Wednesday, February 27, 2013
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Today, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights was to report on the outcomes of their consideration of Bill C-279, the federal bill to include ‘gender identity’ and ‘gender expression’ as protected grounds in the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code of Canada. Sponsoring MP Randy Garrison reported that the Justice Committee was unable to finish its consideration and discussion of the bill given the interruption of the last meeting by unregistered Conservative MP Dave Anderson. As a result, he requested that the Speaker allow the outstanding motions to be heard, considered, and voted on during the Justice Committee Report Stage.
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The Speaker ruled that the Justice Committee’s discussions were effectively incomplete and therefore allowed the outstanding motions from the last Justice Committee meeting to be heard and discussed live, then and there, in the House of Commons. One of two hours of discussion was had today, with the second hour of discussion continuing at a later date. Votes to approve the outstanding amendments will follow thereafter.
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An audio recording of the discussion regarding Bill C-279 can be found on the Parliamentary website at: http://parlvu.parl.gc.ca/Parlvu/TimeBandit/PowerBrowser_SilverLight.aspx?ContentEntityId=10085&EssenceFormatID=443&date=20130227&lang=en. The discussion begins at 4:33 and ends shortly before the 5:40 mark.
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