Public Safety committee  I am really glad that you asked that question. Thank you, sir. There is definitely an investment needed to increase, nationally, our capacity to look at financial crimes. Auto theft is a great example of a money-laundering activity. As I've mentioned, these vehicles are sold, and then the proceeds from that are diverted into arms dealing and other very serious crimes as well.

Public Safety committee  I can very easily get back to you on that in short order. There have been a number of proposals done through various police services to look at a national model. It would be very easy to follow up with you and this committee as to what resources would be required. I don't have that with me here today, but I'm happy to provide that as a follow-up item.

Public Safety committee  Thank you for your question. Certainly the prevalence of auto theft and of repeat violent offenders not being incarcerated is creating a danger for my officers and for officers right across this country. There are great improvements with Bill C-48, and there's the five-year period to evaluate it.

Public Safety committee  Thank you, Pierre. I can absolutely speak to this, not only from an Ontario perspective but also from a national one. There is the provincial carjacking joint task force and the provincial auto theft team. We have over 20 municipal police services working collaboratively right across the province.

Public Safety committee  Organized crime has been a long-going issue for law enforcement. We see criminal organizations adapt to the most profitable criminal markets. As I mentioned, the global pandemic caused a shortage in supply and an increase in demand. Organized crime is exploiting that, along with being able to defeat technology.

Public Safety committee  There is a significant level of participation by young offenders, not only in spotting and identifying the vehicles to be stolen but committing the thefts themselves. That puts them at risk. We're seeing that many of them are armed in the greater Toronto area, which puts officers and the public at risk.

Public Safety committee  It is a whole-of-system approach, as I referred to in my previous answer. We need to be able to solve the crimes, which means we need the appropriate resources and funding for police services to be able to conduct these investigations. Police services right across this country are doing an absolutely amazing job at tackling auto theft, recovering vehicles and laying charges.

Public Safety committee  They're equally weighted. If we're unable to solve the crime and lay a charge, there is no consequence. However, if we solve the crime, we lay the charge and there's no substantive penalty, we've wasted our time and effort, and the criminals are empowered to continue with their criminal activities.

Public Safety committee  Yes. Thank you for the question, sir. I believe that stiffer penalties would provide two deterrents for us. The first is deterring criminal offenders, obviously, due to substantial consequences for committing offences. Second, many of these offenders are repeat offenders. If they are incarcerated for longer periods of time, they are, in fact, not out in the community and able to victimize innocent Canadians by engaging in these criminal activities that they do over and over again.

Public Safety committee  I believe that increasing the minimum penalties would be a deterrent. Right now, there is a minimum penalty of six months on a third offence. I do not believe that is strong enough. I believe there's a lot of merit to increasing the minimum penalty, and that bill you referred to is a good place to start the discussion.

Public Safety committee  Thank you. Chair, vice-chairs and committee members, on behalf of the Canadian Association of Chief of Police, thank you for the opportunity to discuss the dramatic increase of auto theft in Canada and opportunities to combat this concerning public and officer safety trend. I very much appreciated participating in the federal government's National Summit on Combatting Auto Theft, which took place a few short weeks ago on February 8.