Hon. Percy E. Downe: Thank you for your speech, senator. Like you, I support the bill. I think it’s much needed.

I am, however, concerned whenever there’s unanimous legislation from the House of Commons. Unfortunately, I base that on years of experience of what I call their manic behaviour. We had the recent pension bill here that, for years, the House of Commons refused to support and then it’s suddenly unanimous.

As you know, it’s not our job to delay this legislation but to make sure that it’s fundamentally sound in the implementation. I mentioned the Veterans Charter when I was first appointed. The House of Commons spent two and a half minutes in total on the legislation. They sent it to us. We sent it to the Department of Finance; we did not send it to the Veterans Affairs Subcommittee. Who doesn’t want to assist the men and women who serve our country? We passed it only to find out years later from the Parliamentary Budget Officer that it shortchanged our veterans by millions and millions of dollars they would have received if it had not been changed.

So, further to the question recently asked, the Guaranteed Income Supplement is an excellent example of a valid program, but in terms of its implementation — many of us worked on it for years. You had to file income tax or, if you don’t owe any taxes, you don’t have to file income taxes. In my home province, hundreds of low-income seniors were not getting a benefit they were entitled to because they didn’t want to pay somebody $50 to file their income tax when they didn’t have the skill set to do so.

Would you share my concern that, notwithstanding the many people saying to pass this, it’s very important that the Senate committee will do the work the House of Commons committees often do not and make sure we have a superb program, with all the wrinkles out of it, before we pass this legislation?

Senator Cotter: I agree entirely with the sentiment you have expressed, Senator Downe. The challenge is to put that together in an organized way.

But in this context, the bill proposes that be done through regulation, so we will not be able to get a very significant parliamentary oversight of that process. It’s intended to be done in as transparent a way as possible, but the construction of it will reside in regulations, I think.

This is my last observation: The result is that we may be comfortable and satisfied — and this is our job — that the markers are right in this bill. I think they’re pretty good. You may identify some that could be better. But it is consciously intended to be a framework. To be frank about it, that places a significant degree of trust in the ministry and the officials to put it together. There’s quite a bit trust that I’m prepared to repose there.

The nice additional thing is the commitment that the disability community will be engaged with that process every step of the way.

[Translation]

Hon. Pierre J. Dalphond: Thank you, Senator Cotter, for your very interesting speech.

I read the bill carefully in preparation for your speech. You said one word that struck me. You said that it was a framework to move forward toward something. I also noted that the legislation is scheduled to come into force no more than 12 months after the bill is passed. I noted that the government must report on the consultations six months after the legislation comes into force and that the government must table a report on the proposed regulations in both chambers within one year of the legislation coming into force. That already means a delay of perhaps two years.

In the briefings you had with the department, was there any discussion of a realistic time frame for the first cheques or benefits to reach recipients? I suspect there could be an election within the next two years.

[English]

Senator Cotter: In one respect, if I may say, Senator Dalphond, the occurrence of an election will be rendered somewhat irrelevant, because the framework will be in place and the department will carry on putting the program together. I hate to use a golf analogy, but I’m a 30 handicap at predicting elections, so I’m happy that it’s off to the side.

The message I keep hearing, which is informal and nobody is prepared to make an absolute commitment, is that it will be possible to do the negotiations and put the regulations in place in 12 months, hopefully. Once that happens, I think benefits can begin to flow.

There will be an application process as the bill is presently constructed, so it does mean that people will have to apply. However, the language people talk about is a 12-month period, and I hope that’s correct; I hope that’s the longest it is.

Senator Downe is right that we have an important job to do. We need to do it in as timely a way as possible, because my feeling is that each month that goes by pushes the time by a month, and that means tens of thousands of Canadians remain in poverty for one more month. It’s really important for them for us to do the best we can do.