House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2015, with 81% of the vote.
Committees of the House November 27th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 54th report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, entitled, “Report 5—Socio-Economic Gaps on First Nations Reserves—Indigenous Services Canada, of the 2018 Spring Reports of the Auditor General of Canada”.
Pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee requests that the government table a comprehensive response to this report.
Auditor General of Canada November 21st, 2018
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals continually brag about their use of the long-form census and their use of evidence, methodology, analytics and data. According to the Auditor General of Canada, they have absolutely nothing to brag about. In fact, they are just plain wrong.
In report after report, the Auditor General has criticized various government departments and agencies saying they had unclear methodologies, they did not establish targets, they did not define performance indicators, they did not use the necessary important and complete data, they did not adequately use data, they did not maintain data, they did not include data, they did not analyze program data.
While the Liberal government allows Statistics Canada to dangerously reach into Canadians' private banking information, Canadians rightfully question what their personal banking data will be used for. That is a good question.
Committees of the House November 19th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 53rd report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, entitled “Report 1—Building and Implementing the Phoenix Pay System”, of the 2018 spring reports of the Auditor General of Canada.
Pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee requests that the government table a comprehensive response to this report.
Veterans Affairs November 8th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, those who served our country deserve our utmost respect, gratitude and support. However, complaint after complaint rolls in about the Liberal government's neglect of veterans and their needs.
My constituent writes, “I am a military veteran...In mid April 2018 Veterans Affairs Canada received all my documents for a reassessment for my disability. And yet, almost 6 months later I still await a decision.... I have no way of knowing whether a decision is 2 months away or a year.”
Why the wait? Why does the government continue to fail our veterans?
Criminal Code November 8th, 2018
Madam Speaker, the former attorney general of Canada is sitting right here.
Very clearly, in the 10 years the Conservatives were in government, we filled those vacancies, and we filled them regularly. Yes, there were always openings, and we filled them as soon as we could. We see hundreds of vacancies now. We see very serious crimes, and criminals walking away because of those positions not being filled. That is one thing we took pride in.
This morning, the parliamentary secretary explained to us why Liberals have not filled those positions. He said it is because there is not a diverse enough population, and they want the top courts to be representative of Canada's population. It is a worthy goal, but it sounds to me like positions are not being filled because they cannot find indigenous people to fill them. I think he mentioned putting members of the LGBTQ community in judge positions. That is the reason there are so many vacancies.
Criminal Code November 8th, 2018
Madam Speaker, that is a very sad question from the member. He stated that we should look at how the Liberals have helped indigenous people, and then he said that they have put billions upon billions of dollars into it. We have a government that believes that throwing billions of dollars at a problem is going to solve it. It is not going to solve the problem. What does the hon. member suggest? He suggests that when there is charge after charge for an indigenous offender, we do not charge that person for all the offences.
With all due respect to the member and the government, I see that as an affront to victims, to the people who have been victimized by those crimes. Liberals are saying that they are going to whittle this down because they think there are too many first nations in our penitentiaries, and they do not want them to have records that are quite so long, unfortunately.
Criminal Code November 8th, 2018
Madam Speaker, it is a real pleasure to speak to Bill C-75, an act to amend the Criminal Code, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and other acts and to make consequential amendments to other acts.
I have real concerns about the legislation, as do many stakeholders, including the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.
First, this is another omnibus bill, containing 302 pages of major reforms to our criminal justice system. For our constituents, that means we need to study 302 pages of legalized legislation. Similar to many other Liberal promises, this is another broken promise, as the Liberals promised not to bring forward omnibus legislation.
It also signals very clearly, the Liberals' reluctance to allow for a thorough review and debate on the modernization of the criminal justice system, including reducing court delays and judicial proceedings, an extremely important debate given the current congestion within our courts, which is resulting in serious offenders having their cases thrown out.
Second, the bill would somehow undo the mandatory victim surcharge that our Conservative government imposed in 2013 under the Increasing Offenders’ Accountability for Victims Act.
The federal victim surcharge is a monetary penalty that is automatically imposed on offenders at the time of their sentencing. Money collected from offenders is intended to help fund programs and services for victims of crime.
We made this surcharge mandatory, recognizing that many judges were routinely deciding not to impose it. While we did recognize that they were doing so with some offenders who lacked the ability to pay, we believed it should be imposed in principle to signify debt owing to a victim.
Like any penalty, fine or surcharge, if people do not have the means to pay, they do not pay. However, it is the principle of the matter, and many times the guilty party does have the ability to pay some retribution to the victim.
The Conservatives strongly believe that the protection of society and the rights of victims should be the central focus in the Canadian criminal justice system rather than special allowances and treatment for criminals. This is why we introduced the Victims Bill of Rights and created the office of the victims ombudsman.
On that note, I would like to thank Sue O'Sullivan for her tremendous efforts on behalf of victims. Ms. O'Sullivan, who retired as the victims ombudsman in November 2017, had a very distinguished career in policing before being appointed to this extremely important position in 2010.
We created the ombudsman's office in 2007 to act as an independent resource for victims to help them navigate through the system and voice concerns about federal policy or legislation.
While we placed such high regard and importance on this office, the prolonged vacancy in fulfilling the position after Ms. O'Sullivan retired demonstrates very clearly what the Liberals think of the office.
In April of this year, more than four months after Ms. O'Sullivan retired, the CBC revealed the frustrations of many victims and victims advocates, including that of Heidi Illingworth, former executive director of the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime.
Ms. Illingworth said:
...the community across Canada feels like they aren't being represented, their issues aren't being put forward to the government of the day...Victims feel that they're missing a voice. The people we work with keep saying, why isn't somebody there? Isn't this office important? Who's speaking for victims... who's bringing their perspectives to the minister?
I would like to congratulate Ms. Illingworth for those sentiments, which I think may influence the government, and also for her appointment on September 24 as the third victims ombudsman for Canada.
Third, Bill C-75 would effectively reduce penalties for a number of what we on this side of the House, and many Canadians, deem serious offences. The Liberals are proposing to make a number of serious offences that are currently punishable by a maximum penalty of 10 years or less hybrid offences.
Making these hybrid offences means they can be proceeded in court by other indictment or summarily. Summary offences are tried by a judge only, are usually less serious offences and have a maximum of two years imprisonment. These hybrid offences will now include: causing bodily harm by criminal negligence, bodily harm, impaired driving causing bodily harm, participation in activities of criminal organizations, abduction of persons under the age of 14 and abduction of persons under the age of 16.
As pointed out in their testimony before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police expressed significant concern about the proposal to hybridize the indictable offences. It said:
These 85 indictable offences are classified as “secondary offences” under the Criminal Code. If the Crown proceeds by indictment and the offender is convicted of one of these 85 offences, the Crown can request that the offender provide a DNA sample for submission to the National DNA Data Bank (NDDB).
If these 85 offences are hybridized...and the Crown elects to proceed by summary conviction, the offence will no longer be deemed a “secondary offence” and a DNA Order cannot be obtained. The consequence of this will be fewer submissions being made to the NDDB. The submission of DNA samples to the NDDB is used by law enforcement to link crime scenes and to match offenders to crime scenes. Removing these 85 indictable offences from potential inclusion into the NDDB will have a direct and negative impact on police investigations.
I realize that due to the pressure exerted by the Conservatives, last night I believe, two offences, primarily the terrorism offences, have been taken out of this and it is now 83 offences with the two terrorism-related offences being removed. However, according to the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, the uploading of DNA taken from 52 indictable or secondary offences, which are among those initial 85 to be made hybrid offences, resulted in 221 matches to primary offences, including 19 homicides and 24 sexual assaults. At the very least, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police is recommending that this significant unintended consequence of Bill C-75 on hybridization be rectified by listing these 85 indictable offences as secondary or primary offences so DNA orders can be made regardless of how the Crown proceeds.
We watch CSI and other programs and we see the importance of this new type of science and technology. However, now the Liberals are saying that these 85 offences are no longer important for the DNA database.
Last, I would like to talk about the intent of Bill C-75 to incorporate a principle of restraint as it relates to circumstances of aboriginal accused and other accused from vulnerable populations when interim release decisions are made.
Section 493.2 places an unreasonable onus on police officers at time of arrest to make a determination on whether an offender falls within this classification. Furthermore, and more important, it wrongly uses the criminal justice system to address the problem of overrepresentation of indigenous peoples within the criminal justice system. Instead, the government should be dealing with the socio-economic and historical generational factors that are contributing to this problem.
I, unfortunately, do not believe that the Liberal government has any intenion of redressing the plight of our indigenous people in any meaningful way and will continue to fail in this regard despite its promise of reconciliation and renewed relationship.
As chair of the public accounts committee, our Auditor General came with two reports this spring. The objective of one audit was to determine whether Employment and Social Development Canada managed the aboriginal skills and employment training strategy in the skills partnership. To make a long story short, the Auditor General said that when the government was dealing with many of these programs for indigenous people, it was an incomprehensible failure.
It is unfortunate that the government is using this one part of Bill C-75 to address the overrepresentation of indigenous people in our penitentiaries.
Criminal Code November 8th, 2018
Madam Speaker, I want to share a quick quote. With respect to the current government's dealing with first nations indigenous programs, our Auditor General described it as an “incomprehensible failure of the federal government to influence better conditions for Indigenous people in Canada.” He went on to talk about a number of programs.
The member opposite stood and said that he likes Bill C-75 because it incorporates a principle of restraint as it relates to the circumstances of aboriginal accused or other accused from vulnerable populations when interim release decisions are made. In other words, if a police officer sees that indigenous individuals have a long record, they can bring a lesser charge or a quicker and maybe in some regard more compromised response to it. Then he cited all the different groups that supported that, which were typically indigenous groups. None of them were victims organizations or victims groups that have real concerns about this part.
Does the member believe this is another indictment on the government, in that it is looking for ways to deal with the high indigenous populations in prisons at a cost to the victims?
Criminal Code November 8th, 2018
Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary talked about speeding up the court system and access to justice and faster court times, believing that turning some of these very serious offences into summary offences or hybrid offences would somehow speed it up.
There is another option, namely, that the minister could fill the hundreds of judicial vacancies across this country so there is access to a judge. Right now that is another area she could act on very quickly. Why does she not do that?
Budget Implementation Act, 2018 No. 2 November 1st, 2018
Madam Speaker, I remember when we brought forward budget after budget. I think for our last budget, which was a balanced budget, the budget implementation bill was, if I remember correctly, 400 pages, maybe 500 pages.
Members of the opposition party at that time which is now the government just attacked us as having what was not so much an omnibus bill but 500 pages that they were expected to read through, come and debate. Now we see the Liberal government with an 800-page budget implementation bill.
The member is right. There are a lot of things that the Liberals promised in the last election and since being elected that they were going to bring forward for Canadians. They were going to have minuscule deficits. They were going to have pay equity. They were going to do all of these things, but the Liberals are failing on one after another.
I honestly believe that next year, in 2019, Canadians are going to hold the government to account, and rightfully so, but not just rightfully so for breaking promise after promise, but rightfully so for not providing strong governance and leadership when it comes to the fiscal management of where we are and how we want to move forward.