Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) Committee on Nov. 1st, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Okay, thanks.

Just as we move forward, I know that you presented that, Madame Jennings, and either the witnesses didn't have a chance--I don't know whether you were asking a question or putting it forward--but I can't give you the time to respond, obviously. But if one of the next questioners wants to give you the capacity to do that, of course they're free to do so.

Monsieur Petit.

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Cooper and Mr. Muise, for joining us.

Mr. Cooper, this is the first opportunity I have had to hear you testify about a proposed piece of federal legislation. Thank you.

I quite liked the comparison that you drew. You stated that since leaving the police force, your income has declined. There's a saying in Quebec that if you want to demote a police officer, from a salary standpoint, you give him a job as a Crown attorney.

Mr. Cooper, I'd like to hear your views on something that's very important to me. Like Mr. Muise, you said that you read the bill yesterday. In your opinion, will Bill C-2, as tabled by the government, resolve—and I use the word cautiously—the problem of violence against women?

In Quebec, as in your home province and elsewhere in Canada, there have been many reported cases of repeated violence against women. In the past, there was no possibility of declaring the perpetrator a dangerous offender or some such thing, and after a while, he would end up killing his spouse. Two or three famous cases come to mind, including one in your province. Can this bill help us to resolve this very real problem in both of our provinces?

Elsewhere, Mr. Cooper, do you also believe that this bill will help to address the problem of child abuse? I'm thinking here about abuse of a sexual nature, among other things. Sexual predators manage to slip through the cracks and at some point, they must be caught.

Since you have read the bill and since you may be required to work within its parameters, do you believe that it will help to address these two major problems, namely violence against women and child abuse?

[Terrance Cooper]

There are several provisions, as I mentioned at the outset, that provide me as a practitioner with significant assistance in terms of bringing forward to the court all of the information that the court needs to make a decision. So in that sense, of course the bill is quite helpful. And because it's more helpful, it will undoubtedly enable us to deal with more cases. So the answer to your question in both respects should be yes. That is a good prediction of what should happen, in effect.

The number of cases will no doubt change somewhat. I don't know that it will be a dramatic change. It does assist us in bringing forward particularly the assessment provision for the breach of long-term supervision order. That is an enormous assist.

What I haven't mentioned to the committee yet is that you may be under the impression that these assessments are conducted in an institution. Five years ago, that would have been the case. When I first gained an interest in these cases, almost all of them were done in an institution. We would get reports not just from the psychiatrist but also from the psychologist, the nurses' notes, from the recreationalist, from the master's of social work people. We'd have a very comprehensive report. Now in Ontario there are only two locations that offer beds at all--the Royal Ottawa Hospital on occasion, and I think there are two beds, for the entire province of Ontario, available at Penetanguishene.

So the vast majority of our cases, if not well in excess of 95%, are assessed at the jail in perhaps a four-hour interview. That's a long way from where we were five years ago. The facilities are simply not there at present. I just wanted to clarify that. The ground we're gaining is sometimes compromised by the reality of what's available to us in the community.

On the whole, I think the assistance rendered to us as practitioners will move us forward significantly. In terms of providing the material to the court, what the court does with it is, of course, the court's call. The best we can do as crown attorneys--and as defence counsel, for that matter--is to assist the court as fully as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Mr. Comartin.

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

With regard to the last response we got from Mr. Muise, I should point out to him and to the committee that the province of British Columbia has a marriage age of 16. So the point he is making is irrelevant, quite frankly, to the actual situation. What is going on in that particular community in B.C. is about polygamy; it's about sexual abuse, if one accepts the facts, or at least the allegations of facts, on the surface. This change in law would not change anything at all with regard to that community.

[John Muise]

In response to that, I understand that it's based on the provincial age that is allowed for marriage in each province, in each territory. I used Bountiful simply because we know it's happening.

I would say two things here. One, all of these things are interlinked--child abuse, polygamy, and older men wanting to marry 14- and 15-year-olds. So with respect to Mr. Comartin dismissing my comments because it wouldn't apply in B.C., I don't think Bountiful, B.C., is the only place where this is going to happen. It could happen anywhere in Canada. I used Bountiful because this is one we know about.

I think my overarching point is that we don't need this section because the end result will be used by those who can in whatever provinces allow marriage of 14- and 15-year-olds.

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

That yet again demonstrates a sore lack of knowledge of the law. In those territories--because none of the provinces have an age of marriage under 16--you're not allowed to marry under the age of 16 unless you either have the permission of the provincial attorney general or some minister, or you have a court order.

So Mr. Muise's comments are in fact irrelevant. That section was put in there...and in fact it should have been broader. I had pushed for an even broader amendment.

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, I'm going on about this just so that the new members of the committee, those who weren't in on the round when we did Bill C-22, will understand.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Yes.

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

The reason it was put in there was to avoid the constitutional conflict that we were inevitably going to run into between the provinces and the federal government.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Thank you.

Mr. Muise.

[John Muise]

Thank you, Mr. Comartin. I am aware of the fact that there are these other requirements, including consent. My point is simple. Other than the transition law, I don't understand how it is that we will be protecting 14- and 15-year-olds. At the end of the day, whether there's attorney general consent or indeed consent of parents in a particular community, how are we advancing protection of 14- and 15-year-olds with regard to a decision that quite frankly they're not capable of making, notwithstanding these other protections or however you would refer to them?

I think it's a philosophical issue, and I think it is a section of the bill that somebody is going to use, and at the end of the day they're going to use it in such a way that a child who is 14 or 15 years old, who is not even close to making these kinds of decisions, is going to be violated. Those are my concerns, and I think we're going to see it happen.

Obviously I support this bill; I support the passage of the bill with or without it. I'm asking the committee at large to remove that section. That's the point I'd like to make.

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

Perhaps I would suggest to Mr. Muise that he go to law school, and maybe then he would understand the significance of this section.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

I would like to call an end to the debate here, because--

[John Muise]

I understand the significance of the section, and I'll take Mr. Comartin's comments as they were intended.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Mr. Keddy.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

I have a comment on the exploitation of 14-year-olds for profit or for dollars or with the intent of sexual coercion. I will certainly go back and look over the notes on Bill C-22 on the age of protection, and read up on what the committee had to say on it and educate myself on the issue, but you don't have to be a lawyer to know the difference between right and wrong, and I've always found that pretty handy in life.

That's simply a comment; I'm not asking for a comment from our witnesses on that.

I would like to thank our witnesses for being here today.

Ms. Jennings raised an issue about Mr. Callow. I will read the report that she has there. I will ask for that. However, I would like to hear our witnesses' opinion on that case and the designation or lack of designation of dangerous offender.

[John Muise]

Regarding Ms. Jennings' comments, as a retired police officer, I accept that there is another side to this, but I raise Mr. Callow for a couple of reasons. I know that the committee likes to focus on case studies or on those the legislation actually applies to, as opposed to bringing up something that has no applicability. I think Mr. Callow, who has two previous offences that are primary designated, is precisely the person. So, hey, if Mr. Callow is somebody other than his four years for rape and his 20 years for sexual assault, and the fact that he was among the 1% or 1.5% of the population in prison who are gated until the very last day of his sentence would show, and he carries on, that's wonderful. Nothing would make this witness happier, and I'm certain nothing would make anybody in this room happier. I think the point is that Mr. Callow is somebody who would be captured by this legislation, both with respect to the third predicate offence if he committed another primary designated offence, and because he would also be subject to the terms of the new section 810, which would allow for two years instead of one, and also allow for broader protective measures with respect to section 810, whether it's electronic monitoring or residency or any number of the good conditions suggested.

I raised him because he applies. If he doesn't commit another crime between now and whenever he passes from this world, that will be a good thing. Hopefully, we'll have a section 810 order that lasts two years, and if we need it we can use it. If he does commit another offence, this section will be available for the likes of Mr. Callow.

I have one last thing. If you accept that if you identify this small minority of offenders who commit a disproportionate number of serious violent crimes, and these are precisely the kinds of people we should be incapacitating, then if this legislation allows for one, five, ten, or twenty more dangerous offenders being declared every year--and I think those are probably the numbers we're going to see--that will result in one, five, ten, or twenty dangerous persons being off the streets if they're given indeterminate sentences or incapacitated, and people won't be victimized by those kinds of individuals.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Cooper.

[Terrance Cooper]

I don't know enough about the Callow decision to make an intelligent comment, but I'd like to make this point. Dangerous offenders, of course, do in fact get released. They become eligible for release on day parole four years after they have been arrested, and they become eligible for release on full parole seven years after their arrest date, assuming they've been kept in custody, as most of them have. Those are dangerous offenders I'm speaking of, not long-term offenders. The average release date of those who do get released--and not nearly all of them get released--is approximately 13 years. That's the evidence, I've been told, which, curiously, is the same average release date time for an individual who is serving a life sentence with a 10-year minimum parole eligibility. Those individuals typically convicted of second-degree murder are on average released at the 13-year mark, if they are in fact released. There is at least one and maybe two dangerous offenders here in Ottawa now who are on release. One of them seems to be rehabilitated--the one I know about--and maybe they both are.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Thank you, Mr. Keddy.

Just in the interest of trying to make sure everyone has an opportunity to speak here, I would ask Mr. Harris if he would like to use his five minutes now.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Muise, I'd like to go back to the age of protection section, which we were discussing recently. I'd like to submit, notwithstanding the comments of Mr. Comartin, that while the age of consent in many provinces and territories is 16, there do exist provisions that would circumvent that age of 16. If indeed we are to honour the title of this portion, “age of protection”...we are seeking to protect children from sexual predators. One has to assume, given the nature of sexual predators, that they know about the provisions in law now that bypass the age of 16, and given the nature of their character, they are probably already thinking about or seeking ways to use those provisions.

I see this part of the bill, which I guess kind of recognizes the marriage thing, as a possible tool that a predator could in fact use. I submit that if we are to truly seek to provide an age of protection of a minimum of 16 for children, to protect them from sexual predators, then we have a responsibility--I agree with you, I believe we have a responsibility--through the use of this bill, to delete a part of it that could be used as a tool by a sexual predator--

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

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

We have a point of order. This won't use up your time, Mr. Harris.

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

Given the statements Mr. Harris is making about the possibility of circumventing the law in terms of the age for marriage, I would request that we ask Carole Morency to come back. She testified before a committee in June that the only case where someone under the age of 16 is able to marry is if they go before a judge. She gave the exact provinces and territories where that's permitted and made the statement that in all other places there is no exception.

So I would like to have--

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Thank you, Madam Jennings. It's not a point of order; it's a request to have an additional witness placed on the list. We will certainly take that into consideration, but it's not a point of order.