Thanks for coming, everyone.
There's one statistic that I'm pretty well aware of. We talk a lot about statistics here, wanting information. I've been here 13 years, and some of my other colleagues have been here as long as I have. We'll remember some stats.
I remember in early 1994, somewhere around then--I know Mr. Lee would be well aware of this--there was a woman by the name of Priscilla de Villiers, who was the president of victims of crime. We tabled over two million signatures--2,400,000, if I'm not mistaken--in this Parliament to clamp down on criminals and get tough on crime. Ever since that petition was tabled there have been hundreds and hundreds, thousands and thousands more signatures all indicating the same thing.
Those are stats that we have records of, petitions that have come to this place. Those people who are petitioning this government to do something about it are the taxpayers out there paying for a system that they're very disappointed in. That's a stat that nobody can argue with.
Not only that, these victim organizations are gaining numbers in membership every day that we prolong it. It isn't decreasing, because the people who are paying for the system are not being satisfied.
Bill C-41 was an attempt to answer that, and I think everybody pretty well liked the idea of making this kind of bill happen. Of course, as you said, Mr. Cannavino, it turned into the rule instead of the exception.
Mr. Altimas, I'm really surprised to hear the statement from you that just because a person did a violent crime, it doesn't mean he is violent. I'm sure glad I didn't take that attitude when I was principal of a school, because when a child committed a violent act against another child, it immediately told me that if this person is capable of committing such an event, he obviously would be capable of doing it again some time in the future. So you have to take action.
I agree with Mr. Elliott. There's another stat. Go to any penitentiary and ask the warden what their policy on drugs is. Zero tolerance; that's the policy. Isn't that what you always hear when you go to a penitentiary?