Bill S-9 (Historical)

Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act

An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime)

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to create offences in connection with the theft of a motor vehicle, the alteration, removal or obliteration of a vehicle identification number, the trafficking of property or proceeds obtained by crime and the possession of such property or proceeds for the purposes of trafficking, and to provide for an in rem prohibition of the importation or exportation of such property or proceeds.

[Huw Williams, National Spokesperson, Canadian Automobile Dealers Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The P.E.I. dealers say hello. I mentioned that I was testifying before your committee today, and they send their greetings.

Good morning.

On behalf of the 3,500 independently owned franchise car dealers across the country, I want to thank this committee. This is not a perfunctory opening thank you. I want to thank you for holding these hearings and advancing the issue of stopping auto theft. Every party around the table has pushed on this issue, and we appreciate it. We appreciated it at the national summit as well.

Ms. O'Connell, we saw you there and appreciated your attendance, and yours as well, Madame Michaud.

I think it sends a really strong signal that all of the parties are together and moving forward. On the way up to testify today, I met with a member from Montreal who is holding a round table on this in their riding in Montreal. The issue is getting attention, but this committee is really important. Why it's important is that auto theft is not a local problem. It's a national and international problem that impacts not just main streets, but every home and every driveway in the country.

Our 160,000 employees and the over four million customers we serve annually are frontline victims of this organized crime. Interpol has made it very clear that this is an international problem and that Canada is a major source country for the export of stolen vehicles. We are literally exporting stolen vehicles across the world from our neighbourhoods, driveways and homes.

Our dealership employees are being carjacked. They're being held at gunpoint. They're being pistol-whipped. They're run over. They're strong-armed out of vehicles on a daily basis. Every single dealership in the country has a detailed security plan and theft protocols to protect their assets and their people, and has gone to the extent of hiring former law enforcement security officials to try to protect their dealership.

If these international crime rings are thwarted at our local stores, they just go and steal factory direct. Days before the auto summit was held here in Ottawa—again, we're appreciative of that initiative—thieves broke into the Oakville Ford plant. They went in and stole 650,000 dollars' worth of vehicles right from the Ford plant. This is organized crime at its best.

Most important, however, our customers are the victims of this crime. There are armed home invasions happening to access keys. They're kicking in doors in the middle of the night. There are armed carjackings in driveways, with kids in the car, to take the keys. They're holding our customers at gunpoint. They're carjacking not just everyday Canadians but NHL stars, sports stars. This is Canada that we're talking about, not Central America. This should not be happening in our country.

Everybody here would be aware of the stats coming out of the auto summit, but they've been well known to the auto sector for a long time: up 300% since 2015 in the greater Toronto area. These are shocking numbers, but the problem is that every police agency knows what's happening and what is costing us a billion dollars a year. The simple formula is this: The cars are being stolen and they're being shipped, towed and sent by rail to the port of Montreal, where the cars are then exported out of the country without CBSA inspection. They're being sent to Africa, eastern Europe and elsewhere, where they're sold by international crime.

The problem is that this is being used to fund guns, drugs, fentanyl and street crime in Canada. That's not our view as the car dealers association. That's what frontline police officers tell us. They all know what's happening. That's what senior police officers tell us, and that's what chiefs of police tell us. It's the pipeline out of the country that's the real problem.

It requires concrete federal action. While funding announcements are appreciated, we need to ensure that action takes place quickly on this, as cars are still being stolen every day and the violent crime that's associated with this is taking place every day. We need a senior official appointed in almost an “auto czar” format to make sure that CBSA and some of the other departments are brought together to do things differently. Doing it the same old way is not going to get it done. In this solution, we need a new way of addressing organized crime.

I'll tell you quickly that CADA has a long history of working on this issue. We advocated when we saw our stolen vehicle rates outstrip the United States in the early 2000s. We advocated loudly for a new bill on this, Bill S-9, which was a specific law passed in 2010 that made it a specific crime to steal an automobile. It also cut down on the trafficking of VIN numbers. It addressed chop shops, and it made it an offence to traffic in stolen vehicle parts.

The most important thing that was passed in 2010 in Bill S-9 gave the Canada Border Services Agency the right to search containers before they left the country. We saw a dramatic drop as that took place. What we're looking forward to is a continued ramp-up of CBSA's activity, in conjunction with that of the RCMP and provincial police forces.

Thank you. I look forward to your questions.

Opposition Motion—Auto Theft

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois agrees with the principle of the motion. We spoke out against rising auto theft at the port of Montreal before the Conservatives.

We think they are taking liberties with the logic underpinning today's motion. They are taking shortcuts that distort reality. For example, claiming that Bill C‑5 is responsible for the increase in auto theft since 2015 is clearly false, because the bill came into force at the end of 2022, and 2022 was a record year for auto theft.

They say they do not agree with the six-month minimum sentence for a third offence, but they are the ones who brought it in with section 333.1, which was added to Bill S‑9 in 2010 under the Conservative government.

We do agree that the Port of Montreal and the Canada Border Services Agency do not have the resources to really check containers and do their job.

I would like to know my colleague's thoughts on that.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think we all agree that auto theft is a scourge and needs to be addressed.

I would like my colleague to comment on the rhetoric, the reasoning behind today's Conservative motion. They claim that the explosion in auto theft is because of the Liberal government. They say it is because of Bill C‑5, even though that bill did not receive royal assent until late 2022. They also say it is because sentences are too lenient, but these sentences, which were added to the Criminal Code in 2010, were the result of Bill S‑9. That bill was introduced by the Conservative Party, the government at the time. If the penalties are too lenient, the Conservative Party only has itself to blame.

I wonder what exactly my colleague is proposing. We know there will be a national summit this Thursday. There was talk of giving more resources to the Canada Border Services Agency and giving existing police forces the means they need to take action. In his opinion, what more should the government be doing to counter this scourge?

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I was just saying that this man, Jacques Lamontagne, is a seasoned professional and he said the following:

There are more legal consequences to crossing the border with four kilos of cocaine than with stolen vehicles. Both crimes pay big dividends [to criminal groups and] the criminal underworld. Young thugs run less of a risk if they steal a Jeep Wrangler than if they sell narcotics on the street....There's not much of a deterrent if people know that they'll probably be let off for a first [offence] or, at worst, serve four to six months for car theft compared to a sentence lasting years for selling illicit substances.

I will return to Mr. Lamontagne's use of the term “young thugs”. The phenomenon is fairly widespread. Crime gangs often use young people who often have no criminal record and are sometimes minors. They are asked to steal cars or transport illegal guns because the punishment for first offences is rarely harsh. It is a kind of strategy that these people use. I am not saying that the thieves should not go to prison, but I think that we need to focus primarily on going after these criminal gangs and their leaders.

Where the Conservative Party goes wrong is in assuming that this entire crisis was created by the Prime Minister himself and by lax policies, like Bill C-5, as the Conservatives are claiming.

The motion specifically calls on the government to "immediately reverse changes the Liberal government made in their soft on crime Bill C-5 that allows for car stealing criminals to be on house arrest instead of jail.” Reading the motion, it is clear that the Conservatives are trying to link the increase in auto theft since 2015 to Bill C-5. As my colleague mentioned earlier, Bill C-5 received royal assent at the very end of 2022. I have no idea how the Conservatives came to the conclusion that Bill C-5 is to blame, since auto theft has been increasing since 2015. I do not think there is one simple explanation. The Conservatives are trying to find simple solutions to complicated problems. They say that this Prime Minister has been in office since 2015, so he is responsible for all of society's problems. Again, I am not defending the Prime Minister, but at some point, members have to put forward serious arguments.

Contrary to Conservative claims, Bill C‑5 did not do away with minimum sentences for auto theft. Subsection 333.1(1) of the Criminal Code provides for a minimum sentence of six months in the case of a third offence. The Conservatives may well say that is not enough, but there is one major problem with their assertion. Are they aware that subsection 333.1(1) was added to the Criminal Code by the Conservatives themselves in 2010 via Bill S‑9? If they now find that that is not enough, they have only themselves to blame.

In this motion, the Conservatives also say that Bill C‑5 allowed for conditional sentences for auto theft. These are also known as house arrest, or what the Conservative leader likes to call Netflix sentences. It is true that the Liberals repealed subparagraph 742.1(f)(vii), which prevented conditional sentencing for auto theft. However, the other paragraphs in section 742.1 set out conditions for conditional sentencing: The court must be convinced that there is no risk to society, and the term of imprisonment must be less than two years. The judge may also impose any conditions they deem necessary. In other words, there is nothing preventing a judge from saying no to a conditional sentence. A judge should be able to exercise judgment. The Conservatives are assuming judges are not capable of doing that.

A conditional sentence cannot be imposed for a sentence of two years or more, so it is not an option in the most serious cases, because the maximum sentence is actually 10 years.

The Conservatives are also forgetting that there is always a bail hearing to determine whether an offender can be released while awaiting trial. Unless there are aggravating factors, it is rare for a person to remain in jail while awaiting trial for auto theft. In other words, the Conservatives' claim that criminals are being caught and and then immediately released because of Bill C‑5 is unfounded, because that was happening long before Bill C‑5 came into force.

Once again, it is up to the judge to decide whether an offender should be kept in jail while awaiting trial and what conditions the offender must meet, especially since, as I mentioned earlier, criminals often use minors because they are handed lesser sentences.

I agree with the Conservatives about one thing in every case. Part of the problem is that Ottawa has done absolutely nothing to control auto theft. Under the current conditions, even life in prison will not act as a deterrent, because the federal government is doing absolutely nothing to monitor the port of Montreal, where criminals can easily ship stolen vehicles overseas. I will come back to that later.

However, I want to close by talking about the second part of the Conservative motion, which seeks to “strengthen Criminal Code provisions to ensure repeat car stealing criminals remain in jail”.

Once again, it was the Conservatives who created a specific offence for auto theft, with their Bill S‑9 and section 333.1 in 2010. If they believe that sentences are not long enough, they have only themselves to blame.

The Conservative leader proposed that a third offence be punishable by three years in prison instead of the six months set out in the Criminal Code. The current six-month sentence in the Criminal Code was a Conservative initiative. What the Conservative Party is proposing today are changes to measures it put in place when it was in power.

The Conservative leader is also talking about eliminating house arrest, or conditional sentences, for thieves. As I said, a sentence of two years or more already cannot be served at home. That said, Bill C-5 did allow judges to impose house arrest if they deemed it appropriate, but not automatically, as the Conservatives like to claim. However, the bill did not make any changes to release pending trial.

Let us make one thing clear: The Bloc Québécois is entirely open to revising the Criminal Code to deal with auto theft. That is what the Montreal police department wants as well. This time, they believe that new sections should be added concerning the export of stolen vehicles and that there should be stricter penalties for ring leaders. I think that might be a good solution. I imagine that will come out in the discussions at the national summit on Thursday.

The last proposal in the Conservative motion concerns the Canada Border Services Agency, or CBSA, and the export of stolen vehicles. It asks that the CBSA be provided with the resources it needs to prevent auto theft in Canada. I could not agree more with this proposal.

I spoke about this a few months ago. I think that the CBSA, which is under federal jurisdiction, needs to do more. Some people say that it does not have the resources it needs to do more right now, that it is short on labour and funds. They need to figure out what the problem is. Clearly, the CBSA is not doing enough right now.

I spoke about auto theft and how thieves steal vehicles; that is the first step. The second step is exporting the vehicles. Like auto theft, shipping the vehicles out of the country is practically risk free. Clearly, for criminal gangs, it means higher costs and more organization, but it seems to be going well when you look at what is happening at the port of Montreal. That is because it is a sieve.

Around 700,000 containers leave the port of Montreal every year. According to the Customs and Immigration Union, only 1% of all containers are searched. According to the Montreal Port Authority, or MPA, the law does not allow employees or the port authority to open a container unless a person's life is in danger or there is a serious environmental hazard. According to the port's director of communications, when the containers arrive at the port, it is already too late to do anything. The containers remain sealed unless law enforcement intervenes for a specific reason. They need a warrant to open them, so they need reasonable grounds.

Police forces have access to the port and can intervene. However, they do not patrol there because the MPA already has its own security guards. The MPA does not intervene because the police can do it and the police do not intervene because the MPA has its own security guards, so that is just great.

As for customs, the CBSA is responsible for controlling goods for export. CBSA agents can open containers. However, in October, we learned from the Journal de Montréal that there are only five border agents to inspect the containers in Montreal, which makes the task practically impossible. Yes, the CBSA is responsible for overseeing exports, but its mandate is more focused on imports. It also needs to look at what is coming into the country. That is understandable. Do changes need to be made to the CBSA's mandate to ensure that exports are better monitored? I think that is something we need to think about.

Another reason why it is easy to export stolen cars is that anyone can rent a container by filling out a simple online declaration form for the shipping company. We could do it without any problem, just as a small business could. Anyone can change their form up to 48 hours after shipping, so that obviously makes it possible for thieves to cover their tracks once the goods are already on their way to Europe, the Middle East or Africa.

Finally, criminals use numbered companies to fill out those forms. They often use the same or similar serial numbers to defraud the CBSA on their export declaration form.

It should be easy for the Canada Border Services Agency to spot, easy to see that a vehicle serial number comes up repeatedly. At least, Le Journal de Montréal was able to do just that and identify the issue using a simple Excel document. However, for some unknown reason, it seems too difficult for the CBSA.

As early as the fall of 2015, an Auditor General's report stated that export control at the border is ineffective and that only one in five high-risk containers was inspected. Now, we are being told that there are almost no inspections and that, even when there is a concern that there may be high-risk contents, only one container in five is searched and checked. It is easy to understand why there are a huge number of stolen vehicles passing through the port of Montreal without anyone noticing.

I asked the customs union to come testify before the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security on Bill C‑21. The union told us that a lot of illegal or stolen material is shipped in containers that travel in and out of Canada not only by water, but also by train, and that the agency performs almost no inspections. At the time, the government dismissed the criticism out of hand, saying that it did not consider this information important.

What Le Journal de Montréal's investigative bureau reported, in a nutshell, is that only five officers at the Port of Montreal conduct searches. They rely on a temperamental cargo scanner that is constantly breaking down. The agency refuses to second an investigator to a special stolen vehicle export squad. The same serial numbers come up again and again. Critical information is not being forwarded to port services or police in a timely manner, and the agency apparently omits to report high-risk containers to its partners.

We see that many organizations are involved, but, despite that, nothing is getting done.

I would be very pleased to answer my colleagues' questions and I hope the summit being held next week will contribute to finding solutions to address this scourge.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

Again, Mr. Chairman, the honourable member mentioned specifically Bill S-9. That is the bill that makes it, for the first time, a separate offence in the Criminal Code to steal an automobile.

As the member's colleague, Mr. Martin, will tell you, I was encouraged to bring forward this legislation by the NDP Government of Manitoba. I appreciate that there are costs to the provincial governments. But to be fair, and to put this into context, we had been lobbied, asked, and had discussed this matter to have a separate section in the Criminal Code with respect to auto theft. I think we are acting in a responsible manner when we respond to those requests from the provinces. Again, I make no apology for making that a separate offence, Mr. Chairman, within the Criminal Code. I had widespread provincial support.

Going back to the last question from the Bloc, yes, there are costs to the provinces. This is why I have found it very helpful over the last four years to sit down with my provincial counterparts to get their input, because yes, in fact the costs of the administration of justice for the most part are borne by the provinces, but we don't do it in a vacuum.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Chair, in the report he just mentioned, the government itself said it is the same thing as what the courts are or were doing.

I am not the one who said that, it was you. The same goes for Bill S-9. On page 2, it says that the “conduct captured by the distinct offence of auto theft is currently addressed by the general theft offence [...] ”. And it goes on.

Bills are supposed to change things. You are the one who said that the bill would put criminals behind bars and would not cost a thing. Come on! You can't put them in facilities that do not exist.

Public Safety

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister continues to show his contempt for Parliament and for the Canadians who send us here by refusing to table the real cost estimates for his Conservative government's crime legislation.

Take, for example, Bill S-9, the auto theft bill. The documents tabled yesterday say it would only cost $600,000. That is only enough money to incarcerate roughly seven more criminals each year. That is not only ridiculous, it is an insult to the intelligence of Canadians.

Why is the government hiding the real cost of this legislation from taxpayers?

Opposition Motion--Documents Requested by the Standing Committee on Finance

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today regarding two important matters.

To begin with, I would like to explain to members how crime affects us all and how it is to some degree impossible to gauge the full cost of crime.

Secondly, the steps that we are taking to fight crime cannot be measured or determined solely by their cost. We have introduced wide-ranging legal reforms in an effort to respond to the concerns of victims and to mitigate the human costs associated with crime. These are major investments, and not only on a financial level.

Crime costs victims dearly; I would go so far as to say that it costs them very dearly. Of course, crime is very costly for all Canadians, but we know that it is the victims of crime who have to shoulder the bulk of this cost.

According to a recent study by the Department of Justice, the total cost of Criminal Code offences was estimated at $31.4 billion in 2008. Since there are no data available for many variables, we know this to be a conservative estimate. Still, it equates to a per capita cost of $943 for that year.

We know that victims are those most directly affected by crime. Of the $31.4 billion in costs, $14.3 billion are the direct result of crimes committed. This $14.3 billion covers medical care, hospitalization, loss of income, school absenteeism, and theft or property damage. More specifically, the drop in productivity accounts for 47% of the total cost borne by victims. Theft or property damage accounts for 42.9% and health care costs account for the remaining 10.1%. These costs are only the tip of the iceberg since they represent recoverable and identifiable expenses, such as those resulting from loss of property or medical care. There is nothing about this that is hard to understand.

The intangible costs such as fear, pain, suffering and decreased quality of life far outweigh the material costs. It is difficult, well nigh impossible, to precisely measure the cost of the emotional and psychological suffering caused by crime, and yet it is important to try to do so.

Research has shown that victims of violent crimes experience stress after being victimized. A crime can influence how victims view the world around them and how much they trust others. It can cause pain and suffering. We know that the psychological effects of crime-related trauma can last a long time. Because of a lack of data, early studies of the costs of crime did not take into account the pain and suffering experienced by victims. The situation is starting to improve because the intangible costs to victims are much too high to be ignored.

According to the results of the study by the Department of Justice, which I mentioned earlier, the intangible costs to victims total around $68.2 billion. Thus the total cost of crime in Canada in 2008 would be $99.6 billion. If we take into account intangible costs, the costs borne by victims represent 82.8% of the total costs. It is a fact that crime is costly for the victims.

The victims are the people most affected by acts of violence, but other people suffer as well. Family members mourn the death of a loved one or must put their daily activities on hold to accompany victims to court or to doctor's appointments, for example.

Governments provide various victims' services and compensation programs to directly help victims, and they work on strategic plans on these issues.

The third-party costs take all these costs into account. In 2008, the total third-party costs were about $2.2 billion.

Why do we need to know the cost of crime and the cost borne by the victims?

We know that no amount of money can adequately compensate a victim of crime or his family, especially when it comes to homicide. No one would choose to die in exchange for $2.5 million or would agree to an assault on his child in return for $10,000.

It is important, though, to establish these estimates. We know that resources are scarce and that programs such as those to increase the number of police officers on the beat or provide funding for health and welfare, to improve the environment, or to build highways and parks are always competing with one another for a share of the public purse.

There must be several facets to our attempt to allay the enormous costs incurred by the victims of crime.

Our government is determined to enhance the safety of all Canadians and raise their confidence in the justice system. That is important. We want to start by dealing with the main concerns of crime victims, those people who have discovered how the system works as a result of an unfortunate experience and have told us that changes are needed. We listened to them.

Canadians are proud of their justice system. It is admired the world over for its fairness. There is always room for improvement, though. Our government is determined to ensure that our justice system continues to be the envy of the world and, most of all, that it is valued in Canada.

In 2006, our government set out its plans for changes to the criminal justice system, and over the last five years, those plans have been realized. It was not easy to ensure that the key changes passed. We were and still are a minority government.

It is easy, though, to see that Canadians support our program to fight crime.

Canadians agree that the personal, financial and emotional consequences for crime victims and the public are too severe and that measures to make Canadians safer, hold offenders responsible and raise confidence in our justice systems are worth the investment.

Allow me to describe a few key legislative changes that illustrate how concerned we are about crime victims and the people of Canada in general.

Our changes were intended to make the punishment fit the crime a little better, something that crime victims and many other people had been demanding for a long time. Changes were made to protect children, our most vulnerable victims. Some changes focused on issues that affect Canadians in their daily lives, such as automobile theft, identity theft, drug-related crime, fraud and street racing.

I would remind the House of Bill C-25, the Truth in Sentencing Act, which was introduced on March 27, 2009 and passed three months later on June 8, 2009. The bill received royal assent on October 22, 2009, and the changes came into force on February 22, 2010.

In general, these changes limit the credit for time served in preventive detention to a one to one ratio. A maximum ratio of one and a half to one applies only when circumstances warrant. A maximum one to one ratio applies to the credit accorded offenders who broke their bail conditions or were denied bail because of their criminal record. No higher ratio is allowed than one to one, regardless of the circumstances.

This amendment to the Criminal Code was welcomed by those who were appalled by the two- or three-for-one sentencing credits being given to offenders who were detained before their trials.

Victims of crime welcomed this amendment, which is designed to guarantee that offenders serve their sentences. Victims do not want revenge; they want sentences to fit the crime. Bill C-25 addressed this concern.

Bill S-6, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and another Act, which dealt with the faint hope clause was recently passed by the House and the Senate and will soon be ready to receive royal assent. It will abolish the faint hope clause for individuals serving a life sentence for murder. Those who commit murder after this bill comes into effect will no longer be able to avail themselves of the faint hope clause. Family members of murder victims have been calling for the abolition of this clause for many years. We listened to them.

Our government is committed to abolishing the faint hope clause, which allows murderers who are serving life sentences to apply for parole after serving 15 years of their sentence rather than 25 years. As you can well imagine, murder victims' families could not understand how a life sentence could turn into parole after only 15 years. It was absolutely scandalous. As I said earlier, victims are not acting out of revenge; they just want the sentences to be reasonable. We listened to them.

I would also like to remind the House about Bill C-48, the Protecting Canadians by Ending Sentence Discounts for Multiple Murders Act, introduced on October 5, 2010. This bill deals with multiple murders and responds to the legitimate concerns of victims of crime, who feel that every homicide victim has to count and every sentence handed down to a murderer has to fit the seriousness of the crime. Life imprisonment means spending life in prison. It is impossible to give multiple murderers multiple life sentences since we have only one life. Nonetheless, Bill C-48 will allow a judge to impose consecutive periods of 25 years with no chance of parole for each murder conviction. For example, a person found guilty of two murders—the easiest case to understand—might have to spend 50 years in prison before being eligible for parole. Bill C-48 was passed by the House and is currently at second reading stage in the other place. This bill is another example of our goal to make the punishment fit the crime and to ensure that offenders are held accountable for their actions against victims.

I also want to talk about other reforms centred around victims. I am sure that my colleagues in this House will recall Bill C-21, the Standing up for Victims of White Collar Crime Act, which was introduced in the House of Commons on May 3, 2010 and passed by the House on December 15, 2010 and is currently before the other place. Bill C-21 provides a mandatory minimum sentence of two years for fraud over $1 million. As pointed out in the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, of which I am a member, many cases of fraud involving large sums of money already end in prison sentences greater than two years.

I would also like to point out that Bill C-21 has been long awaited by victims of white collar crime. These reforms will do more than just add a minimum sentence. They will allow the court to issue an order prohibiting people who have been found guilty of fraud from having any authority over anyone else's money or property in order to ensure that they do not defraud others. Restitution for victims of fraud will be given greater importance, and the courts will be allowed to take into account community impact statements concerning the repercussions of the fraud. Community impact statements will be a vital tool that will serve to remind the court, the offender and the public that these crimes have negative repercussions on communities and on the victims who suffer direct financial losses.

We listened to victims.

Who among us has never had their car stolen or does not know someone who has had their car stolen? Car theft is common. It is a real scourge. It has a huge impact on our daily lives. Victims of car theft feel huge frustration that is compounded by the fact that the thief is not held to account. Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), also called the Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act, was broadly supported and received royal assent on November 18, 2010. That bill will come into force soon.

These changes create new offences related to motor vehicle theft; altering, removing or obliterating a vehicle identification number; trafficking in property or proceeds obtained by crime; and possession of such property or proceeds for the purposes of trafficking. In addition, it provides for an in rem prohibition on the importation and exportation of such property or proceeds.

Bill S-9 also sets out mandatory minimum sentences for repeat offenders.

I will spare you the details of the bills aimed at amending legislation that have been passed by the government. The list is too long. However, I want to point out some, in particular the ones meant to protect our children.

For example, Bill C-22, An Act respecting the mandatory reporting of Internet child pornography by persons who provide an Internet service requires Internet service providers to report any child pornography on their network. A breach of that requirement could lead to a series of increasingly higher fines and the person could be put in prison for a maximum of six months for a third infraction and for each subsequent offence. Bill C-22 was widely supported in the House.

It goes without saying that Bill C-22 addresses the concerns of victims of crime. We listened to them. The bill aims to reduce the number of new victims of Internet child pornography. The federal ombudsman for victims of crime was very clear on the need for such a law; we created that ombudsman's office.

Before I conclude, I would be remiss if I did not mention Bill C-54, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sexual offences against children), also known as the Protecting Children from Sexual Predators Act, which was passed on November 4, 2010.

These amendments will help us better protect children from sexual exploitation because of two new infractions, namely providing sexually explicit materials to a child for the purpose of facilitating the commission of a sexual offence against the child and agreeing or arranging to commit a sexual offence against a child.

These amendments will also require the court to consider attaching conditions to sentences for offenders found guilty of committing a sexual offence involving a child and offenders suspected of having committed this type of offence to ensure that they are not in contact with children under the age of 16 and that they do not use the Internet without supervision by a designated person.

This will allow for a more consistent enforcement of sentences for sexual offences involving children.

Bill C-54 is currently being studied by the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, of which I am a member, and I suggest that, when it is returned to the House, all members show their support for protecting children by ensuring that this bill is passed quickly.

The government is proud of what it has accomplished for victims of crime and for the people of Canada. We are listening to victims of crime and to other stakeholders in the justice system, and we are making reforms that address the needs and concerns of Canadians.

Our government has listened to victims.

Disposition of Abolition of Early Parole Act

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly agree. The process that is being used is denying members their right to debate government legislation and bring the interests of Canadians to bear on that legislation. That is a fundamental right. In fact, it is our responsibility under our system of responsible government to do that.

The member is also right that in order for us to be able to do the analysis and bring the appropriate scrutiny to bear on bills, we have to know how much these government initiatives cost. That is why the finance committee demanded that the costs be revealed by the government.

I do not often give the Liberals credit, but in fact past Liberal governments gave us five-year projections. I am going to take a minute to remind the House what bills are at stake. There are: Bill S-2, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and other Acts; Bill S-6, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and another Act; Bill S-7; Bill S-9; Bill S-10. There are 18 crime legislation bills in total and the government will not provide to members of the House the costs of implementing this legislation. It is unconscionable and it denies members the ability to do their jobs properly.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened closely to the comments of the member in this chamber, and I am a bit surprised, because he is actually engaging in substantive debate around the bill to which the time allocation motion applies. However, what is really before us in the House today is the time allocation motion itself and the government cutting off the amount of time for debate on the bill.

We should not be debating the merits of the bill itself at all, yet I just heard the member say that all kinds of crime bills have been stalled at committee.

Let me give the House a number of the bills that have now passed through the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights: C-4, C-5, C-16, C-17, C-21, C-22, C-23A, C-23B, C-39, C-48, C-50, C-51, C-52, S-2, S-6, S-7, S-9 and S-10. Can the member really suggest that the crime agenda of the government is being stalled?

Some of us would argue they are the only bills we have been dealing with in the House. I wish the member would return to what we are really debating here tonight, and that is the time allocation motion, not the substance of the government's crime agenda.

Standing Committee on Finance

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am saddened today to feel the obligation to rise to address comments with regard to the question of privilege raised by the member for Kings—Hants on February 7.

It is like the movie Groundhog Day. Anyone is familiar with that movie knows it was very successful. American actor Bill Murray relives the day over and over again until he learns his lesson.

It appears the government is reliving the same thing and forcing all other members of the House of Commons and Canadians to relive the same days we experienced back in 2009-10 with regard to a request from the special committee on Afghanistan for the production of documents from the government. The government resisted that. It took a question of privilege to be raised in the House. It took comments from many members of the House. It took considerable reflection and study on your part, Mr. Speaker, before you made a ruling that there was a prima facie case of privilege in that regard.

Yet, again, we are faced with the exact same situation today.

If I look at the timeline, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance tabled its 10th report on Monday, February 7. The member for Kings—Hants, pursuant to that report, raised the question of privilege of which we are now all aware.

I want to concur with the arguments raised by my colleague for Kings—Hants, as well as those raised by my colleagues from Mississauga South and Windsor—Tecumseh on the issue.

However, I wish to note a number of points. I also wish to address, in particular, the issues of cabinet confidence and the requests with regard to all the justice bills. It is important to do so, particularly with the time of events and the government's response to date to the committee's requests for the production of documents. We have not yet heard the government's response in the House with regard to the question of privilege.

On November 17, 2010, the Standing Committee on Finance passed a motion, ordering the Government of Canada to provide the committee with five-year projections of total corporate profits before taxes and effective corporate tax rates from the 2010-11 fiscal year until the 2014-15 fiscal year, inclusive. The November 17 motion also ordered the government to provide the committee with certain financial information pertaining to justice bills, which I will enumerate.

As all members in the House know, I am the justice critic for the official opposition. Therefore, all the information, all the documents requested through the motion of the finance committee have direct pertinence to the committee on justice and human rights. Those justice bills were Bill C-4, the youth criminal justice bill, Bill C-5, Bill C-16, Bill C-17, Bill C-21, Bill C-22, Bill C-23A, Bill C-23B, Bill C-39, Bill C-48, Bill C-50, Bill C-51, Bill C-52, Bill S-2, Bill S-6, Bill S-7, Bill S-9 and Bill S-10.

The motion specifically requested:

—detailed cost accounting, analysis and projections, including assumptions, for each of the bills and Acts, conducted in accordance with the Treasury Board Guide to Costing.

Members are now aware, by the issue of privilege raised by the member for Kings—Hants, that the motion established a deadline of seven calendar days, which ended on November 24, 2010.

On November 24, Finance Canada replied to the committee, and I will read the department's response in its entirety because it is quite important, particularly to any Canadian and any member sitting in the House who takes his or her work as an elected official representing Canadians, a sacred duty in fact, to know the response. It said:

Projections of corporate profits before taxes and effective corporate income tax rates are a Cabinet confidence. As such, we are not in a position to provide these series to the Committee.

The department claimed it was not in a position to provide these documents to the committee because, according to the government, these documents were a cabinet confidence. That is the heart of the matter. Do the documents requested constitute a cabinet confidence and, if so, are they excluded from the rule of the House of Commons, the power and authority of Parliament, to require documents to be provided?

As the House knows, because it has been mentioned by others in the House who have commented on the issue of privilege raised by the member for Kings—Hants, the government has yet to speak to this issue. I understand that one of the parliamentary secretaries has said the government is taking note of all of members' comments in the House, relating to the issue of privilege, and will respond in due course.

On December 1, 2010, one full week after the deadline of November 24, 2010, the committee received a reply from Justice Canada regarding projected costs of the justice bills. I will read the response by Justice Canada in its entirety. It said:

The issue of whether there are any costs associated with the implementation of any of the Government's Justice bills is a matter of Cabinet confidence and, as such, the Government is not in a position to provide such information or documents.

That is interesting because in justice committee, of which I am a member, when we have repeatedly asked the minister for the cost analysis of a government bill before the committee, the minister has never stated that he could not give us that information because it is a matter of confidence. I would challenge members to check the transcripts of justice committee. What I did hear was he did not have the information with him or some befuddled answer that did not answer the question.

On December 7, 2010, after the government had refused to provide the information ordered by finance committee by the established deadline, the member for Kings—Hants provided the committee with written notice of a motion by which, if passed, the committee would draw the attention of the House to what appeared to be a breach of its privileges. That has been done. The committee adopted the motion and the member for Kings—Hants rose in the House to speak to the issue.

On December 10, the committee received an additional response from the Department of Finance Canada in answer to its motion ordering the production of documents relating to the projections regarding corporate taxes before profits.

In response, the department stated:

To the best of its knowledge, the Department of Finance has determined that [the] "series" or projections of corporate profits before taxes or the effective corporate income tax rates have never been previously disclosed. These projections are from a comprehensive economic and fiscal projection that constitutes a Cabinet confidence.

To reiterate, according to the second or additional response of the Department of Finance to the finance committee, the Department of Finance, acting on behalf of the government, claimed that these projections have never been previously disclosed and constitute a cabinet confidence.

As pointed out in this chamber before, but which bears repetition, I would suggest to any Canadian to Google the phrase, “Corporate tax profits before taxes”, and restrict their search to the domain of the Department of Finance Canada. That Canadian would get exactly two results: the HTML and PDF versions of “The Economic and Fiscal Update“ from November 2005. In that update, we find precisely the information that the Department of Justice, in its December 10 additional response to the finance committee, claimed had never previously been disclosed because it constituted a cabinet confidence. In fact, it was disclosed in the November 2005 economic and fiscal update that was issued by the previous government comprised of the Liberal Party of Canada's elected members of Parliament.

Therefore, the assertion on the part of the government, through its Department of Finance, justifying its refusal to obey, respect and act on the order of the finance committee to produce the documents is an outright fabrication.

The government department could have said that in the past the information had been released, but that the policy had been changed with a new interpretation of what constituted a cabinet confidence and, as a result, would not be releasing those documents to the finance committee. However, that was not the reason given by the department, by the government, for refusing to release that information. The reason given to the committee for not providing that information, that it is a cabinet confidence, is pure nonsense.

What is the state of legislation regarding cabinet confidence?

As mentioned, one can look to the Access to Information Act and the law of evidence act, and one will find that the government does not have a leg to stand on, and in fact does not have two legs to stand on.

Any reasonable Canadian reading the pertinent sections of the Access to Information Act and the law of evidence act would see that the two responses given by the Department of Finance and the response given by the Department of Justice are nonsense.

As I said, we know that in 2005 the previous government recognized that projections of corporate tax profits before taxes were not covered by cabinet confidence. Such projections are not considered a cabinet confidence when, as is the case with Finance Canada's revenue model, these projections are used by the department in a manner not exclusively related to cabinet operations.

What has changed between 2005 and 2010-11? On what grounds is the government now claiming that these projections constitute a cabinet confidence when there was no such assertion in the past and governments in the past have in fact provided and disclosed that information?

The costs of the justice bills are also important because the Department of Justice, as well, replied to the finance committee by claiming cabinet confidence as a justification for not releasing that information to the finance committee.

We know that due diligence would have required that cabinet consider the cost implications of each justice bill before making a decision to proceed with each bill. We know that under normal practices, an analysis of the cost implications of each justice bill would have been included with the memorandum to cabinet prepared for each justice bill.

Why do we know this? We know it because the Liberal Party of Canada has formed government in the past. We know that when we came power the government that preceded us, the one formed by the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, had done that as well. So these are normal practices. These are practices of a prudent, diligent and competent government.

No diligent, prudent and competent government would consider an issue, whether amendments, or a justice bill bringing in new legislation to the Criminal Code or amending existing sections of the Criminal Code, because that constitutes government policy, would do so without informing itself of the cost of those changes.

That is what previous governments have done, because those previous governments, whatever their faults, have followed prudent, diligent and competent practices with regard to taking decisions on issues brought before cabinet.

As I said, we know that under normal practices, an analysis of the cost implications of each justice bill would have been included with the memorandum to cabinet prepared for each justice bill.

Now let us look at the legislation that deals with what is, or is not, cabinet confidence and whether or not something that falls into cabinet confidence can be accessible.

If one looks at section 69 of the Access to Information Act, it tells us that such analysis and background information is not, and I repeat, not, a cabinet confidence, if the cabinet decision to which the analysis relates has been made public.

A cost analysis of the implications of a justice bill should have been included, and I believe was included, in the memorandum to cabinet, as it is on each and every justice bill.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege in relation to the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Finance.

In our system of responsible government, the government must seek Parliament's authority to spend public funds. Parliament, in turn, has an obligation, a responsibility to hold the government to account and to scrutinize the government's books.

Recently, this government impeded the work of the Standing Committee on Finance by hindering its attempts to better understand the federal government's budget projections.

As you know, Mr. Speaker, Standing Order 108 empowers committees to send for persons, papers and records. House of Commons Procedure and Practice, second edition, describes Parliament's right to order the production of documents as a right that is “as old as Parliament itself”.

On November 17, 2010, the Standing Committee on Finance passed a motion ordering the Government of Canada to provide the commitment with five-year projections of total corporate profits before taxes and effective corporate tax rates from the 2010-11 fiscal year until the 2014-15 fiscal year, inclusive.

The November 17 motion also ordered the government to provide the committee with certain financial information pertaining to justice Bills C-4, C-5, C-16, C-17, C-21, C-22, C-23A, C-23B, C-39, C-48, C-50, C-51, C-52, S-2, S-6, S-7, S-9 and S-10.

Among other things, the motion specifically requested:

detailed cost accounting, analysis and projections, including assumptions, for each of the bills and Acts, conducted in accordance with the Treasury Board Guide to Costing.

The motion established a deadline of seven calendar days, which ended on November 24, 2010.

On November 24, the Department of Finance replied to the committee with the following. I will read the department's response in its entirety. It stated:

Projections of corporate profits before taxes and effective corporate income tax rates are a Cabinet confidence. As such, we are not in a position to provide these series to the Committee.

The government provided no further information to the committee before the deadline.

On December 1, 2010, one full week after the deadline, the committee received a letter from the Department of Justice regarding projected costs of the justice bills. Again, I will read the department's response in its entirety. It stated:

The issue of whether there are any costs associated with the implementation of any of the Government's Justice bills is a matter of Cabinet confidence and, as such, the Government is not in a position to provide such information or documents.

On December 7, 2010, after the government had refused to provide the information ordered by the committee by the established deadline, I provided the committee with written notice for a motion by which, if passed, the committee would draw the attention of the House to what appeared to be a breach of its privileges.

On December 10, 2010, perhaps in response to the written notice I had written on December 7, the committee received an additional response from the Department of Finance.

In its response, the department stated:

To the best of its knowledge, the Department of Finance has determined that “series” or projections of corporate profits before taxes or the effective corporate income tax rates have never been previously disclosed. These projections are from a comprehensive economic and fiscal projection that constitutes a Cabinet confidence. As a result, the Department of Finance has not been in a position to provide these "series" to the Committee.

This response appeared somewhat dubious. For, if any member of the House or if any Canadian wishes to Google the phrase “corporate profits before taxes” and restrict their search to the domain of the Department of Finance's website, he or she would get exactly two results: the HTML and PDF versions of “The Economic and Fiscal Update” from November 2005, in which they would find, on page 83, that the previous Liberal government had actually published projections of corporate profits before taxes from 2005 until 2010.

At this time, I would like to seek unanimous consent to table page 83 of “The Economic and Fiscal Update” from November 2005.

Criminal Code

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Speaker, as a father, I love my children and I know their mother perhaps loves them even more than I do, if that is possible. Some mothers fall in love with their children even before birth in a way that few of us can understand. These mothers should never have to make a choice between protecting themselves or the child they love.

Forced abortion should be made illegal in Canada. Roxanne's law would accomplish this. The main argument used against Roxanne's law is that the bill is totally redundant because, so opponents claim, abortion coercion is already covered in the Criminal Code under existing provisions for assaults, uttering threats or intimidation. If I wanted to oppose a bill whose sole purpose was to protect women from abortion coercion, I too would want to find some excuse that made it sound like I was in favour of forced abortion. Saying it is already illegal gives me that cover. It allows me to oppose the bill for what sounds to be a legitimate reason while still professing how terrible it is to coerce a woman into having an abortion. After all, who wants to be known as someone who supports what the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada called a crime against humanity? The problem is that the argument that it is already illegal falls apart upon analysis.

Although some of the conduct described in Bill C-510 could fall under existing provisions in the Criminal Code, depending on the circumstances, not all behaviour that could fall under the definition of coercion in Bill C-510 would be captured under existing provisions. It is important to note that the list of examples of coercion in Bill C-510 is not exhaustive. This allows the court some discretion in deciding what constitutes abortion coercion given how it is defined in the bill. Above all though, the fact that no one has ever been charged with coercing an abortion in Canada is absolute proof that clarification of the law is desperately needed, a law Roxanne Fernando could have used to protect herself.

Even in cases where a more general provision would suffice, there is tremendous value in having a new Criminal Code provision specific to abortion coercion. Criminal law scholars say we use the criminal law as a way of indicating a serious condemnation of an activity or action not only to punish people but also to state our most important social values and to send a clear message expressing society's rejection and intolerance of a specific act. When we single out coerced abortion as a separate offence, it is a signal that such behaviour should be denounced as a serious offence. It reflects a social value about the unacceptability of forcing a pregnant woman into ending a pregnancy she wants to continue.

Creating specific provisions when a more general provision already exists in the Criminal Code is not a new idea. There are three such bills currently before Parliament which have passed at least one parliamentary vote. Bill S-9 makes it an offence to steal a motor vehicle even though theft is already an offence. It received royal assent last month. Bill S-215 and Bill C-464 also bring important clarifications to laws that perhaps already capture the crimes contemplated. These are excellent ideas and important clarifications, just as Roxanne's law is.

Thus, it is clear that as legislators we often create offences and provisions even when a more general provision would suffice. We do this in order to send a strong message of denunciation to affirm society's deeply held values and to educate the public. Should one choose to vote against Bill C-510, it will be seen as a choice to turn a blind eye to a horrible injustice.

Roxanne Fernando's story has now been heard across the country and if not now, someday soon she will be considered a Canadian hero. In this Christmas season, I ask members to consider bringing additional protection to mothers with child who are facing dangerous circumstances.

Protecting Children from Sexual Predators Act

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice]

Madam Speaker, I listened intently to the hon. member's speech and I am pleased to hear that his party will at least support sending this very important bill to committee.

He raised the issue of mandatory minimum penalties. Of course, we have heard this from the Bloc before, but I am a little confused because a few weeks ago when we were debating Bill S-9, the bill on auto theft, there was a mandatory minimum penalty of six months for a third conviction offence of auto theft. In the House a member of his party, in fact I think it was the justice critic for his party, said that the Bloc was not rigidly ideologically against mandatory minimum penalties, and as an example, the Bloc was going to vote in favour of the bill because those members think six months is reasonable. Then when the bill went through committee, the Bloc moved a motion to have that deleted because the Bloc members decided they were in fact ideologically opposed to mandatory minimum penalties.

Perhaps the member would like to explain why including a mandatory minimum penalty for accessing child pornography and sexual exploitation of children and moving the minimum on summary conviction up from 14 days to 90 days, and on indictment from 45 days to six months is outrageous. Perhaps he could also comment on the impact on people's faith and confidence in the justice system when they see child sexual predators spend a minimum of 15 days in jail.

Justice

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for the very fine work he does as chair of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

I am pleased to report that just a few minutes ago, Bill S-9 received royal assent. Once this new law comes into force, law enforcement and the courts will have better tools to tackle auto theft and the entire range of activities involved in the trafficking of all types of stolen and fraudulently obtained property. This is just one example of how our Conservative government continues to deliver for victims and law-abiding citizens in this country.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the best way to fight gangs and organized crime is to remove their profits. Auto theft threatens the safety of our communities and costs Canadians over $1 billion each year. It is one of the largest sources of illegal profits for organized crime.

Last week our government's Bill S-9 passed the House of Commons. This bill will deliver tough action on auto theft and on crimes involving the trafficking of stolen property. The bill also will remove dangerous drivers from our roads.

Would the parliamentary secretary give the House an update on the recent news concerning this important bill?

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. I have the honour to inform the House that a communication has been received as follows:

Rideau Hall

Ottawa

November 18, 2010

Mr. Speaker:

I have the honour to inform you that the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, signified royal assent by written declaration to the bills listed in the Schedule to this letter on the 18th day of November, 2010, at 9:10 a.m.

Yours sincerely, Sheila-Marie Cook

Secretary to the Governor General

The schedule indicates the bills assented to were BillC-40, An Act to establish National Seniors Day and Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime).

Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as we all know, joyriding has been going on since the invention of the automobile, but it has taken an extremely long time to pass this bill. It first started out as Bill C-53, then it became Bill C-26 and now it is Bill S-9, a Senate bill.

I have two questions for the hon. member. First, why is it taking so long to pass this bill into law?Second, why does the crime prevention government seem to think that putting everybody in prison is the answer? I would like the hon. member to compare, if possible, incarceration to putting immobilizers in all vehicles.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise once again to speak to Bill S-9, as it is now called. I have spoken on this bill under other numbers in the past.

I listened very intently to all of the speeches this morning. I want to begin by pointing out that auto theft is something that has been with us for a number of years. It goes back to the 1970s, but I do not think it became a public issue until sometime in the 1980s.

Essentially there was a long delay. I think governments of all political stripes were asleep at the switch for a considerable amount of time, when in fact they could have moved a little earlier than they did.

It is comforting to know that auto theft numbers are dropping because of efforts made by various governments, for example, the Government of Manitoba and the government in Ottawa as well. It was in 2003 that the federal government announced that, effective September 1, 2007, all new cars sold in Canada would have to have immobilizers.

So if we do the calculations and recognize that the average car is on the road for perhaps 15 years, it will be around 2021 before the problem actually solves itself. I do not think we should have to wait that long for the problem to solve itself.

The fact of the matter is that the federal government, as far back as Brian Mulroney but certainly under the 13 years of Jean Chrétien and the Liberals, in any one of those years could have acted and could have enforced the requirement for the mandatory installation of immobilizers, which they did effective September 1, 2007.

Just so members know how effective these immobilizers are and can be, for example, the Ford Motor Company in its 1996 version of the Ford Windstar, on sale in the fall of 1995, the higher end models of those vehicles had factory-installed immobilizers. That was sort of the beginning of immobilizers in mass-produced cars. There may have been some around previously in higher end vehicles.

Gradually over time more and more of these immobilizers became factory-installed. There was an after-market product available to be installed, but there were some problems with them. I checked several years later with the Manitoba Public Insurance Corporation, perhaps as little as two or three years ago, and was told that no vehicle with a factory-installed immobilizer had been successfully stolen.

Now, they are damaged because the thieves break into the vehicles and, when they cannot steal the car, of course there is still resulting damage to the vehicle. At least they are not running away with the vehicle, taking a potentially lethal object out on the road and perhaps running somebody down or being involved in accidents with the vehicle.

We knew early on that this was a very solid solution to the problem. The question is, Why did the government not act? When I checked back a few years ago with the Insurance Bureau of Canada data and information, I was not surprised but I did read that there was information available that immobilizers could have been factory-installed in vehicles for as little as $30, I believe I read, but it could be a little more than that. It is not a significant expense.

The United States government could have enforced these and made them mandatory. The Canadian government could have done this.

When police started to report rising theft rates of automobiles, and statistics started to show that people were being injured and killed because of auto theft, it would have been prudent for the government to take this issue more seriously and attempt to nip the problem in the bud by forcing immobilizers to be installed at the factories. But that was not done.

In the 1990s, the Conservative government of Gary Filmon in Manitoba attempted to tackle the problem by several means. It did not get to the point of dealing with immobilizers. It was looking at things that, in the end, proved not to work. It planned to sue the offenders and hold off giving them their driver's licences.

Bear in mind that, at least in Manitoba, authorities had determined that level four offenders for car theft numbered around 50 people. In other words, 50 people were stealing most of the cars. The theory was that if we concentrated on those 50 people the numbers would be reduced.

Most of those 50 people were very young. Some were as young as 13 or 14 years old. Trying to sue them would be an impossibility. Holding their driver's licences back did not mean much to them. Making the parents responsible was another attempt by the Filmon government. It passed legislation holding the parents responsible for these kids.

In the end, I do not think the government was able to gain any significant restitution or result from these efforts. Nevertheless, it was an attempt to respond to the problem. The government of Manitoba was still not there in forming a gang suppression unit, immobilizers, or any of the best practices that seem to have helped to solve the problem.

When the NDP government of Gary Doer came into power in 1999, it had a lot of issues to deal with. It was not overly quick to deal with this one. I believe it was 2005 when the provincial government announced an immobilizer incentive program.

I remember that the government was planning to theft-proof 90% of Winnepeg vehicles within five years. The government was going to guarantee a price of $280, taxes included, for the purchase and installation of immobilizers that met Canadian standards. The customer had to pay $140, half the installation cost, to the insurance corporation, which was a government-owned corporation in Manitoba. The government provided interest-free loans and was going to give an insurance reduction of $40 annually.

Guess what? Almost nobody took up the program. After a while, six months to a year, we found that people were not participating.

Finally, the government decided it had had enough and mandated the installation of the immobilizers free of cost, which was $200. The government made it a requirement that immobilizers had to be installed before vehicle registration and insurance could be renewed, thereby ensuring that it was going to be done. Also, there was a reduction in insurance.

One would think that people would be lined up by the hundreds to get this done, given that this program was free and there was going to be an insurance reduction. But the reality is that people complained. People did not want to get their free immobilizers installed in their vehicles. They felt it was their right to drive around without the fear of their car being stolen.

There is this strange train of thought out there. Many people retain a more or less 1950s mentality, and think they should be able to leave their house doors and car doors unlocked and that no one should steal anything. These people are not dealing with reality. The majority of people realize that they are required to take some precautions and lock their vehicles and homes.

Thieves target certain models of cars. Since September 1, 2007, all new vehicles have factory-installed immobilizers. That means that during the last three years of vehicle production all cars had immobilizers installed at the factory.

Manitoba has taken vehicles methodically, group by group, and worked its way down from the highest-theft vehicles to the lowest. Over time, there is a smaller pool of vehicles available for theft. That has been reflected in lower automobile theft rates. Manitoba had an immediate reduction in the first year. The province had a long way to go, because it was the auto theft capital of Canada by quite a long shot. In fact, Manitoba was almost double the national average in auto theft.

The province had a lot of work to do, but it had a good base to start from. Auto theft was cut down substantially. Once, a couple of years ago, no thefts occurred during a 24-hour period. One day in a month a couple of years ago, Winnipeg actually had zero car thefts. Manitoba has started to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

This problem should never have been allowed to happen in the first place. When governments see a problem, they should be proactive, not reactive. The problem should be studied early on. We should have started studying this problem in the eighties to determine how best to solve it. Putting an immobilizer in a vehicle is a simple solution.

The other part of the approach was to set up a gang suppression unit with the police department, and that has worked very well. The police know who these level four offenders are. They are roughly 50 people. The police targeted these 50 people, and most of them are now in jail, where they are unable to steal cars.

A number of others who are out on bail wear a monitoring device obtained from Nova Scotia, where it evidently works well. There have been incidents of car thieves cutting off their ankle bracelets and escaping, but by and large it has been a decent program. Manitoba set up a pilot project for a year, and I believe it is still going on. So it appears that the pilot worked out okay and is achieving some results, in spite of the odd hiccup along the way.

Manitoba also looked at the bait car program, which is an interesting program that works in some parts of the United States. It also works well in B.C.

However, Manitoba, for one reason or another, decided not to proceed with the bait car program. It could be because we have very cold temperatures for a large part of the year. Vancouver has warmer temperatures to work with. However, to each his own. Evidently, the bait car program worked reasonably well in Vancouver, and that is fine if it is getting results.

The Manitoba government then decided to chase this tough on crime government for some action on crime. To that end, Premier Doer led a delegation to Ottawa on September 13, 2007, and he included in his delegation the attorney general, the opposition Conservative leader, the leader of the Liberal Party in Manitoba, and the mayors of Winnipeg and Brandon. He also included a number of other people.

The province's approach to reducing auto theft and youth crime focuses on four broad areas. One is prevention, with programs like lighthouses, friendship centres, and education pilot projects as well as initiatives like vehicle immobilizers. Another is intervention, with the highly successful turnabout program and intense supervision for repeat offenders. A third is suppression, with more targeted funding for police officers, corrections, and crown attorneys dealing with auto theft. The final area is consequences, which includes lifetime suspensions of driver's licences for repeat offenders.

In addition, the premier cited the success of provincial initiatives dealing with drinking and driving, which helped reduce related fatalities and injuries by 25% from 1999 to 2003. There were also changes that Manitoba was asking the federal government to make.

No other province, to my knowledge, was doing this at that time. The NDP government of Manitoba was actually getting tough on crime. It was coming to Ottawa to talk to the pretend tough on crime government, demanding that the federal government provide stronger penalties for youth involved in serious crimes, especially auto theft. The province wanted to allow first degree murder charges for gang-related homicides. It wanted to eliminate two-for-one remand credits, which the government, to its credit, is doing now. It wanted to classify auto theft as an indictable violent offence, and it wanted to make shooting at buildings and drive-by shootings indictable offences as well. In addition, Manitoba requested the federal government to examine the issue of drivers who refuse to take a breathalyzer test, with a view to strengthening existing laws.

I ask the member for Sudbury, my colleague, does that sound like a party and a government that is soft on crime? The Manitoba NDP government was asking for things that the tough on crime government here in Ottawa cannot seem to get done at all. It has accomplished only two of the five requests from the provincial government. It is clear that the government that is tough on crime is the NDP government of Manitoba. It is tough on crime, but it is also smart on crime, because it relies on best practices. We do not run off for whatever is politically popular at the time. We proceed with what works, what gets results.

I have explained to the member about immobilizers, how we were able to pilot that program and get drastic results in auto theft reduction. I also explained the gang-suppression unit, which isolated and identified those 50 people.

I have not started even one word of the notes I brought with me today. I am extremely disappointed about that, but I am sure that there will be questions.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), be read the third time and passed.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill S-9. This is not the first time we have debated this topic, which is a very serious challenge for the entire country. Many bills have already been introduced about this topic.

This is not the first time that we have stood and talked about doing something with respect to auto theft.

First, before I get into criticizing the government for interrupting its own legislative agenda with the interruption of the sitting of Parliament, one of the most effective ways to battle auto theft and crime in general is to resource our police forces, our prosecutors, our court systems and to restore confidence, which has been diminished in our judicial system by the actions, the words and, in the case of funding, the inactions of the Conservative government.

I met with some representatives of the policing community in Winnipeg. Winnipeg, as members know, once had the dubious distinction of being the auto theft capital of Canada. However, It does not anymore. Therefore, congratulations to the city council and the police forces of Winnipeg. However, another community now has that distinction. Whenever one community falls off the dubious mark, another leaps ahead.

Let us be clear on this. We compliment ourselves in passing laws. We think these great statements and declarations have an effect, and sometimes they do. I do not want to diminish the work of the justice committee, or the Minister of Justice or Parliament itself. However, let us face it, with prorogation, elections, debates and the slowly moving process involving our legislation in our bicameral system, whether it is a Liberal-dominated or now a Conservative-dominated holding up of legislation, the fact is we do not put out a great quantity of precise, surgical legislation for topics like auto theft.

We might ask ourselves, how Winnipeg did it if it did not have our help with this legislation or legislation like it. It did it with resources. It did it with smart tactical policing. It identified groups of what were most likely to be the perpetrators of auto theft and went after them. It also instituted programs outside the Criminal Code and outside strict policing with respect to electronic devices that determined where thefts occurred and where the vehicles would go.

I will take the blame for all of us in Parliament, but we are late at the game in getting to Bill S-9. I have said it before. I hope Bill S-9 does not follow the ill-fated path of its identical twins. We are now into triplets, of which Bill S-9 is a part. Sadly, if this were an obituary in a few months because of an election or something, it would read, “predeceased by identical twins Bill C-53 and Bill C-26” and maybe we would come back again, do another bill and then there would be quadruplets.

The point is we have to get to this bill and we have to pass it. We worked very well at the justice committee, making suggestions, doing the due diligence with respect to Bill S-9, getting statistics and all those sorts of things.

There is no question we want this bill passed. It would give a lot of aid to police services and to communities suffering from epidemics of auto theft.

One thing we know, as the justice committee and parliamentarians in general, is police forces have their hands full, their resources are not necessarily growing and, overall, the criminal element in our country is getting leaner, sleeker, smarter, better resourced, more focused and more efficacious. This is the battle we are fighting on every front, not just auto theft.

However, it particularly bears down on auto theft. The theft of an auto, whether it is for the purposes of committing another crime for temporary use, or committing some other crime of a violent nature so as to hide the identity of perpetrators or the cash value of vehicles, this is an epidemic in our larger communities, for sure. The intelligence of the criminal community in disassembling vehicles, obliterating vehicle identification numbers and transporting parts of cars or whole cars internationally is not in the decline; it is on the rise. Whatever we can do in a modest way to make that better, we should all be for it.

Bill S-9 attempts to amend the Criminal Code. It was introduced, in this case, in the Senate and received first reading on May 4. As I mentioned, it is identical to Bill C-26 and targets motor vehicle theft. It also addresses trafficking in any other property obtained by crime in the exporting and importing of such property.

The raw notion was that we should create a separate offence for auto theft. That, in itself, is a good thing. If we look at the intent of code to develop the importance or hierarchy of offences, one would be surprised perhaps that cattle theft is defined separately in the code, but auto theft is not. Therefore, it is probably time, since the book originates from 1892, that we put auto theft at least on par with cattle theft, with all due deference to ranchers. The auto is the new horse and a way of getting around the community since 1920. Therefore, we are getting in the game and modernizing, and good for us.

It fits very nicely just after section 333 of the code, at about the middle of the section called “PART IX OFFENCES AGAINST RIGHTS OF PROPERTY”. The code speaks first about offences against the person. It speaks mostly about offences against the rights of property. Then it is almost two-thirds caught up with specific offences, modes of trial and procedural aspects of the code, which are so important.

To get back to the very simple nature of the bill, creating the new offence of vehicle theft as punishable is a good thing. We can all support it. It takes it to a maximum sentence of 10 years, which shows that we feel that auto theft is important. It is a serious crime. In the case of a third or subsequent offence, it also provides a mandatory minimum of six months.

There has been a lot of discussion about mandatory minimum sentences in the House and in the newspapers. I think people must understand that this is nothing new, that mandatory minimum sentences in strategic tactical areas have been introduced since the 1980s, more particular under a former Liberal government with respect to specific violent crimes involving guns and organized crime. They were implemented in a very thorough way in 1995. Adding mandatory minimums to a number of offences in the Conservative government's regime has been somewhat scattered, but let us examine it in this case.

If a person steals an automobile with intent to commit another crime, to obliterate the VIN or just simply steals a vehicle three times, is it reasonable that a minimum sentence be applied of six months? We think it is. We think this is a reasonable balance which would meet the test.

The overall test of sentencing in our country in section 718 is proportionality. It bears repeating that section 718 should be the start of any review of offences, any creation of offences, any change to offences because it sets out a scale of how we treat criminals once they have been convicted. Everyone should pay attention to the balance in section 718.

I suppose some would say that we should make rehabilitation of the convicted person the only agenda. I understand and have sympathy for that because every criminal is somebody's son or daughter and every criminal has a very good chance of going back into the community, so we ought to do our best to rehabilitate the incarcerated person. There is no question about that. It is important.

To make it overriding seeks to destroy the balance created within section 718. That balance must include denunciation of the act. In our country the strongest denunciation we give is to offences like murder. Murder in the first degree carries denunciation, meaning a person will be denounced by the judge or a jury of his or her peers by being given a sentence of life in prison with the eligibility for parole, which takes rehabilitation into account.

Therefore, there is a balance regarding deterrence, which is the third factor, suggesting that if the court gives a sentence, through following the laws of Parliament, of severity grave enough to stop someone else from doing the same thing is a good societal reason to up the sentence or consider it.

One of the final considerations in the big four is to remove the person from the public if there is harm.

Keeping all of those in mind, sentences must be proportionate to the offence created. Therefore, we feel that these mandatory minimums placed in this stand-alone section for auto theft are reasonable. They are not new in terms of sentencing and they are something with which we as lawmakers can live.

The stand-alone aspect of the bill is needed. It is modernizing the code. The mandatory minimum that attaches with it is proportionate.

Also, we always have to be mindful of the other provisions in section 718, which specifically suggest that if an aboriginal person is convicted of such an offence, the court must find a way to take into account the special circumstances of the aboriginal community. As we know, aboriginals represent such a high proportion of incarcerated people in our country. There is something wrong that and that is why the section was brought in, under a previous Liberal government. The section suggests to judges that they must take into consideration alternative measures that would better suit the convicted aboriginal person.

I do not see this in any way interfering with the duty of a judge to take that into consideration because the mandatory minimum, frankly, is a short time. Through our committee hearings, we did not hear of the disproportionality of first nations and aboriginal offenders with respect to this proposed offence in auto theft.

That leaves us with the other aspects of the bill, which are quite innovative, and we must compliment the Department of Justice for crafting legislation which is pretty tricky. Those are aspects with respect to giving our Canada Border Services Agency more power with respect to the exporting of vehicles and with respect to the obliteration of the vehicle identification number, or VIN. Those are two topics on which I will spend the rest of my time.

Let us tackle the VIN. I hesitate using the word tackle because it seems every Conservative bill tackles and solves a problem by its short title, when in fact it is a gradual evolution to the good of the Criminal Code. We would prefer the government to be less full of hyperbole and excitement with respect to its bills and concentrate on what is actually happening, which albeit is a good thing. It is evolving the Criminal Code to meet the needs of the changes in society. In this case, the vehicle identification number is something that is a bit tricky.

This is the numbered and lettered code on the dash of a vehicle, which identifies one's vehicle. However, members will know that in recent errors with multifaceted production methods, various parts of automobiles have various identification numbers. In any event, it is the manner in which vehicles are identified. The obliteration of that should be an offence on its own.

If there is a reason to obliterate the number, it has to be a pretty good one. At committee, we could only think of people who were in the automotive repair business and might inadvertently obliterate a VIN in repairs effected in the restoration of vehicles that had been damaged. In the case where the part of the vehicle where the VIN had been damaged, there would have to be a lawful excuse. Therefore, we covered it off, with the help of the Department of Justice, by suggesting that without lawful excuse, the VIN should not be obliterated. However, we wanted to maintain that a VIN alteration was a very serious thing and was something new for the Criminal Code. Bravo for all of us agreeing that this should be the case.

The obliteration of or tampering with the VIN is punishable by imprisonment of up to five years. This is in clause 4 of the bill. We thought that exemplified the seriousness with which we viewed tampering with the VIN. Remember that auto theft is a more serious provision because it is a maximum of 10 years. Tampering with the VIN is a maximum of five years. We think this is the right hierarchy.

Another offence that is created is the offence of trafficking in property obtained by crime and possession of property obtained by crime for the purpose of trafficking. This is punishable by a maximum of 14 years and is a very important part of the bill.

In the time that I have left, I will speak about CBSA and our borders.

While this bill is about auto theft, I think we realize that from sea-to-sea-to-sea we have a long, undefended, porous border. We do our best, but it is a fantastically large task for the Canada Border Services Agency to patrol our borders with the same efficacy that smaller nations patrol theirs. One can imagine that the borders of Liechtenstein might be a lot easier to guard, because it is a much a smaller country.

In our case, we have to admit that we have long stretches of border that are undefended and not monitored. For someone attempting to smuggle guns in, smuggle drugs out, or import or export cars or car parts, it must be easier for them to do that than it is for the RCMP, CSIS, the Canadian government, and the Canada Border Services Agency to plug the holes. With that in mind, we thought it was a great idea to allow the Canada Border Services Agency, by amendment, to prevent the cross-border movement of property obtained by crime, including stolen vehicles.

It might come as quite a shock to people not on the justice committee that this was not an offence before. It will be now, if this bill passes. If the bill does not suffer the fate of its previous twins, it will be an offence to move property obtained by crime, like a stolen vehicle or vehicle parts, across the border.

We had to have assurances from the justice department that there was no extraterritoriality provision in this. Really, it is saying that the vehicle that just left is a party to an offence, and the offence is the exportation. The vehicle might already be gone, might already be somewhere else, and there might be legal issues with respect to obtaining the evidence of the crime, which is the exportation.

We know that the Canada Border Services Agency does a good job. We know that it needs funding, law, and the tools to prevent exportation of vehicles and vehicle parts.

I will segue into something that is controversial.

We had a long debate, not so much in Parliament but certainly outside of Parliament, about gun control. I think all of us would agree that guns are often instrumental in the commission of crimes, and that many guns come into this country illegally through our border. I think we should stop and reflect on doing something about that.

These illegal handguns come through a porous border, and we must give the Canada Border Services Agency the tools they need to prevent this traffic. In the case of auto theft, it is exportation, going the other way. But we want to give CBSA the tools and resources to prevent the intrusion of guns upon our sovereignty. The saying goes that “guns do not kill people, people kill people”, but guns are the objects that are used.

When the Canada Border Services Agency appeared before us, it presented itself in a most professional and informed manner. I want to commend CBSA as an agency of the government. I want to make sure that the government understands that it is ready, willing, and able to take on the task of defending our border.

This little part in this little act is a salute to the men and women of the Canada Border Services Agency for the fine job they do in all parts of our country, whether it is airports or borders, seaports or rail stations. The Canada Border Services Agency protects us and needs our help. Bill S-9 delivers that help.

I am pleased to support the bill in general and the federal agencies that will be affected.

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise to speak to Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime).

This bill has strong support from the government and the opposition parties, which just goes to show how important this bill is.

I will not discuss the bill in detail, since it has been thoroughly studied and I think it is time to move forward with this initiative and to give law enforcement agencies the tools they need to better deal with auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime.

In essence, this bill directly targets the very serious issue of property crimes and, more specifically, auto theft. The bill will add offences to the Criminal Code by creating a separate offence for motor vehicle theft, offences that provide for sanctions for trafficking in property obtained by crime, and also an offence for tampering with vehicle identification numbers.

Auto theft costs Canadians over $1 billion a year, and related cases of dangerous driving make Canadian roads unsafe. Furthermore, it is clear that auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime represent a huge source of revenue for organized crime groups.

With this bill, our government has taken measures to protect Canadians, their property and their communities. That is why I support this bill. I would like to conclude by thanking all the members of the House, including the members of the justice committee, for the work they have done on this important legislation, and I urge members to pass it as quickly as possible.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), as reported (without amendment) from the committee.

Business of the House

[John Baird, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, today we are debating the NDP opposition motion.

Pursuant to any order adopted by the House earlier today, the vote on that opposition motion will take place on Tuesday, November 16 at the end of government orders.

Tomorrow the House will have the occasion to debate at second reading Bill C-32, Copyright Modernization Act, and the backup bill, should debate conclude at second reading, will be Bill S-9, Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act, which I know is a key priority of the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada.

Next week, as the member opposite said, is a constituency week. I encourage all members to remember and recognize the sacrifices made by the men and women of our armed forces, on November 11.

When we return on Monday, November 15, we will call a number of bills, including Bill C-3, Gender Equity in Indian Registration Act, Bill C-31, Eliminating Entitlements for Prisoners Act, Bill C-35, Cracking Down on Crooked Consultants Act, Bill C-20, An Action Plan for the National Capital Commission, Bill C-28, Fighting Internet and Wireless Spam Act, Bill C-22, Protecting Children from Online Sexual Exploitation Act and Bill C-48, Protecting Canadians by Ending Sentence Discounts for Multiple Murders Act. We would also consider calling other bills that may have returned from committee by the time we return.

Thursday, November 18, shall be the next allotted day.

In closing, I wish all members a productive constituency week.

Justice and Human Rights

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the fifth report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

In accordance with the order of reference of Monday, October 25, your committee has considered Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), and agreed on Tuesday, October 26, to report it without amendment.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

I'm mindful of the reminder you gave to all members of the committee at our last clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-22, I believe it was, at which the majority members on the committee defeated the short title because the amendment amending the short title was deemed inadmissible.

I do have a concern about this short title. I do not believe the English version of the short title accurately and appropriately expresses the French version of the short title.

In French, the short title is Loi visant à contrer le vol d’automobiles et le crime contre les biens. But,

in English, the short title says this act may be cited as the Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act. I do not believe that in any way accurately translates or represents this bill, whereas the French short title does.

So I'm asking if the government is at all open to perhaps modifying the English clause so that it more accurately represents the French short title, which in fact does represent accurately the bill itself, whereas I do not believe the English short title does.

Is there any openness to try to find an English short title that more accurately represents the actual body of the bill, the objective of the bill, in the way that the French title does? Because the French title does it very well.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I very much appreciate the comments that our colleague Mr. Ménard is making to justify the amendments he is suggesting, but I am not going to be able to support them.

I would like to explain my reasons briefly. First, these minimum sentences would not apply to young offenders. Secondly, in my opinion—and I hope I am accurately reflecting his words—for once, the Conservative government has zeroed in on a problem with surgical precision. Third, the minimum sentence proposed by the bill is quite lenient.

And because of the fact that the government has once more gone to the trouble to establish that it has to be a third conviction for the same offence, I feel that I can support the clause in Bill S-9 as written, with no hesitation or difficulty, and I am comfortable doing so.

I am very comfortable justifying my vote for the clause as written and against the amendments that you are proposing, Mr. Ménard.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

I reconvene the meeting.

We're moving to clause-by-clause consideration of Bill S-9, an act to amend the Criminal Code for auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime.

Monsieur Petit.

[Caroline Xavier, Director General, Corporate Secretariat Directorate, Canada Border Services Agency]

Thank you.

I'd like to thank the committee for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss CBSA's role in relation to Bill S-9.

Before I talk about the bill, I would like to take a moment to talk about CBSA's role in managing the border as well as the services we provide.

The CBSA is mandated to provide integrated border services that support national security and public safety priorities and facilitate the free flow of legitimate persons and goods, while meeting all requirements under program legislation.

This responsibility extends to enforcing immigration and refugee policy and to border inspection of food, plants and animals. It also aims to provide information and enforcement support that enable us to fulfill our legislative obligations in security and safety matters.

Overall, CBSA administers some 90 acts and regulations that govern the eligibility of people and acceptability of goods entering or leaving Canada.

The CBSA uses a risk-based intelligence approach to border management, whereby the agency focuses its efforts on the people and goods that are considered high risk, while facilitating the border clearance of low-risk travellers and goods.

The risk-based approach allows the agency to ensure that the costs and delays imposed by the clearance processes on legitimate people and shipments crossing the border are minimized, while at the same time identifying and interdicting diverse security threats as early as possible in the travel and supply chain continuum. Ultimately, this approach allows the agency to allocate its resources in the most effective manner possible by assessing risk as far away from the border as possible.

In June 2009 amendments to the Customs Act were made to strengthen the CBSA's ability to interdict contraband and other illegal items in customs-controlled areas, such as airport tarmacs and seaport docks. The primary purpose of these amendments was to give the CBSA greater scope and flexibility in its management of risk.

The key amendments allowed the CBSA to fully implement what we call the advance commercial information program, also known as eManifest, and to put in place changes at customs-controlled areas. Ultimately, this allows the agency to bring greater security within the trade supply chain through the receipt of advance commercial information via the eManifest initiative.

As mentioned, the CBSA enforces the Customs Act and other federal statutes and regulations. However, none of these acts or regulations includes a provision to specifically address the export of stolen vehicles and, in particular, suspected stolen vehicles.

Under current legislation, the CBSA may receive and act upon intelligence information, but the information must relate to the administration and/or enforcement of the Customs Act. The CBSA may only conduct an administrative check of outbound cargo to ensure its compliance with the Customs Act, the reporting of goods regulation, or any other act of Parliament the agency administers and enforces.

Currently, if a CBSA officer happens to discover what they suspect is a stolen vehicle during the course of an export examination, the officer does not have the legal authority to investigate whether or not the vehicle has been reported as stolen. Rather, the officer only has the authority to inform the local police jurisdiction of his or her suspicion. The police will then run checks on the vehicle through various databases to determine whether it's stolen.

Included in the Criminal Code amendments being considered by this committee is a provision that prohibits the importation and exportation of property obtained by crime, such as stolen vehicles. This prohibition will enhance the CBSA's ability to manage the border by triggering existing authorities in the Customs Act, which will allow the agency to undertake examinations to determine whether vehicles have been reported as stolen.

Under the proposed legislation, an officer who suspects that a vehicle has been stolen will also have the authority to run database checks to determine whether the vehicle has been stolen. In doing so, the CBSA will refer vehicles to the police that the agency believes to be stolen rather than just suspected of being stolen.

Therefore, the proposed amendments to the Criminal Code would provide the CBSA officers the lawful authority to assist police by examining and using various law enforcement databases for the purpose of detaining stolen vehicles. Such detained vehicles will then be turned over to the enforcement partners for further investigation, thus enhancing our information sharing capabilities with our law enforcement partners.

Bill S-9 will empower the CBSA to examine vehicles, determine theft through database checks, and detain stolen vehicles until the police can investigate the offence and take possession of them as part of their ongoing enforcement activities. Essentially, this bill will put the CBSA in a better position to work in a more effective manner with its national and international law enforcement partners to deter the cross-border trafficking of stolen goods.

Bill S-9 will also create specific offences: the offence of auto theft; the offence of tampering with a vehicle identification number; and the offences of trafficking in property obtained by crime and possession of property obtained by crime for the purpose of trafficking.

This bill will have a direct and positive impact on the CBSA in that it will allow the agency to play a more direct and meaningful role in preventing the exportation of stolen goods.

Currently the CBSA has a strategic export control program as part of our Customs Act authorities. Bill S-9 will provide CBSA further authority to assist our law enforcement partners by actively targeting those shipments that are reported for export before they reach the port, for the purpose of detecting stolen goods—in particular, vehicles.

These authorities will allow us to look at the export information we are receiving in advance so that we may work with our law enforcement partners to determine whether or not there could be an infraction or prohibited goods, such as a stolen vehicle.

Within its current legislative framework the CBSA works diligently on its own enforcement priorities that support police efforts to identify and investigate suspected stolen vehicles destined for export. The CBSA will continue to utilize a risk-management approach to do advance analysis, using intelligence from our law enforcement partners and our tools to focus our attention on suspicious containers.

In 2008 the CBSA participated in a six-month export vehicle verification probe led by the RCMP. During this probe, the CBSA used established export verification techniques, tools, and resources to look for indications of suspected contraventions of the Customs Act, the reporting of exported goods regulations, or any other act administered or enforced by the CBSA.

During the probe, the CBSA officers assisted the RCMP and examined 281 containers at the ports of Montreal and Halifax and intercepted 258 stolen vehicles. The results of the probe provided law enforcement agencies with a glimpse of the current situation regarding stolen vehicles.

With the passage of Bill S-9, the CBSA will have the legislative authority it needs to take a more effective role in law enforcement efforts to intercept stolen vehicles.

As part of our ongoing enforcement activities, the CBSA will be able to use the authorities provided by this bill to do our job more effectively within the parameters of our available resources.

Thank you for inviting me to contribute our perspective for your consideration of this legislative proposal.

I am now ready to answer questions. Thank you.

[Julie McAuley, Director, Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, Statistics Canada]

Thank you very much, and thank you for the opportunity to present to the committee regarding Bill S-9.

Statistics Canada does not take a position on the proposed amendments in the bill. The presentation we have prepared contains our most recent data on motor vehicle thefts. All data sources used are clearly indicated on the slides, as are any pertinent data sources.

We have included supplemental information at the end of the presentation for the consideration of the committee and have distributed a copy of a Juristat article on motor vehicle theft that was released in December 2008 using 2007 data. That is the most recent Juristat article on this subject.

My colleagues Ms. Mia Dauvergne and Mr. Craig Grimes will help answer any questions.

Please turn to the first slide in the deck.

Police-reported motor vehicle thefts in Canada have generally been declining since 1996. The rate of motor vehicle theft declined 15% between 2008 and 2009, continuing a downward trend that began in 2003.

Police-reported motor vehicle thefts are incidents in which a land-based motorized vehicle is taken or attempted to be taken without the owner's authorization. It includes incidents in which the perpetrator has the intent to steal a vehicle but is unsuccessful.

In 2009 police reported about 108,000 motor vehicle thefts, averaging about 300 stolen vehicles per day. This figure includes both completed and attempted incidents. This is down slightly from 2008, when police reported about 125,000 motor vehicle thefts.

A little over one-third of motor vehicle thefts in 2009 involved cars, and another one-third were of trucks.

Motor vehicle theft is one of the most common types of police-reported crime in Canada. In 2009 such thefts accounted for 5% of all Criminal Code offences and 6% of all non-violent offences.

The next slide shows that the highest rates of motor vehicle theft tend to be in the western provinces and northern Canada. In 2009, for the first time in 13 years, Manitoba did not have the highest reported motor vehicle theft rate in the country; Nunavut had the highest rate, with 593 motor vehicle thefts per 100,000 population. Vehicle theft rates in Manitoba have declined in four of the past five years, including a 39% drop in 2008 and a 28% drop in 2009.

The next slide indicates that in general the same geographical pattern is seen for Canada's census metropolitan areas. In 2009, while the highest rate of motor vehicle theft was in Brantford, Ontario, generally motor vehicle theft rates are higher in western Canada's CMAs.

Winnipeg's rate has been among the highest in Canada for the past 17 years. However, the rate of motor vehicle thefts in Winnipeg decreased from 956 per 100,000 population in 2008 to 629 per 100,000 population in 2009. This has driven the decrease in Manitoba's overall motor vehicle theft rate. In 2009, Winnipeg accounted for 74% of Manitoba's motor vehicle thefts, down slightly from 2008, when it accounted for 81%.

Motor vehicle theft is one of the least likely crimes to be solved by police. Of all vehicle thefts in 2009, 11% resulted in an accused person being identified, compared with 33% of all other non-violent offences.

Slide 5 shows that, similar to other non-violent offences, police-reported theft is a crime often associated with youth. In 2009, police-reported motor vehicle theft rates were highest among 15-to-18-year-olds. Youth 12 to 17 years old accounted for approximately three in ten persons accused of motor vehicle theft in 2009, slightly higher than the proportion of youth accused of other non-violent offences.

About 82% of all persons accused of motor vehicle theft in 2009 were male; this compares with 75% of those accused of other non-violent offences.

Drawing from analysis done in 2007, the next slide looks at police-reported motor vehicle thefts and organized crime. We do not yet have a reliable, direct way of measuring organized crime involvement, but vehicle recovery status has been used as a proxy measure.

As you can see, about four in ten stolen vehicles were not recovered by police, suggesting that these may have been related to organized crime. In 2007 vehicle recovery rates were lowest in the province of Quebec and among the highest in Winnipeg.

In the next slide, we turn to the question of court outcomes for charges of motor vehicle theft. It is not possible to identify motor vehicle theft using court administrative records alone, as motor vehicle thefts are currently recorded together with other thefts under section 334 of the Criminal Code. However, we can link court records, which contain criminal court outcomes, with police records, which contain offence characteristics, in order to identify this subset of theft in Canada.

The question of whether or not motor vehicle theft is treated differently from thefts in general by the courts is often asked, and we recently linked these administrative files to answer this question for another project. An unrepresentative sample of court records did show differences in the way in which theft in general and motor vehicle theft were treated by the courts. Incarceration was used more frequently for guilty charges of motor vehicle theft, and there were significant differences in the length of custody imposed by the courts for motor vehicle theft compared to other theft.

The Criminal Code under section 335 describes taking a motor vehicle without consent as an offence resembling theft. In slide 8 we see that several thousand of these theft-like charges are completed in Canadian criminal courts each year. The number of these charges against youth has been declining since the introduction of the Youth Criminal Justice Act, while the number of these charges against adults has changed very little since 2000-01. The proportion of guilty findings for adults and youth tends to be higher for this charge than for charges generally, but almost identical to the proportion found guilty for theft in general.

Next we turn our attention to data available from criminal courts on the possession of property obtained by crime. Because trafficking in such property is a new offence proposed under Bill S-9, it is not possible to provide data on the extent to which these cases also include trafficking of that property. However, it is possible to provide data on the number of cases that contain the underlying offence of possession of property obtained by crime. Since 2000-01, approximately 10% of all criminal court cases, or roughly 40,000 cases each year, contained at least one charge for property obtained by crime. In 2008-09, the proportion of these cases completed in youth criminal courts was higher than in adult criminal courts.

In summary, motor vehicle theft continues to be a high-volume offence in Canada, but Canada's police-reported motor vehicle theft rate has generally been declining since 1996. Motor vehicle theft rates are particularly high in the west. Vehicle recovery rates can serve as a proxy for organized crime involvement, and we have seen that the recovery rates vary across the country. Stolen vehicles are recovered less often in Quebec than elsewhere in Canada, while in Winnipeg the recovery rate was among the highest.

Thank you. That ends my presentation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

I call to order meeting number 31 of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Today is Tuesday, October 26, 2010.

You have before you the agenda for today to review Bill S-9, an act to amend the Criminal Code for auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime.

To assist us with our review we have a number of witnesses. First of all, we have, representing the Canada Border Services Agency, Ms. Caroline Xavier. We also have the Department of Justice, represented by Robert Borland, counsel. Welcome.

Then we have Statistics Canada. Some of you have been here before, so welcome back. We have Julie McAuley, director; Mia Dauvergne, senior analyst; and also Craig Grimes, chief and advisor. Welcome to all of you.

You know the routine. You have ten minutes to present, if you wish, and then we'll open the floor to questions.

Why don't we start with Statistics Canada.

Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime).

All of us here know of constituents who, or we ourselves, have been victims of individuals who have stolen cars. It is traumatic for the victims and their families. It is costly for insurance companies. Above all else, it is an incredible violation for those whose cars have been stolen.

We support the government bill. We want to work with the government to make sure it is an effective bill in the public interest, to ensure there is a continued decline in auto theft. What is interesting, along with most other crime in Canada, is that there has been a decline in auto theft. In 2006 there were some 430 vehicles stolen per day, which is a very large number, but the number of vehicles stolen continues to decline.

The Liberal Party will continue to support legislation that is effective and improves public safety. At one time the government had 16 bills on the order paper that were related to crime. We said that we would support 11 of the 16 bills immediately, but the government said that if we did not support all of the bills, it would not agree to 11 of its bills being supported in one block. That is unfortunate because this bill has been introduced several times in the past, due in large part to the Prime Minister's continual proroguing of Parliament. In doing that he has put the government's legislation back at square one. That is not in the interest of the public and is not a good use of taxpayers' money. It certainly makes this place work less effectively than any of us would like to see.

We certainly encourage the Prime Minister to work with us to ensure that the bills he is putting forward are good ones. We will work with him to ensure they are passed as quickly as possible. If a bill is not good legislation, we want to ensure that we can change it to make sure it works in the public interest.

This bill proposes to do three things. It makes it a crime to alter, destroy or remove a vehicle identification number. It makes it a crime to knowingly sell, give, transfer, or transport, send or deliver goods acquired criminally. It makes it a crime to possess property known to be obtained through crime for the purpose of trafficking.

In the past, my party put forth a number of bills relating to protecting children, to eradicate child pornography, to reduce violent crimes, to implementing minimum sentences for using a gun in the commission of a crime. We would certainly like to continue supporting good bills.

Auto theft is a national problem. It is particularly problematic in Montreal and Winnipeg. It has been endemic in those cities for a very long time. If the government wants to apply significant resources, it should do that in an evidence-based fashion. Rather than putting forth legislation that sounds good on the surface, we have to make sure that the legislation will make the public safer and will not waste the taxpayers' money.

The government has had a number of bills that will be exceptionally costly. If one sums up the cost of the government's justice bills, they will cost the taxpayer $11 billion. We would support that if that $11 billion was well spent, but the government is putting out a wide net that will capture people who should be in jail as well as individuals who perhaps have medical problems and should not be.

With this broad net, it sounds good for the government to puff up its chest and say that it supports the protection of Canadian citizens. Everybody in the House wants to protect Canadians. We are also interested in ensuring that those people who are inveterate criminals, repeat offenders and those who have committed violent crimes do pay the price and spend time in jail. However, the government has failed to look at both sides of the equation.

When I was putting myself through school, I worked for a while as a guard in a maximum security prison. I used to work there as a physician too. What I found, and this is the fact, is that 50% to 60% of people in jail have a combination of things. They could have fetal alcohol syndrome, now known as fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. A good chunk of them have had brain injuries. Many of them have what we call a dual diagnosis, a combination of both psychiatric problems and drug problems.

The problem is there is not a coherent way to address this. There are ways we can prevent those problems from happening. It would make more sense to work with the provinces, which are the managers of the provincial institutions where people serve sentences of two years less a day.

In one of the jails in my riding, and this is a standard practice for provincial institutions, there is a huge lack of ability to treat people with problems such as fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, which is the most common cause of preventable brain damage at birth, those who have substance abuse and psychiatric problems, and people who have brain injuries as a result of falls or other accidents. The jails are littered with these individuals. Would it not make more sense for the federal government to work with the provinces to ensure that people get the treatment they require?

Right now we see a revolving door syndrome within the provincial institutions. The police and the public are exceptionally frustrated because many people go on to reoffend. They become part of the revolving door syndrome. There are people in my community of Victoria whose houses have been broken into dozens of times. In Victoria proper more than 1,500 people are living on the streets. Sixty per cent of those people have dual diagnoses. They have a combination of psychiatric problems and substance abuse problems. Those problems cannot be shrugged off. They are medical problems that require medical intervention. The good thing about this is that there are programs that are effective in dealing with these problems. Let me give one example.

Dr. Evan Wood and Dr. Julio Montaner at the centre of excellence at the University of British Columbia have put forth programs such as NAOMI, the North American opiate medication initiative. This is a drug program for those who have intravenous injection drug problems, particularly with respect to narcotics. A group of people were given narcotics. Those people who had been committing crimes, stealing cars, doing break and enters and other actions to pay for their drug habits were given narcotics by a medical professional. Those people were brought into the medical system. The result was that a majority of those people moved away from engaging in criminality. They got the care they required. They were able to get skills training. They were able to get off the drugs, get back with their families and get their lives back on track.

It is a much less expensive intervention than throwing somebody in jail.

Members and viewers might be interested to know what it costs to keep one person in jail. For a federal maximum security institution, it costs $240,000 a year for a man, and for a woman, it costs $330,000 a year. In a medium security institution, it costs $140,000 a year. Most Canadians could not hope to earn that amount of money in a year, yet it is taxpayers' money which pays to keep people behind bars.

By all means, inveterate criminals and people who commit violent acts need to be behind bars; that is in the public interest. However, there has to be a way to break the cycle of criminality and there are ways to make this happen.

I mentioned NAOMI. Why is every single city in Canada that has an intravenous drug problem with some of its citizens and wants a North American opiate medication initiative not allowed to have one? Why does the federal government not work with its provincial counterparts to enable people to get the drug rehabilitation and psychiatric services they need in provincial institutions?

Only by doing this, along with the skills training, will we be able to break the cycle of criminality. People will leave the provincial institutions and one day they are going to be convicted but they will not get sentences of two years less a day. They will get sentences that are longer than that. They will end up in a federal institution which means the federal government will be paying for that with taxpayers' money.

It is completely illogical and shortsighted for the feds only to look at the punitive aspects of criminality rather than to ask: Can this be prevented? Can some of these people be treated? Can the cycle of criminality be broken? Can our streets be made safer? Can the cost to the taxpayer be reduced? Can the judicial system be more effective? The answer to all of those questions is yes. Is the federal government doing that? No.

I would implore the federal government to pursue getting the justice minister and other senior ministers, such as the health minister and others together with their provincial counterparts to implement these solutions. We do not have to reinvent the wheel. The solutions are there.

There is a program which the current federal government axed. The program was put forward by a Liberal government. If an initiative reduced youth crime by 50% to 60% and saved the taxpayer $7 for every $1 invested, would that not be a good thing? Would that not be something to embrace? It would be a great investment. That initiative exists.

The early learning head start program has been assessed. Peer reviewed studies have shown very clearly that in the first eight years of life early learning head start programs have a host of social benefits from reducing youth crime by 50% to 60%, to keeping kids in school longer, to better educational outcomes, to more money earned and less dependence on social programs. All of those are winners. That program could be integrated in our schools if the federal government would simply take it upon itself to work with the provincial governments to adopt this.

When we were in government from 2004-06 a member of Parliament from Toronto, one of our hockey heroes, negotiated this with the provinces. All of the provinces signed on to it. They did not sign on because it did not work, they signed on because they knew it would work. Today, four years later, there is more evidence to show that this initiative works to reduce youth crime by 50% to 60%, saving the taxpayer $7 for every $1 invested. We know it works because we can peer into the developing brain. We know how the brain does and does not work. We know what bad things do to the development of a child's brain. We know how that changes the trajectory of the child making the child more prone to leading a life of crime, to taking up substance abuse and to engaging in an array of activities that are not in the interests of society and certainly not in the interests of the individual as the child grows into adulthood.

I have been speaking about this initiative for 17 years. This is the 17th anniversary for those of us who were elected on October 25, 1993. Sometimes it feels as though I am talking into the desert breeze. This program actually works. I implore the ministers to look at this program. The evidence is compelling and exciting. It works.

Initiatives such as the North American opiate medication initiative, the head start program for children, and initiatives that reduce the incidence of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder all work in the public interest and at a much lower cost for the taxpayer. That is something the government ought to be looking at.

For the interests of our police officers, I would implore the government to look at the McNeil decision that came down through the courts. That decision needs to be reversed. The decision is tying the hands of our police officers when it comes to prosecuting those who have been charged. Rather than putting the accused on trial, it actually puts police officers on trial. I would ask the government to review the McNeil decision. It is a very serious decision that is hindering the ability of the police forces across the country to do their job.

I would also ask that the federal government look at ways to ensure that our police have the resources they need.

When we were in government, we put forth a number of initiatives to enable us to have a much larger police force. We have an aging police force. There is a competition for police officers and for various jobs. Right now, police officers in my riding of Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, our RCMP, are having a difficult time policing remote areas that have had some serious crime problems. The public is not served well by this. Our police officers are not served well by this.

I would ask the government to look at some of the work we did, to work with us to ensure that we have enough police officers. We need to deal with the current deficit in police forces across our country.

There is also the matter of how our police officers are treated, particularly the RCMP. There are some significant human resources issues surrounding how the RCMP officers and their families are treated. I would implore the government to work with the RCMP to ensure that this is being addressed.

A last thing I want to mention has to do with victims' benefits. When we were in government, we worked very hard with victims' groups to ensure that they had the resources they needed for the care and treatment of victims. This is a crucial issue in the execution of justice in Canada.

I see that the government has not used the resources set aside for victims. I would strongly recommend that it take a look at this and ensure that those citizens who are victimized in our country, particularly those who have been subjected to violent offences, receive the care they need. I think everybody in this House realizes that abandoning victims would be immoral. The government ought to ensure that there are enough resources to provide victims of violent offences with the care and treatment they require.

In closing, I want to say that we support this bill. We would like to work with the government to ensure that this an effective bill. We want car thefts to continue to decline. We want the government to work with us, not only on this bill but also on its other judicial bills, to ensure that our laws are in the public interest, that the moneys are spent wisely, and that we have safer streets for all.

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his very pertinent question.

It is odd; not too long ago, I was one of the MPs who supported the anti-spam bill. The government was responsible for delaying that bill. Several years later, we are still discussing it, even though this bill appeared to have unanimous support and would have had no difficulty being passed by the House of Commons.

It is the same thing with auto theft. The bills that came before Bill S-9, which my colleague mentioned, were exactly the same. Unfortunately, Parliament was prorogued. The government itself shut down the House of Commons, which meant that the bill died on the order paper.

Another time, we were looking at a bill to bring in fixed election dates, but the Prime Minister decided that he wanted to call an election, which meant that that bill also died on the order paper. This has been going on for years. I get the feeling that the ministers will tell the public that they have come up with a bill to reduce the number of car thefts. We hear that every time, but it is always the same bill. We must adopt it as quickly as possible, and agree to move on to something else. There would be no problem with adopting Bill S-9 quickly.

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I, too, am pleased to be speaking about Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime). As my colleague, the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, so clearly stated just moments ago, the Bloc Québécois supports this bill. Bill S-9, just like Bill C-26, which went down the drain because of prorogation, and Bill C-53, which went down the drain because of the election, has the very specific goal of reducing vehicle theft. The bill's main measure, which is to create an offence for tampering with an identification number—which is also known as a serial number, just to clarify—is not new. In fact, it was lifted from Bill C-64, which was introduced by the Liberal government in September 2005.

However, Bill S-9 is broader in scope. It also targets the trafficking, export and import of any property obtained by crime and proposes a minimum six-month sentence for a person convicted of vehicle theft for the third time. My colleague, the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, explained the Bloc Québécois' position well. Generally, we are against minimum sentences in justice bills because they tie the judge's hands and mean that no matter what happened and despite any exacerbating or mitigating factors, a minimum sentence of x number of months or years must be handed down to the person who committed the crime. This means that one person could receive the same sentence as another even though the crime they committed was not nearly as serious or they played a smaller role in the crime than the second person. The Bloc Québécois feels that is a problem.

However, it is said that when there is recidivism, organized crime is more likely to be involved. When teenagers steal a car and take it for a joyride, the hope is that there is not too much damage, because accidents can be caused by excessive speed. I imagine a person who commits this type of offence already has the makings of a criminal. However, in that case, there is not necessarily recidivism. Criminal groups make money by stealing cars, altering them, chopping them up to sell the parts, or shipping them overseas. If these people are caught more than once, they could receive a minimum sentence. The Bloc Québécois does not really have a problem with that in this particular case because of the way the legislation is drafted.

Bill S-9 is in all respects the same as Bill C-26 as passed, with support from the Bloc Québécois, by the House of Commons during the last session. Furthermore, Bill C-26, which the Bloc Québécois supported at third reading, was practically identical to the version introduced at first reading, which itself was similar to Bill C-53, introduced previously. We are in favour of sending Bill S-9 to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Unfortunately, as some hon. members have said and as my colleague, the hon. member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue, said during a speech on the same subject earlier this year, this committee is overwhelmed because the Minister of Justice has piled on the bills.

Although we may be in favour of some of these bills, we must still study them carefully. We cannot pass a bill without having studied it and heard from witnesses. Sometimes everyone in the House will agree on a bill, because it is clear and well written and we know its purpose and all the ins and outs. In this case, the bill may be fast-tracked, or passed very quickly. However, in most cases, we must study bills in much more detail and send them to committee to ensure that there is nothing fishy going on, and that we are on the right track.

The problem is that there is a lot of jostling in committee. There are bills that everyone agrees on, but members would like to hear from the witnesses. Some political parties want further information, and want to propose amendments. The Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights is very busy right now. So it will be difficult for anything to happen with this bill. I do not know whether the House is unanimous on this bill, but based on what I have heard from the various parties, it seems that we will not have any trouble moving it through. The government needs the support of one party, and the Bloc is in favour of this bill.

A little later, I will give some interesting statistics. According to what I have read on this subject, the number of car thefts has been going down since 1996. Nevertheless, now is the time to act, because it still happens too frequently.

The social and economic consequences of these thefts are a heavy burden, both for individuals and society as a whole. Just think about the insurance companies that are faced with this problem. Insurance companies are no different from other businesses. When they incur costs by compensating people who have had their vehicle stolen, it is the consumer who foots the bill at the end of the day. That is the way things work. It is true that vehicle thefts affect everyone.

The cost of automobile insurance varies based on how often you use the vehicle and where you live. Central Quebec is known as a region with high rates of vehicle theft and possession of stolen vehicles. It is possible that insurance there costs a little bit more. Without repeating what was said earlier, I would say that Winnipeg is, unfortunately, Canada's vehicle theft capital. I am sure that people pay much more to insure a vehicle in Winnipeg than in other municipalities in Canada. Montreal and Toronto also have a high number of vehicle thefts because of the large number of vehicles registered there.

Back when I was a local radio reporter in my region, I witnessed several vehicle seizures. Unfortunately, a number of criminal gangs had chosen Victoriaville and the surrounding area as a location for their illegal activities. Even some very modern garages that sold nice cars were raided, and police seized several vehicles. Charges were laid, and people were sentenced to jail for possession of stolen goods. I sometimes covered these events. Today, there are fewer such garages, no doubt because of those seizures. They may have set up shop elsewhere, or they may be more discreet. Still, we cannot bury our heads in the sand. The scourge persists in my region and all across Canada.

The Bloc Québécois agrees with the new trafficking offence set out in Bill S-9. The purpose of this provision is to curb trafficking in cars and car parts. Organized crime groups get rich by quickly dismantling cars and selling the parts. Some stolen cars immediately leave the country for sale elsewhere, but in general, cars are stolen for parts, so vehicles are stripped right away.

Judging by the list of most frequently stolen cars, thieves are not always after very costly or luxurious vehicles. Some groups put in orders for particular makes of vehicles.

I do not need to list those makes, but I can say that the most popular cars are the ones most frequently stolen. Many of them are compact cars that cost between $20,000 and $25,000. There are so many of these cars on the market that parts are in high demand. That is where possession of stolen goods comes into play. Fenders, engine parts, mufflers, wheels, everything goes. Everything gets recycled and sent to shady dealers for resale. Worst of all, these parts are not necessarily resold for a better price. Consumers who have been in accidents or who have defective parts in their cars buy these parts in good faith, not knowing that they are buying stolen parts. This is a very lucrative market for gang members.

This bill also tackles another problem: vehicle theft for the purpose of joyriding. I am not sure what the correct word for that is in French. Most thefts of this type are committed by young people.

For instance, this happens when someone stops their car in front of a convenience store and unfortunately leaves the keys in the ignition, perhaps even leaving the car running. Sometimes in the winter, people might leave their cars running while they run in to buy some milk. They get out of the car without locking the doors. Someone can walk by more or less by chance and steal the vehicle to go for a joyride. A friend of mine was the victim of this kind of theft and the police found his car in a ditch a few kilometres from where it had been stolen. The young people had simply abandoned the vehicle there, unfortunately with some damage, because they had gone for a joyride in a field. Not everyone commits this kind of vehicle theft for the same reason.

I mentioned statistics earlier. According to the most recent statistics from the insurer's organization, Groupement des assureurs automobiles, there were more than 38,800—that is nearly 40,000—vehicle thefts in Quebec in 2006. That is the equivalent of one motor vehicle theft every 14 minutes. That is a lot of theft. Insurance companies had to pay out $300 million, which has a direct impact on all insurance premiums. Despite those high numbers, Quebec is far from the worst. In fact, per capita, the figures are far lower in Quebec than in the western provinces.

Comparing the number of vehicle thefts in 2006, Quebec had 507 per 100,000 inhabitants and Alberta had 725. The worst rate—and I think some of my colleagues have mentioned this—is in Manitoba. Earlier we heard that Winnipeg was the car theft capital of Canada. In fact, Manitoba had 1,376 thefts per 100,000 inhabitants. This is rather frightening, especially if we compare it to the average across Canada, which is 487 per 100,000 people. In all of Canada, approximately 160,000 vehicles were stolen in 2006. As I said earlier, the rate has been going down since 1996, but the statistics show that we are still facing a very serious problem.

The situations in Quebec and the western provinces are different. In Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, the majority of the cars are stolen for joyrides, simply for the fun of stealing a car and going for a ride. Sometimes cars are used during the commission of another crime. People steal a car to commit a holdup and then abandon the car shortly thereafter. In western Canada, auto thefts are committed by people who are not necessarily seeking monetary gain from this larceny. The purpose is a joyride. These thefts are committed for fun, on a dare, or to get a car to commit another crime.

In Quebec and in Ontario, even though people steal cars for joyriding in those provinces as well, most of the auto thefts are linked to trafficking in and possession of stolen vehicles.

The most commonly stolen vehicles are not the ones we might think. They are not just luxury vehicles with high resale values. The most popular vehicles are stolen for their parts. I have a list from 2006, but most of the media provide a list every year of the 10 most stolen vehicles in Canada. The list is even broken down by most stolen vehicle per province.

For the most part, we are talking about small cars such as the Honda Civic, Subaru Impreza and Acura Integra. The Acura Integra no longer exists, but people modify it. They like that model because it is a high performance vehicle and the parts are traded on the market rather easily. These are highly sought after parts. That kind of car is very popular. There are also the minivans used by small families; we see a lot of them on the road. Vehicles are stolen for their parts and not necessarily for their value.

The Library of Parliament put together a very interesting document for the committee to use during its study of this bill. I remember some of the facts that were in it. The Insurance Bureau of Canada, or IBC, estimates that auto theft creates a financial burden in excess of a billion dollars a year. This estimate includes the theft of uninsured vehicles, costs related to health care, court proceedings, police services and legal services, and personal expenses incurred by owners.

Thus, vehicle theft costs our society about a billion dollars a year. There is a direct financial impact on consumers. Auto insurers figure out how much money they lose because of auto theft, and then they pass the cost on to drivers and vehicle owners. These costs also depend on where the vehicle is located and how it is used. For example, members of Parliament who use their cars a lot for work are more likely to have their cars stolen because they travel a lot and park in many places. Their cars are not sitting in garages. They put a lot of kilometres on their cars and are at greater risk of having their cars stolen.

In Canada, the number of motor vehicle thefts per 1,000 inhabitants dropped 15% in 2008, continuing the general decline we have seen since 1997. This drop is due to the fact that we opened our eyes and adopted certain measures. Since September 2007, Canadian auto manufacturers have had to install electronic immobilizers in new vehicles, which makes them more difficult to steal.

Insurance companies are also trying to reduce theft by offering better deals to owners of vehicles equipped with anti-theft devices. This may not necessarily be an alarm system; it could be a device with an intelligent key, which makes it more difficult for a thief to start the vehicle.

Luxury vehicles stolen and shipped overseas in containers to Russia, Africa and the Middle East, where they are in demand, as my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie mentioned, are often equipped with a GPS, which makes it easy to locate them.

I would be remiss if I did not mention certain municipal bylaws. Unfortunately, there is a great deal of theft in my region. In Victoriaville, there is now a municipal bylaw prohibiting drivers from leaving their cars running if they are not in them. Another bylaw provides for a fine if a vehicle's doors are left unlocked. If a vehicle is parked in the driveway and the doors are not locked, a police officer can give the owner a ticket. People are increasingly being made aware of the problem of auto theft. Studying this bill in committee will allow us to tackle the problem of auto theft.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was listening closely to the member from Hamilton Mountain and I would like some clarification, although I am sure she might give some later on. She must have been telling the Minister of Justice and Attorney General that she was advocating the three strikes and you are out policy. If that is the case, then I am wondering why her party has not supported the crime and justice legislation in the past like we have. When we are trying to make amendments, make things tighter and respond to the call of Canadians on various issue, all of a sudden I hear this and it kind of shocks me.

I will now move on to speak to Bill S-9. I listened earlier to my Liberal colleague from Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine and her perspective on this legislation. I also listened very carefully to what the Bloc Québécois member from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie had to say. Some of the comments I heard from the Liberal speaker and the Bloc speaker were very constructive. However, some of the comments from the NDP puzzled and shocked me as to where it was coming from.

Bill S-9, an act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), is important. I agree with the comments that were made earlier that this type of initiative was before the House back in 2006. Why it took so long is beyond us, but, of course, we did have prorogation and we did have elections that the Prime Minsiter called prematurely.

I and I know my constituents would have thought that one of the first pieces of legislation, along with so many other important pieces of legislation, would have been this type of legislation, seeing what the numbers are out there. We heard some of the numbers earlier today. When we discuss these numbers, it is very difficult to talk about where the numbers in auto theft are higher. I think every member who sits in this honourable House has great respect, whether it is in the provinces of Manitoba, Quebec, P.E.I., Ontario, or in my lovely city of Toronto, but at the same time we need to talk about these statistics, where they come from and where they are accumulated so that the resources could be attached to them as legislation will be applied.

For example, the member from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie gave us some statistics about the recovery percentages in Ontario as opposed to Quebec and how they were much higher in Ontario. Also, auto theft as a whole in Ontario is quite less than most other provinces. That just goes to take away the notion that Toronto has high crime rates. That is not the case in auto theft crimes and I want to put that on record.

Nevertheless, as we talk about crime in general, one crime is one too many, which is why, as my Liberal colleague said earlier, we want to support this legislation. I, for one, on behalf of my constituents in Scarborough Centre, in the city of Toronto and in the province, want to support this legislation. We want to see it go to committee because we believe some good work and good suggestions could be made in committee to fine-tune this bill so that we can finally get a bill out there to do the work that Canadians have asked us to do, which is to tighten up the Criminal Code.

I would like to point out what I think are faults with some of the suggestions in this bill.

The bill would make it a crime to alter, destroy or remove a VIN, vehicle identification number. The member spoke earlier of the significance of it, the role that it plays and how important it is. It would also make it a crime to knowingly sell, give, transfer, transport, send or deliver goods that have been acquired criminally.

We heard earlier today from other speakers about how people steal a car, take it apart and sell different parts or put a car in a crate and ship it abroad. They also can change the vehicle identification number with what was described as a makeover. The member talked about three specific areas: chopping, exporting and the makeover. The bill addresses those specific areas.

The bill would make it a crime to possess property known to be obtained through crime for the purpose of trafficking. For example, if people who need a door, a bumper or an auto part goes to an autobody shop to buy a door for x amount of dollars, knowing very well what the market price is, the moment they pay 30% to 50% less their antenna should go up. They should ask themselves why, if they go to the depot and pay so much, this person is charging so little. Those people should immediately step away from that transaction because they will also be subject to a criminal charge if this legislation is passed.

If everyone who engages in that type of exchange avoids it, then hopefully there will be no market for it. In the early nineties, there was a huge underground cigarette economy. Revenue for the country was down because of loss of taxes and there was a free fall for everyone. I say quite proudly that when we took office we lowered the federal taxes on cigarettes and all of a sudden we eliminated that underground economy. How can we eliminate the selling or chopping of parts? We can do it through legislation and the notification to purchasers of said parts. If they know they could be fined and imprisoned, they will avoid buying, which means it would eliminate a market for that area.

The Canada Border Services has a very important role to play. We have seen documentaries where a car is put in a container on a boat and then shipped somewhere across the ocean. We need to be able to provide Canada Border Services with the right type of technology so it can monitor the containers. However, we must remember that not all cars in containers are put there illegally. Some Canadians may decide to get employment outside the country and they put their cars in containers and ship them to wherever their new job is.

However, along the way I think there is technology today that can help Canada Border Services do a better job in pre-screening to ensure that stolen autos leaving the country is addressed as well.

The Liberal Party has always supported legislation to effectively reduce any type of crime. This is one type of crime. My colleague from Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine has often talked about what is unacceptable and hurting, if I may say, is that when legislation comes forward on crime and justice issues, sometimes the Conservatives say that we Liberals stand for the criminals. That is not true.

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Hochelaga for his encouragement.

I am very pleased to take part in this debate on Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime). As suggested in the short title, it will amend the Criminal Code to give it more teeth. Auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime are often related to gangs and organized crime.

Gangs in large Canadian cities such as Montreal and Toronto often make illegal, totally reprehensible profits from stolen vehicles and especially auto parts that are much sought after on illicit markets.

This bill is needed even though Statistics Canada data show that there has been a clear decline since 1996 in the number of vehicles stolen per 100,000 population. I printed out the 2006 Statistics Canada data by province on motor vehicle thefts per 100,000. There has been quite a large reduction since 1999.

The figures show that in 1999, there were 531 vehicle thefts per 100,000 population. In 2006, there were 487 thefts in Canada per 100,000. That is a major reduction. There were some regional disparities, of course. The extent of this illegal activity varies depending on the part of Canada. In Quebec, for example, there were 507 vehicle thefts per 100,000 population, while in Manitoba, there were 1,376. The regional disparity is obvious. This is related to the reasons why malicious people steal vehicles. The reasons are not the same in Montreal as in Ontario and Alberta. Some people steal cars for the money, while others want to go for joyrides, as the literature shows.

First, this bill includes targeted measures to improve the Criminal Code. It will help us get a better picture of all these illegal activities and the black market, whether in regard to exports and imports of stolen or illegally obtained goods or trafficking in them. It also imposes longer sentences. Minimum sentences are introduced in this bill, but I will get back to that later.

The Bloc Québécois will support Bill C-9. However, we should not focus simply on punishment but look at the source of the problem as well. We need to realize that the societies where crime is the lowest are often those that deal seriously with major social ills, such as poverty and inequality. Our provinces, municipalities and police forces should look at prevention as well. We need legislation and penalties, of course, but what we need most of all are preventive measures aimed at reducing inequality and poverty.

The new measures to reduce car theft have been debated in Parliament before, in 2005. At that time, the Liberal government had introduced Bill C-64 providing that altering the identification number would be an offence. The vehicle identification number, referred to as the VIN, is used to identify vehicles and their parts. It provides each vehicle with a unique identifier. I will come back to this a little later.

The purpose of Bill S-9 is to extend the reach of the Criminal Code by tackling trafficking in, exporting and importing any property obtained by crime. It also clarifies and extends the reach of the Criminal Code. It provides minimum sentences after an individual has been convicted of motor vehicle theft for the third time. So harsher punishments have been provided for these illegal activities.

Section 354 of the Criminal Code already provided punishments for possession of property obtained by crime, but Bill S-9 clarifies those crimes. It creates an offence for trafficking in property obtained by crime, but it also provides a maximum sentence of 14 years. So this adds to the sentences available for these criminal activities.

But it must be understood that the reasons why individuals steal vehicles are not all the same, from one place to another and one province to another. There are regional disparities in the reasons why an individual steals a vehicle belonging to someone in Quebec or someone in Alberta. In Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, the reasons for theft are described as “joyriding”. A vehicle is stolen there for amusement, while the situation is different in Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia. Quebec and Ontario, in particular, have become criminal hubs for stolen vehicles, because people want to profit from property obtained by crime in these cases.

We have seen organized rings becoming real hubs of organized crime. The indicator that enables us to identify these various types of theft is what is called the stolen vehicle recovery rate. The ability of the authorities to locate stolen vehicles varies enormously from one province to another. For example, the stolen vehicle recovery rate in Toronto is 75%.

When we come to cities like Montreal, part of which I represent in the House of Commons, we see that the stolen vehicle recovery rate is 56%. Obviously, the authorities are clearly having trouble locating stolen vehicles in Montreal, as compared to Toronto. The reasons are different. Why is it harder? Quite simply because these cities have in fact become organized crime hubs, as I was saying. These stolen vehicles are used for trafficking and exporting. We can see that there are various ways these individuals, acting with malice aforethought, decide to steal vehicles that belong to members of the public.

First, what does the thief do? They start by identifying the vehicle, based on where it is, whether in a private or public parking lot. Then, they steal the vehicle in a very short timeframe. The statistics tell us that the thief manages to steal the vehicle in 30 seconds to three minutes, depending on whether the vehicle has an auto start system and some kind of protection, whether an alarm or something else.

In a trafficking scheme with crime hubs, where does the vehicle go? There are three activities that organized crime groups do to get rid of a vehicle and make huge profits. The first is that the vehicle is chopped, or stripped for parts. Much as a butcher would do, these organized crime groups dismantle the vehicle to take the most important parts. These parts are identified. They know exactly which parts to take from certain vehicles. They know which parts are worth a lot on the market, and this is determined by supply and demand. So, they strip the vehicle for the most important parts. Next, they immediately export the parts after stripping them, because the vehicle is often sent to underground shops, where mechanics strip the vehicles and identify the valuable parts. Then, the vehicles are exported.

Why are the recovery rates lower in areas like Montreal? Simply because Montreal and Toronto are prime strategic locations for organized crime groups that traffic in vehicles or vehicle parts, for two reasons. First, Montreal and Toronto, and particularly Montreal, are right on the border. As a result, it is a strategic location for organized crime groups to export stolen vehicle parts to the United States. In addition, Montreal and Toronto are near waterways. Second, in terms of strategy, as I said earlier, unlike in Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, it is clear that cars stolen in Montreal and Toronto are not stolen for the purposes of joyriding; they are stolen to be resold.

The second way organized crime groups move a vehicle is to export it to where there is a clearly targeted market. Where are these markets, according to the Insurance Bureau of Canada? Essentially, these markets are in Eastern Europe, Russia, the Middle East, South America and Africa.

Resellers export car parts that are in very high demand to these markets by ocean freight. It is estimated that the sale of a Jeep Cherokee can directly generate $97,000 for organized crime. For some organized groups, it pays to sell stolen vehicles. That has to be taken into consideration.

It is often thought that luxury vehicles are in demand in these markets. However, that is not the case. Quite often, the vehicles or parts in demand are not high-end but have a high resale value. In 2006, the 10 most stolen cars in Canada were the 1999 Honda Civic SiR two-door, the 2000 Honda Civic SiR two-door, Subarus, Acuras, Dodge Caravans, Dodge Grand Caravans, Audis and Dodge Shadows. Luxury vehicles are not necessarily the most frequently stolen. The two most stolen automobiles are plain Honda Civics because their parts have a resale value on the black market.

There are three types of operations: chopping for parts, exporting, and changing identification numbers of parts and vehicles. In addition, parts and vehicles are cloned. How is the identification changed? Organized groups find vehicles involved in accidents, obtain their vehicle identification number or VIN, and copy it onto a stolen vehicle. The identification is changed in the third step in the process, which is also when cloning takes place, once again using the VIN. For example, thieves will go to a shopping centre parking lot, obtain a VIN, and copy it onto a stolen vehicle.

That is how organized crime works and why the VIN is important and central to Bill S-9. We cannot simply create an offence for the possession of property obtained by crime, which has been covered so far by section 354 of the Criminal Code. We have to have provisions covering the VIN. When the vehicle identification number has been altered, there must be better regulation and offences with minimum sentences. That is why we are supporting Bill S-9.

Cars are stolen for two reasons. The first is that there is a black market with well-targeted operations. The Criminal Code must have more teeth and prohibit tampering with the VIN. This would be one measure among others to reduce auto theft and fight this problem.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to participate in this debate on Bill S-9. As we already know, this bill is called An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), or the tackling auto theft and property crime act. The Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada moved second reading of this bill, which we have already started debating.

This bill would create offences in connection with the alteration, removal or obliteration of a vehicle identification number and would also create the offences of knowingly selling, giving, transferring, transporting, sending or delivering property that was obtained by crime. The term “knowingly” is very important, because it shows that the individual who sold, transferred or gave property—a vehicle—must know that it was obtained by crime. Lastly, the bill would create the offence of knowingly being in the possession of property that was obtained by crime, for the purpose of trafficking. The Crown would have the burden of proving that the person in possession of the vehicle knew that it had been obtained by crime for the purpose of trafficking.

This bill creates a separate offence for motor vehicle theft, proposes a mandatory minimum prison sentence of six months for a third or subsequent offence and gives the Canada Border Services Agency the authority to identify stolen goods and keep them from leaving the country.

We, the Liberals, are in favour of this bill. We want it to be sent to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights so that we can hear from witnesses and stakeholders who have thoughts and expertise on the goal of this bill, which we agree with.

We feel that this is a good beginning, even though it is not a comprehensive solution. We believe that some witnesses will also say that it is a step in the right direction and a good start but that it is not a cure-all and it will not fix all of the issues related to vehicle theft and trafficking.

The Liberal Party has always supported legislation that aims to effectively reduce crime and make communities safer. The fact is that vehicle theft rates are going down. The Liberals did not make this up. However, vehicle theft is still a major problem in cities like Montreal and Winnipeg. I am from Montreal, and I have colleagues and family in Winnipeg. So I know what I am talking about. I also had the opportunity, as justice critic in the official-opposition Liberal caucus in 2007-08, to speak with Manitoba's justice minister about this issue as well as youth criminal justice. The minister showed me studies indicating that Winnipeg was close to becoming the vehicle-theft capital of Canada. He told me that this was a serious problem, one that led youth down a criminal path.

Bill S-9 is not perfect, but it is a good start because it updates the Criminal Code, which shows that the government is taking this issue seriously.

That being said, we will see significant reductions in crime rates only if the government invests substantial resources in evidence-based crime prevention programs.

Our party does not play political games with the Criminal Code. Unlike the Conservatives, the Liberals strongly believe that we must fight crime with good laws, not with crude slogans and petty political manoeuvring.

If the government really intended to tackle auto theft and property crimes, the Prime Minister never would have killed Bill C-53, which it did by violating its own fixed election date law in 2008, nor would it have torpedoed Bill C-26 by proroguing Parliament last winter.

This is the third time the Conservative government has introduced the same bill. After the Prime Minister prorogued Parliament in December 2009, it took the government five months to reintroduce exactly the same bill. The Liberals tried to speed it through the House before, and they will do so again this time.

As I said, we are pleased that the government, which torpedoed its own Bill C-26, has introduced Bill S-9, which is an exact replica of its predecessor. We are disappointed that it took the government so long—five months—to reintroduce it. There is no excuse for that.

We are pleased to see that the wording in this bill is harsher than Bill C-53, the first incarnation of this bill. The government has finally decided to add a separate offence for auto theft to the Criminal Code.

As I said, the first auto theft bill introduced by the Conservative government in 2008 did not create a new, separate offence for auto theft. At the time, Liberals, police officers, police corps and provincial governments—the Conservative government's counterparts—criticized this approach. They criticized the government for failing to create a separate Criminal Code offence for auto theft. The government has finally done so in this bill, and we are pleased that it has finally fallen into step with law enforcement in Canada.

Thus, with Bill C-26, the government created a separate offence for theft of a motor vehicle, and this offence is also included in Bill S-9. The mandatory minimum sentence for this offence is six months' incarceration for a third offence or in the case of an indictable offence.

This is important because all studies show that motor vehicle theft in certain cities is quite well organized. The evidence from various police forces, including municipal and provincial forces and our national police force, the RCMP, has clearly indicated that to be the case. When someone is on their third such offence, it becomes quite serious. The criminal justice system must therefore send a clear message that this kind of criminal behaviour is unacceptable.

The new offences provide for a broad definition of trafficking. This would cover selling, giving, transferring, transporting, importing, exporting, sending or delivering property obtained by crime or offering to do any of those things.

Thus, the new legislative provisions would target all the middlemen involved in moving stolen property, from the initial criminal act through to the ultimate consumer. That is very important. Of course it happens in other cities, but we know that in Montreal and Winnipeg in particular, most motor vehicle thefts are committed by organized crime groups. This means there is a network of individuals whose only goal and mission is to steal cars. The orders often come from outside Canada, with requests for x number of certain models, for instance, Lexus vehicles from a given year, Chevrolets from a given year, specific models and colours of BMWs from another year, and so on. The crime of motor vehicle theft is driven by the network.

So, with these offences and this definition, if the proposed Criminal Code amendment successfully passes in both houses of Parliament, this would allow our police forces to pursue not only the person who committed the actual theft, but also all the middlemen who were knowingly involved in the transaction and allowed the sale, transfer or gift of property or a stolen vehicle, when that individual knew the property or vehicle was stolen.

Let us look at the two proposed offences. Both offences carry heavier penalties than the existing offence of possession of property obtained by crime. If the value of the item trafficked exceeds $5,000, anyone convicted of this offence could face up to a maximum of 14 years in prison. If the value does not exceed $5,000, there would be what is called a hybrid offence, which would carry a maximum prison sentence of five years on indictment or six months on summary conviction.

The bill also introduces a prohibition against the importation or exportation of property obtained by crime that would trigger the administrative enforcement powers of the Canada Border Services Agency, allowing the agency to bar the cross-border movement of stolen goods. In the case of auto theft, CBSA officers would be able to investigate, identify and detain imported vehicles or vehicles about to be exported and search databases to determine whether or not the vehicles are stolen.

I would like to add a few words on the statistics and data that we have on stolen vehicles in Canada. According to Statistics Canada, the number of stolen vehicles has decreased almost every year since 1996, by 20% according to 2006 data. Auto theft has major repercussions on car owners, on other victims, on law enforcement and on the insurance industry. According to the Insurance Bureau of Canada, auto theft costs insurance companies and the general public almost $1 billion a year. That is big bucks.

I do not own a car, but some of my friends and family have been victims of auto theft. I can say that this can be quite disruptive to a person's life by the time they settle things with the insurance company, get a new car and so on.

In 2006, approximately 160, 000 cases of auto theft were reported to the police, or about 438 per day. There tend to be fewer thefts in eastern Canada than in western Canada. According to data from Statistics Canada, Prince Edward Island has the lowest incidence of auto theft, while Manitoba has the highest. The incidence of car theft in Manitoba is almost three times the national average. Montreal, however, was the Canadian city with the highest incidence of auto theft and the lowest number of recovered stolen vehicles in 2007.

I am from Montreal and although I do not own a vehicle, I do know many people who do. Some of them have had their cars stolen. There are criminal networks in Montreal that steal cars for export, filling specific orders. Such car theft is a made-to-measure business.

Here is how a number of stakeholders have responded. The Manitoba Minister of Justice, Dave Chomiak, the mayor of Winnipeg, Sam Katz, and the Winnipeg police, all of whom I have met with, are in favour of this bill. The Insurance Bureau of Canada also supports it.

Mr. Rick Linden, a professor at the University of Manitoba noted that the bill was a good step, but that significant reductions in crime would only occur if we also invest significant resources in evidence-based crime prevention programs.

The Canadian Council of Criminal Defence Lawyers is against the bill because it believes it will restrict judicial discretion. The Canadian Association of Crown Counsel is also against it because it believes it will increase the workload of an already overburdened justice system. And yet, the government has failed to announce any new money for its implementation. This is a crucial point. The new offences created by this bill have long been awaited by the Liberals. We are in favour of the bill and its desired outcome. However, we realize that once these offences are passed and come into effect and the desired outcome is achieved, the government will have to allocate additional resources and funding to support the initiatives. The measures will ensure that the police and various stakeholders in our justice system can adequately deal in a court of law with those accused of having committed auto theft. Unfortunately, we have not heard the minister state clearly that the government intends to earmark new money in its next budget to cover these additional costs.

I will conclude my speech by saying that this is a good start and a step in the right direction but not the whole solution. We would like to see the government set aside more resources in order to ensure that our law enforcement system can handle these new offences and that our justice system, courts and prosecutors have the means at their disposal to deal with them.

The House resumed from October 6 consideration of the motion that Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Business of the House

[John Baird, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I did want to stand in my place and correct the record.

Earlier today, in answering a question, I neglected to mention the good work of the Minister of State for Western Economic Diversification as a woman serving in this cabinet. As well, the Leader of the Government in the Senate, the hon. Marjory LeBreton, makes a very powerful and substantial contribution to this government.

I am also pleased to report that the four House leaders are working well together. We have got off to a very good start.

Today is an opposition day for the Bloc Québécois and we will continue to debate on that for the rest of the day.

Tomorrow, we will resume debate on second reading of Bill C-46, the Canada-Panama free trade agreement; followed by Bill S-9, the tackling auto theft and property crime legislation.

On Monday and Tuesday we will begin with Bill S-9, on tackling auto theft and property crime; followed by Bill C-46, the Canada-Panama free trade agreement; report stage of Bill C-3, gender equity in Indian registration; Bill C-42, strengthening aviation security; Bill C-29, safeguarding Canadians' personal information; Bill C-30, on the Supreme Court of Canada decision in R v. Shoker; Bill C-41, strengthening military justice in the defence of Canada; and Bill S-2, protecting victims from sex offenders.

On Wednesday we will begin debate on Bill C-49, the preventing human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system act. If debate on Bill C-49 concludes, we will continue with the business that I outlined on Monday and Tuesday.

The House leader for the official opposition also requested to know about the second budget bill, for the fall. We have begun debate on that. We have already adopted the ways and means motion, but we certainly will be calling it again before the November Remembrance Day break week for constituents. That is obviously an important piece of legislation that we look forward to having the opportunity to debate in this place.

I also neglected to mention the hard work of another member of the priorities and planning committee, the hon. Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs.

[John Baird, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the questions from my friend, the member for Ottawa South. I do have to admit from time to time that I am called upon to respond to certain questions that are asked by the opposition. There are not as many as there used to be, thanks to the appointment of the new Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, who I think is doing a fine job. The new Minister of Transport has a big challenge to tidy up the department. The only minister who has a bigger challenge to deal with is the new Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.

On the issue of decorum, I think there has been some degree of success. I will congratulate the Liberal House Leader . He has perhaps been more successful than I have in reining in the number of interjections during question period, and I undertake to him and to the House to continue to work in that regard. I think there has been a considerable reduction in interjections. Sometimes the members of the government or members of the opposition will bring out those types of interjections, but I will commit to continue to work with him and with our colleagues in the Bloc and the NDP on reducing them. I think we have met with some success. We do have more room to grow, but I will commit to continue to work in that regard. In many respects, that was a big part of the motion the House adopted last night, the motion standing in the name of the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, and I see him smiling at me now.

Much work has been accomplished, but much work remains to be done in that regard.

When government orders resumes after my statement, we will call Bill C-36, the consumer product safety bill. We have an agreement to send it to committee after one speaker per party, and I will be moving the appropriate motion in a few minutes.

I should point out that if we cannot come together to try to protect children and keep them safe, we do not have any place here. I am very pleased with the consultations with all parties on that. I think they will be welcomed, particularly by Environmental Defence, which has been championing these issues for some time.

Following Bill C-36, we will resume the debate which began this morning on Bill C-47, sustaining Canada's economic recovery act. Other bills scheduled for today, if necessary, are Bill S-9, tackling auto theft and property crime, and Bill C-39, ending early release for criminals.

Tomorrow, we will continue with the business before us today.

Next week, as the member noted, is a constituency week.

When we return we will continue, if necessary, with Bill C-47. The Canada-Panama free trade agreement is also on the agenda.

Thursday, October 21 shall be an allotted day, as I have told our friends in the Bloc Québécois.

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, with respect to Bill C-36, I believe you will find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:

That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, a member from each recognized party may speak for not more than 20 minutes on the second reading motion of Bill C-36, An Act respecting the safety of consumer products, following which the said bill shall be deemed read a second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Health.

Tackling Auto Theft and Property Crime Act

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased once again to speak to the issue of auto theft in this country. I say “once again” because I, quite frankly, do not remember how many times I have been on my feet in the House speaking to bills on auto theft. This is the third incarnation. There was Bill C-53 after the 2006 election; Bill C-26 before the 2008 election because of the prorogation at that time; and now we are on Bill S-9.

There is such a lack of credibility on the part of the government on this issue and on crime bills generally. We have been going at this for over four years. The issue actually preceded that back in the Liberal tenure because there was a bill at that time dealing with the issue of playing with VIN numbers.

With the present government, we had one prorogation and the bill went down, one election and the bill went down and then we had the spectacle of the justice committee not being able to meet because of elections and because the chair of that committee was thwarting the activities of the committee for months at a time. Those things delayed the passage of these bills. In April 2009, it finally went before the committee, which was the first time in a year the justice committee actually dealt with a bill. It sat idle a whole year because of both the actions of the chair thwarting the work of the committee and the election in 2008.

Finally, in 2009 the committee was finally working again and we were dealing with the bill before us today, which, if I have time today, I will actually get to. The committee did a lot of work and extensive evidence was taken. It then went back to the House with all party support and then on to the Senate. When we got to the end of 2009, we all know what happened. We had another prorogation. We had three prorogations, one election and dirty tactics by the chair of the justice committee.

Here we are, four-plus years later, and the bill still has not been passed, a bill that has widespread support in the House from all parties. However, it is because of, quite frankly, the indifference of the government to what is a significant issue in the country and a government much more concerned about protecting its political stature than it is about dealing realistically, effectively and efficiently with a major crime problem in the country.

We already have a backlog in the justice committee because so many other bills have been impacted exactly the same way. This bill will probably go through the House tomorrow and get to committee, which is backlogged significantly. If it is dealt with in its proper order, it is highly unlikely that this bill will get out of the justice committee in 2010. It almost certainly will not be, given the other bills before the committee. It has been my forecast for some time that we will have an election in the spring and that this bill will never become law before the next election. We need to be very clear that the responsibility for that lies entirely in the hands of the government.

All three of the opposition parties have dealt responsibly with the bill. When it was before committee, we did our proper work. We analyzed the problem, saw that the bill would work the way it should work, passed it, and then we see this again and again.

That is the reality of what we are dealing with. It is almost frustrating to say, “Why am I bothering to stand here today, because we are going to have an election before this bill becomes law?”. We will then start all over again and it will be another couple of years before we get it into the books as law.

The bill, as I see it, has only one significant problem, which is where I take some issue with what my colleague from Scarborough said. The mandatory minimum in the bill is only after a person has committed his or her third offence. As my colleague from the Bloc has raised, we are not quite sure what that would do. One of the reasons we should not be supporting mandatory minimums in some cases is that it sets the standard and judges feel compelled to work to that standard.

We can think of any number of scenarios. When a person has been convicted for the third time, six months is a ridiculously low sentence, especially if it involves individuals who are involved in organized crime in the theft of autos. Six months is a joke in those circumstances after a third offence. However, that happens because it is sometimes easier for judges who are overworked to say that the legislature has said that six months is the target after the third offence, so that is what they will invoke, when it should maybe have been two years or a penitentiary sentence, especially if it involved organized crime.

At the end of the day, my friend from Scarborough may be right, we may see an increase in the number of people incarcerated for this theft but it is also possible that we will see a reduction in the amount of time that they spend in our provincial jails.

The member has a very good point, though, in that the government does not know. Its simplistic solution is that everything can be solved by a mandatory minimum penalty. It just throws it at the problem. It has absolutely no idea what the consequences will be of that provision. Will it dramatically increase the prison population? It is building all those jails to the tune of $9 billion and there was another announcement for more jail cells. For those crimes that are not being reported, so we cannot put those people in jail because they will never get to court, we can maybe increase the population here to justify spending that $9 billion. The bottom line is that the government does not know. It has absolutely no idea what the consequences will be of that mandatory minimum in this situation.

The other point of significant concern, which came out of the work done by the justice committee, is that the bill would empower, which is necessary and we are supportive of it, the Canada Border Services Agency to take additional investigative methods to deal with the illicit importing and exporting of mostly autos and auto parts. The CBSA does not have enough jurisdiction right now and it is the agency that is on the front line.

When that was explained to us as we heard the evidence on it, we understood the necessity of it, but what was corresponding to it was that there were no plans by the government to provide the additional resources. This will be a significantly increased workload for the Border Services Agency but there were no plans in the last two budgets to provide additional funding to that agency. I am sure we will hear again, when this issue comes before the justice committee, that the government still has not planned for it. By that, I mean doing a basic business plan. How much more will we need? How many additional staff will we need? How much more equipment and investigative tools will we need? The government has no idea of that at all.

We are seeing this in terms of complaints coming back from governments at the provincial and municipal level, where these additional burdens are being put on our police officers, our prosecutors and our judiciary with no additional resources being provided by the federal government.

In this regard specifically, this is a federal government agency and this responsibility is entirely ours. We do not have any analysis of how much it is going to cost, how many more people, how long it is going to take to get it fully staffed. Are funds going to be available to fully staff it, or are we going to dump this responsibility on the officers who will have no ability to carry it out because they are under-resourced? They are under-resourced now. If we had additional staff at the Windsor-Detroit border, we could be doing much more, for instance, in the illicit import of guns. There is no capacity to do it. Now these officers are going to be forced to do more work with no particular ability to carry it out.

I am not a great fan of making auto theft a separate offence, although there is nothing wrong with doing it. It just does not add anything to the front-line police officer who enforces the law.

I want to acknowledge the work we saw in Manitoba. It came up with a solid, practical solution that dramatically reduced auto theft rates, particularly in the city of Winnipeg. In 2007 Winnipeg was the auto theft capital of the country by a long shot, running at about 1,700 thefts a year. The next closest city was Abbotsford at just under 1,000. Montreal, which traditionally until about 2000-01 had been the auto theft capital in the country, was only at 550 thefts a year.

Those numbers have altered somewhat in the last two years, since the last study available from Juristat. Winnipeg has dropped dramatically. It is no longer the auto theft capital of the country. Abbotsford still is and Edmonton is right behind. Montreal is running fairly close.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Madam Speaker, this is the fourth time that this bill has been introduced in Parliament. I do not know if anyone said it was an urgent matter at the time, but they were ignored.

It started out in 2005 as Liberal Bill C-64. They were stopped short because an election was called, which they did not appreciate. It then became Bill C-53, and was shelved by an election or prorogation. It then became Bill C-26 and we now have Bill S-9, which was introduced by the government in the Senate in order to speed up its passage.

I believe that everyone recognizes that the government is responsible for the recent delays. That contradicts what we hear on a regular basis from the Minister of Justice in this Parliament, who says that the opposition is dragging its feet and that the opposition systematically opposes the legislative program it wants to present.

First, that is not true; second, the opposition's philosophy about some matters is diametrically opposed to that of the current Minister of Justice. We do not want our country to follow the example of the United States and become a country with one of the highest rates of incarceration. We know that half of all inmates in the world are found in U.S. prisons and it is obvious that this has not produced the desired results. There is a considerable difference in our philosophies. When a criminal justice bill that will really improve things and address an urgent problem is introduced, we are ready to collaborate. The minister knows that. Why did he not move more quickly before?

That said, now that he has introduced it, we will get the bill passed quickly because I note that there are no objections from the other two opposition parties, nor do we have any.

Nevertheless, I would like to make some comments. First of all, I must point out that auto theft has declined since 1996. I think the members who spoke before me said it is down by 20%. I think that corresponds to the statistics I have. Clearly, the nature of auto theft has changed somewhat over the years and now our legislation requires certain adjustments.

For instance, one thing that really surprised me when I consulted the most recent Statistics Canada data on the subject is that the incidence of auto theft varies considerably across the country. For example, Newfoundland and Labrador reports only 131 auto thefts per 100,000 inhabitants. Prince Edward Island reports 115. Nova Scotia reports 263, which is very high for the Maritimes. In New Brunswick, the number is 187. Quebec reports 507 thefts per 100,000 inhabitants, which is quite high. The number of auto thefts per 100,000 inhabitants in Ontario is 303, and in Manitoba, it is 1,376.

We have heard some reasonable explanations so far. I can come back to some and add to them, in order to understand. Personally, I do not say this to humiliate Manitoba—as we have been unfairly humiliated—because in Quebec, we do more to tackle corruption; we tolerate it less and we prosecute the offenders. Therefore, it is in our newspapers more often than in other places, but it does not mean that we have more corruption than other places, nor does it mean that the entire population is corrupt. In any case, we can look at it hypothetically.

In Saskatchewan, the number of auto thefts per 100,000 inhabitants is 663, in Alberta it is 725 and in British Columbia, it is 682. As we can see, the incidence is higher in western Canada. Once again, this clearly shows that the Parliament of Canada, which creates legislation for the entire country, does not necessarily have the power to make the changes needed to address crime. It was my experience, as a member of the Quebec government, that crime must be fought locally first, with local police forces and our own policies.

It is our duty to amend legislation when needed and that is what we are doing.

Statistics vary a great deal according to the province and the size of the city. I am all the more sympathetic to Manitoba when I know that the city in Quebec with the highest theft rate is the one that I have the honour of partially representing. Part of my riding is in Laval. In Laval, there are 852 car thefts per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to Montreal where there are 723 thefts per 100,000 inhabitants. That is quite high.

I understand that the rate is higher in Toronto than in Montreal because of Montreal's port. In Montreal, there are orders from foreign countries for four-wheel-drive luxury vehicles with air conditioning and other accessories. These vehicles can be shipped out of the country quickly through the port of Montreal, something that is not an option for car thieves in Toronto. This certainly plays a role in organized crime, which makes crime prevention more difficult, but not impossible.

Another significant number: the stolen vehicle recovery rate is 75% in Toronto and 56% in Montreal. This also clearly illustrates that organizations that steal luxury cars are able to offload them quickly because of the port, or so I am told by the police.

When I was young, another common reason for stealing a vehicle was joyriding, which is far less common today. Cars were not stolen for the thrill of stealing, but to cruise around and try it out. We all need to understand that boys are fascinated by cars. At least, that has been my experience. Young girls think about the utilitarian side of a car, but young boys think about how much fun it would be to drive one. That is why, quite often, the only crime a young person ever commits is having helped steal a vehicle. Young men are fascinated by them.

How do we combat this? I think that we have done it over time. It is far more difficult to steal a vehicle now. We have taken measures to make it more complicated to start a car. In earlier days, among young people, both delinquent types and those not overly involved in crime who had never committed a violent act and who were respectful, it was a source of pride to know how to start a car without the key and things like that. That is another explanation.

Perhaps the members from Winnipeg can tell me if they agree. When there is a large population of youth from not-so-rich families, there are perhaps more youth who are tempted and fascinated by automobiles, as are all young boys. If their fascination is not satisfied by their family's vehicle, they will be more tempted to steal vehicles simply for the joy of riding around in a car, being in control and driving it.

We are taking advantage of the opportunity to change the legislation. First, a minimum sentence of six months has been added. People may think that the Bloc Québécois has an ideological stance against minimum sentences. We are not against minimum sentences, but we recognize the circumstances under which a minimum sentence can be effective. Most of the time, the minimum sentences that have been proposed are not effective. I am sure that not even 10% of the members in the House know how many minimum sentences there are in the Criminal Code. If I gave them a test and asked which offences have a minimum sentence associated with them, less than 2% of them would pass. And I am being generous.

So how can we expect criminals to know what the minimum sentences are? These sentences have no impact on criminals' behaviour because they do not know what the minimums are. I have always said so. The most striking example is the importing of marijuana in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when I began practising law. Marijuana was starting to spread. It all came from outside the country, because the marijuana that grew here was not hallucinogenic at all. The minimum sentence for importing marijuana was seven years. This was when marijuana use went up the most, so someone had to import it. We found that this minimum sentence, which was the longest in the Criminal Code after the minimum for murder, did not deter anyone. Minimum sentences generally have no deterrent effect, except under certain circumstances. The minimum sentence in this case is smart because it is for subsequent offences and because the offender is informed.

As a lawyer, I always informed my clients that if they were caught a second time, a minimum sentence would apply. That can act as a deterrent. If I had been appointed as a judge, I would have made a point of informing offenders when I had to sentence them for a crime for which a minimum is provided in the event of a subsequent offence. That way, an individual who might commit the same offence again is aware of the minimum sentence. That acts as a deterrent.

That is what we are talking about here. There is a reasonable minimum sentence of six months for a second offence. The minimum sentences that the members opposite come up with are always paradoxically flawed. Logically, a minimum sentence should apply to the least serious form of an offence, so that the maximum sentence can be handed down for the most serious form of the offence. But the people who come up with minimum sentences think about the most serious cases, which is why they want a minimum sentence. However, because they are motivated by the most serious cases, they set very long minimum sentences.

We have seen this in the United States, where there are many minimum sentences. Moreover, this is one of the problems with minimum sentences. In this case, there is no such problem. I feel that a six-month sentence for a third offence is reasonable. It can certainly act as a deterrent. As hon. members can see, the Bloc's objections are not ideological, but are based on rational knowledge, experience and criminology.

A new offence has been created—tampering with the vehicle identification number. I am surprised it is not already an offence. Someone who alters a VIN obviously does not have honest intentions. I really believed it was prohibited. No matter, it will be in the future.

A presumption is created: if an individual owns a vehicle with an altered VIN, he is presumed to have obtained it illegally. I believe that this is a reasonable presumption, but it does not always hold true. One can always provide a defence, if it is a good one. If it raises a reasonable doubt in the judge's mind, he will not accept the presumption. It seems to me that something is amiss if we own a car with an altered VIN, unless we dealt in good faith or were victims of the person who stole the car, changed the number and sold it to us. We apparently bought the car lawfully, and went to register it with the Société de l'assurance automobile du Québec. That is a good change.

There is another new offence concerning trafficking in stolen vehicles. I have always thought that there could not be trafficking in a stolen car without possession of a stolen car. However, this is not a bad change—

[Shawn Murphy, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

I believe the short answer to that question, Madam Speaker, is that the Prime Minister and the justice minister are probably not taking this issue as seriously as they ought to.

The member is right that it did go through the Senate in two weeks, which is unusual. Usually justice bills would originate in the House, but this is somewhat different. This bill came from the Senate and once it got through the Senate came to the House as Bill S-9. Hopefully that means that it will become law. Let us all roll up our sleeves and get this bill enacted so that we will not be talking about it anymore.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member rightly talked about the number of times this bill has come into the House and how we have heard the same speech from the government over and over again. It is a colossal waste of House and committee time to do the same bill over and over again.

I thought the hon. member would be interested in commenting on the fact that this is an S bill, S-9, a Senate bill. The Senate, an apparently unelected, unaccountable institution, started with first reading of this bill on May 4 and had second reading May 6. The bill went to committee on June 3 and it was reported on June 3. Third reading was on June 8 and it was reported to the House immediately after. That is pretty efficient on the part of an unelected, unaccountable Senate.

I would be interested in the hon. member's comments on how it is that the institution across the way, as it is euphemistically known, can proceed with a piece of legislation that pretty well everyone in the room agrees with in such an expeditious fashion, yet the justice minister and the Prime Minister do not seem to be capable of moving a piece of legislation forward in any kind of expeditious fashion. They seem to prefer to make the same speeches over and over again.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am sharing my time with my colleague from Charlottetown, and I am pleased to do so.

I am pleased, once again, to speak in support of Bill S-9, but I have to admit it is somewhat in frustration that Parliament is yet again debating this important legislation.

We have heard from others here today that Bill S-9 is identical to Bill C-26 from the last session of Parliament, which was killed when Parliament was prorogued last year. I am struck by the fact that it was May 5, 2009, when I spoke in favour of Bill C-26, which was, as of yesterday, 17 months to the day since that bill had been introduced.

We on this side have consistently supported legislation to effectively reduce crime and to enhance community safety, including motor vehicle theft. We have heard from the previous speaker that this is an issue of particular concern to those who live in Winnipeg and Manitoba. It is a very serious issue.

Some may recall that in September 2007 a delegation from Manitoba came to Ottawa, met with members of the government and the opposition party. It was a very significant delegation, made up of the mayor of the city of Winnipeg, the mayor of Brandon, members of the aboriginal community, members of the police force, leaders of the opposition parties in Manitoba and several victims of crime. They asked for motor theft to be made an indictable offence.

As a result of that, I introduced my private member's bill on motor vehicle theft in March 2008, which was originally known as Bill C-526, and in the last Parliament I reintroduced it as Bill C-237. While I support the bill, I am somewhat saddened that it has taken so long for the government to act and to move forward on what is a very pressing issue for Manitobans.

After the delegation was in Ottawa, I made a point of doing a broad-based consultation within my riding and within my community on the issue of property crime and, most specifically, auto theft. I had several meetings with the police in district 6 in Winnipeg. I met with young people, some of whom were in the process of rehabilitation. I also met with victims of crimes, with business owners and with a broad-based representation in the community to understand what had been done. I heard of some of the initiatives that the provincial government had undertaken to reduce the number of auto thefts. We heard earlier about the immobilizer prevention programming, the intervention programming, suppression programming and the consequences for young people, which often includes a lifetime suspension of a driver's licence for repeat offenders.

I also heard very clearly that there was a role for the federal government to act, and that is why I introduced Bill C-526. Unfortunately my name was further down on the list and we did not have the opportunity to debate it in the House. The bill proposed that a person who committed a motor vehicle theft for a second or subsequent offence would be guilty of an indictable offence and liable to a prison term not exceeding 10 years and would require a mandatory minimum sentence of a year.

I am not, for the most part, someone who endorses mandatory minimums. I think prevention in all its various manifestations is equally important. However, there has to be consequences for the offence. There also has to be prevention programming. The provincial government does it, but it is also incumbent upon this federal government to undertake more support and resources both for the provinces and what they do and for the community groups directly in the work that they do.

I am struck by the irony of the government putting forward tough on crime legislation while at the same time not providing the supports to communities that deal with young people in distress, or reducing the supports, or narrowing the criteria of the support so that the violence is not curtailed.

This bill is not perfect, but it is indeed an important start in taking this issue seriously by updating the Criminal Code. Significant reductions in crime will indeed occur if we also invest significant resources in evidence-based prevention programs, and I underline evidence-based prevention programs. We need to see what works and build upon it, not decide on an ideological basis that we want to do x or y and then make the program fit the criteria.

If the government were truly serious about tackling auto theft and property crime, the Prime Minister would not have killed Bill C-53 when he broke his own fixed election date in 2008, and he would not have prorogued Parliament last winter, killing Bill C-26. Seventeen months later, I am speaking to the same issue.

This is the third time the government has introduced the bill. It took the government five months to reintroduce it in the exact form after the Prime Minister prorogued Parliament. We tried to expedite it in the past and we on this side will continue to do so again.

We are glad that this bill is more robust than Bill C-53 and that the government chose to make auto theft a unique offence in the Criminal Code. The separate offence did not exist in Bill C-53.

We know that according to Statistics Canada the rate of motor vehicle theft has declined almost every year since 1996. Data for 2006 confirms that motor vehicle theft has fallen by 20% since 1996, but motor vehicle theft has a major effect on vehicle owners, third party victims, indeed law enforcement agencies and certainly the insurance industry. According to the Insurance Bureau of Canada, it costs insurers and the public close to $1 billion a year.

Statistics Canada numbers show that Manitoba has the highest rate of auto theft, which is nearly three times the Canadian average. We also know that Montreal has the most stolen vehicles and the fewest recovered in any city.

When I speak to this issue, while I support and want to see this bill implemented, this time in a timely fashion, I also want to underline once again the importance of prevention programs.

When I met with a group of eight young people in Winnipeg who had been in trouble with the law, they expressed to me the absolute importance of having prevention programs available. That week, while we were meeting, community clubs in the city of Winnipeg were being closed down for lack of resources, lack of infrastructure.

We cannot give with one hand and take away with the other hand. It is important that there be a coordinated policy of prevention that will reduce overall the auto theft in the city of Winnipeg, provide opportunity for young people and provide opportunity for the residents of the city.

Having said that, it is important that this bill be implemented and moved through this House and through the Senate in a timely fashion. I would ask all colleagues to co-operate in doing so.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to continue my presentation on Bill S-9, which was Bill C-26 last year. This is another bill that was killed when the House was prorogued. We will have to spend a lot of valuable parliamentary time going through the various stages to get it back to where it was when the government prorogued.

My files on all of these government bills are quite substantial now, as we have been going through these bills a second time and a third time in some cases.

I have in my files a press release issued on September 13, 2007 by the Manitoba government of the day with respect to Bill C-26 regarding its mission to Ottawa to press for tougher sentences with respect to auto theft. For the tough on crime Conservative government, it must come as a bit of a surprise to know that an NDP government was even tougher on crime and three years earlier.

On September 20, Premier Gary Doer, who has since been appointed ambassador to Washington, led the Manitoba mission to Ottawa to press for urgent national action on auto theft and tougher sentences for serious youth crimes. The Manitoba delegation included Attorney General Dave Chomiak, who has since been replaced by Attorney General Andrew Swan; Conservative opposition party leader Hugh McFadden, who is still the opposition leader; Jon Gerrard, the Liberal leader; and Winnipeg mayor Sam Katz who will be mayor for at least two more weeks. I am not familiar as to whether the rest of the members of the delegation are still in their respective positions. Nevertheless, this was a concerted effort on the part of a provincial government to lobby Ottawa politicians to do something about auto theft in this country.

The Government of Manitoba was not sitting back resting on its laurels and demanding another government to solve the problem, as so often happens in the political world. The province, simultaneously with the request, had a program of its own. The province's approach to reducing auto theft and youth crime focused on four broad areas, one being prevention, which is an important part of all of this. It provided lighthouse programs, friendship centres and education pilot projects, as well as initiatives like vehicle immobilizer, which I have spoken a lot about that in the House over the last two years.

The second area was intervention. The government provided programs, such as the highly successful turnabout program which involved intense supervision for repeat offenders.

The third area was suppression, with more targeted funding for police officers, corrections officers and crown attorneys dealing specifically with auto theft. In fact, Manitoba set up a task force that identified the top 50 level 4 offenders, the most serious offenders, and singled them out for special attention. They were watched on an hourly basis. In addition, there were consequences. Repeat offenders faced a possible lifetime suspension of their driver's licence.

In addition to all of this, the Manitoba government adopted a program that has been reasonably successful in Nova Scotia. It involved monitoring car thieves and forcing them to wear ankle bracelets. This initially was a one year pilot project but I believe it has been extended so it must be reasonably successful.

The Government of Manitoba also tried the bait car program. One of the government members in this House spoke positively about the bait car program in British Columbia. For whatever reason, however, the Manitoba situation did not mandate the bait car program.

I am not certain what the reasons were for that but I would suggest that perhaps it was because of all those days where the weather in Manitoba is minus 40, as opposed to the nice temperatures and moderate climate out in Madame Speaker's province of British Columbia. The British Columbian government chose to pursue the bait car program, and I do not fault it for that. If it gets results, that is what we want to see. In Manitoba, we decided to go with the immobilizer program and the gang suppression unit and we were able to reduce our car thefts very substantially over a very short period of time.

The point here is to look at best practices. That is essentially our entire criticism of the government when it comes to crime. We hear it with the speakers from the Bloc, the speakers from the opposition and the speakers from the NDP constantly. There is a recognition, at least in the opposition, that governments should look for best practices. They should look for what works in other parts of the world, and not just blindly follow ideology and implement programs, for example, from the United States that have a 25 year track record of not having the desired effect, of not working.

That is all we are telling the government. We are prepared to support the government in positive approaches to the problem but we want to ensure that whatever money we are putting into the program is well spent.

What we have here is that three years have gone by and still the government has not done what the Manitoba government delegation was asking for, which was to provide stronger penalties for youth involved in serious crimes, especially those involving auto theft; allow first degree murder charges for gang-related homicides; eliminate the two-for-one remand credits; classify auto theft as an indictable violent offence; and make shooting at buildings and drive-by shootings indictable offences.

Three years later, the government is now starting to get around to implementing some of the requests of the Manitoba government. So much for its tough on crime approach and its suggestions that somehow the NDP is soft on crime.

I will now deal with some of the macro issues here that should have been identified 20-some years ago.

As I had indicated yesterday, when I look around I see a lot of grey hair in this Parliament. There are people here with a lot of experience. In former careers, they were provincial members, city councillors and mayors. There is a lot of collective experience here. The fact is that most of us remember that in the 1970s and early 1980s, it was still possible to leave our cars unlocked on the street and find them still there when we went to look for them. Auto theft was not really a problem in those days.

There are two types of auto theft that we are dealing with here. In the larger cities, like Toronto and Montreal, the issue with auto theft is more criminal activity. Criminal gangs are stealing high-end vehicles, changing the VINs on the vehicles and chop shops tearing these cars apart and selling them for parts or exporting them out of the country. That is the type of activity that perhaps is growing but, if we were to look back, I think we would find that it was still a problem many years ago and probably much easier to do in the 1970s and 1980s.

Our problem here with the big numbers is the joyriders, the young people who steal the cars for no other reason than to just simply take them out and go from point A to point B. Another group of people steal a car with the intention of committing burglaries. They just steal a car whenever they feel like it and go and break into houses. Some other joyriders have been in races with the police. They have killed people, sometimes deliberately running people over. They have had car accidents with police. They have even put bricks on the accelerators and sent the cars into buildings just for fun. These are the types of activities going on, which makes it very hard for the police to deal with the problem.

Had we been on our toes 20 to 25 years ago, governments would have seen those statistics coming up each year and would have mandated the car companies to factory install immobilizers.

It was not until 1997 that the Ford Motor Company started to install immobilizers in its higher end vehicles. When I looked at the statistics a number of years later, at least in Manitoba, no vehicle with an immobilizer had been stolen. The proof is in the pudding. The more vehicles that have immobilizers the less cars are being stolen. Therefore, there is a lesser pool of cars for people to be stealing.

I need to correct myself. It was the Liberal government that announced the anti-theft immobilizer program in all new vehicles built after September 1, 2007 for sale in Canada in July 2003, but it was the current Conservative government that actually implemented that requirement. It is great that it did this but it should have been done years before and years before the Insurance Bureau of Canada indicated that the cost of requiring factory installed immobilizers was something like $30, $40 or $50 a car. Can we imagine the small cost that this would be given the huge cost that society has paid because this mushrooming problem?

Now it will take at least 10 years to get all these old cars off the road and the problem, of course, will solve itself. However, it will take another decade and it will take a lot more effort.

However, in Manitoba there is the exception. The Manitoba government initially offered an incentive for people to avail themselves of the optional immobilizer program but it changed the rules a couple of years ago to make the program mandatory. As of 2007, I believe, the registration of and insurance for all cars without immobilizers could not be renewed but the government paid for the immobilizer.

While we had a voluntary program, the uptake was very poor. As soon as the government mandated it, a few people complained about having to do it. Even though it was free, they still complained. However, as long as the government made it free, people could not renew the insurance or registration until an immobilizer was installed in the car. Starting with the highest theft vehicles, because we could identify them based on the type of car, we gradually mandated that all those be brought in. We worked group, by group, by group and now we find a smaller and smaller pool of cars on Manitoba roads.

Has that solved all of the problems? No, not exactly. It has certainly reduced the costs and the rate of car theft. The fact that we are using the gang suppression program to chase the level 4 offenders has also been very positive. We have had to fine-tune the program but most people agree that we are on the right track.

I do not know why more jurisdictions do not get on board with this idea. Simply waiting over the 10 year period to allow the old cars to be gradually phased out is not being proactive. It is just accepting the fact that we will have more carnage on the roads and more costs to society. The point is that all provinces should be moving equally to make immobilizers mandatory as quickly as possible.

The House resumed from October 5 consideration of the motion that Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill S-9. I want to follow up on an issue the Bloc member dealt with in terms of the microchip solution.

I had pointed out that a number of years ago Manitoba was looking into making immobilizers mandatory. In fact, in the beginning Manitoba made them optional. There was a reduction in the insurance premium for people who voluntarily installed immobilizers in their cars. Guess what? Absolutely nobody took the offer. There were maybe 100 people in the whole province who did. It was only when the provincial government took the bull by the horns and made immobilizers mandatory and free that we started to see results.

We saw a huge reduction over the first year or so. In fact, auto theft was down to the point where there was one day in March a year ago where there were no auto thefts. As a matter of fact, the problem has changed to one where people have been having difficulty finding cars to steal and lately they have been commandeering taxis. That has become a problem that Manitoba is dealing with. The taxi drivers are looking at options involving shields and further protection because recently quite a number of taxis have been commandeered.

At the time we were looking at the immobilizer program there were some statistics available from the Insurance Bureau of Canada. Those insurance statistics would represent all the provinces outside of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and British Columbia, as they all have government-run programs.

I believe the studies at the time showed that if the big car companies were mandated by the government to install these immobilizers it could have been done 10 years ago at a cost of $30 for installation in each car. I may be wrong on the amount of $30, and it could have been $40 or $50, but it did not cost a lot to install an immobilizer in each car. We would have nipped the auto theft problem in the bud in the beginning and it would have cost a fraction of what it has cost society overall. However, the car companies refused to do that.

People then would have to put in after-market immobilizers. We all know that after-market immobilizers often do not work with the car's electrical system. Also, the engineering department of Ford, for example, refused to honour the warranties if the owners had put in after-market immobilizers. The car owners were caught. They wanted to do the right thing, but if they put in an after-market immobilizer, it would cause problems with the warranty on their new car, so there was a bit of a standoff. It is no surprise that very few people put in after-market immobilizers which, by the way, were very expensive.

The government had a responsibility here. In those days it was probably still a Liberal government because it was a few years ago. The government has to look at the Insurance Bureau of Canada statistics and it should be proactive. It should be looking for a solution and not waiting for the problem to mushroom to the extent that it has.

I am not sure whether it was during the last days of the Liberal government, but I think it may have been the Conservative government that actually mandated immobilizers in all new cars in Canada as of a certain date three or four years ago. That was a very positive thing to do. Within a 10-year period, which is the time it will take for all the older cars to be removed from the road, the problem should cure itself. That is quite a long time. Certainly, if the microchips are going to help solve this problem or do more to curb the problem, then we should be looking at them as well.

In Manitoba there are people who joyride in cars. In Toronto and Montreal, it involves more organized crime in high-end vehicles.

Madam Speaker, I understand that my time is up for today.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that my colleague knows the Bloc Québécois's position on the Senate. The only option is to abolish it. But we are not there yet.

If the government thought that it would be quicker to go through the Senate, it was wrong. It is trying to do the same thing with Bill S-4 on aboriginal matrimonial rights. The Conservatives may be able to get any bill they like passed in the Senate, where they have the majority, but there are still 12 members of this House on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, which meets twice a week. They cannot make anything up. They are trying to hurry us, but they will have to wait a bit.

I personally thought this bill would be introduced right away. It is the type of bill we all agree on. The same goes for Bill C-22 on child pornography. Everyone agreed on Bill S-9. I do not understand why it is being introduced through the Senate. I agree with my colleague, and as we like to say, enough is enough. Let us just leave it at that.

I find the government is trying to push things through the Senate where it thinks things will move more quickly because it has a majority and the Senate sits in June and July. When a bill arrives in the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights or in the House, it does not move any more quickly. We have been waiting for this bill since April 2008, two years and six months ago. It is time to act. We could have come to an agreement with the House leaders. These are bills we all agree on. Let us proceed more quickly than planned.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, briefly, at the closing of this debate, it is offence to the sensibilities of all democrats, or should be, to read that the title of the bill is Bill S-9, which means it originates in the unelected, undemocratic Senate instead of in the House of Commons, where people are elected by the people of Quebec and the people of Canada to put forward legislation.

I want to know my colleague's views. Does he not find it an affront to democracy in general that it is the unelected, undemocratic Senate that is driving these bills into the House of Commons? If these bills have merit, they should be generated in the freely elected democratic institution, and that is the House of Commons.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this bill, but we have a problem at the outset. I am going to say something important, and the members opposite should listen, because if they do not, they are going to make the same mistake again.

Currently, in committee in the room next door, we are trying to finish studying Bill C-4. Some members will say that that has nothing to do with Bill S-9. I am coming to that. Because of the government, we are still waiting for a report on Bill C-4 that should have been tabled on June 16. We have been waiting for three and a half months for this report so that we can finish studying this young offenders bill. The government says that we are dragging our feet. I have good news and bad news for the government. The good news is that we are not the ones dragging our feet. The bad news is that they are the ones dragging their feet. The same is true of Bill S-9. The first iteration of this bill was introduced on April 14, 2008—not last week, not in April 2010 or April 2009, but on April 14, 2008. All the parties said they were prepared to study this bill quickly in committee, as I am saying today.

The problem is that they are introducing so many silly justice bills, so many populist bills as they see it, that we can no longer work. As we speak, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights has already received four bills to study, and the session only resumed on September 20. Does the government think we are going to have the time to consider Bill S-9? Still, the government should not take us for idiots. That is the problem with the Conservative Party, the problem with this government. It thinks it can ram bills through. It is wrong.

Getting back to this bill, I have some trouble calling it S-9 because they tried to pass it through the Senate before bringing it here. It is not moving any more quickly because the problem is that part of the work had already been done on Bill C-26. The committee had already heard from representatives of the Insurance Bureau of Canada and Statistics Canada. It is the party in power, not us, that is delaying the work. I hope that the public will remember this because auto theft is an important issue. Everyone in Quebec and across Canada is asking us to do something. We certainly have no objection. It is an interesting bill. It is a bill that should have been introduced well before Bill C-4, and well before a number of other bills, given that we were probably going to move more quickly on it.

We do not have recent statistics, but just in terms of auto theft—addressed by Bill S-9 before us today—there was a small drop in 2007. However, auto theft remains one of the most common offences in Canada and is committed in particular by youth between the ages of 15 and 18. In 2007, they were responsible for three solved auto thefts in ten. That same year, 146,000 vehicle thefts were reported to police, an average of 400 thefts per day. I imagine that I will be asked about the statistics for 2008, 2009 and 2010. We do not have them. I believe we should have them soon. It is possible that we may not get all the information because the census will not be taken. However, with the Insurance Bureau of Canada, as well as Statistics Canada and the police stations, we should have a good idea and we believe the numbers will be similar. Unfortunately, there will be around 140,000 vehicles stolen per year.

That is a huge number and it is far too high. We need to eliminate this scourge.

We in the Bloc Québécois think that Bill S-9 is not a bad bill. We agree that it should be studied quickly in committee, as was the case with Bill C-22. Perhaps we will set some other bills aside in order to pass Bill C-22 on child pornography. Perhaps the same thing could happen with Bill S-9, but for that to happen, it has to come to us in committee. It seems as though the Conservatives have other bills like this. In fact, we have been told that we will spend the whole week discussing justice bills. We have to be able to work at some point.

I have been looking at what is being done with the bill. I am sorry to say it this bluntly, but there are three types of motor vehicle theft. Three out of ten vehicles are stolen by youth. We call it theft, but the young people take what are known as joy rides. In French we call them des promenades de joie. I know that it is likely not the best term, but no better terms come to mind. They take a vehicle from somewhere and drive around town. They take a vehicle that was “forgotten” at the corner store, with the keys in the ignition, lights on, motor running. They take it for a ride and leave it somewhere else. This type of crime happens a lot with youth.

Where it becomes a bit more dangerous—and this is happening in Manitoba—is when someone takes off with a vehicle and kills someone. Unfortunately, this type of offence happened recently in Abitibi-Témiscamingue when a young man took a motor vehicle from Rouyn-Noranda to Val-d'Or. He stole the vehicle in Rouyn-Noranda and caused an accident that seriously injured two people. This is extremely dangerous and something must be done.

I am not saying that the motor vehicle thefts I just mentioned are not serious. They certainly should be punished, but there are worse kinds. There are several different types of motor vehicle thefts, and there are essentially two main methods. One of them involves stripping the vehicle for parts.

I will read a list. I do not know if my Conservative colleagues have these models, but if they do, they should be careful, because they are the most likely to be stolen: 1999 Honda Civic—this one is a bit old, but it gets stripped for parts; 2000 Honda Civic; Subaru Impreza; Acura Integra; Dodge Grand Caravan or Plymouth Voyager; 1994 Dodge Grand Caravan or Plymouth Voyager with all-wheel-drive; 1998 Acura Integra; Audi TT Quattro and Dodge Shadow or Plymouth Sundance. These vehicles were among the 10 most commonly stolen vehicles in 2006, and I do not think much has changed since then.

We need to take action quickly. These vehicles are generally stripped for parts, and are rarely exported. They are exported, but not much. This is where organized crime comes in. These individuals place orders for certain types of motor vehicles, which are then stripped for parts. The thief is one thing. Yes, he is a criminal, but the ones who place the orders are the worst ones. These types of orders are generally made through organized crime groups. So we must find a way to punish them.

Bill S-9 does contain some interesting elements. We believe we can improve it through further study in committee. It seems to me that we all agree that we need to improve this bill and that we need to find ways to prevent criminals from taking vehicles apart. We need to reduce the incidence of auto theft. We need to create an offence for tampering with an identification number. When certain vehicles are taken apart, some very important parts disappear, such as the engine, the body and the doors, if they do not have a VIN. As we heard in committee, if the thief is really organized, a vehicle like a 1999 Honda Civic, for example, can be taken apart in half an hour. Now that is organized crime. We must absolutely find a way to make it impossible to take vehicles apart.

We also heard in committee that there are small electronic chips placed in secret locations in certain vehicles, and when those vehicles are stolen or taken illegally, they can be found with a certain kind of GPS. We did not take our study any further, which is why we want the bill to be examined in committee. Perhaps we could find a way to encourage manufacturers to install this kind of electronic chip in several specific locations in vehicles without necessarily forcing them to do so. This would allow authorities to find these vehicles or parts quickly, as soon as the theft is reported. We began receiving this information when we started studying the bill.

Today we must absolutely find ways to prevent this crime. To do so, we have to work with Industry Canada. The Criminal Code is not enough. It is used to punish individuals who steal and dismantle automobiles. We will probably invite the departments involved to work on prevention, which is the best way to avoid this type of theft. If someone knows there is an alarm system set up, they might be less likely to commit a break-and-enter. We want to look at the bill from that angle in committee. Even though we are on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, it is nonetheless important to find ways to prevent crime.

There are some major offences. However, at least there are no minimum prison sentences. That is a step in the right direction. If the bill passes, then we will amend the Criminal Code to ensure that there are maximum prison sentences for trafficking in property obtained by crime. This did not exist before. The bill will create the offence of trafficking in property obtained by crime, specifically parts from stolen vehicles. The offence of possession of stolen goods exists in the Criminal Code, but when a vehicle is dismantled into parts and there is nothing left but the car door, generally speaking, if there is no identification number or electronic chip linked to a GPS, the door cannot be linked to the vehicle stolen a few weeks or months before. The offence that will be created will concern trafficking in property obtained by crime. That is how the parts will be linked to the vehicle. Circumstantial evidence will show that the vehicle was dismantled into separate parts and that some parts were sold to this or that individual.

To traffic will mean to sell, give, transfer, transport, export from Canada, import into Canada, send, deliver or deal with in any other way, or to offer to do any of those acts.

This bill will help border services officers conduct searches. It will tighten the noose around criminals who tend to steal vehicles to resell them quickly or, more importantly, to alter them. We think this is a worthwhile bill, and we will have to come up with ways to put an end to this scourge.

Criminals tend to take the easy route. Why do young people steal cars? Generally, car thefts take place outside a corner store, when the car owner leaves the key in the ignition and steps inside for some milk. How many tens of thousands of thefts sadly result in penalties that may seem light to a young person, but that can have an impact if the offender commits other crimes later?

We support this bill, which we have to say is worthwhile, even though it should have been introduced much sooner. I do not understand the government. We have been waiting for this bill since April 2008, but it seems to have been forgotten when Parliament was prorogued.

Vehicle theft is an easy crime that is often committed by young people. We must find ways to prevent people from falsifying the vehicle identification number or VIN.

The question was put to Criminal Intelligence Service Canada, and this was its reply:

The Insurance Crime Prevention Bureau has identified an increase in four main fraud techniques that are used by organized crime to steal vehicles. These include: the illegal transfer of Vehicle Identification Numbers (VINs) from wrecked vehicles to similar ones that have been stolen; a legitimate VIN is used to change the legal identity of a stolen vehicle of the same make, model, and colour, a process called “twinning”.

Let us consider the example just given. The VIN from a wrecked Honda Civic 1998 can be used for a stolen Honda Civic 1999. This is where we are being asked to take action.

In closing, we want to study this bill quickly. We can work on it in the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, but on the whole, it is a worthwhile bill that the insurance companies and police forces have been calling for. I do not believe that any member of this House will be against having this bill studied quickly in committee.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I sense we are straying a bit from Bill S-9 on this but I am happy to engage in debate with my colleague.

I was not here during the previous Liberal government so I do not know first-hand. Oh, I do remember. When I was mayor of a city and a member of FCMs finance committee, I remember the Liberal government. I remember Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin developing the first infrastructure program and the first gas tax that benefited communities and cities across this country. They did much better than what the Conservative government has done in its almost half decade. I was there. I was a consumer. I know the Liberals did the best job of any government in recent history.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise on Bill S-9, the tackling auto theft and property crime act.

I rise today to speak to this bill, an act I am pleased to see yet again in this place. I hope it will not follow its ill-fated identical twins, Bill C-58 and Bill C-26, which we mourn today. They were killed on the order paper by the poll-obsessed Conservative Party for the sake of political expediency. This is another well-intentioned piece of legislation and another piece of legislation where good intentions are late and not enough.

Let us be clear, as vice-chair of the justice committee, I and the Liberal Party promise that we will support this bill going to committee and being expeditiously dealt with at that committee.

The system within this bill will fail to keep Canadians safe and secure in their property without a commitment to enforcement, not headlines and hype but money and manpower, boots on the street, a dedication to putting Canadians' safety first, above hyperbole, above how our parties are faring or may fare in the polls.

Standing up and acting for Canadians, which I believe is a slogan of one of the parties here, standing up for Canadians, means taking concrete action. On this side, we have committed to taking what action we can to protect Canadians and encourage government to fund the police forces that can put laws like this, albeit very lately enacted, into action.

That means making the best of a flawed bill like this, sending it to committee, studying it, amending it, recognizing the good and singling out the bad, but nothing that this bill or the justice committee can do will affect the deficit of police forces and money to police forces across this country.

I want to reiterate the point that my friend, the NDP member for Winnipeg Centre made in having us remember what could be called the good law firm of Doer, Chomiak and Katz, and of course those were the Manitoba premier and minister of justice and the mayor of Winnipeg. The Manitobans came to town and asked for four things.

Now it is over four years since they came, and this bill addresses three of those items. The last item was in fact a request towards the realization that gangs, and youth gangs in particular, were being used in Winnipeg as the pawns, the effectors, of organized crime thefts of vehicles. The Youth Criminal Justice Act as it existed then and as it exists now allows for an accused youth to be let out of remand, to be not remanded, pending trial and in between offences.

Now this was precisely the situation that led the province of Nova Scotia, on my coast, to commission Justice Merlin Nunn to study the issue of youth criminal justice legislation and to make recommendations in what is now known as the Nunn commission report.

One of those glaring recommendations was to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act in the smallest way, with the fewest words to absolve our communities of this problem, the problem of youths being let go from remand, being let out of the custody of the court pending a determination of their issues. Remand is something that keeps a person who is accused of a serious offence in custody pending the determination of their issue, if there are grounds.

In many cases there are grounds for adults, and adult offenders are remanded or kept in custody. It is not so in the Youth Criminal Justice Act. It was that fact that in the Nunn commission case study gave rise to its need. It was not the case and it had disastrous consequences.

As I said Doer, Chomiak and Katz came to Ottawa wanting that simple amendment more than four and a half years ago. They have not, as my NDP colleague mentioned, received that simple amendment.

People might ask why a simple wording amendment to a fairly large and complicated act, which would not have met with any resistance from this side, was not done. It is because, like everything the government does, it has to be presented in a political fashion. Politics has to be played with the Criminal Code. It has to be played in the realm of criminal justice.

When everybody agreed on an amendment to the Youth Criminal Justice Act that would have given Manitobans the fourth item they wanted, the Conservative government added a phrase that was of debate. The point is that there was unanimous agreement on the amendment, but it had to add another element of denunciation and deterrence, which is alive with debate in the country, and spoiled it. It spoiled the idea that very quickly and very simply, for the benefit of the people in Nova Scotia, Alberta, Manitoba and all the provinces in Canada, it could have had this amendment that everybody wanted. No doubt this has wreaked havoc across this country and has resulted in further actions by youths not in remand, joyriding and stealing cars, as adjuncts of gang activity in cities such as Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Abbotsford, British Colombia, and have made Canadians less safe than when the Conservative government was elected.

Shame on the Conservative government for not acting quickly on that fourth request from the Manitoba delegation.

Any night between 5:00 and 7:30, depending upon where one lives, newscasts will show the Conservative government as friends of the police, as friends of victims, but it does very little in action for police forces across the country. Police forces have been requesting funding. Police forces have not received the man hours, the boots on the streets that they require.

With respect to auto theft, members may say that more police officials will not necessarily lead to a decrease in auto theft. The Toronto Star reported in July 2009, three years or so into the mandate of the government, that the provincial auto theft team, a joint task force involving the OPP, the Insurance Bureau of Canada and local police forces, was going through a restructuring that would see a further decrease in the number of officers investigating auto theft in the GTA.

This is Canada's largest city. Now we know that the government has money to throw around in Canada's largest city on various security measures for a very short-term project, but it does not have the money to flow through the provinces to keep the provincial auto theft team properly staffed. If I were the mayor of Toronto or running for election as mayor of Toronto, I would be kind of steamed at the federal government for not putting its resources in policing.

Police forces are indeed the front line of how to prevent auto theft. I recall, as part of our study on organized crime, that in Winnipeg we met with a number of police officials who were very surgical in how they were going to approach the problem of auto theft in their community, and they were very successful. They were not successful with laws, necessarily. They did not rely upon the after-the-fact retribution or punishment that is replete in the Criminal Code. They relied upon intelligence, savvy and resources, and they successfully reduced the level of auto theft in Winnipeg. That was a matter of resources, of money.

While we might sit here as parliamentarians all agreeing to what is in this bill, we as parliamentarians have a deficit with the public in suggesting that this bill was brought forward in a timely basis and that it will have the effect of completely eradicating auto theft or even reducing auto theft in the short term. In other words, we have gone to the shelf and we have seen what is on the shelf. We are going to grab what is on the shelf, but it is not enough to feed the issue that is burning, in this case, auto theft across this country.

Let us examine some of the elements of this bill.

It includes mandatory minimums. We can have a long debate on whether mandatory minimums work. Some of the bad in this bill includes the provisions for mandatory minimums in sentencing. We have been at this experiment of increased mandatory minimums for five years. I look forward at committee to seeing whether the mandatory minimum increase experiment is working. In this case it is a six-month mandatory sentence for third and subsequent auto theft offences. These mandatory minimums are less severe than the Conservatives have brought forward in the past, but as always they impinge on judicial discretion in sentencing. It is why the Canadian Bar Association has expressed opposition to mandatory minimums.

This is a continuing trend with the government. As in many other justice bills, the Conservatives seek to strip judges of their authority. There is lack of overall respect for judges. On this side, for probably the umpteenth time I am here suggesting that we have one of the best judiciary systems in the world. We should be very proud that we do not have the kind of capricious justice that takes place in almost every other country but Canada. As the government is always saying, we should celebrate our strength. We should celebrate the fact that we have a great judiciary.

I was here yesterday in this place making the same case on white collar crime. This is a bill that would not have incurred much opposition had it been brought forward earlier. It is a bill that we should have brought to the Canadian public earlier, and it is a bill that might have prevented other white collar crimes or frauds having taken place in the time it took us, I will say, to get to this.

Of course the reason we did not get to it is we have been having elections every couple of years. The government prorogued Parliament, and I hope the public understands that if a piece of legislation that is ready to go, could be almost all the way there, has not been signed by the Governor General it is not law. If it is not proclaimed, it is not law. So it can be right up to the eleventh hour and all the work has been done on it with respect to amendments and committee reports and witnesses coming before the committee, and all the speeches in the House, and if we have prorogation the bill dies. All that work goes down the drain and we start the process over again.

That is why we have this subject today in Bill S-9 which is really the same bill as C-53 and Bill C-26 before it. It seems that the government is okay with wasting this chamber's precious time on failed ideology and simplistic conceptions of crime prevention. Conservatives feel that a sentence, something to amend the Criminal Code, will really work with respect to crime prevention. It is not the case. Crime prevention starts at an early age with respect to an offender. It starts in the communities and the police forces when they have to be properly equipped and resourced to combat crime.

The second element of the bill, which we applaud, is the separating of the offence of auto theft. One of the positive aspects is the creation of the new separate discrete offence of auto theft. It provides for a far more appropriate range of sentencing options than could be found in previous legislation. The summary conviction aspect of it has a maximum penalty of 18 months, which tripled the existing summary conviction and average summary conviction limit of 6 months. It shows strength. It takes account of the realization that auto theft is a major and numerously copied crime in all communities in Canada. It is a response to the delegation from Winnipeg and from the various articles from decades before in the larger cities in Canada.

The indictable conviction has a maximum term of 10 years regardless of the value of the vehicle. In case the House is curious, I can inform it that the most stolen vehicle in Canada is the Honda Civic. So everyone who has a Honda Civic, please take note. Lock it up.

There is no minimum sentence for summary convictions, and the type of prosecution is up to the crown attorney, creating a broader spectrum of options. That hybrid aspect, as the parliamentary secretary mentioned, is a very good and flexible way to deal with the different types of auto theft. It is an improvement on the previous legislation. However, I have to put my two cents in that if the government believed in discretion with respect to how a crown attorney or crown prosecutor might proceed, it should give a little more leniency toward the idea of judicial discretion, as we were saying just a minute ago about mandatory minimums.

The aspect of giving more powers to the Canadian Border Services Agency is another positive change. The Canadian Border Services Agency will be empowered, if this legislation passes, to stop, search and seize goods believed to have been obtained criminally. At present, the CBSA may only stop, search and seize goods whose importation or exportation was prohibited by an act of Parliament. There is no provision for the seizure of goods, the possession of which is prohibited by law. Therefore, this is a very good enhancement to the authority of CBSA.

Perhaps what is most modern about the bill is the respect that it gives to vehicle identification numbers.

We believe it is useful to add measures concerning vehicle identification numbers and we would like to discuss this measure in committee. That is the kind of innovative measure that could help combat the problem of auto theft in Canada.

The obliteration of VIN numbers is a low-risk, high-profit tactic of organized criminal gangs. This provision should help crack down on organized criminal activity, a main source of auto theft in Canada. By denying criminal gangs access to a primary source of funding, the currency of gangs, we can inhibit them from developing their activities elsewhere.

The possession of property: to be in possession of a stolen car:

The provision concerning the possession of stolen vehicles is interesting and also merits discussion. That is another measure that could prove to be a useful tool for police forces. We need to be innovative in order to combat criminals who steal vehicles, who themselves are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

The measure is the first half of a clause meant to combat the trafficking in stolen goods following the actual theft. By cracking down on those in possession of stolen property, the disincentive from purchasing property one suspects or knows to be stolen is created. By restricting, therefore, the ability of criminals to fence or sell their stolen goods, their capacity to easily make money is reduced, their risk level goes up and their profit goes down as consumers choose to forgo the risk in inherent in the slightly cheaper, ill-obtained good from their legitimate cousins.

Trafficking in stolen property initially is buttressed and improved in, let us call it Bill C-26-Bill C-58-Bill S-9. We wholly support this aspect. The penalty for trafficking or fencing in stolen goods can be severe: up to 14 years in prison. It is an example of an effective provision that leaves the judicial determination through discretion of giving a sentence that severe in the most severe case of auto theft, trafficking or being in possession, and we support it.

In this case, the Winnipeg and Manitoba officials support this law and the stakeholder reaction has been very supportive of the bill, although half-heartedly. The support is that. yes, this is a good bill, but Professor Rick Linden, University of Manitoba, at the heart of the auto theft activity in this country, noted that the bill was a good step forward but that significant reductions in crime would only occur if we also invest significant resources in police tactics, numbers and in implementing other evidence-based prevention programs.

That is where I would like to conclude. As I stated, we could have had and should have had this bill long ago. It is only one step and only a minor step forward in the battle against car theft in this country. We need to get boots on the street and respect and resource municipalities, communities and police forces who will use, as Professor Linden says, smart tactics and other evidence-based prevention programs. There is something new for the government.

With that, I am happy to conclude and say that we support the bill going to committee. In fact, I have every indication that we will deal with the bill by the end of the year and get it onto the books as a minor step forward.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime). This bill targets property crime, in particular auto theft which continues to cause serious harm to Canadian communities.

To this end, Bill S-9 would create a new offence of motor vehicle theft, a new offence to address tampering with an automobile's vehicle identification number and new offences to address trafficking in property obtained by crime.

Just how serious is auto theft in Canada? According to information provided by Statistics Canada, motor vehicle thefts are one of the most common types of police reported crime in Canada. In 2008, they accounted for 6% of all Criminal Code offences and 7% of all non-violent offences. In 2008, police reported approximately 125,000 motor vehicle thefts, averaging about 340 stolen vehicles per day. It is estimated that this costs auto insurance policyholders approximately $465 million in increased insurance premiums.

We also know that motor vehicle theft is one of the least likely crimes to be solved by police. Of all vehicle thefts in 2008, 12% resulted in an accused person being identified compared to 34% of all other non-violent offences.

Motor vehicle theft is a crime often associated with youth. In 2008, police reported motor vehicle theft rates were highest among 15 to 18 year olds. Youths accounted for approximately three in ten persons accused in motor vehicle theft in 2008.

Auto theft also creates immense public safety risks. As a representative from the Winnipeg Police Association testified before the Senate committee, auto theft has had tragic consequences in many parts of Canada, including Winnipeg. Mr. Sutherland, the president of the association, listed for the committee a few examples of the Winnipegers who have been killed or seriously injured by stolen vehicles since 2007.

In 2007, a jogger in Winnipeg was seriously injured by a car thief who deliberately targeted joggers by hitting them with his car door as he drove past. Two other individuals were killed in Winnipeg in 2007. A woman was killed after her van was hit by a stolen vehicle and a cyclist was killed after being struck by a stolen car driven by a repeat offender. In 2008, a cab driver was killed after his vehicle was struck by a stolen vehicle. In 2009, a man was killed when his Subaru was struck by a vehicle that was being driven by a repeat offender.

There have been other cases in Canada. In 2007, two teenagers were killed in Toronto when a stolen vehicle smashed into their taxi. That same year a York Regional Police officer was killed trying to stop the theft of an air bag. In 2004 in Nova Scotia, a young woman was killed when a stolen car driven by a repeat auto theft offender smashed into her car.

The bill proposes that the distinct offence of theft of a motor vehicle be added to the Criminal Code. It would be a hybrid offence with a maximum penalty of 10 years imprisonment on indictment and 18 years imprisonment on summary conviction. There also would be a mandatory minimum penalty of six months imprisonment for a third or subsequent conviction when the prosecutor proceeds by indictment. This penalty is a balanced approach to repeat offences of a serious nature.

Canadians have repeatedly told us that they want appropriate penalties for repeat offenders and we believe this legislation moves us in the right direction.

Bill S-9 is also proposing to create an offence for wholly or partially altering, obliterating or removing a vehicle identification number, or VIN, on a motor vehicle. Under the new amendments, anyone convicted of tampering with a VIN could face imprisonment for a term of up to five years on indictment or six months, or a fine of not more than $2,000 or both on summary conviction.

Both the VIN tampering offence and the distinct motor vehicle theft offence would offer benefits to the criminal justice system not offered by the current offence used to cover these activities, “possession of property obtained by crime” found in section 354 of the Criminal Code. A conviction for either of these offences would clearly and more accurately document a person's involvement in an organized vehicle theft ring as part of the criminal record. This, in turn, would help police and crown prosecutors to deal appropriately with these people in subsequent investigations and prosecutions.

The House will note that the VIN tampering offence contains an express exception in subsection 353.1(3) to ensure that those individuals who must remove or alter a VIN in the course of legitimate auto repairs, maintenance or modification are not captured under the ambit of this offence.

A question was raised in the Senate committee on why this express exception is required when subsection 353.1(1) also contains a lawful excuse defence. I will take a moment to explain how the provision works.

A VIN is not located only on the dashboard of a motor vehicle. It can also be found in numerous locations such as the door, the engine block, the door frame, and on the steering wheel or steering column, to name but a few. These VINs will be affected and possibly removed entirely when parts are changed or repaired following accidents or in the course of regular maintenance or modification. It is clearly necessary that any definition of VIN tampering not apply to the numerous law-abiding Canadians who could technically fall within the scope of the definition of the offence while engaged in repairing or modifying vehicles.

The inclusion of the lawful excuse clause by itself would be insufficient to protect innocent Canadians from being charged under the provision. The lawful excuse defence is meant to apply only under those limited circumstances in which a specific defence cannot be envisioned by Parliament, even though it is acknowledged that there could be situations in which some lawful excuse could exist.

Lawful excuse is a flexible concept designed to provide an accused who bears the onus with access to justifications that, depending on the nature of the offence and the circumstances in which it was committed, may be appropriate in particular cases, although these cases will usually be rare. With some offences, it is impossible to envisage every situation that can amount to a lawful excuse for a particular offence. Whether there was a lawful excuse for certain offences is a determination that must be made on the basis of all the circumstances presented in evidence.

However, when Parliament can identify circumstances that are clearly blameless in nature but that would otherwise fall within the scope of a broadly phrased criminal offence, it should be incumbent upon Parliament to expressly set out such circumstances in the law. This way there is no uncertainty on the part of the individuals who engage in that conduct and no uncertainty on the part of the police or prosecutors about the lawfulness of the conduct.

This is why we have the express exception in the proposed VIN tampering provision. Without specifying the exceptions, there is a real risk that individuals engaged in conduct that Parliament does not wish to criminalize will be caught up in the criminal process. The exceptions complete the definition of what the offences seek to capture.

Bill S-9 also proposes to create offences to address trafficking and property obtained by crime. The proposed trafficking offences are intended to target the entire length of the marketing chain that processes the proceeds of theft and other crimes like fraud.

One form of trafficking in property obtained by crime is the movement of stolen automobiles and their parts. This is where organized crime is most involved in auto theft, either through car- theft rings, chop shops, or re-VINing a car for the sophisticated international rings that smuggle stolen luxury cars to foreign locations.

Currently, section 354 of the Criminal Code, the general offence of possession of property obtained by crime, which carries a maximum of 10 years imprisonment for property valued over $5,000, is the principal Criminal Code offence used to address trafficking and property obtained by crime. This possession offence does not adequately capture the full range of activities involved in trafficking.

Both proposed offences have higher penalties than the existing offence of possession of property obtained by crime. If the value of the item trafficked exceeds $5,000, anyone convicted of this offence could face imprisonment for up to 14 years. If the value does not exceed $5,000, it would be a hybrid offence and subject to imprisonment for up to five years on indictment or up to six months on summary conviction.

In the auto theft example, the trafficking offences would capture all of the players in a chop-shop operation, whereas the offence of possession of property obtained by crime would apply only to those in possession of property such as stolen cars or car parts. In order to avoid detection and reduce the probability of multiple counts in the event of an arrest, chop shops have very little inventory at any given time. It is to be noted, however, that the trafficking offences address dealings involving all property obtained by crime, not just the results of auto theft and chop-shop operations.

I am pleased that the trafficking offences also provide the Canada Border Services Agency with the legislative tools necessary to allow them to detain property, including stolen cars about to be exported from Canada, in order to determine whether they are stolen and to allow the relevant police agency to recover them and take the appropriate action.

Bill S-9 is a comprehensive piece of legislation that addresses many of the activities that organized crime undertakes in relation to auto theft and other forms of property crime.

Bill S-9 has been studied in-depth by the Senate and in the last session by the House of Commons in its previous form as Bill C-26.

Bill S-9 is unchanged in any material respect from Bill C-26, and, in my opinion, there is no reason to delay bringing this bill into law. I would urge all hon. members to support this bill in its early passage.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice]

moved that Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Business of the House

[John Baird, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I want to tell you that when the leader of the Liberal Party named the member for Ottawa South as the House leader of the Liberal Party I was asked many times, “How do you feel about this? Are you looking forward to working with him?” I said to each and every one of them that I was every bit as looking forward to working with the member for Ottawa South as I am sure he was looking forward to working with me.

In all seriousness I can report that the Liberal House leader and I are working well together. I am even working well with the Bloc House leader and with the House leader of the New Democratic Party.

We are all working hard to make Parliament work.

Today I can tell the House that we will be continuing debate on Bill C-46, the Canada-Panama free trade agreement, another key economic initiative as part of Canada's economic action plan, a plan to create jobs, build growth and opportunity for all Canadians across the country.

It is, though, with deep regret that yesterday I learned the NDP moved a six-month hoist motion on the Canada-Panama free trade agreement. As the House knows, the only purpose of moving such an amendment is to obstruct and delay the progress of important legislation.

On Friday, my good friends in the NDP moved a concurrence motion obstructing and delaying the passage of Bill C-22, protecting children from online sexual exploitation, another key part of our government's tough on crime agenda.

I say to my NDP friends, let us work together and make Parliament work. I hope we will not see any more of this.

Tomorrow, as the member opposite has said, we will be having question period and leaving early for the installation of the new Governor General in the Senate chamber.

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of next week, the government will call the following bills for debate: Bill C-22, protecting children from online sexual exploitation; Bill C-21, standing up for victims of white-collar crime; Bill C-30, the response to the Supreme Court of Canada decision in R. v. Shoker; Bill C-39, ending early release for criminals and increasing offender accountability; Bill S-6, serious time for the most serious crime; and Bill S-9, tackling auto theft and property crime.

On Thursday, it is the government's intention to begin debate on the second budget bill, sustaining Canada's economic recovery act, just one more key economic action plan legislative initiative.

Canadians have told us they want us to focus on creating jobs, building growth and opportunity. They have told us that they want their government to have a robust legislative agenda, to get tough on crime, and that is exactly what we are delivering.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, perhaps to deal with the issue that was raised by one of my colleagues, the member for Kelowna—Lake Country, about Jazz Air, the Minister of Labour, who has been working diligently on this file for weeks now and certainly at an intensified rate over the last 48 to 72 hours, has addressed that issue.

As she noted, the government filed a notice that appeared on the order paper this morning, indicating that were there to be a work stoppage that would threaten our communities serviced by Jazz Air, threaten the livelihoods of many Canadians, indeed inconvenience business, threaten the fragile economic recovery that we are seeing in all parts of Canada, but obviously would severely threaten the economic recovery in those parts serviced by that airline, the government is prepared to act expeditiously to ensure that work stoppage would be of the shortest possible duration.

As for the business of the House, as it is the Thursday question, today we will continue to debate the opposition motion and then later this evening, the business of supply.

In a few minutes, to address the other question that the official opposition House leader asked, I hope to create and complete, at all its remaining stages, Bill C-23A, an act to amend the Criminal Records Act. We will also be adopting, at all stages, Bill C-40, celebrating Canada's seniors.

When the House meets again, we will continue to debate on Bill S-2, the sex offender registry, and Bill S-9, tackling auto theft.

As we near the end of this sitting, I want to thank my colleagues for their co-operation, particularly in these last few weeks. We have had many challenges and I think we have met most of them. Most notably was the challenge of these two five-week sitting blocks. I would point out, however, that anyone who just watched question period would have to draw the conclusion that it truly is silly season here in the House of Commons, given the level of the debate.

However, the challenge being that we had to be absent from our constituents and families, the upside of course was that we as members had the opportunity to spend so much quality time together. Just like any good family visit, unfortunately all good things must come to an end.

I would also like to speak briefly to express my appreciation to the House staff who serve us so well.

[David Greening, Executive Director, Policy Development and Analysis, Department of Justice, Government of Manitoba]

Thank you.

By way of background, I am the executive director of policy development and analysis for Manitoba Justice. I have been doing criminal law policy work now for a bit over 14 years, and prior to that I was defence counsel, dealing with both adult criminal cases and youth court cases for roughly five years.

I'm pleased to be here today to speak to the committee about the Manitoba government's position on YCJA reform and its concerns about Bill C-4 and its approach to reform of the Youth Criminal Justice Act. Manitoba has longstanding concerns about youth crime and the YCJA. Since 2006 it has been advocating for reforms to enhance the bail and sentencing provisions of the YCJA to ensure that serious and repeat young offenders can be more easily held in custody upon arrest and face jail sentences for their crimes.

To clarify, Manitoba is not suggesting that all alleged young offenders should be detained in custody or sentenced to custody, but just that judges be allowed the opportunity to consider the circumstances of each case and to make appropriate decisions based upon the youth's behaviour and the risk they pose to the public, rather than having their hands tied and being prevented from doing so by the existing YCJA presumptions against pre-trial detention and custodial sentences. Being unable to keep out-of-control youth in custody not only creates a public safety risk, but also undermines public confidence in the justice system, as the public begins to see it as a revolving door catch-and-release exercise.

In addition to Manitoba raising its concerns at meetings of federal-provincial-territorial ministers responsible for justice, and in meetings with the federal Minister of Justice, in September 2007 Manitoba's then Premier and Minister of Justice led a non-partisan “Mission to Ottawa” delegation, including Manitoba's opposition leaders, the mayors and chiefs of police of Winnipeg and Brandon, and community leaders to press the Prime Minister, the federal Minister of Justice, the federal Liberal caucus, the federal New Democratic Party caucus, and Manitoba members of Parliament to amend the YCJA to address Manitoba's concerns.

A key impetus for Manitoba's concerns and for the “Mission to Ottawa” delegation was a trend of escalating reckless and dangerous conduct associated with motor vehicle theft, which is one of the offences for which the YCJA currently provides a presumption against denial of bail and a presumption against the imposition of a custodial sentence. In the first seven months of 2007, in Winnipeg, there were four incidents where persons were killed or seriously injured as a result of being struck by vehicles driven by youth motor vehicle thieves.

In fact, one of the participants in the mission to Ottawa was Kelly Van Camp, a jogger who was deliberately targeted by a youth driving a stolen vehicle, was struck by the vehicle, and was hospitalized with broken bones and serious head injuries. There were further serious injuries and fatalities caused by out-of-control youth car thieves in 2008 and 2009 and there have been circumstances in which the police have been targeted for collisions, both while in their vehicles and while on foot. Although we have had great success in reducing the overall incidence of motor vehicle theft--down by over 75%--we still need amendments to the YCJA to address this problem.

Turning to Bill C-4, although the bill implements some of Manitoba's longstanding YCJA reform recommendations, such as recognizing deterrence and denunciation as valid principles for sentencing young offenders, in other respects it does not address Manitoba's concerns but is actually a step backwards that worsens the ability of the youth justice system to deal with serious out-of-control young offenders. I want to clarify, much like previous speakers, that certainly we do support the intent and the policy thrust behind Bill C-4, but there are serious concerns we have about some of the provisions.

Again, this is going to sound a bit repetitious, and I'm going to try to streamline my comments so I don't repeat the fine comments of colleagues to my left. Manitoba definitely shares their view that there are three key problems with Bill C-4. The first one is the amendments related to pre-trial detention, the second is the amendments related to adult sentences, and the third is the amendments related to deferred custody sentences.

I should also note that those three concerns have also been identified and championed in terms of trying to find a solution by the western Attorneys General and Solicitors General in Canada.

In terms of pre-trial detention, instead of eliminating the presumption against pre-trial detention outright, Bill C-4 actually creates what is in effect a mandatory release provision that prevents judges from denying bail for offences that do not fall within the new limited category of serious offences and offences such as committing an indecent act, damage to property, theft of a vehicle worth less than $5,000. Unless Bill S-9 is passed and proclaimed—it creates a new offence—violating bail conditions or other court orders, or escaping from custody or failing to return to a custody facility when required to do so, regardless of how many times this conduct is repeated, won't fall within the definition. At a minimum, the definition of “serious offence” in Bill C-4 needs to be removed or changed to allow a broader range of offences to be considered for denial of bail and thereby prevent re-offending with impunity.

In terms of the adult sentencing provisions, Manitoba shares the view expressed today that Bill C-4 goes beyond what is necessary to address the Supreme Court of Canada's concerns in the R. v. D.B. case and that the proposed new proof beyond a reasonable doubt standard for determining when an adult sentence should be imposed will make obtaining an adult sentence virtually impossible except in the rarest of cases. The adult sentence provision of Bill C-4 should be amended to remove the reasonable doubt standard of proof requirement and restore the existing list of factors in terms of providing guidance to the court about when an adult sentence should be imposed, such as age, maturity, background and prior record of the offender, and circumstances of the offence. All of those should be considered by the court in determining whether an adult sentence should be imposed.

In terms of deferred custody, Manitoba's view—and again, this is the same as my colleagues' from Alberta and Nova Scotia—is that there is no justification for allowing the YCJA equivalent of conditional sentences to be available for serious violent offences that are now excluded from consideration. Doing so jeopardizes both public safety and public confidence in the justice system. Bill C-4 should be changed to ensure that the deferred custody sentences remain unavailable for situations in which a young person causes or attempts to cause serious bodily harm. Also, at the very least, there is a need for consistency with the legislation on the adult side in relation to where conditional sentences are prohibited.

In conclusion, I would ask the committee to give serious consideration to the concerns I have identified about Bill C-4 and to amend the bill to rectify them before the bill proceeds any further.

Thank you, and I will take whatever questions you have.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague, the deputy House leader for the Official Opposition, for her questions.

When I get into addressing the issue of the upcoming government legislation that I intend to call, I will make reference to Bill C-34, which was her first additional question. The other question dealt with private member's Bill C-391 and the report that came back from the committee about that legislation. I am sure the member is well aware of the process of private members' business. It has nothing to do with the government business and therefore those negotiations and consultations will take place between yourself, Mr. Speaker, and the sponsor of that legislation.

We will continue today with the opposition motion. Tomorrow we will call Bill C-2, the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement, which is at third reading.

I would also like to designate pursuant to Standing Order 66(2) tomorrow as the day to complete the debate on the motion to concur in the third report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

Next week we will hopefully complete all stages of Bill C-34, Creating Canada's New National Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 Act. I would like to thank the opposition parties for their support of that legislation and for allowing it to pass expeditiously when we do call it.

There may also be some interest to do something similar for Bill C-24, First Nations Certainty of Land Title Act; Bill S-5, ensuring safe vehicles; and Bill S-9, tracking auto theft and property crime act.

I would also like to complete the remaining stages of Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

In addition to those bills, I would call Bill C-23, Eliminating Pardons for Serious Crimes Act; Bill S-2, Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act; and Bill C-22, Protecting Children from Online Sexual Exploitation Act.

I would also like to announce that on Monday we will be having a take note debate on the subject of the measures being taken to address the treatment of multiple sclerosis. I will be moving the appropriate motion at the end of my statement.

Pursuant to Standing Order 66(2) I would like to designate Tuesday, June 15, as the day to conclude debate on the motion to concur in the first report of the Standing Committee on International Trade.

Finally, I would like to designate Thursday, June 17, as the last allotted day.

At this time I will be making a number of motions and asking for the unanimous consent of the House for them, starting with the take note debate motion.

Tackling Theft and Property Crime Act

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

moved for leave to introduce Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime).

(Motion agreed to and bill read the first time)

Message from the Senate

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

I have the honour to inform the House that messages have been received from the Senate informing the House that the Senate has passed the following bills to which the concurrence of the House is desired: Bill S-5, An Act to amend the Motor Vehicle Safety Act and the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999; Bill S-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (auto theft and trafficking in property obtained by crime).

It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre, Maternal Health; the hon. member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley, Oil and Gas Industry; the hon. member for Vancouver Quadra, Vancouver 2010 Winter Games.