I have here the list of criteria for making items of private members' business non-votable, and I think it was the position of your committee that number two is the reason you've deemed this to be non-votable, that the bill violates the Constitution, but in fact it doesn't.
First of all, if you look the equality section of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, section 15, sexual orientation is not included in that. So it does not violate someone's equality rights to maintain the legal definition of marriage as a union of a man and a woman because sexual orientation is not included in section 15 of the Constitution.
But notwithstanding that and more to the point of the bill, not only is the bill not unconstitutional, it specifically uses the Constitution, section 33, the notwithstanding clause, to prevent a court challenge against the legal definition of marriage.
So on both those counts the bill clearly does not violate the Constitution. On the contrary, it uses the Constitution, the notwithstanding clause. It's as simple as that. To say that this violates the Constitution is just clearly not the case, because it uses the Constitution. The notwithstanding clause was put in the Constitution in contemplation of just this type of a use. It's a perfect example of where one would use the notwithstanding clause.
So to deny this bill as being votable, there's no legitimate grounds on which to do that, and it would be breaching my privilege and right as an MP to have this issue put forward.
I'd like to say as well that members of this committee should not allow their decision to be prejudiced based on what they think of the bill--in other words, how they would or would not vote on it. What you think or how you would contemplate voting in the House of Commons should be detached from your decision on whether or not this thing is votable. There are no legitimate grounds to deem it not votable.