Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-17.
I will continue some of the comments my colleagues made about how unfortunate we are to have a Liberal government that pays lip service to the real problems of victims.
I want to relate to an instance that happened in Langley, Aldergrove and Abbotsford, British Columbia. It was shortly after the government brought in Bill C-41 which contained conditional sentences.
We debated conditional sentencing in the House. We indicated that there were some danger signs. We wondered who it would apply to. The government brought in conditional sentencing and disregarded all our comments in the House.
Shortly after Bill C-41 was proclaimed and conditional sentences became a reality, Darren Ursel in my riding met a young lady, a single mother of two, a non-drinker, in a restaurant and convinced her to go for a Coke. When he got her in his car at the back of the restaurant, outside in the parking lot, he quickly locked the door, pushed her back in the seat and ripped her clothes off. He could not get an erection so he reached for his racketball racket and used the handle on her front and back. When he was in court he convinced Judge Harry Boyle he was tender at times. The judge suggested that because it was Darren's first conviction it should be part of the sentence. He also said that Darren Ursel indicated he was sorry for what he did. Judge Harry Boyle went to the justice minister's Bill C-41 and applied conditional sentencing which meant that Darren was allowed to leave the courtroom on the condition that he did not do it again.
In our country today, like we use to have in the fifties, women are now able to be raped and sodomized. The perpetrator is able to walk out the door after the court case. I stand here and say "I told you so" as can many members who sitting in the Reform Party. I remember my hon. colleague from Crowfoot and many of our critics speaking on that matter because they understood the consequences of it.
I was at the appeal hearing. Gertie Pool, a grandmother, obtained 13,000 signatures to debench the judge. It was the Liberal government's fault in the first place. I heard the defence lawyers suggest there were too many people in our prisons and we needed conditional sentences. Therefore Darren Ursel walked away with raping and sodomizing this young lady. That is sick thinking.
In this exercise the Liberal government has moved women back into the closet where they were in the 1950s and 1960s after being raped, because they knew it was useless to go into a courtroom and obtain justice. That is perhaps the saddest point of all.
I tell the people of Ontario, Atlantic Canada, Quebec and western Canada who are listening that this kind of scenario is coming to them. The Liberal government has said that it is okay to rape and sodomize women and that the offender can walk. That is what occurred in my riding and it is damned disgusting, I must say.
There is but one choice to get ridiculous laws like this one off the books, that is to get these people from the House for good. The Reform Party and many victims of violence have been asking for a long time just exactly what are our rights. What exactly are our rights? Every day they approach us and the government, but when they approach the government it unfortunately falls on deaf ears.
Let me give a few good quotes from the legal industry about victims. A defence lawyer said: "Victims want someone else to fix their petty problems".
This kind of attitude that has pervaded the Liberal government for years, making up of much of the legal industry, is wrong. Judicial decisions on the bench in some cases are getting worse. Harry Boyle's decision is an example of that. What is this government going to do about it?
"I do not know what you people are so upset about; 11 children could have just as easily been killed in a bus accident. If they are dead, they are dead". That is a quote made by a prosecutor to parents of children murdered by Clifford Olson.
If that attitude pervades this legal industry and exists in the courts of this land, we as responsible legislators must legislate it out because it is wrong.
"There is no such thing as a victim, it is just a state of mind". A defence lawyer calls that a state of mind. I have worked with many victims since I was elected and I do not think it is a state of mind. But there is a growing passion among these folks to not have other people in the country victimized as they have been. They are not asking for a lot in this country, I do not think. They want the unrestricted right to provide a victim impact statement at a parole board hearing, whether it is oral or written, at a sentencing case or at a judicial review. That is not too much to ask for.
However, the government took the automatic right of victims to submit statements at judicial reviews away from them. Why? Is it just stupidity or is that these members got caught doing it and now we are screaming?
I wish I had more time. I am sure these Liberal members would love to hear more about this so that maybe we could teach them a bit about what is going on in the country. Maybe they could listen and learn.
However, the fact is that this legal system which now pervades what used to be a justice system has got us in trouble. And for the Minister of Justice to stand in the House yesterday and tell me that he has done a lot for victims because he has made amendments to the Criminal Code tells me he does not have one iota of understand of what I am talking about. But he will after this next election, he can be darned sure of that.