Senator Patterson: Senator Gold, let me get a little more particular on my concern. We have heard that groups such as the National Association of Women and the Law felt they were not meaningfully consulted on Bill C-28. In fact, the national association’s meeting with justice officials occurred on a Tuesday and the bill was tabled that Friday. The association has now asked all senators for the opportunity to state their case. They complain that the process is rushed. However, it is possible, according to the motion you have given notice of today, that we will receive the bill either later tonight or tomorrow and be pushed into considering the bill at all stages in a single day without hearing — in this place or in the other place — from any women’s organizations, not to mention the wider legal community.

Senator Gold — and I ask this as, I suppose, yet another man speaking on this issue — is your government content to entirely exclude the voices of women’s organizations to provide their considered comments now that we know what’s proposed in the text of the bill? Is your government, which prides itself on being feminist, really content to exclude women and women’s organizations from commenting on this bill when they are telling us they have identified significant flaws in the legislation?