Francis Scarpaleggia

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, April 30th, 2013]

Fortunately, I have the defence critic sitting next to me here. He is a fine defence critic and knows the bill inside out. He has been briefing members of our caucus with great skill and knowledge of the bill.

We have the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff who can intervene in any disciplinary process. I would like members, especially members of the NDP, to look at the parallel with the RCMP and the Commissioner of the RCMP. There is a complaints process within the RCMP in cases where an RCMP member has been found to have violated the code of conduct. However, the Commissioner of the RCMP does not have a right to get involved in that investigation.

The members opposite say it is very important that the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff has that right because he can bring the operational context to bear in the investigative process. However, the same could be said for the Commissioner of the RCMP. The argument could be made that he or she should have the right to intervene because he or she could bring some operational context into the process. There is a contradiction here. In the case of the RCMP, the Commissioner cannot intervene. In the case of the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff, he or she can intervene. I do not quite understand why the distinction.

Let me read a quote regarding the danger of this right to intervene, which I am told is a new right that did not exist in preceding years. This is from testimony before the defence committee by Mr. Peter Tinsley, the former chair of the Military Police Complaints Commission. He said:

My very brief summary submission is that if Bill C-15 is passed into law in its present form, inclusive of the new subsection 18.5(3) authorizing the VCDS to interfere with police operations and investigations, it will be inconsistent with the principles of police independence as recognized by the Supreme Court of Canada a[s] late as 1999 as underpinning the rule of law, as well as run counter to the norms of police-government relations, certainly in Canada, and I can tell you internationally in developed countries, which recognize the importance of police independence and prohibit police service boards or similar executive bodies from giving directions regarding specific police operations.

This is a very interesting quote. We like to compare ourselves to other countries, which is proper because we can learn from what is being done elsewhere, as other countries can learn from us.

I would mention that in other countries, they appear to have understood that the military justice system needs to change. We cannot just say that it has always been like that since time immemorial, and therefore it should remain like that. Maybe some people can say that, but that is not the Liberal perspective on things.

Justice Gilles Létourneau, in providing criticism of the summary trial system, which remains, as I said, largely unaddressed in Bill C-15, said the following:

This form of trial has been found to be unconstitutional in 1997 by the European Court of Human Rights because it did not meet the requirements of independence and impartiality set out in Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. As a result of this decision and others, the British Parliament enacted legislation which now provides guarantees to an accused soldier. These provisions include the following:

(a) the accused may be represented by counsel; (b) the accused is entitled to an Appeal to the newly created Summary Appeal Court; (c) the Summary Appeal Court is presided by civilian judge, assisted by two military members who are officers or warrant officers; and (d) as a general rule, imprisonment or service detention cannot be imposed where the offender is not legally represented in that court or in a court martial.

In our system, not only does the accused have to stand through the whole process, and not only is there no transcription of the process, but the accused does not have the right to legal counsel. That sounds pretty retrograde to me. That just does not sound like modern Canada to me.

All of that having been said, I will say that there has been one improvement to the system that would be brought by Bill C-15. That would be, of course, security of tenure for military judges so that they feel that they can exercise their independence. As a result of Bill C-15, military judges would have security of tenure until they reached the retirement age of 60 or until they were removed for cause on the recommendation of an inquiry committee or if they resigned.

This bill would also allow for the appointment of part-time military judges, which I suppose sounds like a fairly good idea if the caseload is not high enough to have full-time judges or if full-time judges need some supplementary help. Why not use part-time military judges? I do not see a problem with that.

All in all, we cannot support this bill. We have been consistent in our voting throughout the process. We have not voted against it at second reading only to flip and vote for it at third reading even after all our amendments have been rejected.

I think consistency is important in this place. I am proud to say that we will continue with our previous line of argument, and we will continue to not support this bill.

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, April 30th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I have the distinct pleasure of rising for the second day in a row to discuss and debate Bill C-15 on the military justice system.

I would like to begin by saying that, philosophically, the founding tenet of liberalism is that we never accept the status quo if there is no good reason to do so. In other words, a Liberal will never say that something must be done a certain way just because it has always been done that way and for no other reason.

In some debates on the military justice system, people rely heavily on that line of reasoning. They say that it is a different system and that it has always been different. They say that military culture has been around for thousands of years, that that is how it works, and that it should continue to work that way. That is not good enough for a Liberal.

I would like to continue with what I was saying yesterday about how a soldier is a fully fledged citizen who has the same rights as any other citizen. Soldiers are simply citizens who have decided to dedicate themselves to their country, to wear the uniform with pride and to serve either in conflict zones overseas or here in Canada when they are called to help communities cope with natural disasters, for example.

The soldier's role and place in society has changed a lot. As I was saying yesterday, there was a time when soldiers were either slaves or mercenaries. Members of the society they served did not respect them. They may have had no choice but to do as they were told because they were slaves or mercenaries. That is no longer the case; society has changed.

Soldiers today stand up for their rights. We see that every day. The person sitting next to me is the Liberal critic for veterans affairs. He has risen several times in the House to ask the government why it is not treating veterans fairly on many fronts, including its efforts to claw back disability pensions.

Soldiers know that they have rights and they are ready to stand up for those rights. Modern soldiers expect society to grant them the same rights as any other citizen. This bill maintains a justice system apart from the one that we civilians enjoy as members of society.

I want to share a quote from a witness who testified in committee. The witness in question, retired colonel Michel Drapeau, has been quoted many times during debate today and yesterday. During his testimony, he said:

...someone accused before a summary trial has no right to appeal either the verdict or the sentence... [He does not have] the right to counsel, the presence of rules of evidence, and the right to appeal.

As we have heard many times, soldiers are made to stand for the entire trial. In addition, there is no transcript that could be used for appeal.

Colonel Drapeau went on to say:

In Canada, these rights do not exist in summary trials, not even for a decorated veteran, yet a Canadian charged with a summary conviction offence in civilian court, such as Senator Patrick Brazeau, enjoys all of these rights. So does someone appearing in a small claims court or in a traffic court.

In other words, I have more rights than a soldier who is accused of speeding. However, this person willingly chose to join the armed forces and to serve Canadian society.

There are big differences between the military justice system and the civilian justice system. I understand and accept that the military justice system is a separate system and must always be unique, but I am not sure that the differences should be so drastic. That makes me very uncomfortable with this bill.

It may be because the military justice system is not as open as the civilian justice system, but there is something else I want to point out. I heard that 98% of trials end in a guilty verdict. In other words, the accused is found guilty 98% of the time. That seems high to me.

This raises some questions about the nature of the military justice system and about whether we should make more significant changes than what is proposed in Bill C-15.

The government needs to recognize that society in general, but specifically in this case, the legal system, is a system of interrelated aspects, that is in a kind of delicate balance. What may have been acceptable a couple of years ago, before this bill, may no longer be acceptable because a certain important change has been brought to another aspect of the legal system making the current system less fair for military personnel accused of wrongdoing.

Of course, I am talking about the fact that the government has removed from the legal system the possibility of obtaining a pardon and erasing a record based on continued good behaviour after a mistake has been made. When that is taken away, all of a sudden the fact that the military justice system is less fair becomes a bigger problem.

Now, if someone is falsely accused and found guilty, based on a trial process that has not respected the principles of fairness and justice that exist, even for someone who gets a speeding ticket, then that the person is really stuck. The individual would have no recourse, and that would impede his or her ability to perhaps obtain gainful employment after leaving the military.

We recognize now that many former servicemen and servicewomen suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. However, this is something that was not recognized a few years ago, and it was certainly not recognized after the Second World War.

We are talking about people coming out of the military who may have gotten into trouble because of post-traumatic stress disorder and now they cannot get a pardon. They are out of the military, trying to find a job and may be having trouble adapting to the demands of employment. Not only that, they are dragging this offence around, which they cannot have pardoned. Therefore, we have a whole new set of problems that flow out of this situation of unfairness.

We have to understand that society has changed. We have PTSD, which is something we did not understand a few years ago. Therefore, this creates a problem that is perhaps going to get worse because of not having properly thought through Bill C-15.

There is a delicate balance, but the government has upset that balance in the judicial system by making certain changes that it thought might have some value for it politically.

I would like to speak to the issue of the VCDS. I can never remember what that stands for. The vice chair of disciplinary services, is that correct?

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, April 29th, 2013]

I apologize, Mr. Speaker. I should have known better. I have been in this House long enough to know that.

Mr. Speaker, there was a time when soldiers held a very different position in society. I know that the hon. member for Ajax—Pickering, who no doubt studied history, understands that the role of the military in society has evolved over time. There was probably a time, and he probably knows better than I, when the military was considered somehow on the bottom rungs of society, perhaps there were slaves in the military, and they did not enjoy the same rights as those who governed society or as those who practised other trades.

However, society has evolved and now members of the military, to quote another individual, are equals in society. They are citizens who wear the uniform and show a great deal of commitment to the values upon which this country is based, a commitment so strong that they are prepared to put their lives on the line to promote and to defend those values around the world.

Members of the military are equal members of society. They have a right to the same protections under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and we owe them a great deal.

Let us talk a bit about changing attitudes and about morale.

We know that if we want our men and women in the military, who are volunteers, who put themselves in harm's harm, to do their best for our country, if we want them to protect us with the commitment that they show every day, it is important that they feel respected by society, that they feel they are respected by us, that they are respected under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In this sense, we are talking about enlightened self-interest. It is in our enlightened self-interest to ensure that members of the military have the morale, that they feel the respect that will allow them to do the best job they can on our behalf.

I will get a bit more into the detail of the bill, and it is not all bad. Not every part of the bill is bad. I would remind the House that the bill came out of a process that involved the House of Commons and the Senate. I would like to touch a little on the background of the bill.

The bill originated from recommendations made in a report by the Rt. Hon. Antonio Lamer, the late former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, as well as from recommendations contained in a report by the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, entitled, “Equal Justice: Reforming Canada's System of Court Martials”.

I would like to underscore the word “equal”, equal justice, in the title of the Senate report. I think this is very important in the context of today's debate because this is really what we are standing up for today, on this side of the House. We are standing up for equality and fair treatment of those like the hon. member for Winnipeg North, like the hon. member for Westmount—Ville-Marie, like the hon. Senator Roméo Dallaire, who have committed themselves to protecting this country from what is obviously a very dangerous world, at times.

I think I will end on that note.

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, April 29th, 2013]

--his caucus for the first time, as leader of the party. That was a fine day.

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, April 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to talk about one of the points that my colleague just raised. He spoke about the role of the House of Commons within our Canadian democracy. It is a place where anyone can bring up ideas related to the topic of debate.

I am not a member of the Standing Committee on National Defence. We have an extremely competent critic who is a member of the committee. I was therefore not fully aware of the issue raised by Bill C-15. I had heard about this bill and I had heard that it left a lot to be desired. However, I was not able to examine the issue before the bill made it to the House and we had a chance to examine it more closely.

This once again highlights what an important role the House of Commons plays in our country's democracy. I congratulate our dear colleague who just spoke for bringing up that point.

I would also like to say something about my colleague from Winnipeg North.

I remember when the member for Winnipeg North joined the House of Commons not long ago after a very exciting by-election win in Winnipeg. He brought tremendous experience as a provincial legislator to that race and then to Parliament. I remember being very impressed by his oratorical skills, his ability to speak in Parliament and to get right to the core of an issue so that we could better understand what was at stake in any debate. When I learned that he had been a member of the armed forces I doubly appreciated his public service and what he has done for this country. He joins two eminent Canadians, one of whom is sitting to my left, the member of Parliament for Westmount—Ville-Marie, who also was a member of the military. Not only was he Canada's first astronaut in space, but he was also a member of the naval forces and used his skills and knowledge as an engineer to support that arm of the armed forces. In the Senate we have Senator Roméo Dallaire, a great military man, a great Canadian, a great internationalist, and of course a great Liberal. We have on this side of the House a fair amount of depth when it comes to discussing military issues. I am proud to say that I belong to this caucus.

The government has for years disparaged the opposition by saying that it does not support the military. In any crisis or any situation where the military was discussed with a certain amount of intensity, the government never missed a beat in questioning the esteem with which all members of the House, including members of the opposition, hold members of our military, not only veterans but currently serving members.

I ask members to look south of the border for one minute. I wonder if they can recall a time when, in a crisis or in any other situation, the military has been used as a partisan weapon by one party to attack another. In a crisis, have we heard presidents say members of the other party do not respect the military, do not believe in the military, do not have the best interests of the military at heart? I do not hear that from south of the border, yet that is supposed to be a society so much more divided than ours, so much more polarized than ours.

Government members talk a good game when they talk about supporting the military, but when it comes time to give charter rights to members of the military, they do not talk about such things but rather gloss over them.

I would remind hon. members that two weeks ago was the 31st anniversary of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That anniversary day coincided with the day that the new Liberal leader, Justin Trudeau, met with--

[Business of Supply, April 25th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Canadian Heritage talked about the Canadian public rejecting certain ideas and so on but, if I recall, the Conservative Party, especially when Mr. Obama was on the rise, embraced the idea of carbon markets, and people voted for it. Therefore, it seems to me that the Canadian public was supporting the kinds of policies that would help combat climate change. It is just that the Conservatives did not deliver. What would the member say to that?

[Business of Supply, April 25th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, it is all about trust. The question really comes down to whether we can trust the Conservative government to do the right thing when it comes to promoting sustainable development.

A couple of years ago the opposition was saying that we have a problem in the oil sands in that the oil sands were polluting the Athabasca watershed. For many months members of the government said that if there was bitumen in the Athabasca River, it was from natural causes.

Then Dr. David Schindler did some research, and we launched a study at the environment committee to look into the problem. Two years later, the government was forced to do a 180° turn. This leads us to believe that the government needs to be pushed up against the wall before it will acknowledge there is a problem with sustainable development and act on it.

Could my colleague tell me why we should trust the government to do the right thing? Anything it does, it does begrudgingly.

[National Victims of Crime Awareness Week, April 23rd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with a heavy heart, yet at the same time with necessary hope, to mark National Victims of Crime Awareness Week.

Across the country, events are being held to raise public awareness about the hurt and loss that results when a criminal act targets an innocent individual. This hurt and loss reaches beyond the known victim, as he or she is a loved one—father, mother, brother, sister, friend.

This week offers all of us, especially legislators, the opportunity to reflect on the place of victims in our legal system and whether we have done enough to assist them on the arduous road on which they find themselves in search of healing and justice.

There is a particular poignancy to this year's National Victims of Crime Awareness Week in light of the tragedy of Rehtaeh Parsons, and of course, of last week's terrible events in Boston. The days that follow should also remind us that we must do our utmost to ensure public safety so as to reduce victimization in Canada.

[Combating Terrorism Act, April 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, what is encouraging is that our public security and safety agencies are working very well at investigating threats. We saw that in the events that unfolded earlier today. They are working well together and working well with agencies in the United States. As the House will recall, it was not always the case that agencies worked well together. In 2001, one of the problems was that the FBI was not talking to the CIA and the Department of Transportation in the United States.

Great progress has been made, and hopefully we will not need to use the measures in this bill because our security agencies are doing such a good job. However, it is a good insurance policy to have in case the existing tool box does not serve every situation well.

[Combating Terrorism Act, April 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member brings a great deal of legal knowledge and deep thinking to all of the debates in the House that he takes part in.

In terms of preventative arrests, there are other cases where that can take place, for example under section 810 of the Criminal Code, if someone is threatening domestic violence or sexual aggression.

There was a court case recently, which I mentioned in my speech, Regina v. Hall, where the issue of preventative arrest was brought up in the context of a bail hearing. My understanding is that Bill S-7 responds somewhat to some of the points made in that judgment. However, that judgment upheld the notion of preventative arrest in certain cases.