Greetings All. MP Murray Calder, our champion in the House of Commons, recently had his name drawn in the Private Members Bill Lottery. While he has more than one Private Member Bill in the works he has chosen Bill C-312 as the one to put forth. C-312 is identical to Senator Milne's Bill S-12 currently under review by the Senate Standing Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology. If passed into law these Bills would give us the access to Historical Census Records that we seek. It is expected that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs will likely meet on 21 November 2001. It is this Committee that will determine whether or not Bill C-312 will be deemed votable. Murray will make a presentation to argue that it should be votable. In it he will no doubt point to the enormous interest in this issue as expressed in the tens of thousands who have signed petitions. It is important to understand that the committee doesn't necessarily look at the merits of the bill -- only whether it should be votable. In other words, a committee member may be opposed to it, but still feel it should come to a vote. They will choose 5 bills from the 15 selected in the recent draw to become votable. The process is explained at this site: (be sure to include the full URL) www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/process/house/precis/chap15-e.htm If all goes well, the bill could come up in the House as early as December 11th. If deemed votable and passed at this stage, Bill C-312 would proceed to review by a Committee of the House. I copy below a list of the members of the committee and their email addresses. Perhaps they would appreciate some brief notes advising them of them of the importance of Census records to our research. Advise them that seek their positive vote in making Bill C-312 votable. Keep your messages polite and to the point. As a point of interest, checking the MP's Scoreboard for the members of this committee there are 8 gold ticks of support, 4 non-committal fences, three question marks indicating no response, and 1 red X of opposition. Happy Hunting. Gordon A. Watts gordon_watts@telus.net Co-Chair, Canada Census Committee Port Coquitlam, BC http://globalgenealogy.com/Census en français http://globalgenealogy.com/Census/Index_f.htm Permission to forward without notice is granted. ===================================== STANDING COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURE AND HOUSE AFFAIRS Chair -- Peter Adams Adams.P@parl.gc.ca Vice-Chairs Richard Harris Harris.R@parl.gc.ca Jacques Saada Saada.J@parl.gc.ca Members Pierre Brien Brien.P@parl.gc.ca Marlene Catterall Catterall.M@parl.gc.ca Cheryl Gallant Gallant.C@parl.gc.ca Yvon Godin Godin.Y@parl.gc.ca Michel Guimond Guimond.M@parl.gc.ca Jay Hill Hill.J@parl.gc.ca Joe Jordan Jordan.J@parl.gc.ca Paul Macklin Macklin.P@parl.gc.ca Carolyn Parrish Parrish.C@parl.gc.ca Geoff Regan Regan.G@parl.gc.ca John Reynolds Reynolds.J@parl.gc.ca John Richardson Richardson.J@parl.gc.ca Tony Tirabassi Tirabassi.T@parl.gc.ca