NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has successfully moved a motion calling on the Senate to pass legislation harmonizing Canadian laws with the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and requiring sexual assault training for judges.

Singh rose in the House after question period Wednesday to ask his fellow MPs to support sending a message to the Upper Chamber calling for both bills to be “passed into law at the earliest opportunity.”

In the motion, Singh called the bills “critical pieces of legislation” that had been passed by the elected House and had been before the Senate for “many months.”

It was unanimously adopted by the House.

Both pieces of legislation are private member’s bill that won relatively broad support in the House.

NDP MP Romeo Saganash’s Bill C-262 to have Canadian laws conform with UNDRIP was passed by the House last May. It was supported by all parties in the House save for the Tories, and enjoys broad support among Indigenous groups, including the Assembly of First Nations.

Bill C-337, known alternatively as the JUST Act, would mandate sexual assault training for everyone seeking a federal judicial appointment. It was sponsored by former interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose, citing concerns over the behaviour of judges handling sexual assault cases.

In the most notable instance, an Alberta judge questioned the accuser in a sexual assault case he was overseeing about why she “couldn’t just keep [her] knees together.”

The bill was passed unanimously in the House in 2017, however,

it has not advance quickly in the Senate, where it remains at committee. Saganash’s bill is at the second reading stage in the Upper Chamber.

Ambrose has frequently criticized the Senate for moving slowly on her bill. In a recent CTV interview, she blamed a “group of old boys” in the Upper Chamber for stalling the bill. A website promoting the bill that prominently features Ambrose has a running clock on how long the Senate has been “delaying the JUST Act.”

As of Wednesday, it stood at 694 days.

The full text of Singh’s motion:

That, in the opinion of the House, bill C-262, An Act to ensure that the laws of Canada are in harmony with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, as well as bill C-337, An Act to amend the Judges Act and the Criminal Code (sexual assault), are both critical pieces of legislation that have been duly passed by the House of Commons, and have been in possession of honourable Senators for many months; that both bills should be passed into law at the earliest opportunity; and that a message be sent to the Senate to acquaint that House accordingly.