Justice committee  I heard the minister explain that he discussed with his AG counterparts the subject matter of the bill and that they shared the importance of moving forward with these amendments. That's what I heard earlier. In our forum, in the Coordinating Committee of Senior Officials, we dis

Justice committee  We don't meet regularly or even not regularly with hospital officials, if that's what you mean.

Justice committee  I don't know the internal discussions the provinces had with their counterparts in other departments. I'm not in those other governments.

Justice committee  As I explained, the courts will have to consider various elements of evidence. Among them, there is the testimony of experts and of psychiatrists. However, the decision remains with the court. The decision is not made by psychiatrists.

Justice committee  The bill does not contain any definition of brutality; it simply sets out a provision requiring the court to consider the nature and circumstances of the offence. So the bill contains no definition of brutality as such. It would be up to the court to decide that case by case.

Justice committee  It is not completely new. The concept actually appears in the part of the Criminal Code that deals with dangerous offenders. Perhaps it was interpreted in that context. In the future, it may well be interpreted in the context of people with mental disorders.

Justice committee  The bill requires that several stages have to be gone through in order to submit a request to the court. Subsequently, the case will be heard by the court that has the file, either the provincial court or the superior court. As defined in the Criminal Code—and the minister menti

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  Just to elaborate on that point, the enhanced minimum penalties proposed in the bill with respect to firearm offences are very much tailored to specific offences that appear to be growing in terms of their problematic nature--the gangs and guns problem in certain urban centres--a

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  I'm sorry, I missed part of the question. Were you asking if there's a presumption of guilt?

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  No, the evidentiary burden on the crown to prove all the requisite elements of the offence is not changed under this law.

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  The firearms provisions proposed in Bill C-2 and the dangerous offender applications are not tightly connected, except in the case of two new offences that are created under the bill. The offence of break and enter to steal a firearm or robbery to steal a firearm is going to be l

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  Do you want the firearms first?

Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) committee  Very briefly, to respond to the question of potential exposure of law-abiding people who own firearms for a legitimate reason and whether they could be targeted through some of the offence provisions proposed in Bill C-2, I can indicate that the offences that are targeted in this

Bill C-35 (39th Parliament, 1st Session) committee  I believe in the minister's opening remarks he indicated that the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics does not currently keep data on the rate of release on bail for offences under the Criminal Code. I believe they have a project under consideration to do that, but it is still

Bill C-35 (39th Parliament, 1st Session) committee  My understanding--and we did make inquiries--is that the data is not there. If it were there we would certainly have asked for it to be analyzed.