Public Safety Committee on March 24th, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Marshall.

We'll move into the first round of questioning.

Mr. Holland, you have seven minutes.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I think what's difficult about this issue is that there are a lot of folks who are lumped into this bill.

Now, the history of it is that we dealt with Bill C-23A, and that's something Parliament did collaboratively, at the end of last June, to find a compromise. I think all parties believed there was a case for reform and changes needed to be made. Arguably, they should have been made many years ago.

The concern we have now is that in questioning the minister, and in fact in questions even from Conservative members, there's an acknowledgement that this is trapping a lot of folks it did not intend to.

Mr. Lemcke, maybe I'll pose this question to you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Ask through the chair.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

It's the first day we're doing this, Chair. I guess I'm getting used to your new system after all these years.

So through you, Mr. Chair, you had somebody, as an example, before this committee, who was a victim of the residential school program, who made some mistakes as an 18-year-old. These were not sexual assaults. The person has been crime-free for many years and now is a leader in his community who is making a difference by helping people in aboriginal communities lift up out of the situation. It is somebody who dealt with terrible abuse in his lifetime. This bill would stop him from getting a pardon. It would mean that he wouldn't be able to get a good job. It would mean that he's not able to travel to other places.

We also heard testimony that for somebody--an 18-year-old mother, as an example--who made a bad decision and wrote four or five bad cheques, that would be four or five offences. She similarly would be hit by this legislation and would not be given another chance.

What bothers me is that Conservative members in committee will express sympathy for witnesses who express this viewpoint, and the minister will even express sympathy. He said here in committee that change needs to be made. And then he will stand in the House and say that I stand for sex offenders because I asked those questions. It's outrageously dishonest.

I guess I would ask if you would agree with me that those portions of the bill that in particular deal with the folks I've just described need to change before we pass this legislation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Holland.

Go ahead, Mr. Lemcke.

[D/Chief Cst Warren Lemcke]

I think, Mr. Chair, that it is one portion of the bill that could be looked at. But I want to expand on that a little bit by saying that you can't just look at the individual. There are many factors that have to be considered, including the fact that the individual may have been given absolute or conditional discharges before a conviction on an indictable offence. You also have to look at the reality that with many chronic offenders, they commit 10 offences before they're ever convicted. They'll do 10, then get convicted for one.

Having said that, there's a lot more you have to look at. You have to look at the individuals and their entire contact with the criminal justice system and the police. Having said that, I have met people in my 26 years of policing who have turned around.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Well, Chair, in fact, we know that the rate of violent recidivism in Canada is less than 1%. The point is that I think when we're crafting this, we have to be careful, because these are real people. And we have to remember this after a lot of years of no instances of any repeat offences.

You have somebody like the gentleman we heard here, not just the fellow who went through the abuse of the residential school program, but somebody who all committee members acknowledged was doing fantastic work as an entrepreneur, as a taxpaying citizen, who said that he can't grow his business because he can't go to the United States if he doesn't get a pardon. He is somebody who was selling steroids. Clearly it was a mistake, but clearly he is somebody who's reformed and is now an advocate for making people better. Why would we throw brick walls in front of people--and maybe this can be to the other witnesses--who clearly have turned a corner? Why would we seek to block them from becoming good, taxpaying citizens? Why would we block them from growing their businesses or helping other aboriginal youth to make sure they don't make the same mistakes? I mean, that's what this bill is doing in different parts today. That's what I'm saying here. Absolutely.

Frankly, a number of years ago, there were elements we could have tightened. The argument I'm making on pardons is that we should make sure we're not throwing brick walls in front of those folks who deserve another chance, who made mistakes when they were 18 and 19 but deserve their shot at redemption. That's fundamentally what rehabilitation in our incarceration system is about, is it not?

[D/Chief Cst Warren Lemcke]

That is correct, as long as you look at the entire picture and ask how many absolute discharges there were and how many conditional discharges there were. What were the crimes? They might have been crimes of violence. They might have been property crimes. They might have done 40 residential B and Es.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

But I guess my point is--

[D/Chief Cst Warren Lemcke]

If I could just finish, Mr. Chair, as long as we're looking at the entire picture, you can't just say more than three.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Chair, he's making my point.

When you look at the fact that you're saying that we have to look at the circumstances, we have to look at the individual cases, this bill kills that. This bill removes that possibility. It blankets a rule across the entire spectrum. There's no possibility of doing what you're saying. Everybody gets caught up in this.

The people we had in committee, who every single member of committee—and if any of the Conservative members have changed their minds about the witnesses they expressed sympathy for, who they felt were doing a good job and had turned their lives around, then please express that. But the point is that it captures everybody. It removes discretion. Is that not something that concerns you?

[D/Chief Cst Warren Lemcke]

It does, Mr. Chair, because I have seen people who have been redeemed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

[D/Chief Cst Warren Lemcke]

Mr. Chair, I would just add that I am only referring to the topic that was brought up. I'm not referring to child sex offenders.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

This is an important point, Mr. Chair, because every day in the House of Commons I'm attacked as supporting child sex offenders. I've been very clear in this committee that I support the portions of this bill that deal with serious, violent, sexual offences. Let me be equally clear that in a blanket fashion destroying all discretion and throwing walls in front of people who are moving forward with their lives is a mistake, and that's something I won't support, despite the fear-mongering.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Holland.

Madame Mourani.

[Maria Mourani, Bloc, Ahuntsic, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses and welcome.

This bill has two components that trouble me. First, there is the issue of ineligibility. With this bill, it would be impossible to obtain a pardon after three offenses. I am personally opposed to this provision since someone having done three B and Es could certainly be rehabilitated.

However, the part that I am especially interested in is the one making child sex offenders ineligible to pardons--I will still refer to pardons since the name has not been changed yet. I have to admit that I am rather in agreement with that. I believe that paedophile is a disease that cannot be cured.

Here is the question I want to put to Mr. Marshall, an expert in these matters: according to you, is paedophile a disease? If so, can it be cured?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Madame Mourani.

Mr. Marshall.

[Dr. William Marshall]

Mr. Chair, I don't think the concept of a disease is particularly relevant to this issue. Let's set that aside for the moment.

The question is whether they can be rehabilitated in a way that reduces their reoffending. The answer to that question is absolutely, unequivocally clear. There have been two large-scale meta-analyses, for example. Meta-analysis is a statistical procedure for clumping together a whole range of studies and making them essentially into one. One of those studies, by Friedrich Lösel and his colleague, which was published in 2005, had a sample size of 22,000 sexual offenders from around the world, in a variety of studies, representing the average reoffence rate you would expect in the untreated group, about half of the 22,000. The other half, the treated group, had a recidivism rate that was substantially and statistically lower than the untreated group. It was less than half of the reoffence rate of the untreated group. That's across a whole range of treatment programs, some of which I wouldn't think were much good.

It's very clear from that and a variety of other studies that we could--

[Maria Mourani, Bloc, Ahuntsic, QC]

I understand. You are saying that a sex offender who follows a treatment is less likely to reoffend. That would also depend on his involvement in the program.

However, that was not my question. paedophile is a perversion--I will not call it a disease--that can be controlled in some individuals but cannot be cured, as you are perfectly aware, Mr. Marshall.

[Dr. William Marshall]

Well, I'm not perfectly aware of that, in the very first place.

Pedophilia is a diagnostic label. The question that always arises about diagnostic labels is whether they are reliable. That is to say, would two psychiatrists who saw the same client and reviewed the same set of records come to the same conclusion? The answer with respect to pedophilia is no. The disagreement is huge.

You can't talk about whether it's a disease or not if experts can't agree on whether it actually exists in a particular person. It's an irrelevant question.

[Maria Mourani, Bloc, Ahuntsic, QC]

In that case, why is paedophile in the DSM-IV if it is not a disease?

[Dr. William Marshall]

I haven't the faintest idea. I've protested about this. I'm not against anything being in the diagnostic manual so long as it can be demonstrated that it can be diagnosed reliably. The clear case is that it cannot be. The DSM's own committee investigated this and found levels of reliability that were far too low to be acceptable.

[Maria Mourani, Bloc, Ahuntsic, QC]

You talk about the likelihood of reoffending. Is it not true that not reoffending does not necessarily mean that the individual has not committed other offenses? For example, a pedophile who started with killing children and who now does not kill them but only rapes them would be considered a success as far as reoffending is concerned, would he not?

If there is a reduction of harm--for example, if a pedophile who killed a child after having raped him follows a treatment that makes him stop killing children while continuing to rape them--, that would be considered a success as far as reoffending is concerned.

[Dr. William Marshall]

That wouldn't count as a success at all for me. If he reoffends, he reoffends. It would be very interesting if the harm he did was reduced. I would count that as somewhat positive. I don't have any reservations about barring--