rights Act to add two prohibited grounds of discrimination: gender identity and gender expression. As a result, it will be explicitly discriminatory to disadvantage people because of their gender identity or expression in any workplace, in hiring and promoting, and in the provision of goods, services, facilities and accommodation by or in entities under federal jurisdiction.
If the grounds “gender identity or expression” were added, this would mean that a trans person working for the federal government, or one of the federally-regulated employers, could not be passed over for a job or promotion simply because they are trans. It would also be unacceptable to harass a trans person because of their gender identity or expression, turning their workplace into a hostile and poisoned environment for reasons that have nothing to do with their skills or ability to do their job.
Similarly, if a trans person applies for a bank account or a passport, they should receive the same level of respectful service as any other Canadian.
The bill will also amend the Criminal Code in three ways. It will expand the list of identifiable groups that are protected from hate propaganda by adding “gender identity” and “gender expression” to the list.
Second, there are three crimes of hate propaganda in the Criminal Code.
Their purpose is to eliminate extreme and dangerous speech that could incite others to violence against groups listed in the code. The amendment proposed by Bill C-16 would add gender identity and gender expression to this list.
The third amendment to the Criminal Code will establish that hatred on the basis of gender identity or gender expression is an aggravating factor in sentencing for a criminal offence, along with other listed categories like race, colour and religion. The aggravated sentencing provision in the Criminal Code will therefore allow judges to recognize and denounce crimes against trans people motivated by bias, prejudice or hate; condemn these hate crimes as being against a group of people who are more vulnerable to crime simply because they are identifiable as trans; send a special message of deterrence for these crimes; and encourage prosecutors and law enforcement offers to be aware of the particular vulnerability of trans people.
Why is Bill C-16 so important? The Ontario Human Rights Commission notes that there are arguably few groups in society today who are as disadvantaged and disenfranchised as the transgender community. Transgender people suffer profound alienation and discrimination in their daily lives. They live in fear of frequent, often brutally violent, physical and verbal bullying. They live in fear of sexual assault. They suffer significant economic discrimination and discrimination in housing and medical care. Their circumstances have led to extreme levels of suicide and suicide attempts. They need our help.
Research projects by the Ontario Trans PULSE Project and by Egale, and the 2015 report Being Safe, Being Me, provide stark and startling evidence of what trans people face in Canada today. These studies found that of those transgender people surveyed with respect to employment barriers and economic marginalization, 13 per cent had been fired for being trans; 18 per cent were turned down for jobs because they are trans; over 70 per cent are earning less than $30,000 per year; and their median income is $15,000 per year. This is despite the fact that they are highly educated: 70 per cent have some form of post-secondary education, and 44 per cent have post-secondary undergraduate and graduate degrees.
With respect to discrimination in medical care, of those people surveyed, 10 per cent who had accessed an emergency room were refused care because they were trans; 21 per cent avoided emergency at one time or another specifically due to being trans; and 40 per cent experienced discriminatory behaviour from a family doctor.
With respect to bullying and violence, of those studied, 20 per cent had been physically or sexually assaulted; 34 per cent had been verbally threatened or harassed; and 24 per cent reported being harassed by police.
With respect to mental health and suicide, of those studied, more than 50 per cent presented symptoms consistent with clinical depression; 77 per cent reported that they had considered suicide; 43 per cent had actually attempted suicide and — this is striking and startling — of those, 70 per cent had done so at 19 years of age or younger.
With respect to youth, of those studied, 90 per cent reported being subjected to transphobic comments frequently, often daily; 23 per cent of students reported that teachers directed transphobic comments at them; 25 per cent of students reported physical harassment; 36 per cent had been physically threatened or injured in the past year; 9 per cent had been threatened or injured with a weapon; 33 per cent said they had been bullied through the Internet in the past year; and trans youth are more than twice as likely as their non-trans counterparts to consider suicide.
These findings speak to the urgency of passing Bill C-16 and implementing the recognition of the rights and protections that it will afford transgender people in Canada. Clearly, they need our help.
Arguments are recurring and stock, in many cases, against this bill, and I would like to address some of these.
One argument is that gender identity and expression are not required in law since trans issues are already covered. This alludes to the idea that in jurisdictions where these are not covered explicitly, the categories of sex, disability and sexual orientation in human rights legislation are sometimes stretched in judicial and tribunal proceedings — and in the Criminal Code — to cover transgender cases.
What I say is if that is the case, then there can be absolutely no harm in simply adding belts to suspenders to ensure the consistency of these protections. And it should be noted that being transgender is not a disability. In fact, the only thing that can be said to disable trans people is the sometimes paralyzing discrimination that they suffer.
There is also the argument that transgender identity is too subjective a concept to be enshrined in law because it is defined as an individual’s deeply felt internal experience of gender, yet we of course accept outright that no one can discriminate on the basis of religion, and that too is clearly a very deeply subjective and personal feeling.
The most pernicious of arguments is the washroom argument. This is the default-to-disaster scenario. It goes that somehow men will dress up as women to get into women’s washrooms or locker rooms, engage in some criminal act and use this bill as a defence. This is a particularly hurtful argument. It’s spurious. It’s hurtful because it casts, as it does, all trans people with criminal suspicion.
In fact, it is trans people who are at great risk of being assaulted. They live in fear of being outed in a washroom. Moreover, any of the kind of activity considered in this washroom argument would be so clearly criminal that no court would absolve it on this basis.
In any event, if we were truly serious about making washrooms safer, then why wouldn’t we simply advocate for putting alarm buttons and privacy curtains and other measures in all washrooms and make them safer for everyone? Excluding trans people from washrooms will simply not make anyone in any washroom any safer.
The problems cited by opponents have been denied in any case by the actual practice of and experience with this kind of legislation in other jurisdictions. Eight Canadian provinces and one territory have human rights legislation that includes gender expression and/or gender identity. The world has not somehow been turned upside down by the extension of trans rights and protections in provincial and territorial jurisdictions. There has not been an epidemic of men dressing up as women to commit crimes.
I believe it is very unfair to question and to be judgmental about something as personal and intimate as someone’s appreciation of their own gender. Who are any of us to judge another person in this way? Transgender people hurt no one because of their gender identity and gender expression, but they are themselves hurt often relentlessly and brutally by those who judge, discriminate against and abuse them for being who they are.
Yes, it takes effort and commitment to make a law like this one work in the day-to-day practical world. The practical and successful experience of the Edmonton Public School Board and so many organizations and groups across this country, however, in implementing transgender inclusion policies is a wonderful demonstration, a practical and real demonstration, that with goodwill, this is entirely doable.
The public school board in Edmonton has a clearly stated policy that affords inclusion and respect for transgender staff and students in their schools, including washrooms and locker rooms. As the chair of the board recently explained to me, they have arrived at solutions to every challenge in the implementation of their policy through discussion and collaboration on a case-by- case basis. They have redesigned facilities, educated children and staff and appointed staff contacts for trans children. They have made it work, and their schools are safe and accepting.
To sum up, Bill C-16 is about equal opportunity for trans and gender-diverse people in employment and access to services. It is about freedom from hate propaganda: calls for genocide or promotion of hatred of groups of people. It is about denouncing acts of violence and other crimes when they target people because of their gender identity or expression, or because of prejudice or hatred.
To conclude, this bill will do two very important things. It will give transgender people real, concrete protections against losing their jobs, being evicted from the place they live and being refused places to live; protections against economic discrimination and against brutal, ongoing, soul-destroying verbal and physical bullying and violence.
In addition, passing this bill will send an important, powerful and hopeful message of inclusion and acceptance to a group of Canadians who experience alienation and discrimination that most of us cannot even imagine. It will elevate awareness of the plight of transgender people and inspire Canadians’ compassion.
As Irwin Cotler, former member of Parliament and human rights activist of great national and international stature, once said:
The Canadian Human Rights Act is more than just an act of Parliament. It is an act of recognition, a statement of our collective values, and a document that sets out a vision of a Canada where all individuals enjoy equality of opportunity and freedom from discrimination.
Justice La Forest of the Supreme Court of Canada said that a failure to explicitly refer to gender identity in the Canadian Human Rights Act leaves transgender people invisible.
The true greatness of Canada is found in our open, inclusive, caring and accepting culture and values in these core elements of our society. They make Canada a beacon of justice and fairness for those much less fortunate and those who are vulnerable around the world.
We are not perfect in this. There are gaps. Let’s move now, senators, to close one of these gaps and send a message to transgender people in Canada that they are welcome and accepted, embraced and protected by Canada and Canadians, that they can in Canada, of all places, be free to be who they are.
The Hon. the Speaker: Senator Jaffer would like to ask a question.
Would you take a question, Senator Mitchell?
Senator Mitchell: Yes.
Hon. Mobina S. B. Jaffer: Thank you.
Senator Mitchell, you spoke of others who have spent many hours on this issue. We would be remiss if we didn’t recognize the many hours you also have spent on this issue. Thank you very much.
Some Hon. Senators: Hear, hear!
Senator Jaffer: Senator Mitchell, when this matter was being discussed at the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, for as long as I live, I will never forget a young transgender girl who came and spoke about how important it was for her to be treated equally. I think she was 10 or 12 years old
You spoke of children. You have been involved with this issue for many years and you spoke about Edmonton. If this law is passed in this chamber, the first thing it would do is reach out to that little girl to say that senators care about her rights.
If this law is not passed, what do you think would happen to that little girl?
Senator Mitchell: Thank you, senator.
The little girl that you refer to is Charlie Lowthian-Rickert. She is a remarkable young girl. She not only appeared at the committee, but she has appeared many times on the steps of Parliament, speaking in front of hundreds of people. She appeared with Minister Wilson-Raybould at the press conference announcing Bill C-16. At that press conference she said something very powerful that I haven’t been able to forget. She said: “This bill will make me feel safer.”
But your point goes beyond that, in fact. It’s been such a long time. I said that MP Siksay started this issue 11 years ago, but even before that. You have a group of people who are, as I described, discriminated against. They are in agony in the place that they find themselves in this society, waiting and waiting and hoping and hoping year after year after year that at some point this will be passed into law. Remember, it has been passed twice, majorities by Canadian parliaments. That raised people’s hopes and expectations, only to have those hopes and expectations dashed again.
This does specific, concrete things in recognizing rights and giving protections, but every bit as important is the message that it sends on behalf of all Canadians to transgender people: “You are welcome. You are understood and appreciated. We do embrace you. Canada is a place unlike any other place on the face of the earth, where you can be yourself without fear.” It’s a remarkable thing that we would give to them. I simply believe we have to do that, and we have to do that soon.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you, Senator Mitchell. I also remember the day this bill was discussed in committee. Afterward you had to explain to those who I would now say are your friends why they had to wait longer. I very clearly remember the disappointment of those people when they realized this bill would not be passed in the Senate.
I know that many of them spoke to you about not just being safe but being equal. Can you explain to this chamber the pain they went through when we didn’t pass the bill that time?
Senator Mitchell: It’s so difficult to capture that, particularly for somebody like me who has never experienced that kind of discrimination. It was a very emotional moment. Almost every time I speak to transgender people who relive that moment, you feel it again. It’s not just transgender people themselves; it’s also parents. Parents love these children profoundly and deeply and agonize with them through this process. We listened to them come through that process and then realize that their children actually can be happier. They realize their children should be accepted, not rejected like they were when this bill has been allowed to die time after time after time. So yes, it’s deeply emotional. It’s heartrending to see, and it’s heartrending to experience it.
Hon. Jane Cordy: Thank you, Senator Mitchell, for the tremendous work you have done in this field of giving rights to those who are transgendered. I do remember sitting in on the Human Rights Committee and listening to the American lady who had played the piano in the White House. When it was discovered she was transgendered, she actually stopped getting any job offers to play the piano whatsoever, even though she was a world-renowned pianist. It was all because of being transgender.
It was very emotional listening to the people who presented before the committee. It was also very emotional talking later to the people who were just gathered there to hear the testimony and to stand side by side with those who were giving that testimony.
One of the things I keep hearing about is the bathroom issue; it always seems to come to the forefront: No, we can’t pass this legislation because people will be dressing up and going into bathrooms and hurting people. Yet when I was on that committee at the time, I did research about where this had been legalized in the United States. There was no sense whatsoever and no proof whatsoever that there was a problem in the bathrooms.
I wonder if you would comment on research that you have done related to that. If somebody were to pretend that they were female and go into a bathroom and commit a crime against somebody in the washroom, would that not be considered fraud and abuse by the person who committed it?
Senator Mitchell: Thank you, Senator Cordy. The information that you referred to was as a result of research done by Member of Parliament Randall Garrison, who contacted each of the jurisdictions in the United States. At that time there were four. All of them adamantly indicated that they had no episodes or events such as those who are opposed to this bill sometimes allude to.
There are eight provinces and one territory in Canada. In fact the first jurisdiction in Canada to recognize transgender rights was the Northwest Territories, in 2002 I think. Once again, I’m not aware of these kinds of episodes.
Transgender people are terrified of being outed. They are not going into washrooms to expose themselves in any way to that kind of abuse. They simply want to be able to live their lives quietly as other Canadians do without those kinds of fears.
In the example you used of the trans woman who lost her job, she was an internationally renowned as a pianist. There are so many of those cases and anecdotes that are so tremendously wrenching. I’ll give you another, the story of a trans woman I worked with a great deal on this. She came out. She’s not allowed to go back to her home except when her mother is alone there. Her sister has completely cut her off and has never introduced her to her nieces and nephews. The sense of her parents is that she’s transgender because she banged her head when she was eight years old.
You can hardly fathom the hurt and the depth of pain that somebody like that must feel. A lot of this evidence is anecdotal, and there is a lot more than what we hear because so many trans people simply don’t talk about it.
Hon. Michael Duffy: Thank you, Your Honour, and thank you colleagues. Thank you, Senator Mitchell for your outstanding work on this very important issue. I rise this evening to support Bill C-16. I won’t repeat the many excellent points, arguments and magnificent exposition of the sad and sorry history of the attempts by various people of goodwill to do the right thing for our trans population.
I know and well remember Bill Siksay who did a lot of important and hard work. As a result of talking to him about this issue, I was converted to support for this years ago.
As I was considering what I could add to your remarks this evening, Senator Mitchell, I received the following email from a woman in Calgary. She wrote:
My name is Angie Webster and I am writing you on behalf of my seven year old son, Sydney. Assigned female at birth, Sydney identifies and thrives as a boy. As Bill C-16 is now before the Senate, I urge you to fully support it. This bill will protect my son so he can grow up in a place full of love and acceptance as he lives his truth. I want him and other gender creative/transgender children like him to be able to live their entire lives authentically in this amazing country we call Canada, a country that prides itself on diversity and opportunity.
With this bill, my son’s basic right to be himself will be protected and he’ll be able to live his true self without fear, a fundamental right so many of us take for granted. I want my son to be able to be proud to be Canadian, proud to be living in a country that fully acknowledges him as an equal, contributing member of society, regardless of the gender he identifies as.
Thank you.
Angie Webster, Calgary.
Honourable senators, what parent, which of us in this room, would not want these simple basic rights, the right to live free of harassment and bullying, for their own child?
I encourage you to read Sydney’s very touching story as reported by Sharon Kirkey in the November 17 edition of the NationalPost. No one should be bullied, singled out for ridicule and abuse.
Bill C-16 is an important step in making life better for Sydney and for countless kids like him. Tonight I urge you to vote in favour of this legislation. After all, like young Sydney, we are all God’s children.
Hon. Terry M. Mercer: Honourable senators, it had not been my intention to speak on this bill at this point. This past weekend I had an experience where I was invited to a brunch by a community group who worked very closely with transgender young people. It was a very moving experience. I’m not quite prepared for my speech tonight, and I was going to take the adjournment of the debate in my name, but I also don’t want to delay anything. I may save my time for third reading to tell you the story of the wonderful young people that I met this weekend. It was truly amazing.
By the way, I laugh about the discussion about washrooms. This weekend I went to a hotel in Halifax that I have been to a dozen of times. Because of the event that was on at the time, the signs on both washrooms were changed. They were both sexes. It did not matter which washroom you used.
My wife was with me, and we were both off to the washroom. I said, “I’ll go to this washroom.” I walked in. I did not remember that that was not the men’s washroom. It was the women’s washroom. She moved on down the hall and went into the washroom that was normally the men’s washroom. Do you know what? It was not anything special. As usual, the ladies washroom was cleaner.
Honourable senators, it was one of the most interesting brunches I have had in my life. I met some of the most interesting young people engaged in “being them.” They were entirely in touch with who they are and where they want to go.
I will be putting together a more detailed speech. I want to tell some of their stories. I don’t have all the data with me to do that tonight. I’m not going to adjourn the debate, because I know we’re anxious to get the bill to committee. I’m going to take my seat now. But I do want to give notice that at third reading I will be telling you the story of some absolutely wonderful young people and also an organization in Nova Scotia that is doing absolutely wonderful work with young people who are transitioning. It really is quite spectacular.
This was a fundraiser on Sunday, and it included one of Canada’s large banks that agreed to match all donations that we made. I do not know what the final number was at the end of the brunch, but I am sure it was a significant amount.
A camp for transgender young people is operated for a couple of weekends every summer. Listening to young people talk about the experience of being safe with people who are experiencing the same things that they are was very moving. I only wish that some people in this place who are opposed to this bill had been with me at brunch on Sunday, because I think even the hardest of hearts would have been softened.
(On motion of Senator Martin, debate adjourned.)
Tax Convention and Arrangement Implementation Bill
Second Reading
On the Order:
Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Greene, seconded by the Honourable Senator Runciman, for the second reading of Bill S-4, An Act to implement a Convention and an Arrangement for the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income and to amend an Act in respect of a similar Agreement.
Hon. Pierrette Ringuette: Honourable senators, I will be brief, but not for the same reasons as Senator Baker.
I am pleased to speak this evening to Bill S-4. Over the short time I have been given, I wish to express my support for this bill and emphasize how important it is that we refer it to a Senate committee with due diligence and dispatch so that it may be studied.
On November 15, the sponsor of the bill, Senator Greene, provided the reasons for our support of Bill S-4. This bill seeks to modernize the 1975 taxation convention concluded with the State of Israel. It also seeks to add an interpretation provision on the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China, as well as a tax arrangement with the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Canada.
I want to focus on the agreement concluded with Taipei. Since 1993, I have been actively participating in the Canada-Taiwan parliamentary association and I have had the opportunity to visit Taiwan many times. My last visit was in 2011, when our former colleague Doug Finlay and I led a delegation of senators to observe the presidential election.
I don’t have enough time to really express how impressed I am by the Taiwanese people’s entrepreneurship. Survival and independence are merely the beginning to them.
They achieve their socio-economic objectives so much more efficiently than we Canadians. I should add that their attention to detail is unrivaled.
For example, during my first visit to Taipei in 1995, I saw thousands of Taiwanese people on mopeds wearing masks as nominal protection from pollution.
It was quite a rude awakening for a small-town girl like me: Pollution, created by phenomenal economic expansion and fast- track urbanization, these growing pains, was quickly addressed. I would even venture to say it was addressed at warp speed compared to other industrialized states.
Barely eight years later, I was in downtown Taipei, where to my disbelief there was no pollution and hardly any mopeds. Instead, there was an ultra-modern skyway throughout Taipei. I was and still am so impressed with their degree of project execution, and I believe that we Canadians could learn a lot in planning and execution for similar projects, with so many infrastructure investments in the years to come. Taiwan is certainly a model to follow in this respect, as in many others, with their high level of business skills.
Many of you do not know that the Taiwanese are the biggest investors in Mainland China. They are also becoming a major business group in India.
How can we, as Canadians, seek their business savvy and their investment portfolio? Honourable senators, it will not happen if we only raise our hand up and say, “Me too, me too,” or by relying on our natural resources again. We are not the only geographic region to have natural resources.
Taiwan has double taxation conventions or agreements with 30 other countries, including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Switzerland and the U.K.
The current Taiwanese authorities have already ratified this agreement, and they are waiting for us to do the same. Again, they are showing greater efficiency, as their taxation system is ready to enforce this arrangement for January 1, 2017. So how efficient can we be to enforce Bill S-4 by January 1, 2017?
In competitive economies, these taxation tools are basic requirements for trade and investment.
In fact, these tax agreements or conventions are so basic that the WTO has developed an international-agreement standard to facilitate these types of tools.
I would be remiss if I did not inform you that, in the last two years, Taiwanese investors have invested, in the oilsands alone, close to $1 billion. I hear that, given Bill C-4 enforcement in January 2017, much needed investments are seriously being contemplated by the Taiwanese.
Of course, this agreement is not one-sided as it also provides reciprocity for Canadians who are employed or have businesses in Taiwan, partnerships and other investments. You would be surprised at the level of membership and activities that the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Taiwan exercises on a monthly basis. I subscribed a long time ago to their newsletter.
This arrangement includes provisions for both taxation authorities to seek information from each other to prevent abuse while removing double taxation. It provides certainty to taxpayers and ensures that they are not subject to discriminatory taxation, while preventing tax evasion and avoidance. Senator Downe will be particularly pleased with these attributes.
That said, I believe that senators of all groups will endorse the opportunities for economic activity provided within the framework of Bill S-4 and that, accordingly, we shall move efficiently and expeditiously so that enforcement can occur January 1, 2017.
(On motion of Senator Tannas, debate adjourned.).
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