Mr. Speaker, I share the sentiment that there is a lot more we can do to prevent crime.
My question for the member is not a personal question of where he was but where his party was. When the legislation was passed in 1996, it was a Liberal government. It was around the time I first joined the police board and the problems with the witness protection program have been known since at least 1996. During that very long period of time when the Liberals were in power, they took no action. I know from my own personal experience that local municipal police officers were pointing out that they did not have budgets for this and they could not make use of the program.
My question to the hon. member is, in the broad sense, where was he and where was his party? The government has been slow to bring this forward but it is certainly faster than the Liberals were.