Bill C-23 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments)

This enactment amends various provisions of the Criminal Code in relation to criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other matters.
The amendments respecting criminal procedure provide for, among other things,
(a) the use of a means of telecommunication to forward warrants for the purpose of endorsement;
(b) changes to the process with respect to the challenge of jurors;
(c) a new election for the accused where a preferred indictment has been filed against him or her or where the Supreme Court of Canada orders a new trial;
(d) an appeal of a superior court order with respect to things seized lying with the court of appeal;
(e) summary dismissal by a single judge of the court of appeal when an appeal has erroneously been filed with that court; and
(f) a summary conviction trial with respect to co-accused that can proceed where one of the co-accused does not appear.
The amendments respecting the language of the accused clarify the application of provisions related to that matter.
The amendments respecting sentencing provide for, among other things,
(a) clarifications with respect to the application of impaired driving penalties;
(b) the power to order an offender not to communicate with identified persons while in custody and the creation of an offence for failing to comply with the order;
(c) the power to delay the sentencing proceedings so that an offender can participate in a provincially approved treatment program;
(d) an increase of the maximum fine that can be imposed for a summary conviction offence to $10,000 and a change with respect to the calculation of the period of imprisonment to be imposed in default of payment of a fine;
(e) the suspension of a conditional sentence order or a probation order during an appeal;
(f) in the case of a person serving a youth sentence who receives an adult sentence, clarification that the remaining portion of the youth sentence is converted to an adult sentence; and
(g) the power of a court to order, on application by the Attorney General and after convicting a person of the offence of luring a child by means of a computer system, the forfeiture of things used in relation to that offence.
The enactment amends the description of the offence of conveying information on betting and book-making so that the offence encompasses the conveying of that information by any means and makes related changes to the exemption provided with respect to the use of a pari-mutuel system.
Finally, amendments are also made to reclassify the offence of possession of break and enter instruments into a dual procedure offence.

Criminal Code

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

moved that Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I will speak, not surprisingly, in favour of the provisions of Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code, which deals with criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments.

As members know, this government has introduce in the House a number of legislative measures that contribute to the protection of law-abiding Canadians. I believe ensuring that our criminal justice systems remains modern, efficient and effective is an important component of the multi-faceted goal of tackling crime, which the government has made one of its key priorities.

This initiative is an example of work of the Department of Justice to update, modernize and improve the law and to respond to the ongoing need to make technical amendments, such as addressing procedural anomalies, making corrections, clarifying current ambiguities in some Criminal Code provisions, as well as modernizing other provisions by introducing the use of communication technologies. So-called housekeeping amendments of this kind are needed from time to time.

The changes proposed in Bill C-23 may not appear to some people as a pressing initiative, but it is an important bill that will contribute to the smooth functioning of the criminal justice system and it will assist the day to day functions of those who work within the system.

I believe these types of amendments are necessary from time to time and such bills should find their way to the House on a regular basis, as needed.

As many of these amendments have been developed in collaboration with justice system partners, this initiative also illustrates the government's resolve to work in cooperation with its provincial and territorial counterparts, as well as other justice system stakeholders, such as the Uniform Law Conference of Canada, to improve the Canadian criminal justice system.

The amendments contained in Bill C-23 fall principally within three categories; criminal procedure, language of the accused and sentencing.

Without describing each proposal introduced by the bill, which are for the most part so-called technical amendments, I would like to highlight some of them. First, I will deal with the criminal procedure amendments.

Several criminal procedure amendments serve to clarify the application and purpose of certain provisions, as well as improve procedural efficiencies by permitting the use of modern technology and rationalizing existing provisions.

For instance, one amendment is proposed to streamline the procedure for executing search warrants in a jurisdiction other than the jurisdiction where the search warrant was obtained. Currently, out of province search warrants can only be endorsed by presenting the original warrant for endorsement to a judge or a justice in the province where the warrant is to be executed. This, of course, takes time and is labour as well as resource intensive. This amendment would allow the search warrant obtained in one province to be submitted by electronic communication to the court in the province where a copy of the warrant would be endorsed by a judge or a justice, thus expediting the process for executing out of province search warrants.

Another criminal procedure amendment will serve to clearly set out the right of an accused person to change his or her mode of trial when the Supreme Court of Canada orders a judge and jury trial to be retried. The proposed amendment will introduce more flexibility and will assist in avoiding unnecessary jury trials where the accused prefers to be retried by a judge alone.

An additional procedural amendment would clarify that in the case of the summary conviction trial, which involves multiple defendants, the court may continue the proceedings against all of them, even where one of the co-defendants fails to attend.

The Criminal Code currently provides several provisions dealing with the proof of service of court documents, such as a notice, subpoena and a summons. The bill includes a series of amendments that will effectively consolidate into one provision all relevant sections dealing with the proof of service of court documents, thus ensuring that this regime is governed by one easily referenced provision.

Other amendments would refine the jury selection process to better protect the impartiality of prospective jury members, as well as sworn jurors. Another amendment would correct inconsistencies in this process with regard peremptory challenges.

Before moving on to the other two categories, I would like to mention one last criminal procedure amendment. The offence of possessing break-in instruments is currently a straight indictable offence. Experience has shown us that this offence is often committed together with the offence of “break and enter into a place other than a dwelling house”, which is a hybrid offence; that is, an offence where the prosecution can either elect to proceed by way of indictment or summary conviction.

The amendment would hybridize the offence of possessing break-in instruments, thereby allowing crown prosecutors, in appropriate circumstances, to proceed with one single trial by way of summary conviction for both offences.

I believe the examples I have listed together with other criminal procedure amendments contained in this bill are necessary and provide practical procedural improvements to the Criminal Code.

I would now like to turn to the amendments in Bill C-23 with respect to the language rights of the accused person during a criminal proceeding. Sections 530 and 530.1 of the Criminal Code of Canada guarantee the right of all accused persons to have their preliminary inquiry and trial before a court that speaks the official language of the accused and to have a crown prosecutor conducting a prosecution who speaks the language of the accused.

These rights are an example of the advancement of language rights through legislative means as provided in subsection 16(3) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and have been in force throughout Canada since January 1, 1990. However, since the coming into force of these provisions, studies and public consultations have demonstrated that these language rights are often misunderstood by accused persons, the bar, crown prosecutors and judges.

This situation may well result in some accused not invoking their rights in a timely fashion, thus presenting a barrier to the full exercise and implementation of these rights, as well as creating additional difficulties and costs for the justice system. In turn, such misunderstanding has led courts to identify certain shortcomings and to issue rulings that do not always correspond with the intent of the existing provisions.

The amendments proposed in Bill C-23 would clearly set out the full extent of these rights and would assist in better implementing the language requirements in the Criminal Code and in rectifying some shortcomings identified in various studies and by the courts, notably by the Supreme Court of Canada in R v. Beaulac in 1999. The amendments also bring greater clarity to the provisions, thus ensuring greater efficiency throughout the criminal justice process.

The amendments would also provide solutions and improvements that respond to a 1995 study by the Commissioner of Official Languages entitled “The Equitable Use of English and French Before the Courts in Canada”. In the study, the Commissioner of Official Languages identified a number of barriers to the exercise of the language rights of accused persons.

The commissioner recommended that all accused be better informed of the right to a trial in the official language of their choice. The commissioner also indicated that there appeared to be little logic in providing a trial in the language of the accused while failing to provide the accused with a version of the originating documents leading to his being on trial in the language as well.

Finally, the commissioner identified a number of practical issues that arise in the context of bilingual trials and which have led to contradictory approaches and court decisions.

The amendments proposed here address many of these concerns. For example, amendments to the language rights provisions would heed the advice given by the Supreme Court of Canada in the Beaulac decision by requiring the court to inform all accused persons of their right to be tried in their official language whether they are represented or not.

The amendments also follow court decisions requiring that the charging document must be translated in the language of the accused upon request. This appears to be a necessary complement to accused persons exercising their language rights. The proposed amendment would standardize existing practices in that regard and ensure the wording in the Criminal Code more accurately reflects the state of the law.

By the same token, to satisfy the need for certainty and precision in criminal proceedings where the charging document has been translated, a further amendment would make it clear that where there is an inconsistency between the original version of the charging document and the translated version, the original document ought to prevail.

Finally, the proposed amendments would provide the presiding judge with the power to issue appropriate orders to ensure that bilingual trials run smoothly and efficiently. The absence of such a provision has led to fruitless debate and it is time to bring greater efficiency to such proceedings.

I would now like to turn to the sentencing provisions. Bill C-23 gathers together several technical sentencing amendments. The purpose of this series of amendments is similar to that of the other two categories, namely, to clarify the intent of certain sentencing provisions and improve efficiencies in the application of certain court sentencing processes. There are also other amendments that serve to update the law or extend existing measures to protect victims.

I would like to highlight some of the changes that are proposed in sentencing. One area where uncertainty warrants changing the law is the penalties for impaired driving. As I will detail in a moment, the following amendment will provide courts, the parties to the proceedings and, in particular, impaired driving offenders with some certainty regarding the exact sanction that will apply to a person convicted.

Given current uncertainty in judicial decisions, this change will have the effect of clearly stating that the minimum fine and minimum jail terms that apply for a first, second and third impaired driving offence, such as the operation of a motor vehicle while impaired and refusal to provide a breath sample, do apply to the more serious situations of impaired driving causing bodily harm or death. Accordingly, this amendment will also clarify that conditional sentence is not available for these offences as this type of sanction cannot be imposed for offences that attract a minimum penalty.

Another impaired driving amendment that I would like to highlight here is with respect to concurrent driving prohibition orders. The Criminal Code currently provides that impaired driving offenders who breach a driving prohibition order can receive a subsequent driving prohibition order. However, this subsequent additional prohibition order runs concurrently with the initial order imposed. As both orders run at the same time, the second driving prohibition may be rendered less meaningful. The amendment that is proposed would expressly provide that the second order is to be served consecutively with any existing driving prohibition orders.

This bill also contains two additional amendments with respect to impaired driving offenders who participate or wish to participate in an interlock ignition device program with a chance to make an early return to driving. These interlock device programs are currently offered in a number of provinces across Canada. Alberta and Quebec were early leaders in implementing such programs.

Criminal Code provisions enable provinces and territories, if they wish to do so, to permit an impaired driver who drives a motor vehicle equipped with an ignition interlock device to drive during the driving prohibition period imposed by the court, but only after a minimum period of time has passed based upon whether the impaired driving conviction was a first, second or subsequent offence. Just to clarify matters, if it sounded as though we are allowing impaired drivers to drive, that is not the intent of the legislation. It is those who have been convicted of impaired driving. This does not change the law in that respect.

One amendment that would provide that for greater certainty an impaired driving offender is only permitted to drive while being the subject of a driving prohibition order if he or she has registered in an alcohol ignition interlock device program and is in compliance with the conditions of the program. This amendment is intended to make it clear that the offender must not only be enrolled in the program, but must also comply with all the terms of the program during the driving prohibition period.

In addition, currently the only proceeding by which an offender can request permission to be enrolled in an interlock device program is at the time of sentencing. Where this request has been omitted at the sentencing stage, the opportunity to request permission to enrol in such a program has been lost, as no other proceeding is provided in the Criminal Code to address this request at a later time. Therefore, a minor amendment would ensure that unless the sentencing court states otherwise, all impaired driving offenders will be authorized to apply for an enrolment in an alcohol-ignition interlock device program in those jurisdictions where such a program, with an early return to driving, is available.

Before I conclude, I would like to highlight two additional sentencing amendments contained in the bill that may be of particular interest to my hon. colleagues. I hope this next amendment will give victims some reassurance as it provides sentencing courts with an additional tool to protect them from unwanted communications while the offender is serving a jail term.

Courts currently hold the power to order accused persons and convicted offenders not to communicate with victims while they are either in remand, out on bail or on probation. However, no similar power exists to order an offender not to communicate with victims while the offender is serving a jail sentence. Practises for dealing with unwanted communications in correctional institutions vary among jurisdictions with most situations being addressed on a case by case basis and handled through disciplinary measures.

The amendment will extend the existing measures to protect persons from unwanted communications by providing sentencing courts with the power to order an offender not to communicate with victims, witnesses and other identified persons while the offender is in custody.

The amendment also includes the creation of an offence as an enforcement mechanism for a breach of such an order. I believe the amendment will provide the missing link in the chain of prevention measures against unwanted communication by accused persons and convicted offenders.

Last, I would like to bring to the attention of my colleagues an amendment with respect to fines. The current maximum monetary penalty for summary conviction offences of $2,000 has remained unchanged for over 20 years. Other monetary limits in the Criminal Code have been adjusted over the years. Bill C-23 proposes to increase the maximum fine to $10,000. This adjustment would allow crown prosecutors to seek a higher fine when proceeding by summary conviction.

As members can see in some, the amendments, as highlighted by the examples presented today, would strengthen sentencing measures, enhance the efficiency of criminal procedures and clarify court related language rights provisions.

I would like to call on all members of the House to join me in supporting this important legislation.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-23 is a good clean-up bill because it takes care of a lot of loose ends. The Department of Justice should be complimented on its good work.

However, I cannot say the same about the justice minister's implications in this bill. The bill was the fruit of the good work of the Law Commission, which has been eradicated. One of the first steps of the Minister of Justice, through the government purse keepers, the Minister of Finance and the President of the Treasury Board, was to cut the Law Commission.

Would the minister agree that the government was hasty in completely gutting the Law Commission?

The second point I would like to make is that the new Official Languages Commissioner, Graham Fraser, before the official languages committee said that he would be in favour of keeping the court challenges program.

The minister will know, at least I hope he knows, that the battle and struggle for language rights in this country has been in part as a result of successful court challenges applications and the testing of municipal and provincial laws and even, in some cases, federal laws to ensure that francophones across the country have the rights that have been improved in Bill C-23 but were in fact instituted by court challenges. Will the minister reconsider the efficacy of the court challenges program?

Finally and briefly, the imposition of a fine up to $10,000 on summary conviction offences from $2,000 is certainly to be lauded. This is a modernization of the reality of the effect of crime and the willingness to pay and the capacity to pay which must be judged by a judge. The judge's judicial discretion in deciding up to $10,000 in the capacity to pay area is something that acts totally against what the government has done to the judiciary. It was held up, I learned today, and it completely delayed bringing back the discussion in the House of the pay packages for our judges, ripping them of their discretion when it comes to Bill C-9 and Bill C-10, and yet in this case lauding the fact that we are increasing the discretion to $10,000 on summary conviction offences when in fact every other step of the government and the Minister of Justice has been an attack on the judiciary and its wise use of discretion.

Those are three little questions on which I will await the minister's response with apt attention.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I do not take the same position as the member across the way. For example, I support the mandatory revocation of driver's licences for impaired driving for those who kill on our roads. I know the member may not support that but I believe the majority of members in the House do.

This type of attitude that parliamentarians cannot send out messages in our legislation setting certain floors is a completely irresponsible attitude. We would not be responding to the demands of our constituents.

When I look at the calls by people like MADD Canada, the Mothers Against Drunk Driving, it calls for mandatory licence prohibitions and the elimination of conditional sentences for those who kill on our highways. The member across the way may not have concerns about those kinds of killings but killings on highways, for example, are one of the leading criminal causes of deaths. The member may not be concerned about that but I am.

I have worked long and hard in the justice system to bring about administrative licence suspensions roadside and the administration seizure of motor vehicles for those who drink and drive.

I was very disappointed to see the member stand in the House and say that we should just open this up and remove mandatory sentences, such as licence prohibitions, fines or conditional sentences.

I do not know whether the member is a lawyer but he sounds like a lawyer who is more interested in representing the interests of the accused. Our government is interested in rebalancing the system to ensure that victims have a voice in our country's legal system. This bill, in that respect, reflects that and I am proud of the steps our government has taken.

I would discourage the member from making those kinds of irresponsible statements about what Parliament should be doing in respect of helping victims.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in a few minutes I will have the opportunity to deliver my speech informing the House that the Bloc Québécois is favourably disposed towards this bill. I am, however, going to take advantage of the minister’s speech to try and get a few clarifications. We know that the minister is an extremely enterprising man, who in a way practises judicial activism. At present, six bills are under consideration, and there is a rumour, which I would be inclined to believe has some foundation, to the effect that six other bills will be tabled.

I would like the minister to tell us, in order, his government’s priorities. Does he hope to begin with the passing of Bill C-9? Is it Bill C-10, followed by the bill respecting age of consent? Is it the one dealing with DNA data banks?

Soon there will be more bills than the minister has teeth. It is not easy to figure out what the government’s priorities are. Each bill will be discussed in committee and in the House. Some are good, others less so, but overall, I would say that the output is fairly discouraging.

Can the minister, for each of the bills and in numerical order, tell us his government’s priorities? I am sure that he does this in consultation with the leader.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I must thank the member for Hochelaga for his diligent work on the justice committee. It is certainly a pleasure to have him on the justice committee to ensure that a different perspective is brought to the administration of justice. He and I may not agree in every respect but I respect his integrity.

In respect of the issues regarding the priorities, we have attempted to list bills in the priority that we would like to see them passed.

I know that some of the bills are more difficult. Bill C-9 has raised a number of issues. I have made comments in front of committee on that issue. We know that the bill regarding judges' pay is before the committee. I know there are many bills and much work to be done by the justice committee. We have issues, such as the review of the DNA legislation, a task that should have been done a couple of years ago but was not.

While I may have my own priorities and this government may have its own priorities that are reflected in the way that we have introduced legislation, I have full confidence in the member and the other members of the justice committee to understand the priorities of Canadians and to respond accordingly. I would rely on his wise judgment in that respect.

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the rights of accused persons to a trial in their own language—, in French or in English, have certainly evolved over the years. This has not always been the case. I remember a few years ago some young francophones who were charged and tried in English in Vancouver, and the only services they had were those of a single interpreter. So this is considerable progress and this bill seems to settle some technical issues.

In my opinion, the minister should acknowledge that it is often thanks to court challenges that francophones have succeeded in winning their case in many of these language issues. As for me, since I am from Manitoba, I know that court challenges have helped francophones to maintain their cultural identity.

I would ask the minister to please acknowledge the importance of court challenges for Canadians.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am no stranger to that litigation in Manitoba and I am no stranger to the issue of francophone language rights. I have been a strong defender in Manitoba of francophone language rights. Indeed, I represent a riding that probably has the highest number of francophones in any rural riding in western Canada. I believe my riding is second only to Saint Boniface in terms of the percentage of francophones.

I understand the francophone people and their desire for equal language rights, even though I do not speak French. However, I respect that and I work toward that goal.

I know there are other mechanisms other than the court challenges program. Even before the court challenges program, some of the initiatives were taken in Manitoba, for example, through the Public Interest Law Centre. An individual by the name of Arne Peltz used to take many of these cases, which were all funded through legal aid. Legal aid does much of that itself. Therefore, there are mechanisms to advance these types of cases.

I am mindful of the comments made by the member but I believe there are appropriate mechanisms that remain available, including work by interested lawyers who want to advance cases in the interest of justice in this country.

This particular bill is a very necessary bill. It helps, not only to improve language rights, which I support very strongly, but it helps to modernize the criminal justice system. One of my concerns is the whole issue of the efficiency of the criminal justice system. This bill would assist in that respect.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to rise today on Bill C-23, which will amend the Criminal Code in several respects.

This is an omnibus bill concerned more particularly with criminal procedure, the language of the accused, sentencing, and other changes.

The proposed legislation is essentially a cleanup bill with the objectives of ensuring that the Criminal Code is up to date and to maximize its efficiency. Bill C-23 includes many substantive amendments to the Criminal Code, changes that touch on a number of issues, mostly to modernize the Criminal Code.

This is why we believe that this bill, if sent to committee to be thoroughly examined, would result in good law. At committee, experts can be called as witnesses to give evidence on the efficacy of each section of the amendments, whereby we might get closer to improving the Criminal Code, which we all recognize is a tired, well-worn and incomplete document for our criminal justice system, but it is the best we have had.

I do give compliments to the other side in suggesting that the Criminal Code was the child of a Conservative finance minister and subsequent prime minister in the 1880s. It has been patchworked together over the years, but no full and final revision of a modern Criminal Code has been undertaken, and it is long overdue.

However, this bill seeks to band-aid and fix up what we can to modernize certain sections of the code and we on this side welcome its implementation.

Some clauses included in Bill C-23 are aimed at keeping up with today's society, such as increasing the maximum fine for a summary conviction offence from $2,000 to $10,000. Although this might seem to be quite a jump, I believe that judges, with their cautious deference to the circumstances that exist, will use fair determinations to determine if an accused, based on capacity to pay, can make the payments and if the amount of the fine is indeed proportional to the person's capacity to pay.

Here I want to interject something that I think is very important to the whole tableau of justice bills that are before the House in this session. The 39th Parliament has seen a plethora of legal bills, but many of them and many of the actions of the government, despite the inundation of law, have really ripped apart the sense that we respect the judiciary.

I think of the delayed report on justices' salaries, now further delayed, we understand today. I think of the comments made by the Prime Minister of Canada in this House that Liberal lawyers were running the court challenges program. I think of the comments made by the Minister of Justice at the Canadian Bar Association conference in St. John's, and of those of the Prime Minister about Liberal judges made on occasions during the campaign of December and January of last year .

Notwithstanding that everybody might have a problem with certain appointments, when a judge becomes a member of the bench, he is a judge. He is an “Honourable Justice”. He is an interpreter of the laws. He deserves all of that respect.

The government has done nothing to further the cause of respect for the judiciary. It may be the on first day of civics class in grade 1 or grade 10, or in undergraduate or law school, that one learns that unless people have respect for the law through its judges, the law will not have the impact we all need it to have.

As the member for the riding of Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, which is probably the most bilingual and most bicultural riding in the country, I am happy to see that Bill C-23 will reinforce the right of accused to be tried in the official language of their choice, and more particularly, the right to a bilingual trial in cases where two or more accused speak different official languages.

This is an important measure to ensure that all Canadians can have justice in either official language. As I was saying, in my community it would not be uncommon for an anglophone and a francophone to be tried together. The change to the law and the proposed amendments will ensure a trial in the preferred language of the accused. This is basic to our judicial system and would be just and fair.

At this time, I would also like to interject that this side of the House is for safer communities. This side of the House is for law and order. This side of the House is for the victims of crime as much as anything else that we stand for.

We differ in the ways to ensure that victims are safe in their communities. It is not enough to grandstand with bills that have catchy titles and catch the six o'clock news. To make people feel that they are going to be safer, the laws have to be effective. For the laws to be effective, institutions like the Law Commission and programs like the court challenges program are essential to ensure that we have a just and equitable society and that people feel safe in their communities.

More than that, in the situation and the environment where there is some $13.2 billion in surplus, we need to see that there are more resources in the community to enforce the law and to enforce programs that the police forces believe in, such as problem-oriented policing, which means having the police presence in the schools and in the community to prevent crime from happening. And that is to say nothing about the whole concept of rehabilitation, which must wait for another day.

Another aspect of the bill that I find very interesting, at least in principle, is the aspect of the issues surrounding subsequent prohibition from driving for consecutive offenders on impaired driving charges. As a father of three beautiful young girls, it enrages me to hear on the news of repeat drunk drivers and the menace they pose to our society.

I am proud to say that the president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a New Brunswicker. I am proud to say that the very first meeting I had in my constituency office was with the president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving. I know it is especially important to look and to act as if we as parliamentarians care about what happens when someone gets behind the wheel of a car impaired, not for the first time and certainly not for the last time if they do not get consecutive sentences that restrain them from driving.

Some people cannot get the message. They must be restrained from driving. This bill does that. It is long overdue. I think all sides can agree with the wise impact of that amendment. We often learn in these cases that it is these irresponsible individuals who have been arrested many times before for drunk driving and are out again in the community posing danger to our community.

However, here is where I must interject as well. In recent announcements by the government, $4.6 million has been cut from a pilot program administered or put in place by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to determine if someone is impaired from drug use while driving. While the acronym MADD might stand for Mothers Against Drunk Driving, they might as well be MAID, mothers against impaired driving. It matters not the source of the stupefier or the ingested product, whether it is alcohol or drugs. What matters is the danger to our innocent public.

It is insincere to cut this program on the one hand and on the other hand suggest that this law is in step with what the government feels. Through Bill C-23, the government has added prohibitions that were long thought of, but on the other hand it has stopped a program that might easily identify people who are impaired from other sources. It completely misses the mark. It is completely inconsistent. It makes me think that the Minister of Justice has not thought through the implications of his whole dossier in justice.

Of course, justice should not just be about more severe sentences and longer jail terms. Justice is about making our country safer. I strongly believe that this is not done by locking up criminals and throwing away the key. It is done through prevention, to protect potential victims from living through the recurrence of dramatic events. When it is not possible to prevent crimes, I believe justice is done through proper treatment to ensure criminals understand what they have done. This should, we all hope, be the first step in rehabilitating them and preventing further crimes. Again, our concern is about the victims: prevention of crime.

Bill C-23 is proposing to allow a sentencing delay in order to enable the offender to receive treatment. Bravo. This is finally the government suggesting that it believes in principles of sentencing other than deterrence and denunciation. It makes me think again that this bill, which we support, really is not a bill of the government. This was not the brainchild of the government. This is a fix-up bill that was well under way prior to the change in government.

So I must applaud the other side for seeing the sense in these parts of the amendments. I am very pleased that the Minister of Justice is bringing such a liberal approach to his department in this respect. I would almost be tempted to congratulate him on realizing the important role of treatment and rehabilitation, but of course we all know, both at the committee and in the public, that there are many other bills that have been before the House, and are to be before the committee, which strip away at the sincerity of the government's posturing toward treatment and rehabilitation. So I came close to complimenting the minister, but I cannot.

I must say it is refreshing to see the Conservative minority government respect some of these principles. We would like to see more action on them as it relates to the bill.

I am very interested in having the House discussing the omnibus bill one week after the Conservative government abolished the Law Commission of Canada. As most members are probably aware, the main objective of the Law Commission of Canada was to advise Parliament on how to improve and modernize its laws. Is that not ironic? We are here discussing Bill C-23, which is essentially a modernization, a keeping up to date of the Criminal Code, one of our oldest statutes, and as most members are probably aware, the Law Commission of Canada is to exist no more.

The Law Commission of Canada provided exceptional advice on such topics. This is why we are at a loss to explain that on the one hand we see parts of this omnibus bill that obviously recognize the evolution--somebody watching the Criminal Code as it evolved and coming up with these proposals--and on the other hand the government is saying it is not really interested in organically studying the evolution of law and it will cut the Law Commission just like that without any real reason.

I would say, if I could make a statement here, that in the space of a few days, the government in fact has shown its support for the Law Commission of Canada by speaking in favour of the bill. It is cutting funds to the Law Commission of Canada, and on the same day, as we know, there was a surplus announced of over $13 billion.

Generally speaking, Bill C-23 is all about details, but as we all know, some amendments have been made to the Criminal Code, and sometimes they look pretty small and unimportant. They often, however, have long term implications. Any of us following the saga of Bill C-9 on conditional sentencing will know that in what was more than the stroke of a pen, in what was a 60 page decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Proulx, what seemed like a very ordered system to deal with the application of conditional sentences turned into something completely different.

I believe, however, that we must study each of these amendments further at committee and learn more about the implications of some of the changes.

The purpose of Bill C-23 is to clean up, modernize and update the Criminal Code. We still have a responsibility, though, to study it thoroughly and understand the implications of the proposed changes.

The proposed amendments are quite varied and touch on several areas of the Criminal Code. It would be a very long, complicated process, therefore, to discuss them in detail in the House. For this reason, it is very appropriate to send BillC-23 to committee to ensure that each of these changes is well understood.

I am looking forward to studying this bill in the justice committee and the workings therein. With almost 50 clauses, Bill C-23 will definitely need some serious consideration to ensure we do actually clean up and modernize the Criminal Code, and not create more problems.

One last thing that concerns me is the workload that is being sent to the justice committee, not because the members of the committee from all parties are afraid of work, we are sitting three times a week now, but because of the sheer volume of bills presented to the committee. It seems like the government is more interested in putting these bills in the front store of its populist democracy and has no real interest in making sure that these bills are passed by this Parliament in a quick and just way.

I caution members of this House, if we are serious about keeping communities safer, if we are serious about protecting victims, then let us back up our words, as much as we agree on certain bills, and get these bills through this House.

That is why I emphatically endorse Bill C-23. Members will find that on this side of the House, in the House and in committee, we will put forth our very best efforts to see to it that it is passed with speed because this party and this side believe in safer communities and in the safety of victims.

I hearken back to my comments about my three daughters, aged 7, 8 and 10. If I thought we were not of ultimate dispatch in passing the amendments to this bill that call for further and subsequent prohibitions from driving for repeat drunk drivers, I would hold all of the members here accountable for not having done enough. Let us get to work on this bill.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board]

Mr. Speaker, the member across complained vigorously about the Conservative government's decision to get tough on crime. He complained loudly that the Conservative government has introduced over a dozen tough on crime bills in the House of Commons. He complained that it is too much legislation for the House of Commons to deal with and that we should not be getting so tough on criminals.

I would like to point out that during the election the Liberals claimed, for about two weeks, that they too were tough on crime. They claimed that they too supported mandatory jail time for gun criminals and serious offenders. They claimed that after 13 years, they had learned their lesson and that all the soft on crime provisions that they had brought in over those 13 years would be removed if they were re-elected.

Now that they are back here in opposition, it is clear that they have learned nothing. The Liberals are still soft on crime. They oppose mandatory jail time for hardened criminals and gun criminals. The Liberals oppose our decision to end house arrest for serious sex offenders. They oppose our bans on street racing. They oppose all of our efforts to crack down on the growing scourge of gangs, guns and violence.

I have a question for the hon. member. Why will he not stand in his place and admit that his party, the Liberal Party, will always be soft on crime, and that crime victims can never rely on Liberals to keep our communities safe?

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I am acquainted with the hon. member. We worked very hard and diligently on Bill C-2, the accountability act. I am very familiar with his absolute ability to have a drive-by political bombast, as we just witnessed.

If there was a question there, the question should have been on Bill C-23, but I will underline that this party is about keeping communities safe. This party, on this side, does care about victims' rights, which is precisely why, and it is so evident in the member's question and comment, we like to take a fact-based approach.

We would have appreciated the Minister of Justice and the parliamentary secretary coming to the justice committee with some studies or some facts to back up their storefront democracy version of events. This suggests that these laws that they are proposing, mostly written on the backs of napkins and usually three pages in length, are the panacea, and that they do not give people out there a false sense of security.

We believe in keeping communities safe and spending some of that $13.2 billion in surplus on resources in the community. I would love to discuss this with the hon. member and have him say that we are not giving enough to the police forces in our communities, that we have cut $4.6 million from a trial project administered by the RCMP, who they so steadfastly support and so do we, for drug-impaired reactions.

I know it is very difficult for members opposite to focus on what is before them, but this bill is the fruit of the good work of people at the Law Commission, and people in the Department of Justice. It is a good bill, having nothing to do with the Minister of Justice and his parliamentary secretary and the members opposite.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have to admit to this House, and to anyone who is watching, how much I appreciated the comments of my colleague who just spoke.

I would like him to provide us with a bit more information about the particulars of this bill as it regards ensuring the rights of two co-accused, each one from one of our two official languages, to have a bilingual trial to ensure that each one would be able to have their trial in their language of choice.

There is first, the fact that this charter right, which we now are finding in this bill, actually comes out of court challenges which were funded under the Court Challenge Program which this new Conservative minority government has just cut. Second, there is the fact that many of the issues that are being dealt with within this bill are as a result of work that was done by the Law Commission, which again this new minority Conservative government is cutting funding for, notwithstanding that it was created by parliamentary statute.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, where I come from, Acadia, we certainly recognize that the Court Challenges Program has brought many cities, villages and provinces along with the federal government in interpreting the charter toward increasing the rights of francophones, primarily as the minority in New Brunswick, to have access to government services in the language of their choice.

I was a little dismayed when I heard the Minister of Justice say that he has a large francophone portion in his riding, he understands francophones, he cannot speak French, he represents them, he cares about them, he was an attorney general, and all that sort of thing. Yet, he cannot recognize that although the charter of rights gave entrenched rights to francophones and anglophones to have trials in the language of their choice in 1982, we are in 2006 realizing, after having been tested through the Court Challenges Program, that this needed to be ratcheted up a bit as this section would do.

How is the minister, from rural Manitoba, going to find out about other holes in charter rights across the country if he does not have court challenges or the Law Commission? I am not sure he is going to get it from the members opposite. I have not seen minority language rights as the storefront democracy document that the Conservatives are using. They are using the scare tactics of justice on the streets and they are using hyperbole, which will not get the job done.

As a result of court challenges and because of the Law Commission, which have now been obliterated by this government, it is very clear to Canadians that there is one side of the House that cares about justice, and that is this side, and one side of the House that does not care about justice. The Conservatives are not concerned with justice issues.

The Minister of Justice should be aptly renamed the “minister of what's popular in a scare tactics world”. That would be too long so we could make it an acronym. But the bottom line is that this minister and this government are only interested in very shallow bills that have a great ability to get on the six o'clock news.

The people of Canada should be aware that they are breeding a false sense of security out there because these bills are not supported by any facts or any studies, and the Conservatives are not doing the best they can to protect the victims as we are doing on this side.

[Brian Fitzpatrick, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I heard the member's comments about studies and to me the best study is real experience.

The State of New York and the City of New York in the 1980s and 1990s had bleeding heart liberal democrats running both the city and the state. It was not safe to walk through Central Park at two o'clock in the afternoon, as a prosecutor found out back in the 1990s.

There was a change in that state. Rudy Giuliano was elected mayor of New York and George Pataki as the governor and they got tough on crime. They pushed aside all this liberal bleeding heart stuff to the sidelines, and got to the root cause of crime and got tough on it.

Today, New York City has a lower crime rate than any city in Great Britain of 500,000 people or less. That is based on real experience, not a bunch of bleeding heart criminologists cranking out some sort of opinionated, slanted report on crime. This is a real study in criminology.

If we want results, look to where we are getting results and follow those things. We have had 13 years of Liberal dithering. The only thing the Liberals could come up with was to register every firearm in the country as some sort of way of getting tough on crime. It did not make any difference in this country, as we have seen.

The Liberals did not want to put resources where they were really needed, putting police on the streets where crime is happening and getting the people that endanger our communities off our streets and out of our communities, especially the chronically dangerous type of criminals.

This is what the member opposite fails to address. I think he must have spent most of his years defending criminals in the criminal courts of our land. I am here to--

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. I must give the hon. member for Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe an opportunity to respond.

[Brian Murphy, Liberal, Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his examples from the United States. We all know how fond the other side is of following whatever is done in the United States.

Let me correct what he may think about the State of New York. Yes, George Pataki was the conservative republican governor who came in. Yes, he is the governor under whose administration most of the mandatory minimum sentences in the State of New York have been revoked. This is Bill C-10 for the member's information.

The mandatory minimums in that state have completely been removed. I know it is not popular, but the facts show it does not work.

We have to be oriented toward the facts in all of these cases. I was simply saying on Bill C-23 that these are good amendments. The fact is they were born by contests in the Court Challenges Program and the good work of the Law Commission. Now we do not have these programs, so we will probably not have a Bill C-23 in the future.

I would like to agree with the member that these are good reforms and they will improve our society and make them better. Basically, they are the fruit of Liberal institutions.

We will see if the member will put his vote where his mouth is and vote against this Liberal bill presented under the guise of the Conservative government and truly not want more safety in our community which this side wants.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for allowing me to speak to this bill, which, let us be frank, is really somewhat technical.

Before starting, I would like to take a few moments to comment on the news. I am a little discouraged with this government. People who know me know that I am an optimist through and through. I love life. I am even a rather affable fellow: I keep my cool and I get angry only on very rare occasions. I am a little worried about this government, however. Frankly, we get the impression that this government has assigned itself the job of making life difficult for minorities. It is unbelievable that this government, which is not even a year old, would decide to cut off programs that deal with the status of women and that fight illiteracy.

We might think that in our society, illiteracy is a marginal phenomenon, that people who need to learn how to read are found in marginal groups. When we look a little closer, we realize that there are people in all walks of life who, as a result of problems in their lives, are illiterate. Not knowing how to write has nothing to do with people’s intelligence or with how well off they are. The phenomenon is somewhat related to social status, however. Statistically, there is in fact a higher risk that poverty, in the broad sense, will lead to illiteracy. Nonetheless, it would be a major sociological error to think that illiteracy affects only people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

We also know that this government has chosen to attack gay rights, at a time when considerable progress had been made. We have to ask ourselves: why reverse the gains that have been made and that are no threat to anyone?

Earlier, in reply to a question I asked him, the Minister of Justice said that there was no basis for this. I hope that we will never, in this House, be told that we are going to have to examine a bill that will, in the name of freedom of religion, allow disrespect to be shown for the homosexual communities, for lesbians or gay men.

We have a duty to keep a very close eye on this government. In the area of criminal justice, it has been a long time since we saw, in a democracy, a government that is not merely conservative, but completely reactionary. We have to ask who this government is speaking for. A demagogical line is being drawn between public safety and the desire for harsher sentences, and we know that there is not one member of this House who is not concerned about public safety.

In August 1995, in my neighbourhood, Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, on Adam Street, near my office, I witnessed a car bomb explode. The explosion was part of a conflict going on between motorcycle gangs. All of the members who followed the news at that time will recall that a young man, Daniel Desrochers, lost his life in that explosion. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I immediately joined with all parties in this House to determine what we had to do to respond to this new phenomenon of organized crime. Organized crime was wearing a new face, it was different from what we had seen at the CIOC.

I recall having conversations with senior officials. I do not blame them because this was a new phenomenon. Some officials had the strange notion that it would be possible to break up the 38 criminal biker gangs by using provisions on conspiracy. It is one thing to conspire, and it is quite another thing to be actively involved in a criminal gang. A new law had to be created. The Bloc Québécois devoted itself to that task through the work of my former colleague, the member for Berthier—Montcalm, my colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, and my former colleague from Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles.

That was a time when Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles was well represented. I am convinced that this mistake will be corrected in the next election.

So, it was necessary to create a new law, to establish new provisions and the Bloc Québécois at that time supported the new section 467 of the Criminal Code which established the criminal organization offence. It was not perfect and it was quickly recognized that the criterion of having five members who had previously received sentences of five years during the previous five years—the three fives rule—was not really operational in terms of the law. Why? Because the criminal biker gangs set up what could be called farm teams that recruited people who were not so well known to the intelligence services and the police. As a result, it continued to be difficult to bring those people before the courts.

Suffice it to say that it is sometimes necessary to establish new offences. Some of the social problems we were faced with call for a solution based in criminal law. Given the times we live in, we cannot follow the government in certain matters. Criminal activity has never been so low. Obviously, if there is a crime, some wrongdoing, a robbery or a sexual assault, that is one too many. That is clear. Nevertheless, as legislators we must think of the overall picture, of prevailing trends. It is clear that currently crime is on the decline; and that is true for all western societies.

Why is crime on the decline? Because we are living in a society where, in terms of population, people age 50 and over represent a much greater share of the population. There is an obvious correlation between population distribution and criminal activity. That is the first explanation. The second factor is that the economy is doing well. We are not in a period of recession, as was the case in the 1980s or the 1990s. Of course, that does not mean that we can cut the POWA program. Obviously industrial sectors are facing obsolescence, but overall the economy is doing well.

So if the government had said that its first legislative action was going to be to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act to include social condition or status as a prohibited ground of discrimination, the Bloc Québécois would have acknowledged that the government had a degree of sensitivity. Instead, the first bill that the government brought forward relates to the issue of conditional sentences, against a backdrop of demagoguery the likes of which has rarely been seen before. God knows that I have had some experience of it. I have been here for 13 years, and I have taken part in a number of public debates.

I want to say a few words about conditional sentences before getting to the heart of the bill. I imagine that no one in the Bloc Québécois or among the other parties thinks that in every possible scenario we must allow prisoners to serve their sentences at home. Socially, one does not need a Ph.D. in criminology or political science to understand that there are some offences that call for real denunciation.

That is the purpose of sentencing. When we look at the objectives in section 718 of the Code, we see rehabilitation and denunciation. Denunciation means that there have to be exemplary sentences. Some offences are so heinous, arouse such disgust that we cannot imagine that people could serve their sentences in their communities.

But the Conservative government, with its obvious lack of nuance, says that this will apply to all offences punishable by more than 10 years in prison. Obviously, the fact that an offence is punishable by more than 10 years does not mean that a judge will hand down a 10-year sentence. We are well aware of this.

An offence that is punishable by 10 years, that could be the case for counterfeiting currency or pirating software. It can also apply in the case of simple possession of marihuana. So obviously the marker for detention in the community cannot simply be the 10-year sentence criterion.

On the other hand, some offences—such as child neglect and abuse—are not punishable by 10 years’ imprisonment. But do we want people convicted of that kind of abuse to be serving their sentence in the community? Of course not.

For organized crime, section 467, that I spoke about earlier, contains certain provisions—sections 467.1, 467.2 and 467.3—that provide for offences that are not punishable by more than 10 years in prison.

We therefore see that this is a very odd sort of government. And it is very plain that it is completely at odds with the values that Quebeckers uphold. I also think that in the next election we will be looking at a government that is refusing to resolve the fiscal imbalance issue.

It really is quite unbelievable. The Prime Minister was elected because of the Gomery Commission. He talks about transparency, accountability, keeping his word. He goes before the Chamber of Commerce in Sainte-Foy and he makes a speech.

We told ourselves that, if the leader of the Conservative Party had something to say about this, it was because he believed in what he was saying and he was saying what he believed, and that he would turn the commitment he had made into a reality. He undertook to solve the fiscal imbalance. In fact, the Séguin commission had mentioned a shortfall of $50 million a week for the Government of Quebec, in light of its responsibilities in such areas as education, culture and income security.

Imagine our disappointment when we heard the Prime Minister say on Le Point a few days ago that he was not in a hurry and that we would see.

He wants the consensus of all the provinces. All those who read the O'Connor report know full well that a consensus of the provinces regarding the fiscal imbalance and equalization will be hard to get. They do not agree on either the inclusion of natural resources or what has to go into the actual equalization formula.

Let us stay on topic. I want Quebeckers to remember how this government is on the verge of becoming dangerous for our democratic values.

The bill that the government has submitted, however, does contain some relatively positive measures overall. It is fairly inoffensive, seeking to reform some procedural provisions, such as the one on service.

The former premier of Quebec loved to quote the old Latin adage Audi alteram partem. Premier Bernard Landry also said, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger”. He used this expression in an election campaign, but of course I am not here to talk about him although I must say that former Premier Landry was a great debater. He was a very great premier, let us never forget.

That being said, the bill before us is interesting in some respects because it will harmonize the rules of service. According to the principles of natural justice, it is unthinkable that an accused person might be brought before the courts without knowing exactly why the law is concerned about him. When one is brought before the courts, one must not only have a clear idea of the charge, but one must also have complete access to the evidence. This was the ruling by the Supreme Court in 1992 in Stinchcombe.

Of course this revolutionized the whole justice system, as my friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board knows. Incidentally, I just learned that he and I share a common passion, as he was an Olympic wrestler. Of course, we are not in the same weight class since he has put on a few kilos over the years, but I know he is in great shape. He goes to the gym regularly and it would be a great pleasure for me to take him on in a friendly competition if he so wished.

That being said, the bill contains interesting aspects on the whole issue of evidence.

We are interested in looking a little further to better understand this bill, but we are reassured with regard to this aspect.

Another positive aspect is the use of telecommunications to forward warrants to be executed in a different jurisdiction than the one where the search took place. It is called a change of venue.

There are also changes to the process with respect to the challenge of jurors in order to help preserve their impartiality, among other things. This is an interesting aspect since the use of jurors comes from the common law system. It may be the only direct way for our fellow citizens to take part in the judicial process if they are not the victims or the accused, or if they do not themselves work in the justice system.

However, the challenge of jurors is not that simple since it is a random system, something we must not forget. Parties may challenge jurors on the basis of their background, their bias, their statements, their roles, etc. We are indeed very happy to learn that there will be an updating of the way jurors can be challenged.

I was somewhat concerned after reading one aspect. We will see what it means in due course. An appeal of a superior court order with respect to things seized lying with the court of appeal is not always a simple matter, because some appeals are appeals as of right—an appeal de plano—while other appeals are appeals with leave.

The majority of appeals are made with leave to appeal, which clearly involves some degree of discretion. For example, in the case of a conditional sentence of imprisonment, it was not clear whether a conditional sentence order could be suspended. It appeared that the department had agreed and that it is not a provision that is reflected in the bill. That is, perhaps, a less positive aspect. We will see exactly what meaning is to be given to it, but that does not compromise our wish to see the bill referred to committee. However, overall, it is less positive.

In closing—I have the feeling that my time is quickly expiring and if all is well, Mr. Speaker, please let me know—I want to speak about one aspect about which we have some questions. The severity of the sentence can be appreciated depending on whether it is a summary prosecution or a criminal charge. We consider that a criminal charge is generally more serious in terms of the offence, the penalty and the judicial process because the laying of a criminal charge leads, more often than not, to a trial by jury.

Now, on the subject of fines and summary conviction offences, the maximum fines have been increased from $2,000 to $10,000. I am concerned about that. However, it is true that the amounts had not been revised for 20 years. We will see what the witnesses have to say on that subject.

This is a strange government, somewhat removed from the values of Quebeckers, but it has introduced a bill that deserves consideration not because it deals with the substance of the matter but with the rules of procedure. We will be pleased to work in committee to obtain the most information possible and to ensure that we produce the best legislation possible.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the member's presentation. It is with great satisfaction that I noted, as he did, that a change had taken place in the riding of Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, now represented by a colleague who sits on the government side and who helps bring forward concrete legislative measures like the bill before us today.

During the summer, that member took the time to hold consultations in his riding to ensure that the measures brought forward will help improve our justice system. I myself took part in some of those meetings, including with women's groups that are trying to deal with the problem of domestic violence and that are looking for ways to help rape victims and to prevent these types of crimes.

The groups we met were very pleased with the measures proposed by our government. What is nice about being a government member is to be able to propose concrete measures and to go forward with them with the cooperation of other parliamentarians.

This bill will make several improvements. I would like to have my colleague's opinion on three of those. I would like to know if he supports them. First, this bill proposes to give our justice system a means to deal with child pornography. It also provides that the examination of an accused be conducted in the language of the accused. Finally, it limits or prohibits communications between the accused and the victims.

I would like my colleague to tell us what he thinks of those three measures, which I believe are excellent and will improve our justice system.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, our rules prevent us from saying bad things about our colleagues and I will definitely not engage in that.

However, I must say that the last time I saw the hon. member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, it was on the TVA television network, when he had to apologize for making comments that hurt his constituents. Be that as it may, we are not allowed to say bad things about our fellow members.

As regards the Quebec Conservative caucus, I do not question the hon. member's good faith when he says he wants to make a contribution. However, when it comes to major issues—such as the fiscal imbalance, UNESCO and the protection of Quebec's interests—if I were to make an analogy with a movie and the Conservative caucus in Quebec, the title that comes to mind would be “The Silence of the Lambs”, since its members are so terribly silent on these matters. I hope that when it is realized that this government is not fulfilling its commitments regarding fiscal imbalance, the hon. member for Lévis—Bellechasse will put partisanship aside and rise to call his Prime Minister to order and tell him that he must first protect the interests of Quebec, and not those of a man who has decided to team up with Jean Charest.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy listening to the member address the House. He made a statement that we should not stray too far from the bill. That was after he had talked about a number of items such as fiscal imbalance, wait times, EI benefits and a few others.

It supports his assertion, and I tend to agree with him, that the government is dangerous for our democratic values. I thought immediately of the vote to extend the Afghanistan mission for two years. The Prime Minister rose in this place and said that even if members voted against it, he would still extend it for a year. The member is quite right.

This is an omnibus bill that would make a variety of changes to the Criminal Code. The member will well know that it is extremely difficult to deal with bills such as this. We need to have a copy of the Criminal Code with us to see the context in which the changes are made.

Would the member not agree that it would have been better to have sent the bill to committee before second reading so the items of concern could have been brought to the attention of members and we could have had a more informed debate at second reading?

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question. I also thank him for pointing out that I always try not to stray too far from the substance of the issues before us.

This minority government was elected in a legitimate fashion. However, almost seven Canadians out of ten did not vote for it. It must be recognized that, in terms of democratic values, and particularly those values that are deeply rooted in Quebec's collective fabric, this government is light years away from that kind of debate and understanding. We will have the opportunity to point this out regarding several issues, such as the status of women, literacy, the rehabilitation of young offenders, criminal law, community life and so on.

Only when voters cast their votes, at a time to be determined by this House, can this situation be corrected.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I also enjoy hearing the speeches by the member. Sometimes he even speaks on the matter before the House and that is even more enjoyable.

I would like to draw his attention back to the specific provisions of the bill. One of the provisions in the bill is to increase the fine for summary conviction offences from $2,000 to $10,000. Has the member any thoughts on whether that is too steep an increase? Does it have the risk of compelling people who cannot afford to pay the larger fines to jail time as opposed to wealthier people who can easily pay fines? Do we have a povertization of crime in this process?

Could the member comment on that?

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to speak to this point before the House. I also share this concern. As I said, there has been no increase for 20 years. Additionally, speaking of summary convictions, they often involve less serious offences and people who may have financial problems. Of course, we realize that this is not always the case, but I am very anxious to hear the witnesses.

Depending on any additional information, this should be one of the first things amended in committee. Indeed, I have concerns about jumping from $2,000 to $10,000 all at once. I will reserve my judgment for an open and honest discussion with the witnesses, who will no doubt enlighten us. Nevertheless, I share my colleague's concerns completely.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-23 is a series of amendments to the Criminal Code with regard to, primarily, criminal procedure but also with regard to some changes in the sentencing provisions in the code and some, what I would see as improvements in the language rights of people who are accused and appearing before our courts.

I know I sound like a broken record but I will be raising, as I have just about every time I have spoken to a bill, particularly a crime bill from the government, the need for a major overhaul of our Criminal Code. It is long overdue. It is not in the process at all. The government has made no serious attempt to bring the Criminal Code into the 21st century. In some respects, this mini omnibus bill is a reflection of the need we have to reform and, in many respects, rewrite our Criminal Code.

The code contains serious contradictions and gross inconsistencies, both in crimes and the sentencing that we apply to crimes, crimes in some cases where the maximum penalty is way out of line with the seriousness of the offence in the sense that it is either way too low or, in other cases, way too high.

This is not just an academic discussion. The courts, all the way up to the Supreme Court, have made it very clear, particularly with regard to the sentencing provisions within our Criminal Code, that there has to be a reasonable proportionality between the seriousness of the offence and the sentence that is imposed. I believe we are at risk at some point of defence lawyers beginning to consistently challenge, I believe ultimately successfully, a number of provisions within the Criminal Code in that the penalties are widely disproportional to the severity of the crime and grossly inconsistent with other crimes that I believe objectively most people would say are less severe but have greater penalties. That is just one example of the problems in the code as we have it.

We have not had a major revision to our Criminal Code since, I believe, sometime in the 1970s. We are getting on close to 40 years since there was an overall to the code, and even that was not a complete revamping of it.

I compare that to the number of times this has occurred in other common law jurisdictions around the globe. A number of states in the U.S., in England, Australia and New Zealand, countries like that, have all done much better, more efficient and more timely work on their criminal codes than we have.

I believe this problem is heightened now by what happened a week ago when the government, in a very arbitrary manner, decided to kill the Law Commission, which was probably, in my opinion, the only body in the country that could have organized the necessary talent and brought it together. I do not think there is one institution, one law school or even the Law Commission itself that would not have had the resources or the talent, quite frankly, to be able to prepare a draft Criminal Code in order to update it and bring it into the 21st century.

The Law Commission will be gone if the government is successful in its meanspirited approach to that particular institution, an institution that is renowned in the common law jurisdictions around the globe. It is interesting to read the number of commentaries that have come in from our Commonwealth partners in particular about the work the Law Commission has done. It has done cutting-edge work that a number of other countries have looked to and, in some cases, used extensively in revamping various parts of their justice system and their laws.

It will be a real shame if the government is ultimately successful in destroying that institution because with the kind of problems we have with our Criminal Code it will no longer be a resource that is necessary to get the draft of the code in place so that it can be considered by the House at some time in the future.

Some of the changes the Conservatives are proposing in this mini omnibus bill reflect the technological advances that have been made but have not been taken into account. I will use a simple example. Under the Criminal Code, as it is now, we can send documentation by fax machine to other jurisdictions and the document that comes out of the fax machine is sufficient for the court to use as proof of the validity of the document and it can then be used in the court proceedings in the new jurisdiction. However, this cannot be done by telecommunication. An email cannot be sent the same way. The bill, assuming it passes, will allow the criminal justice system to use that advance in telecommunications.

Another provision to which I think we are all sensitive is communication equipment, computers, et cetera, that are used for the purposes of child pornography or luring children. The Criminal Code has no provision for that equipment to be seized after an accused has been convicted. It is just a blank because 10 or 12 years ago the Internet did not exist for mass use and, therefore, there was no need for that provision.

This is yet another example of where we need to update the Criminal Code in order for our courts to be able to adequately deal with convicted persons and dealing not only in penalties of imprisonment or fines but also being able to seize the equipment that they used to perpetrate those crimes. Both of those are clear examples where the Criminal Code has not been able to keep up with technological changes in our society.

Another proposed amendment is to modernize how we deal with betting and bookmaking. As it stands right now in the code, there are quite severe limitations on what that means and a great deal of bookmaking at this point is conducted by way of modern technology, telecommunications, computers, et cetera. As those crimes are now defined in the code, when they are performed that way they are almost certainly not crimes under the code. We need to update that and say that the conduct is the same as it would be if one were running numbers and communicating those by way of a computer over the Internet that would now be a crime. It is not at the present time, which is why the code needs to be updated.

All of those are clear examples of the inadequacy of the Criminal Code in this country at this time and they are a clear reflection of the need for a major overhaul of the code. It is so confusing and so complicated it really impairs our ability to run an efficient justice system.

However, because the government is much more concerned with the hot button items, we consistently see, time after time, very short bills coming through dealing with one hot button crime to draw attention in the electorate, but, quite frankly, in a very cynical way, having no intention of dealing with the problems in this Parliament.

We were doing some scheduling work in the justice committee yesterday and it will not see this bill, assuming it gets through second reading and out of the House, until the fall of next year and it may even be into 2008 before the committee sees it because it is that backlogged. We have many bills and we have been told that we will get two more the week after the break. The list seems to be unending.

Rather than dealing with this in a reasonable fashion and recognizing that it has to stop playing politics with crime, the criminal justice system and policing in this country, the government moved to do an omnibus review of the Criminal Code and brought back a whole new code to Parliament. As long as the present government is in power, which, hopefully, will not be for too long, we will continue to see consistently small bills coming through addressing hot button items that will have no chance of ever being dealt with by Parliament simply because the justice committee is so backlogged already.

With regard to the balance of the bill, I want to address some comments to the sentencing provisions generally, but the specific concern I have is with the increase in the fines for summary conviction offences. Those are the lower offences in terms of seriousness as opposed to indictable offences.

Fines used to be $1,000 and then they were increased to $2,000 back some time in the 1970s or 1980s, about 20 or 25 years ago. The government is now proposing to increase the $2,000 fine by a multiple of five to $10,000.

The concern I have is that those summary conviction offences tend to be the lower end ones. They tend to involve, in a vast majority of cases, individuals who are at the lower end of the socio-economic levels in our society and who would be most affected negatively in terms of their ability to pay fines. It appears, whether it is intended or not, and with the present government we never know for sure given some of the vindictiveness in its cuts last week, that the government is intentionally targeting that lower socio-economic group within our society.

However, whether it is intentionally targeting that lower socio-economic grouping within our society or not, we will end up, almost certainly, with more people from that lower socio-economic grouping being incarcerated in our provincial prisons.

This would have a double impact. It, obviously, would have a very negative impact on those particular individuals, and unfairly so compared to people who have a better economic status, but it is also a form of downloading responsibility on to the provinces. The federal government is attempting to pass a law that will require the provincial governments to increase the number of cells they have because of the number of people they will now have incarcerated in their prisons because of these new offences. If those individuals cannot pay the fine they will be going to provincial prisons, not federal prisons.

We know, from all sorts of evidence that we heard fairly recently at the justice committee, that our provincial jails are way overcrowded. There is not one province in this country that does not need additional cells. In some cases, particularly in the provinces where there is less wealth, there is a very strong need for their prisons to be expanded. This would only dump more people into those provincial jails with the end result being that the provinces will need to find ways to pay for it.

This is a double whammy because our provincial jails have no more capacity. Not only will we have an increase in the yearly administration costs, because so many more people will be incarcerated, but the provinces will need to move out substantial amounts of capital dollars to build additional prisons at the provincial level. With those huge amounts of capital dollars that will go out, there will be substantial increases in their yearly administration and operation costs for those same jails.

There was no proposal in the last budget, and no proposal with regard to this legislation or any of those other crime bills we have seen, for the federal government to give any additional money to the provinces to respond to the need that is going to be created by the federal government but dumped on them, leaving them the responsibility to find dollars in order to be able to house these additional convicted criminals in a prison setting.

We need to take a very close look at this when it gets to committee, assuming it gets there, as to whether the fine should be increased to $10,000 or to an amount that is perhaps more in keeping with inflation since the last time the amendment was made to the level of fines for summary convictions.

I am conscious of the time. If I have time, I will come back to the sentencing issue in a few minutes, but I do want to speak about two other issues.

One issue is procedural. It is with regard to these relatively minor but important changes that need to be made when we are selecting juries. Basically what is happening is that if a juror is being challenged for what we say is “cause”, the cause being some declared bias either against the accused who is before the courts or the Crown, that juror can be challenged in appropriate circumstances. It has been difficult in the past to determine how we decide whether the evidence we are getting from that prospective juror is sufficient to show a conflict and a bias to the extent that he or she would be excluded.

The amendment being proposed, which I think is a good one, is that if jurors are already selected, we would allow two jurors to make a determination, a finding, in effect, taking the place of the judge, as to whether the person has a clear bias and should be excluded from the panel.

If we do not have sufficient jurors already on the panel, then two would be picked at random from the general panel sitting in the courtroom at the time. They would be sworn in and would be required to make a decision as to the bias of the juror in question and determine whether the juror is to be excluded or included in the panel.

I think that is a major step forward in the jury selection process. I think it makes it more credible. It makes it more accountable to the panel of jurors that is there.

There are some additional provisions to clarify the availability of a person's right to use the alternate official language from the one that is customarily used in the court. There have been some problems with that as to when it is available. Oftentimes it crops up when there are co-accused, each of whom has as his or her primary language one of the official languages but not the same one. There is clarification in this bill, which I believe will go some distance toward rectifying some of the problems our judges have had in determining how extensively available trials in both official languages are in this country. That is a major change, one that would be welcome.

With regard to a number of other criminal procedural matters, again, it is a criticism of both the previous government and the current one that we have not done these before. They are quite straightforward. They should have been done a long time ago. In some cases, these problems were identified as long as 10 to 12 years ago and we are just now getting around to it. We have no way of knowing whether we are actually going to get through this bill, as I said earlier, but it may be some time down the road.

Let me conclude, in my last minute, by saying that we badly need a total revamp of our Criminal Code. This bill is a clear example of all sorts of corrections to the code, corrections that have been needed for a long time. We are probably not going to get to them in this Parliament. I keep emphasizing the need for this major revamp and reform so that our Criminal Code is in the 21st century, not back in the 1900s.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board]

Mr. Speaker, the member spoke of the Conservative government's decision to get tough on crime. He is right.

We have made the decision to raise the age of protection to protect children against sexual predators.

We have cracked down on Internet child pornography.

We are bringing in tough three-strikes legislation to ensure that offenders who commit three serious violent or sexual offences serve jail time for an indefinite period of time.

We have replaced house arrest with mandatory jail time.

We are banning street racing.

These are the tough on crime measures that we promised during the election campaign and they are the measures that we are now delivering.

Here is the question. During the election campaign, the Liberals and the New Democrats claimed to support tough on crime measures. They claimed they were behind mandatory jail time for hardened criminals. Now that the election is over, they are breaking their promises and holding up these important tough on crime measures. We--

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The hon. member for Mississauga South on a point of order.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if I were to pull out Marleau and Montpetit I am sure I would find the section which indicates that debate in the House should be relevant to the order of the day before the House. I understand the member's points, but there is an important bill before the House and his statements validate the point raised about the government throwing bills at us to make it look like it is doing something when it has no intent. We do not have to be paranoid for them not to be out to get us.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

I think that is a point of debate. The hon. parliamentary secretary is addressing things that the member for Windsor--Tecumseh raised in his speech. We will allow the hon. parliamentary secretary to continue.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I see we have struck a nerve here. I know that particular member has received a lot of pressure from his constituents, who are very angry that he broke his promise and that his party broke its promise to support mandatory jail time for hardened criminals. That is a big issue in his riding. That is why he leapt to his feet to try to silence me.

The reality is that we are getting tough on crime and we have kept our word, whereas the Liberals and the NDP, which claimed to support these tough on crime measures when it was election time, are now holding up at least 12 tough on crime bills that are before the justice committee. If they really believe in keeping criminals behind bars and keeping our families, communities and children safe, they will immediately pass these bills through the justice committee, out of the House of Commons, through the Senate and into law, so that we can make our streets safe again.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thought that was just a speech. I think he forgot the election was over about nine months ago.

It is so typical of the Conservatives not to understand our platform. We were very specific. If we are going to get serious about dealing with crime in this country, which they are not, a series of pieces of legislation just thrown into the House will not solve the problem. There are any number of other ways in which we can deal with crime.

Have the Conservatives done anything yet about delivering on their promise to deal with programs that would prevent crimes from ever occurring?

[An hon. member]

None.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Actually, they did, and we told them it would cost about $100 million a year. What did the Conservatives do? They put in $20 million for two years in the budget delivered in the early part of this year.

When the Minister of Public Safety and the Minister of Justice appeared in front of the committee in the springtime, I asked them how they were going to spend the $10 million allotted for this year. They could not tell me about one point that they were going to spend money on. Not one. The money is inadequate in terms of doing preventative work and the government does not know what it is going to do with it anyway. That is so typical on crime because the government has no idea what it is going to do.

The government brings in pieces of legislation that it knows will not get through the justice committee, yet it just keeps dumping legislation into the House. The Conservatives are not serious about crime. They are misleading the Canadian people. That was their pattern in the election and it is a pattern with them in government.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

There will be five minutes left for questions and comments when this bill comes before the House again.

The House resumed from October 4 consideration of the motion that Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments). The government has already presented important measures in the House that aim at providing better protection for Canadians against crime.

Bill C-23 responds to the government's multifaceted goal of tackling crime by strengthening sentencing measures, enhancing the efficiency of certain procedures and improving access to justice by clarifying court related language rights provisions in criminal proceedings. Most of these amendments are the result of changes that the provinces, territories and other stakeholders have been instrumental in helping our government identify.

Hon. members will appreciate that Bill C-23 is not about fundamental law reform. Rather, it is about fine tuning. While the amendments contained in Bill C-23 are generally of a technical nature, they are nonetheless important. These amendments can be divided into three major groups. I propose to first highlight some of the criminal procedure amendments. I will then say a few words with respect to the amendments proposed to the language rights provisions of the Criminal Code. Finally, I will detail some of the sentencing amendments.

First, let me deal with criminal procedure.

Criminal procedure amendments would, among other things, improve procedural efficiencies and rectify certain shortcomings in criminal proceedings. Other amendments would confirm the intent behind some criminal procedure provisions and clarify their application. For instance, a corrective amendment is needed to rectify the situation by which the appeal route of a Superior Court judge's order is to return seized property to another judge of the same court. This is obviously problematic. In order to make this appeal route consistent with other similar appeal route processes and to avoid the unusual situation whereby a judge is called upon to review the decision of a fellow judge from the same level of court, the amendment would provide that the appeal of a superior court in relation to the forfeiture of things seized would lie with the Court of Appeal rather than with the Superior Court.

Another amendment would bring more clarity to section 481.2 of the Criminal Code, which deals with the ability to charge and try an accused in any territorial division for an act or omission committed outside of Canada. This amendment would clarify that the intent would not be to make any criminal act or omission committed outside of Canada an offence in Canada. Usually offences are prosecuted in the territorial division where they are committed. This, however, poses a difficulty with respect to those offences that, while having been committed outside of Canada, can be prosecuted in our country in accordance with a federal statute. War crimes are examples of such offences.

Unfortunately, the current wording of section 481.2 leaves room for interpretation whereby any offence committed outside of Canada could be prosecuted here, and that is clearly not the case. The amendment would now make it clear that this provision would deal strictly with court jurisdiction and would act as a residual clause where proper court jurisdiction with respect to territorial division would not otherwise be provided for in another federal statute.

Another criminal procedure amendment is proposed with respect to the right of an accused to be tried before a judge, sitting without a jury, where an indictment has been preferred; that is, where the Crown files the indictment directly before the Superior Court. Currently, when this is the case, the accused may not, without the written consent of the Crown prosecutor, choose to be tried before a court sitting without a jury. The amendment would allow the accused to elect to be tried before a Superior Court judge, sitting without a jury, subject to certain conditions. This amendment would introduce more flexibility and would assist in avoiding unnecessary jury trials where the accused would prefer to be tried by a judge alone.

Another proposed amendment will streamline the process for executing search warrants in a jurisdiction other than the jurisdiction where the search warrant has been issued. Currently, before a search warrant can be executed in another province, it must be presented to a judge or a justice in the other jurisdiction for endorsement in its original paper form. Obviously, this can be time consuming, complicated and inefficient. This process is resource intensive and very time consuming. The proposed amendment will allow the search warrant to be sent by facsimile or by another means of telecommunication, thereby permitting a copy of the search warrant to be endorsed by a judge or a justice in that other jurisdiction.

By taking advantage of technologies that are both reliable and expedient, we are making better use of the time and resources of law enforcement agencies.

Bill C-23 also contains two amendments in relation to jury selection. When selecting jurors, the Crown and the defence are each afforded a certain number of peremptory challenges; that is the ability to unilaterally reject a potential juror without having to invoke any specific ground. One proposed amendment will fill a gap in the current scheme by clarifying that peremptory challenges will also be available where a sworn juror is excused before the evidence is heard and where a replacement juror must be selected.

The other proposed amendment will assist in preserving the impartiality of prospective jury members, as well as sworn jurors, by providing the court with the power to order the exclusion of jurors from the courtroom where a potential juror is being questioned in the course of a challenge for cause and may potentially through his or her answers inadvertently jeopardize the jurors impartiality.

These technical yet practical changes to the various processes that operate in the criminal justice system will contribute to the improvement and greater efficiency of criminal procedure.

I will speak a bit about language rights. The amendments in Bill C-23 with respect to language rights deal with an accused person during a criminal proceeding. The right of all accused to a trial in either official language is consistent with both the letter and the spirit of the language provisions enshrined in the Constitution Act, 1867, and in section 19 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Since 1978, the Criminal Code has sought to ensure access to services of equal quality for members of both official language communities. This is an important objective because, as the Supreme Court of Canada noted, “Rights regarding the English and French languages are basic to the continued viability of the nation”.

From time to time it becomes necessary for Parliament to intervene to provide the means by which such rights can be enjoyed.

Canadians have told us there are still obstacles to full and equal access to the criminal justice system in one's own official language. Court decisions, as well as reports by the Commissioner of Official Languages, confirm that barriers continue to stand in the way of the exercise of these fundamental rights. The proposed amendments will bring the Criminal Code provisions in line with judicial interpretation, thereby avoiding misunderstandings, legal debates and costly delays. One example of such difficulties involves the application of the language provisions of the Criminal Code to bilingual trials. In R. v. Beaulac, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that all the rights that are provided to an accused person in the context of a trial in one official language also apply to bilingual trials. Yet the lower courts are still struggling with these issues as well as with the practical manner in which bilingual trials are to be held.

The proposed amendments clarify such matters and specify that the right of an accused person to be tried by a judge, who speaks the official language of the accused, as well as the duty of the Crown prosecutor to speak that language, indeed do apply to bilingual trials. The amendments also provide the presiding judge with the necessary tools to manage bilingual trials in a fair and efficient manner. In doing so, the amendments implement recommendations made by the commissioner of official languages in 1995 that certain amendments be made to section 530 of the Criminal Code.

The commissioner's study also identified another vexing problem. The study noted that difficulties had arisen in a situation where there were co-accused who did not speak the same official language and that, in the absence of clear indications in the Criminal Code, the matter was being raised more and more frequently.

Some courts have ordered that each co-accused be tried separately in his or her official language. Such decisions have significant repercussions on court resources, as they involve a duplication of trials. They also offend the general principle that persons who are jointly accused should normally be tried together. On the other hand, some courts have ruled that the right of each accused can be reconciled by ordering a bilingual trial.

The proposed amendment brings clarity to the issue by stipulating that the situation of a joint trial involving co-accused, who do not share the same official language, warrants an order for a trial before a judge or judge and jury who speak both official languages. Such an amendment not only brings greater clarity to the code, but also ensures that a proper balance is struck between the rights of the accused person and the efficient administration of justice.

When taken as a whole, the proposed amendments are balanced and fair. They will resolve a number of problems that have been identified with the existing provisions, bringing greater efficiency and putting an end to some persistent legal debates, while also removing some of the hurdles on the road to a greater access to justice in both official languages in our country.

I now turn to the issue of sentencing and I will highlight some of the amendments that are proposed to the sentencing provisions of the Criminal Code.

Bill C-23 contains a number of proposed amendments, some of which will clarify how certain sanctions are intended to apply. Others will improve existing processes or update the law in this area. For instance, one amendment will allow a sentencing court to refer an offender, under the supervision of the court and in appropriate circumstances, to a provincially or territorially approved treatment program before sentence is imposed. In the right circumstances and where appropriate, addiction treatment programs and domestic violence counselling programs can contribute to public protection from crimes where the underlying causes are addiction or where there has been family violence.

Early court supervised access by offenders to these treatment programs can serve as a strong incentive for behavioural change and successful rehabilitation. Specialized drug treatment courts, such as the ones in place in Toronto and Vancouver, are based on the U.S. model that works to adjourn sentencing proceedings, following a finding of guilt, to allow the offender to enter and to complete a court mandated program. By delaying sentencing until the completion of the program, the offender is given a strong incentive to succeed.

Domestic violence courts or court processes have also been implemented in a number of jurisdictions across Canada. These specialized courts include education, counselling or treatment programs for offenders aimed at reducing the offending behaviour.

Allowing sentencing courts to refer offenders in appropriate circumstances to such programs before sentence is imposed will promote early access to rehabilitation and reduce recidivism, thereby contributing to the protection of the public by attacking the source of the problem at an earlier stage.

Another proposed amendment to the sentencing proceedings will provide appeal courts with the power to suspend a conditional sentence order until the appeal is determined. Currently what can sometimes happen is that the conditional sentence is served before the appeal from sentence or conviction is heard. This amendment will ensure consistency with similar appeal court powers, such as in the case of a probation order where a suspension of the sentence, until the appeal is determined, is already provided.

A related amendment, applicable to both conditional sentence orders and probation orders, would allow the court that imposed one of these two sentences the power to bind the person until the appeal would be determined with conditions similar to those imposed on an accused person who is released on bail.

One amendment is also proposed to update the provision with respect to forfeiture of computer systems and other things used in the commission of certain child pornography offences by adding to the existing list of offences the offence of luring a child by means of a computer, so a court may also order the forfeiture and disposal of computers where the offender is convicted of luring a child.

With respect to clarifying current penalties, one Criminal Code proposed amendment will expressly state that where no maximum jail term is provided in a federal statute for an offender who is in default of a monetary penalty imposed for an indictable offence, the maximum term of imprisonment will be five years.

Penalties for impaired driving offences where there is a death or injury are also clarified by an amendment so that there is no uncertainty: minimum fines and jail terms that must be imposed for a first, second or subsequent driving offence, such as failure or refusal to provide a breath sample, must also be imposed when the impaired driving offender is convicted of the more serious offences of impaired driving causing bodily harm or death.

This amendment will mean that conditional sentence orders cannot be imposed for impaired driving offences causing injury or death, as the Criminal Code does not authorize the imposition of such orders for an offence where a minimum penalty is provided.

Other impaired driving offences will tighten and clarify application of driving prohibition orders, including the application of ignition interlock device programs, with a possibility of early return to driving where the program is in place.

Bill C-23 will also increase the current $2,000 maximum fine that can be imposed for a summary conviction. This amount has remained untouched since 1985, while the monetary values for other offences have increased. It is time to update the law in this area by raising the maximum monetary penalty to $10,000. The increase will provide more flexibility for crown prosecutors to proceed by way of summary conviction, in particular where the sanction sought is a higher amount than $2,000.

Before I conclude, there is one final sentencing amendment that I feel should be highlighted, that is, the amendment with respect to victims of unwanted communications.

Such orders can already be imposed on an accused person in remand or released on bail as well as on an offender who is on probation. Current disciplinary measures in correctional institutions with respect to unwanted communications vary among jurisdictions, with most cases being addressed on a case by case basis.

This amendment will provide sentencing courts with an added means to protect victims from unwanted communications by providing the sentencing court with the power to order a convicted person not to communicate with identified persons such as victims and witnesses while the person is incarcerated.

In addition, it will be an offence to breach an order not to communicate with an identified person.

In conclusion, I wish to state that in contemplating criminal law reform we must not lose sight of the system in which these substantive provisions of the Criminal Code operate. It is important that we take the time to respond to calls for changes such as the ones highlighted today, so that our criminal justice system can most effectively contribute to the protection of society. That, I trust, is the goal of all parliamentarians in this place.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take some time to comment on the work of the Uniform Law Conference of Canada. I believe that most the provisions of this bill came from the law conference's work. There are 46 clauses affecting different areas in the Criminal Code and in procedure.

I would like an acknowledgement by the parliamentary secretary that the bulk of the work for the bill was done by the Uniform Law Conference of Canada. In my speech, I will be talking about what it does for us in this country.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her work on the justice committee and on these issues and the many bills we are putting forward as a government.

As I stated, these provisions draw on input that we received from across Canada. These provisions and the streamlining are measures that provinces have called for.

I used as an example the issue of using a fax machine. That brings us into the modern era. Rather than having someone such as a police officer, who could be out on the street protecting citizens, doing the mundane task of getting an original signature, under Bill C-23 we would be able to use a fax machine.

On raising the $2,000 fine for a conditional sentence, that maximum was last revisited in 1985. As we know, the price of almost everything has gone up. This will give prosecutors the means to proceed by way of summary conviction, which will do more to unclog the court system when a fine of more than $2,000 is sought. They will still be able to achieve that greater fine by going by way of summary conviction.

I will say to the hon. member that the bill does draw on the input from a broad section of input from across Canada. Certainly this is being called for by those who work in the criminal justice system. They want us to make our criminal justice system more streamlined and more effective so that our police can be out enforcing the laws rather than going through greater bureaucracies.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my question concerns clause 6 of the bill, amending subsection 204(2) of the Criminal Code.

I would like the hon. parliamentary secretary to tell the House how far the proposed amendment is intended to go, because it is not entirely clear to me. Perhaps the committee will have to look at that if this bill is passed at second reading stage.

With respect to gaming and betting, that clause would allow the Criminal Code to keep up with the new telecommunication technologies, and Internet in particular.

Could the hon. parliamentary secretary tell us a bit more about the proposed amendment to subsection 204(2) of the Criminal Code?

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-23 makes note of “by any means of telecommunication”. The hon. member made note of that in his question.

Bill C-23 in many ways recognizes that there has been a great change in our society and in technology since many of these provisions were put in place. For example, 20 years ago people would not have contemplated that someone would use a computer and something called the Internet to lure a child and potentially commit a further criminal offence. That is why this bill seeks to attack the issue of Internet luring. It has become very serious. We have heard testimony about it over the last couple of years. We have heard disturbing reports of people using computers and the Internet to lure children, even from outside Canada.

Our Criminal Code has to evolve with evolving technology. The hon. member points out a provision in the bill that does this. As I mentioned on the subject of Internet luring, for example, this bill provides that the mode used to commit the offence, the computer, can be forfeited to the Crown. Under current law, that is not the case.

We want to put a little more teeth into our laws to allow our justice system to better protect all Canadians, but as the hon. member pointed out, we also have to recognize that society and technology are advancing and the Criminal Code has to adapt. For example, it is being brought up to date so that a fax machine can be used for some of these orders, and even fax machines are getting to be behind the times. This is an effort to keep the Criminal Code in some way up to date with the times.

As well, the maximum fine for a summary conviction is $2,000, which in 2006 is not what it was 20 years ago. Criminals recognize that. The profit margins that can be gained by criminal organizations and offenders may far outweigh the fines, so we need to bring this more into step with today's current realities.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, whether I get the answer to my question now or at a later stage, I want to flag one thing in this bill, which is that two unsworn jurors will determine whether the cause of a challenge is true in a criminal procedure. I was wondering what the rationale would be for having unsworn jurors as opposed to sworn jurors.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to exploring in committee all areas of the bill and this question and all questions the hon. member may have, which can be put to our witnesses there. Some of the provisions dealing with jurors have dealt with not wanting to taint the sworn jurors when there are questions being put to potential jurors by crown attorneys and by defence lawyers. This is one area relating to jurors which we have to address to ensure that people get a fair trial.

Most of what is contained in Bill C-23 is there to streamline our judicial process, to make it more effective and to take out some of the ancient modes used in the past. Bill C-23 recognizes that we are living in a new era where we have to use a more streamlined system. It recognizes that technology has moved on, so we as a government have to move on in order to better protect society.

That is the main thrust of the bill. It is not to make major substantive changes. We have other bills, such as Bills C-9 and C-10, that make some very substantive changes to the Criminal Code. Bill C-23 is going to make our entire system more streamlined without making major changes to the code itself.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code, which is comprised of numerous unrelated amendments in relation to criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing, and some other matters.

From time to time this type of legislation is required to do a general cleanup of sections that need changes for either a practical reason, a legal reason or an administrative reason, and sometimes even for substantive modernization of sections of the Criminal Code.

This is a bill that should go to the committee for fine tuning and due consideration of each section. Amendments, where and if required, could be made at the committee.

This bill was read for the first time on June 22, 2006. I must say that in the past, briefings on new bills were provided to the opposition critics either shortly after the bill was introduced or upon request. It was always up to an opposition critic whether he or she wished to accept a departmental briefing. I certainly encourage the government to provide departmental briefings. As justice critic I had asked for a briefing on this bill back in June and again over the summer months. None was provided until the first week the House resumed sitting in mid-September.

I remind the government that it is a minority government supposedly wishing to pass legislation through this House.

When the government finally allowed access to the appropriate individuals who worked on this bill and were knowledgeable, they had been instructed that no paper briefing was required. Remember that there are 46 disparate parts to the bill.

The Minister of Justice in his first meeting at committee agreed that briefings are useful and we would be receiving them.

Briefings that are given to critics months after the request, or without some written information, are not as useful as they could be. I do not wish to leave any impression that those who provided the oral briefing from the Department of Justice were in any way unhelpful; they were not; it was more the timing and the documentation. This issue is more a political decision, certainly not a bureaucratic decision.

Since I have raised this more than once and I have tried to raise it privately, I am now raising it publicly because I believe it should be fixed for future bills. Most of us, and I would hope all of us actually, came here to do good policy work. There is no need to allow a political agenda to override working in the best interests of all Canadians, which does include full and timely briefings on procedures and for the bills that are laid before this House. I trust that this situation will now be corrected and will be rectified for future bills.

Today I pushed to have a briefing on a bill that is on the order paper for later this week and I was advised that it was done.

My point is that as a critic on government bills I should not have to be pushing to have a briefing from the government on a bill. The bureaucracy, the officials, the best known people working on that bill over a long period of time should not have to beg for this type of information. That information should be shared, especially if we are trying to move forward together on some of this implementation.

This bill, as I said before, includes 46 clauses. Not all are substantive amendments to the Criminal Code. For instance, the bill establishes the general rule that in criminal matters the service of any document and proof of service may be made in accordance with provincial law. This seems incredibly straightforward. I do not see problems with this. To reflect this rule, a number of the provisions of the code have been repealed.

Many of the provisions in Bill C-23 are as a result of consultation with the provinces and territories within the context of the Uniform Law Conference of Canada. Because many people in our system would not realize who provides input into these types of amendments, I thought I would put forward some of the information that I gleaned about this organization from its website and other places.

The Uniform Law Conference of Canada operates in two sections, one being the criminal section and the other being the civil section.

The criminal section unites prosecutors for federal, provincial and territorial governments with defence counsel and judges to consider proposals to amend criminal laws which are mainly under the federal authority of Canada through the Criminal Code of Canada. Since the administration of criminal justice is undertaken by the territories and provinces, they are the administrators of the systems.

The meetings of the criminal section give the provinces and the territories a chance to ask questions of the federal government and suggest ways to make the system better and reflect the challenges they come across in their day to day operations in performing that administration service. Often they suggest changes based on identified deficiencies or detect gaps in existing law, or it could be problems created by judicial interpretation of existing law. The annual meetings of this conference are not public ones but they are attended by persons designated by their respective governments at the federal, provincial and territorial levels.

The Uniform Law Conference is a volunteer organization. Its work over the years has been extremely useful to the justice system in the land, but it has been relatively unheralded. Like many volunteer organizations in Canada, it is important to recognize and acknowledge its valuable work.

I want to pass now to some of the examples of substantive changes contained in Bill C-23. The first one I will talk about is the default maximum fine for a summary conviction which is being increased from $2,000 to $10,000. Also, we have the realm of having bilingual trials warranted where they involve co-accused who understand different official languages. I also think that this is a good advance.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. With all due respect to my colleague, I would like to be able to follow her speech, but there is no French interpretation right now. There has not been any interpretation for about five minutes. I hope that the interpreter is not dead or incapacitated. I am worried.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I wish to inform the House, including the honourable member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue, that we realize that the simultaneous interpretation system has not been working for about five minutes. It is being worked on and will be fixed shortly.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, do you wish me to continue without the translation?

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I said that the problem would be solved any minute and, as we can see, it has now been corrected.

The hon. member for London West.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Translation is very important in this House.

Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of my colleague from the Bloc, I will repeat that having a bilingual trial is warranted where it involves co-accused who understand different official languages. That is a very important part of the bill.

Orders of prohibition from driving are being made consecutive. I will talk about that a bit later.

Another area that is substantive is allowing a sentencing delay to enable the offender to receive some treatment. This is a positive development in the bill.

Another change in the bill is proposing that two unsworn jurors decide whether the cause of challenge is true. I asked the parliamentary secretary to provide information but I did not get a clear answer in the House. When the bill gets to committee, I suppose we will get the real information as to why they are unsworn. I heard a partial answer, but this still needs clarifying.

Clauses 23 and 24 of Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments) are concerned with changes to direct indictments. I believe we would want to hear more about these changes from criminal defence lawyers at committee. I would also like to hear some expert evidence on the area of the peremptory challenges which are affected by clauses 25 and 26 of the bill. Again, these are not matters that we have to debate at this stage, but I am flagging them so the government will be prepared to make sure these areas are contained.

With respect to subclause 8(3) of the bill which addresses consecutive periods of prohibition for driving, this may allow for extremely long prohibition times. This in turn could upset the balance in sentencing principles in section 718.2(c) of the Criminal Code. The court has an obligation to avoid unduly harsh or long consecutive sentences. We will have to take a look at this area.

I understand clause 37 of Bill C-23 has been proposed to address issues raised by some of the case law in the land. This clause adds a requirement for the court to explain to the offender the mandatory and optional conditions that the offender must meet as part of his probation. Does this mean that the judge should do this personally in court, or will delegation to court officials suffice? I had briefings in this area, but further explanation will be required. This would appear to revert to a former practice in the courtrooms in many years past.

Clause 9 of the bill changes the offence of possession of break-in instruments from an indictable offence to a dual procedure offence. That will obviously allow the prosecutor to make the choice to go with a summary conviction where it is deemed appropriate.

There are many more sections of Bill C-23 which I have not highlighted. The Library of Parliament has put out a very good summary for my colleagues to look at if they are interested in any of the specific sections of the bill. I think it is fair to say that the bill has been out since the summer time and I do not think it has attracted wide attention. I have consulted with some of the people who will have to use these sections in the courtrooms.

The bill quite rightly should go to committee. I encourage those most affected by the operations of these individual clauses to come to the committee as witnesses. We will have to deal with any piece of information or slight adjustment that may be required at that time.

In due course, if the House forwards the bill to the committee, which I believe it will do, we will have the opportunity to work further on sections of the bill. Unlike some of the other justice bills we are faced with in the House, this bill has less of an ideological bent. This is something that has been worked on over time by the provinces, territories and the federal government.

Many of these provisions take years to work through the system. Every once in a while this type of omnibus legislation is required where technical amendments are being made. Criminal law is a living statute. It benefits from being modernized by using our new technologies as has been suggested by some of the other speakers.

At this point, I see no real areas of ideological controversy or any other type of controversy. In due course, I could be corrected by experts who might come forward at committee stage and point out some serious flaws which at this stage of the game we have not seen.

I will be encouraging my caucus to move this bill forward to the committee stage. Each and every stage of a bill is important, but this is the preliminary stage and these changes could serve the justice system well in that administration.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to my colleague and I am in complete agreement: Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments) needs some fine tuning.

I trust that my colleague believes, as I do, that this is probably one of the most interesting pieces of legislation tabled by this government in the past few months. However, I would have this to say. Unlike Bills C-9 and C-10, Bill C-23seems very interesting at first glance. I believe that we, the members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, should spend some time on it as it really strikes me as very important.

This is the question for my colleague: does she know whether or not the Law Commission of Canada—which our current government has just cut or would like to abolish—helped draft Bill C-23 and made any recommendations? In addition, are these the recommendations found in Bill C-23? If yes, which ones are they?

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I believe the Law Commission of Canada is a separate entity from the Uniform Law Conference.

The Law Commission of Canada that was just gutted in its financing is a different entity. It was a very valuable entity to helping modernize Canadian law in all fields and not just the criminal law field. The Law Commission of Canada has done superb work.

Actually, there is a matter of privilege before the Speaker because the Law Commission of Canada was established by statute of Parliament. What we just received with the Law Commission of Canada was the cutting of funding for this organization when in fact the Minister of Justice has to respond to the reports of the Law Commission of Canada. The Law Commission of Canada has a statutory authority to report to Parliament. Its reports are tabled in the House and the Minister of Justice has a statutory obligation to respond to those reports.

Over the years, the Law Commission of Canada has done amazing work on everything from immigration issues, to equality issues, and to issues pertaining to all of the workers of the land. If we look at its annual reports, we can see the breadth and knowledge of work being provided to the House.

In fact, I have tabled a motion in the justice committee that deals not only with the current minority government's decision to remove the financing from the Law Commission of Canada but also the court challenges program. These are two incredibly important and short-sighted decisions of the current government.

When the member asked me about the Canadian bar or anyone else, it raises the concept of consultation on government bills. I have no idea who was consulted on this bill. I think the provinces and the territories were consulted because we know of the input of the Uniform Law Conference. Therefore, there would have been wide consultations.

When we have wide consultations of the appropriate players, we generally get a bill that can be dealt with efficiently in the parliamentary process because a lot of the kinks have been worked out. A lot of the obvious problems have been worked through, people have come together to discuss solutions and so the legislation that is properly consulted and not merely ideologically driven comes to us in a better form for us to deal with.

Here we have an example of legislation. Even though it contains 46 different issues, we have an example of where we have had the broad consultation that was necessary. When that is done, our job as parliamentarians is much easier. We are not doing the same initial level of research, looking for the constitutional or other deficiencies that could easily show up in a piece of legislation, whether it is intended or unintended.

I am concerned when we get the other type of legislation which is the ideologically driven legislation and sometimes we get unintended consequences. That is especially true if we are trying to amend pieces of legislation that have deficiencies in them. In past years, we have sent some of the controversial bills before second reading to committee. This allowed the committee to do a better job at looking at the bill in total and making amendments to legislation that work for the betterment of the bill. When we do it the other way after second reading, it makes it much more difficult.

It really does set us up for all or nothing approaches, which is not helpful and not what is intended when parliamentarians from all parties come to this House to work for good policy or good administration, especially in the areas of justice.

This is a bill that has gone through sufficient consultation, the nature of it, but would it have been from the Law Commission of Canada? I am not sure at this point.

I do respond to my colleague, who currently also serves and works hard on the justice committee, by saying that I hope, and it is my wish, that we have good consultation on all bills that come to committee. Otherwise, what we have is just a deceptive practice of stacking numbers of bills high on the order paper with no intention of ever getting them through, doing it for a political agenda instead of a real work agenda. We on this side of the House are concentrating on the real work agenda for Parliament.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I would like to advise the hon. member for York South--Weston that my glasses are foggy when he is not in his own seat.

I can now see and recognize the hon. member for York South--Weston.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I apologize. I have changed seats so many times that I had actually forgotten where I was supposed to be sitting.

I wonder if I could ask the member a question. Whenever we are dealing with provisions dealing with summary conviction, in my experience summary conviction legislation is to expedite court proceedings and allow the judge a little more flexibility with respect to a delineation of offences where summary conviction proceedings can apply.

Does the member have any problems in terms of prejudicing a co-accused? It has been the experience in the court that where charges are laid, those charges are dealt with, with the co-accused where there are two or more that have been accused of a particular crime.

I understand from this legislation that under summary convictions, where the co-accused does not appear, the judge has the flexibility to allow the proceedings to continue. I wonder if that is an element of the legislation that could be investigated at committee. I am given to understand that there may be some problems with respect to the nature of justice that would apply in those cases where that provision would be implemented.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for London West will want to know that there is less than a minute to respond.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in that case, I will compliment you on your discretion on having foggy glasses to allow my colleague to put his concern on the table, and say that in committee we will have noted his concern in this area and will talk about it because there are some provisions about the co-accused in this document.

I also want to clarify the point that summary conviction, where it is a lesser offence, is two years less a day. When there is a dual procedure offence, it could be the same charge, but the more serious would be proceeded with by way of indictment. The sanctions in sentencing would be two years or more.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to recommend that Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments) be referred to a committee for review.

A number of members have already expressed their support for this bill, which seeks to meet current needs, to propose legislative amendments to address procedural anomalies, to make corrections and to clarify current ambiguities in some Criminal Code provisions. It also modernizes other provisions by introducing the use of communication technologies.

This bill is the result of proposals made in cooperation with the provinces, the territories, interest groups—such as the Uniform Law Conference of Canada—representing linguistic minorities and the Commissioner of Official Languages.

The changes to Bill C-23 affect three main areas, namely criminal procedure, language of the accused and sentencing. I am going to review some of the changes proposed in this legislation, beginning with those affecting criminal procedure.

The purpose of one of the proposed amendments is to reclassify the offence of possession of break-in instruments into a dual procedure offence, that is an offence for which the prosecutor may proceed by way of indictable offence, or by way of summary conviction. Currently, under the Criminal Code, the indictable offence route is the only option for possession of break and enter instruments. However, experience has shown that this offence often results in a penalty similar to that imposed in the case of an offence punishable on summary conviction. Under the circumstances, it is important not to impose on the prosecutor the more onerous indictable offence route, when the outcome of the whole process is similar to that for an offence punishable on summary conviction.

As well, we note that the offence of possession of break-in instruments is often committed in conjunction with a second offence, breaking and entering a dwelling-house. The Criminal Code already provides that this is a hybrid offence, and so the prosecutor has the flexibility of choosing the most appropriate procedure having regard to the facts of the case. When the two offences are committed in the course of the same criminal operation, the present scheme in the Criminal Code means that even if it were more appropriate to prosecute the two offences by way of summary conviction, given that the facts are not extremely serious, the prosecutor may opt to proceed by way of indictment, the more onerous procedure, to avoid holding two separate trials. The proposed amendment in Bill C-23 therefore offers prosecutors greater flexibility, while promoting more judicious use of the resources of the judicial system.

Another amendment is designed to clarify an ambiguity in the present wording of the section dealing with where in Canada an offence that was committed outside our borders may, in certain cases, be tried. The present wording of section 481.2 of the Criminal Code could be interpreted as meaning that any offence committed outside Canada could be charged in Canada. The disastrous repercussions that this kind of interpretation could have on the resources of our courts can easily be imagined, not to mention the enormous challenges that this would present for prosecutors.

However, our law does provide for some exceptions under which it is possible to charge certain offences in Canada that were committed abroad. Examples are sexual offences involving children and terrorism. The proposed amendment will clarify the wording of section 481.2 to specify that those few exceptional offences, and only those offences, may be charged in any territorial division of Canada.

Another amendment clarifies the role of the Attorney General in private prosecutions, that is, prosecutions that are not initiated by the state, where a private information is laid with the court.

The Criminal Code provides that a justice will hold a hearing to determine whether there is justification for issuing a summons or a warrant for the arrest of an accused. The Criminal Code also provides that the Attorney General may participate in that proceeding, including by calling witnesses and presenting relevant evidence. However, the Criminal Code does not specify which Attorney General, provincial or federal, may do this.

The amendment clarifies that the term Attorney General means the Attorney General of Canada, where the offence in issue falls within his jurisdiction and the proceedings could have been commenced at his instance. Another change relates to the jury selection process. That amendment will remedy a flaw in the procedures for replacing a juror before any evidence has been introduced.

The Criminal Code provides that during jury selection, the prosecution and the defence are entitled to an equal number of peremptory challenges, that is, opportunities to reject a potential juror without having to state a reason. However, the Criminal Code is silent as to whether such challenges may be made when a new selection process is necessary to replace a juror who has been discharged before evidence was introduced. The proposed amendment provides that the prosecutor and the accused will each be entitled to one peremptory challenge for each juror to be replaced.

Another proposed amendment concerns jury selection and is designed to ensure the impartiality of jury members. Under certain circumstances, the jury selection process currently allows a prospective juror to be questioned in connection with his or her capacity to be impartial where the prosecutor and the accused are concerned. For example, questions may be asked regarding media coverage on the basis of which an individual might form an opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the accused.

Under the existing process, this questioning takes place in the presence of those already selected as jury members.

There is a risk that answers provided by a prospective juror could bring to the notice of jury members information that is likely to affect their impartiality. The amendment would therefore enable the judge to order that jury members be removed from the courtroom for the duration of the questioning.

Another amendment would allow a judge of the court of appeal to dismiss an appeal summarily without calling on any person to attend the hearing when it appears that the appeal should have been filed with another court. Here again, this will streamline a process which is otherwise unnecessarily tedious.

With respect to linguistic rights, I would now like to address the proposed legislative amendments designed to improve and clarify the linguistic rights of the accused in a criminal trial.

As hon. members know, the right of the accused to a trial before a judge, or judge and jury, who speak the official language that is the language of the accused has been recognized for years now. This guarantee is the product of successive stages that have brought about gradual but definite changes over the past 30 years.

However, studies carried out by the Commissioner of Official Languages and by the Department of Justice have confirmed that there are still obstacles to the exercise of those rights and to the achievement of their ultimate objective, which is equal access to justice in both of Canada’s official languages.

At the same time, our courts continue to interpret, sometimes with contradictory results, the exact meaning of the rights set out in the Criminal Code. This causes delays, sometimes results in unequal application of the provisions from one region of Canada to another and causes uncertainty for judges, lawyers and the accused.

These rights represent an important element of the Canadian identity. As the Supreme Court has stated, language rights “are basic to the continued viability of the nation”. For that reason, the federal government has a duty to take positive measures to ensure the enforcement of those rights.

It is for the purpose of advancing the language rights of accused persons, to reduce obstacles to the exercise of those rights and to put an end once and for all to problems of interpretation that we are proposing legislative amendments.

To improve the efficiency of proceedings, it is essential that the accused person’s choice of the official language for legal proceedings be established as early as possible at the start of proceedings. However, the current provisions of the Criminal Code only require a judge before whom the accused appears to inform the accused of the right to a trial in either official language if the accused is not represented by a lawyer.

As the report of the Commissioner of Official Languages confirms, the lawyer for the accused is not always aware of the language rights applicable to criminal proceedings and does not inform his client of them in all cases.

The commissioner has therefore recommended that all the accused be informed of their right to a trial in either English or French. That is exactly what we are seeking to do with the amendments proposed today.

The Commissioner of Official Languages has also pointed out in her study that it would seem somewhat illogical to grant the accused person the right to a trial in the official language of his or her choice but to refuse access in that same language to the documents by virtue of which the accused has been brought before the courts.

The amendments we propose in the bill would correct that shortcoming and would enable an accused person to ask for a translation into his or her official language of the criminal charge or indictment.

The application of the current provisions of the Criminal Code to so-called “bilingual” trials has given rise to countless debates in the courts. It appears those debates are due to the vague wording of section 530.1. The Supreme Court of Canada however has stated that the enumeration of language rights set out in section 530.1 of the Code which, on the face of it, applies to a trial “in the language of the accused” must necessarily be interpreted as applying equally to a trial taking place in both official languages.

Still, some lower courts continue to adjudge that none of the rights listed applies to an accused who takes part in a bilingual trial. The proposed amendments would put an end to such equivocations.

When we examine all the amendments proposed, we can see that they are adjustments to existing rights and not drastic changes to the justice system but will be of great importance for the accused.

Furthermore, the proposals put an end to the interpretation difficulties identified in both jurisprudence and various government studies that currently prevent the legislator’s aims from being met and trials from being managed efficiently.

In short the proposals will ensure better access to justice in both of Canada’s official languages.

I would now like to discuss the amendments proposed in this bill with respect to sentencing. Without reviewing all the changes, I propose to examine a few of them.

Some of the amendments respecting sentencing are fairly substantive. I would like to mention them briefly and then go on to some other more technical changes provided for in this bill.

At present, the maximum fine for a summary conviction is $2,000, when no other maximum fine is provided for in a federal statute for a summary conviction.

This amount has been the same since 1985, although other specific monetary limits have been adjusted over the years.

Bill C-23 proposes that the maximum fine that a judge may impose for a summary conviction offence be raised to $10,000.

This change will allow the prosecution to proceed by way of summary conviction in a larger number of cases, where justified by circumstances, even though it may recommend the imposition of a higher fine.

For some, this new maximum fine may seem high. We must bear in mind, however, that this amount is the maximum a court may impose on an offender at its discretion.

Also, the Criminal Code provides that, before imposing a fine, the court cannot impose the fine unless it is convinced that the offender is able to pay it or to settle it in whole or in part by using other assets or through work performed under a provincial program, where such programs exist.

Another significant amendment aims to allow The sentencing judge to issue an order prohibiting the offender from communicating with any victim, witness or other person identified in the order during the custodial period of the sentence.

The Criminal Code currently provides for this type of order at various stages in the judicial process. For example, a judge may impose such an order when an accused is released on bail, held on remand or under a probation order.

However, the Criminal Code does not currently allow for such an order to apply during the period of incarceration of an individual convicted and sentenced to prison.

The existing measures at correctional institutions regarding undesirable communication from inmates are generally effective, however, and such situations are addressed on a case-by-case basis, following the procedures and policies in place.

The proposed amendment offers an additional protective measure by granting sentencing judges the power to prohibit an offender from communicating with a victim, witness or other individual identified in the order, for the duration of the period of incarceration.

The amendment also creates the offence of violating that order, punishable by a maximum of two year's incarceration.

I would now like to move on to the technical amendments regarding sentencing.

First, an amendment to section 720 of the Criminal Code is proposed. This amendment aims to allow the court to delay sentencing, when deemed appropriate, to enable the offender to attend a treatment program approved by the province or territory under the supervision of the court, such as an addiction treatment program or a domestic violence counselling program.

Indeed, Canada has tribunals that specialize in treating problems of domestic violence and substance abuse. In certain appropriate cases, referral to such programs can allow offenders struggling with these problems to demonstrate to the court that they are willing to take concrete action towards their social reintegration.

A certain number of technical amendments also aim to make clarifications regarding sentences imposed for impaired driving offences.

In view of the different judicial decisions regarding the application of minimum penalties for impaired driving offences causing bodily harm or death, some clarifications are being made to clarify the real intent behind these sentences. To this end, a provision is added to specify that the minimum penalties for simple impaired driving offences—such as refusal or failure to provide a breath sample—can be imposed on persons found guilty of a more serious impaired driving offence causing bodily harm or death.

This amendment will also help to clarify the fact that conditional sentences cannot be handed down in the more serious cases of repeated impaired driving since the Criminal Code does not permit this when a minimum prison sentence is provided.

A second amendment to clarify the application of impaired driving penalties pertains to offenders who participate in a provincial alcohol ignition interlock device program. A number of provinces have these programs, which enable offenders who have been prohibited by the courts from driving for a specified period to operate a vehicle if it is equipped with an alcohol ignition interlock device and after the expiry of the minimum prohibition period provided under the Criminal Code.

In order to tighten up this provision, the amendment clarifies the fact that offenders are only authorized to drive during their prohibition period if they are registered in an alcohol ignition interlock device program and comply with the terms and conditions of the program.

Other more technical amendments allow courts of appeal to suspend a conditional sentence order until the appeal has been heard and disposed of. This makes it possible to avoid cases in which conditional sentence orders expire before the appeal is heard.

Another amendment would also enable courts of appeal that have suspended a conditional sentence or probation order to require the offender to enter into an undertaking or recognizance that includes conditions similar to those found in cases of accused persons on interim release awaiting appeal.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to the hon. Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, CPC, I will put my first question to the hon. member who just spoke. It will probably also concern the minister, who is sponsoring this bill.

It is surprising that we have to wait a few weeks, or even a few more months, before debating in committee this legislation, which was introduced in June, because it is an important measure. I do not understand why the government waited like this. Considering that this bill does not reflect a right wing ideology, it should take precedence over Bills C-9 and C-10. However, there is one issue of concern to me, because I practised criminal law for 25 years and this is an interesting piece of legislation as regards criminal proceedings: how will the government ensure that the accused is informed of his right to be tried in one of the two official languages? That is the first question.

Secondly, how can the accused be sure to obtain a translation of all relevant documents, including those relating to the indictment and the preliminary inquiry?

Of course, this is not a problem in Quebec, but I am thinking of my clients in Calgary, Vancouver, Winnipeg, or in other places in Canada where English is the official language. As we know, in those regions documents are only translated in French when there is time to do so.

Before introducing this legislation, did we make sure that the constitutional right to be heard by a justice would be respected? This means the right to appear before a judge who can speak and understand French fluently—not someone who just took language courses on the weekend—and who can explain the principles that underlie this bill.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as my colleague said, he is a lawyer. He knows perfectly well that once a right is integrated into legislation and institutionalized, failure to respect that right is a procedural error. Therefore, because it is part of the legislation, it cannot be ignored, and there is no choice but to respect it.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased at the progress the bill is making in the House but some comments were made with respect to the Law Commission having some influence in respect to the drafting of the bill. I have checked with justice department lawyers and they have indicated that the Law Commission neither had any hand in drafting it nor influenced the bill in any way. I wanted to put that forward as a matter of correction on the record.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there seems to be a lot of support for this bill because few questions and comments have been raised. At first glance, this is an interesting bill to which members of this House and litigants should pay close attention. This bill would have a direct impact on litigants like me.

I have been practising law for 25 years. For the past 10 or 15 years, I have focused on criminal law. Bill C-23 is therefore of great interest to me. It will probably also be of interest to my colleagues in the legal profession who specialize in criminal law or who have been practising it more and more over the years and have become very knowledgeable about it.

Bill C-23 is interesting. With all due respect to the Minister of Justice, I would have liked this bill—which is neither right-wing nor repressive ideologically—to have been introduced before bills C-9 and C-10. We are currently debating these bills in committee, and they seem to be based on repressive right-wing ideology. In contrast, Bill C-23 is interesting in many respects.

As I was saying, for 25 years I was a lawyer and argued all sorts of criminal cases. It is not unusual to have clients or cases where it is a matter of possession of break and enter instruments, as this bill addresses. Time and time again attorneys general in the various provinces—the Attorney General of Quebec who administers criminal law in Quebec as well as the Attorney General of Canada—have been told that this does not make sense. Our client was automatically accused of breaking and entering and possession of break and enter instruments. He was accused of a criminal offence because that act was automatically considered as such. This seems utterly unusual and unacceptable to us.

It seems that Bill C-23 will at least amend that—without removing it, of course—and will allow a person accused of breaking and entering and of possession of break and enter instruments to be tried by summary conviction.

In the Criminal Code there are two types of offences and that is what I want to talk about now. There are offences that can be tried by indictment; they are indictable offences. Murder, homicide and all sorts of offences are examples. There are a number of such offences in the Criminal Code. Other offences are called dual procedure offences. The Crown prosecutor filing the complaint can decide to try by indictment or by summary conviction. In summary conviction cases, if the person is found guilty or pleads guilty, he or she will receive a maximum fine of $2,000 or a six month prison sentence or both the fine and sentence.

This new bill, and I think this is important to point out, proposes a number of amendments. It is a large bill that deserves our time and attention and careful consideration as to how it will be debated in committee.

Criminal procedure sets out how to proceed in criminal cases. Let us take for example an accused who is to receive documents. If this bill is passed, it will provide for a means of telecommunications to be used to forward warrants for the purpose of endorsement and execution in a jurisdiction other than the one in which the search warrant was obtained.

In French, that means that if someone was arrested in Rouyn-Noranda and they wanted to search the person’s residence in New Liskeard, Ontario, the original document was required. They sent it by car, from one police officer to the next, until it got to Ontario, and that could take hours. If this bill were passed, it would be possible to send it by fax, for example, with the original document to follow by mail.

On reading the bill, I think that it would be possible to send it by Internet, by e-mail, so that it could be executed as soon as possible. That is a good thing.

Changes are made to the procedure for challenging jurors, among other things, to help to preserve their impartiality. This is also a very good thing, which the bill will bring in if it passes. In the jury selection process, particularly in terms of challenges, this means that we will be able to preserve and protect the impartiality of jurors, which is the very foundation of a jury trial.

There are also a host of other details, such as summary dismissal by a judge of the court of appeal where the appeal has been brought in error. Before, a motion had to be made, saying that it had been filed in the wrong place and asking the judge to dismiss it. Now this will be handled expeditiously.

Where it starts to get interesting is in an appeal to a court of appeal from an order of a superior court relating to objects that have been seized. For example, in the past, you could not move forward as long as the court of appeal had not ruled. You had to wait, but now you will be able to proceed.

Turning now to trials by way of summary conviction for a co-accused where the co-accused fails to appear. This avoids a lot of delay. Before, the accused appeared, but the co-accused was not present, for one reason or another. The judge then adjourned the appearance until the co-accused was located. Now, if this bill is passed, the accused could be tried much more expeditiously than before.

There are all sorts of things like this, and useful things. I mentioned earlier the reclassification of the offence of possession of break-in instruments to make it a dual procedure offence. That may be useful.

Certain things are even more useful, but would almost run counter to Bill C-9. We know that that bill would eliminate the possibility of suspended sentences for a host of offences.

We all hope that this bill will not come before this House again, as introduced by the hon. Minister of Justice. On behalf of the Bloc Québécois and probably many of my colleagues on both sides of this House, I would add that Bill C-9 does not really accomplish what justice demands: that judges have the opportunity to hand down individualized sentences.

Bill C-23 contains some interesting amendments. The bill provides for the power to order an offender in custody not to communicate with identified persons and creates an offence for failing to comply with the order, which increases protection for victims. We had long been calling for this. Defence lawyers had been calling for this. Often, our client in detention would receive telephone calls from victims who wanted to talk to him, and he would call them back. In future, offenders will be prohibited from doing so. If they do not comply with this order, they will be charged with a separate offence of failing to comply with a court order.

The clarifications with respect to the application of impaired driving penalties had long been called for.

Among other things, the possibility of using an alcohol ignition interlock device was raised. This device makes it possible for an individual found guilty of impaired driving to drive a car. The offender has the right to use this device after three months.

We can now provide clarification. Previously, the matter was very complicated, and it still is. For example, a taxi driver who also owned his own car would have to have two alcohol ignition interlock devices. If this bill is adopted, it seems that things will be less complicated. We might come to a consensus about placing the device only in the principal vehicle. It is starting to look interesting.

Probably two of the most important aspects of this bill are the suspension of a conditional sentence order or a probation order during an appeal.

Today, October 16, if an accused is found guilty by a judge, he is subject to a probation order or conditional sentence order and if the accused decides to appeal, the orders remain in force. Thus, even today we still have serious problems. I hope we will be able to change this quickly.

As criminal lawyers we tell our clients that we will appeal their sentence, but that the probation order is in force. The probation order may be for a term of two years and it might be one year before the appeal is heard. The individual would have been subject to a probation order for one year for nothing.

Henceforth, we can at least apply to the court of appeal and ask the judge, upon filing of the notice of appeal, if it would be possible to suspend the sentence. Even today, this can be requested. However, criminal lawyers who live, as I do, in a region such as Abitibi-Témiscamingue are ofter forced to go to Quebec City to do so. This results in additional expenses for the accused. Thus, we believe that this is a very useful amendment. I hope it will be adopted quickly.

One of the interesting comments and one of the even more interesting amendments, is the power to delay the sentencing proceedings so that an offender can participate in a provincially approved treatment program.

This is important and here is what it means. When judges hand down a decision and find an accused guilty, after a fair trial, they will very often delay sentencing, by asking, say, for a pre-sentence report. This is a report that establishes the circumstances of the charge, the circumstances of the offence and who the accused is. Generally a pre-sentence report is prepared at the request of the accused and most often in very important cases.

The accused may in fact have a long criminal record. For instance, he may be charged with manslaughter or found guilty of criminal negligence. These are often very serious cases. The following example comes to mind. An accused found guilty of, or who pleads guilty to, impaired driving causing bodily harm, or causing death, is automatically subject to a prison sentence. The court will generally hand down its decision.

However, under the proposed amendment, the court could delay sentencing until the accused completes his addiction treatment or another appropriate treatment program.

Take, for example, an accused who is sentenced for domestic abuse. He decides to attend a treatment program or violence counselling. The judge hands down his decision, stipulating that the accused must continue his therapy. The accused continues his therapy, but the judge does not know anything about it. Is the accused still dangerous?

So there were some cases—and we defended many—in which the judge, in a case of manslaughter or impaired driving causing bodily harm, handed down his sentence without knowing what the effects were on the accused and the victims.

If this amendment is passed, sentencing could be delayed. Sometimes it takes from three to six months before we get all the reports. Nowadays we do so by consent, but it is illegal.

So the proposed amendment could make it very interesting for the courts in their decisions.

Moreover I would like to urge the House to look very seriously at Bill C-23 with regard to anything to do with both official languages. I was able to take a quick look at the proposed amendments proposed to section 730.

It is proposed that section 720 respecting probation orders and treatment orders be amended. As far as probation orders are concerned, the accused is entitled to have the documents. So someone who has been found guilty must receive the documents and they must be explained in the official language of his choice. Let us take the example of a francophone accused who works in Calgary or Fort MacMurray. These are areas in which English predominates but someone who asks for his trial to be in French can get it.

I draw your attention to subsection 5 of section 732.1, where it is stated that a copy of the documents explaining the conditions must be given to the offender in order to ensure that the terms of presentation and so forth are respected. The following would be added to that subsection, “For greater certainty, a failure to comply with subsection (5) does not affect the validity of the probation order.” This subsection deals with the fact that when a court issues a probation order it gives a copy of the documents to the offender.

This casts some doubt on what the parliamentary secretary told us earlier when I asked him the question. We will have to pay extremely close attention when the amendments set out in Bill C-23 are being examined. It is fine to talk about bilingualism, but bilingualism has to be applied. To achieve that, it is necessary that a person not only receive all the information in his or her official language, but that he or she should understand the information and that someone should take the time to explain it.

On the whole, this is a very interesting bill. The amendments proposed in the bill could clarify the provisions of the Criminal Code and simplify some judicial proceedings.

Mr. Speaker, I see you signalling that I have only one minute remaining. I will proceed directly to my conclusions. The Bloc Québécois is especially pleased to see amendments that contribute to improving the work of judges by giving them greater discretion. These measures will give judges better tools to do their job, which is to determine the most appropriate sentence. And this will contribute to the objectives of deterrence and reparation, as well as an objective that is too often forgotten by our friends opposite in the government, which is that of rehabilitation.

In closing, the Bloc Québécois will be in favour of this bill and we hope that it can receive the support of this House as quickly as possible, in the interests of improving justice.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this is one of those bills where there is not very much in the way of partisan attitude. It comes across almost like a catalogue, and many members have spoken to the it. Running through its various sections, most of them seem fairly technical.

My remarks will be directed to what I think is the underlying purpose of the bill, and from where it came.

While most of the amendments look fairly technical, they have been generated through a great deal of consultation and meetings held across the country, not by the parties but by professionals in the various ministries. I am speaking of Crown prosecutors and in some cases consultations with police and defence attorneys. All of this has been focused on meetings of federal, provincial and territorial officials, then with the federal, provincial and territorial ministers, including the Minister of Justice. Each of these apparently small amendments is intended to improve the efficiency, fairness and efficacy under the Criminal Code operations.

I have noticed an underlying theme of the thinking and creativity on the part of law enforcement, Crown prosecutors and other counsel, in using the provisions of the code, as it has been updated every few years, to better address the problems of macro-organized crime such as gangs and organized crime groups. It is usually in the large cities where these things show up and in order to deal with big city problems, we have to get big city professionals together.

The Criminal Code has quite a number of useful provisions in it, which can be used if we can get the various parties to work together. Keep in mind that it is not one level of government that makes the justice system work. Both the federal and provincial governments have split the corrections piece, or the execution of sentences at the end of a conviction. The front end is where the federal government enacts the Criminal Code and puts in place basic criminal procedures, but the provinces handle the prosecutions and convictions in the courts. Therefore, provincial crown prosecutors carry most of that load. It is also a huge responsibility for our municipal police forces that do most of the work in responding to crime, investigating and laying charges and providing evidence.

The bill is an example of a collaborative amendment of our laws, but I could not help but note recently how authorities have come together to provide much better use of the bail provisions of the Criminal Code when it comes to gang activity. It takes a lot of work but in the end the product is a whole lot better.

I will speak of the Toronto experience. Police has been very successful in gathering intelligence, making arrests and prosecuting street gangs. We used to find that arrests would be made and gang members would be arraigned, but they would be released pending a trial. It takes three, six and sometimes nine months to get a complex trial organized in our large cities now, which means gang members are back out on the street on bail.

For the petty criminal that may work, he or she may stay close to home, show up for trial and justice will be done. However, police noted for many years that as soon gang members were back on the street, they would be right back into what they had been doing. Over time it became apparent that it was possible to use bail conditions as the mechanism for controlling the activities of these not yet convicted gang members, or alleged gang members, and the police and the prosecutors became very good at it.

In my neck of the woods, it all came down to what the police called bed checks. The arrest of gang members might involve five, 10, 15 or 20 members. In one case, it was over 20 members. The bail conditions imposed on the interim release were very strict. In many cases the individual had to be back in a specific home by seven, seven-thirty or eight o'clock at night.

It is one thing to set out the rule and the bail condition, but it was another to enforce it. Therefore, there was a need to craft the appropriate bail condition for the alleged offender, or the accused. Then there had to be the expenditure of police resources to go to a home every day or every second day to ensure that the accused person was complying with those conditions. Where the person was not compliant, that involved a subsequent charge and a tightening of the bail conditions. This took a lot of police work and expenditure of public funds, but it worked incredibly well. The bail conditions either worked, with the person off the street at night, or the bail conditions self-tightened, as there was a non-compliance, which ended up, in some cases, with the accused person being required to be in custody until trial.

The creative use of bail conditions began to work as a crime-fighting tool. I will not go into all the reasons why it was a crime-fighting tool, but from my perspective it was a good use of the judicial and police interface. While it was expensive, in terms of policing hours, it really worked. That type of police-prosecutorial collaboration is continuing, at least in the community I represent. I hope it is working similarly in other parts of Canada.

The bill is a reflection of efforts by the criminal justice community to produce legislation that is more efficacious in achieving these types of goals. Sometimes it is a cost efficiency, or a safety efficiency or a procedural efficiency.

The first one I notice sets out the power to make an order that an offender not communicate with identified persons while in custody. This does not involve a bail scenario, but it involve while a person is in custody. Frankly, it affects the circumstances where gang members issue threats or instructions while in custody. This is a new provision. It would allow the imposition of a restriction, which might under our charter, be seen as a restriction on free speech. However, it is clearly a restriction on people who are in custody from communicating with other specified persons. If they do so, it is a breach of the condition and a Criminal Code offence. This is a good thing if properly used by police authorities. I presume there is always room for abuse, but I am not even suggesting that would happen. The committee will have a chance to look at the intended operation of this provision. From this point of view, I like the look of it.

There are four other sections I wanted to make note of, in the same vein, and that is improving efficiency.

One is the increase in the summary conviction offence filing from $2,000 to $10,000. That is the maximum fine. Because the Criminal Code does not have an inflation escalator, that $2,000 fine looks awfully small for some offences now. Therefore, this is a good change.

The second item is the suspension of a conditional sentence order or a probation order during an appeal. There was a lack of clarity when a person appealed a conditional sentence or a probation order. There was a lack of clarity on both the part of the convicted person who was appealing and the part of police as to whether components of the order were in place while the appeal was under way. This simply clarifies that and it is a good idea.

The third item is an excellent addition to the code. After a person is convicted, this provision would allow a delay in the imposition of a sentence so the offender can participate in a provincially approved treatment program. What has happened up to now is that the judge, prosecutor or defence attorney would sometimes find a way under the rules to postpone sentencing until the offender could engage in some form of treatment to deal with an alcohol or drug dependency or other medical disability.

Now the code, if this passes, will allow the delaying of sentencing so that the accused or convicted person has an opportunity to participate in a recognized treatment program that would allow a judge to select the most appropriate sentencing following the treatment provisions. I do not know how much time would be involved but we will certainly scrutinize that in committee.

The last item I want to mention is the ability of the court to order the seizure of a computer that had been used in child luring on the Internet scenario. That makes good sense. We seize other private property where proceeds of crime situations are involved.

What I want to note for future reference, and the committee will certainly look at this, is that the seizure of computer hardware is one thing but computers now contain information on the hard disk. What is not clear is what happens to the data on the hard disk of a computer that is seized. Is it the intention that the data be rendered inaccessible or is it possible that the data can be accessed and used by the authority seizing the computer? Will the police have the ability to review that data without a warrant, make use of it and turn it into evidence or will it not be evidence? What about other personal and business data?

I do not think we have an answer to that and that should be clarified. What appears to be a simple seizure of a computer may actually be the seizure of a sizeable amount of information, some of which, in a child luring scenario, could be an indicator of further criminal activity by the person from whom the computer was seized. What should happen to that information? Should it be usable as evidence or should it not?

I applaud the many professionals in law enforcement, in the provincial ministries and in the federal ministry who would have collaborated on and assembled quite a good number of technical and administrative procedural changes in the code, which will make the code more efficient, more effective, just as fair and just as charter compliant but a better tool for use in tackling the criminal law problems that we have in many places across the country.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his explanation of Bill C-23 I was most interested in his remarks toward the end of his speech when he dealt with evidence, the rules of evidence and the possibility that some evidence may be deemed inadmissible if it were I believe it is called fruit from the poisoned tree. If the source of which came into question it may preclude the possibility of that valuable evidence being used in some subsequent court hearing.

I would like him to answer a question but I would ask him to dumb it down as much as he can and speak in plain language for those of us who are not lawyers. The issue was raised recently in the House of reverse onus in two different contexts. The concept of innocent until proven guilty is being chipped away at and eroded. In one context that I can point to there was a private member's bill which did not succeed but a version of which did succeed in the province of Manitoba. In the event of the proceeds of crime being seized the onus is on the criminal to show that these are not in fact proceeds of crime. In fact, a Hell's Angel speed boat could be seized if that Hell's Angel could not actually show that he or she bought it with legitimately earned dollars.

I think where the member was going with his reservations about this bill is that if that evidence gleaned, which may be tainted and unusable, that we are getting toward a reverse onus situation and the party would have to demonstrate that it was in fact gleaned in a legitimate way.

Is that the connection that he is making reference to and does he have a comment on the proceeds of crime reverse onus situation?

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, yes, that is generally the envelope I was referring to in terms of the seizure of a computer that contained data. Even though the computer and the data is seized under an order, it is not clear that the judicial order contemplates the use of the information on the hard disk as possible future evidence and I think we should be careful about that.

Most people would say that if the guy has done something really wrong and his computer shows it, yes, it should be evidence. However, in our justice system we usually do not make inferences about people's guilt. Our system is based on a person being presumed innocent unless the state or the courts find the person guilty.

I am very reluctant, as a legislator, to alter that balance. The member properly makes reference to the increasing use of reverse onus situations which lowers the burden on the state to produce evidence to get to a certain type of proof.

I am surprised at the scenario that the member has mentioned. It sounds like it may be provincial legislation but normally we do not impose reverse onus situations. I know there are two or three of them in the code and in other pieces of legislation but we do so only reluctantly when there is a need that we could describe as, to use the words of the charter, demonstrably justifiable in a free and democratic society.

I think the courts would frown upon increasing the use of reverse onus situations simply because while most people in Canada would be in a position, in normal language, to rebut one of these inferences made by statute, there have to be many Canadians who could not on their own rebut the inference without the use of a lawyer or without someone else speaking for them. We must remember that there are Canadians with various levels of education and various levels of literacy. We must be careful that when we pass a law we have each of those persons in mind when it comes to making them bear the burden of a particular procedure in a statute.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the helpful remarks because they did flush out the reservations I had.

If an organized crime figure, who we knew full well had no visible means of support for the last 20 years but owned a mansion, a speedboat, a bunch of luxury cars and had all kinds of holdings, what would be so wrong if we had the power to simply say that unless that person could demonstrate that those were not the proceeds of crime, that we would seize them and use those assets to give our police officers more resources to bust more criminals? Does he not think that would be a justifiable way to use the reverse onus concept that most Canadians would support?

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has offered a scenario that prejudges most of the facts. In other words, we have an organized crime scenario. We have the classic accumulation of wealth by the individual, conspicuous wealth, and not many other facts to go with it. In that fact scenario it seems awfully easy to say that the person has $25 million worth of assets and no other visible means of support that can be shown, we will take the person's assets, sell them and turn the money over to the police.

It sounds all right except that if we take that rule and apply it to every other Canadian in every other fact scenario, it may produce some unfairness. It is at the wording of the procedure that I would want to look closely. If the member has some wording, we should talk about it and do something that is good for the public.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

It being 2 o'clock, the time for statements by members has now arrived. Two minutes remain in the question and comment period following the speech by the hon. member for Scarborough—Rouge River.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Order, please. Before the debate was interrupted for question period, the hon. member for Scarborough—Rouge River had the floor for questions and comments. There are two minutes remaining in the time allotted for his questions and comments period. I therefore call for questions or comments for the hon. member for Scarborough--Rouge River.

There being none, resuming debate. The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-23 which is before Parliament today.

I am going to read the title of Bill C-23 for the benefit of the members of the public listening to us. Bill C-23 is an Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments).

Our party, the Bloc Québécois, takes a favourable view of this bill, because it amounts to a broad set of changes to revise and modernize the Criminal Code. That is the objective. It is in response to a broad consultation undertaken by the Department of Justice involving Crown counsel and police services in every province, the public service, and federal and provincial justice departments. As I said, it is an instrument for revising and modernizing the code. Given that this balance has been achieved by the various specialized players in the justice system, the Bloc Québécois supports these amendments.

Among the excellent things that Bill C-23 will do are to clarify the provisions of the Criminal Code, simplify certain judicial proceedings such as improper appeals and clear up unintended meanings to mention but a few.

The Bloc is particularly pleased with the amendments that will help to improve the work of the judiciary by giving judges greater discretion. The public must understand that this bill comes after negotiations and discussions that were undertaken, in part, by the previous government and at the request of stakeholders in the justice system: Crown counsel, police services and officials of various government departments. Why is there a balanced position in this bill? It is not the right-wing, Conservative position being imposed on us by this government. Other bills brought forward by the current Minister of Justice will in fact reflect Conservative ideology.

The bill that is before us now is a bill that was originated largely with stakeholders in the justice system from all provinces of Canada, from the public service and from the various departments of justice. It is therefore a much more balanced position. One of the things it will do is provide judges with better tools for doing their job properly, that job being to determine the most appropriate sentence, the sentence that will best serve the objectives of deterrence, reparation and rehabilitation—a factor too often forgotten by the Conservative government.

The bill that is before us has passed through the mill of the justice system and its stakeholders, and this has produced a balanced bill. That is not the case for the bills introduced by the Conservative government that reflect a Conservative and Republican ideology modeled on American positions. That is what the Conservative government is getting us accustomed to and will get us accustomed to in upcoming justice-related bills to be introduced in this House, with the exception of this one, Bill C-23. This bill comes to us from the previous Parliament. It is therefore a bill that the government has taken over from the previous government and that was supported by the Bloc Québécois during the previous Parliament.

For those of us in the Bloc Québécois, improvement of the law is consistent with efficiency. Adapting our legislative structures to new technology and new situations should be a continuing concern for all lawmakers. The men and women who belong to this magnificent party called the Bloc Québécois believe we must continually modernize our laws to apply them to new technology. The Criminal Code, among others, calls for this type of updating. People see new technology in their own homes. In this House, the members of the Bloc Québécois say to the government it is time to adapt new technologies to be in a position to use them in criminal investigations carried out by various police forces in Quebec.

Advances in terms of information technology, along with the changing values of Quebeckers, must be reflected in our legislation.

The obvious message is that the values of Quebeckers are changing and our laws must change as well. Among other changes, new technology must be integrated into the judicial system.

In addition, the Bloc Québécois believes that such revisions should be done on a regular basis. Too often, the government puts off these amendments or revisions. Or, we have to wait for a right-wing conservative government with republican values and ideologies borrowed from the Americans to make changes.

The best way to protect against that, in the opinion of the men and women of the Bloc Québécois, is to regularly revise the Criminal Code so that it is always balanced legislation and so that we do not allow political parties with ideological values of the republican right to impose their changes. Let us establish a regular process for amending the Criminal Code to adapt it to new technology and to new values that we ourselves can defend. Bill C-23 is among those new values.

I will now deal with this measure in greater detail. Although it sometimes appears a bit technical this is really a worthwhile bill, considering that it has been called for by different stakeholders in the legal community, from crown attorneys to police services, and various officials in the Quebec justice department and other provinces as well. Still, it is somewhat technical.

One of the amendments is a harmonization of procedures for service of documents. The first clause of Bill C-23 would provide that the service of documents may be proved in accordance with the laws of a province relating to offences created by the laws of that province. As a consequence, the bill deletes several sections of the Criminal Code that now set out methods for proof of service. These deletions would harmonize criminal procedures in terms of proof of service.

This is simply to say that provincial methods for proof of service have evolved with new technology, something that has not been done by the federal government.

We, in the Bloc Québécois, therefore ask the federal government to allow the provinces, who are quicker to harmonize and to follow the changes in technology, to act and to remove itself from this manner of proof of service. That is what is now being done with Bill C-23. It will fall into line with the methods for proof of service that are in effect in the different provinces.

The second amendment extends the application of the court order. Clause 4 of the bill amends section 164.2(1) of the Criminal Code. It gives the court, in addition to the existing power to seize material used for child pornography, the power to order the forfeiture of the computer of a person convicted of luring a child under section 172(1) of the Criminal Code, and to dispose of it.

Simply put, luring a child is a crime that consists in communicating with children in discussion forums, through instant messaging or electronic mail, for the purpose of sexual contacts.

Since we already have the power to seize pornographic material, it goes without saying that this bill should also allow us to seize the technology in which this material is stored. So, this is an improvement.

I should point out for the benefit of those young men and women who are watching us that we do not always pass laws to punish people, or to prevent them from doing things. All too often, members of Parliament are perceived as legislators who prevent people from having fun. On the contrary, we want people to have fun, but in a safe way. Unfortunately, all too often, the Internet and this whole new technology are used by sexual predators who try to corrupt our young generation.

I hope people realize that the men and women who form this great political party, namely the Bloc Québécois, are here to protect the public interest. We want people to have fun using the Internet and all the other electronic gadgets available, but we want them to do so safely, so that our children will not be corrupted or led to commit illegal or criminal acts, and so that we can punish the individuals who commit such crimes, by forfeiting all the material they use to do such deeds.

The purpose of the third amendment is to reflect the new communication technologies. Clause 6 of the bill amends section 204(2) of the Criminal Code, dealing with gaming and betting. It amends the Criminal Code to include new communication technologies, such as the Internet, since the existing section does not provide for any means of communication other than the telephone.

Bill C-23 would opt for a much less restrictive definition that would include all possible means under the term “means of telecommunication”. Hence, bets placed over the Internet with the race-course, an association or a betting theatre, in accordance with the regulations, would be deemed to have been made at the race-course and would not be treated as an indictable offence.

This measure is included to liberalize the industry's means of doing business so that the actions of those who might place bets by Internet directly with the race-courses are not considered indictable offences.

This does not mean that those who place illegal bets are authorized to do so. It remains against the law to place such bets. The Bloc Québécois members will always be there to prevent some people from getting rich at the expense of the weakest and most disadvantaged members of our society. We will always stand up for the latter. However, those who have licences and are authorized by the law to make these types of bets, those who enjoying betting, may place bets over the Internet with organizations who have the right to do so and have the requisite permits. These individuals may use the Internet to place bets. It could not be done previously. You could place bets by phone but not by Internet.

Judges have more latitude in terms of sentencing and timing. That is the fifth amendment. Several sections of Bill C-23 seek to give judges more flexibility when handing down sentences. This is the case of clause 8.2 of Bill C-23 which permits a judge to make an order against an individual found guilty of a designated crime, for example manslaughter, to prohibit the offender from operating a motor vehicle during any period deemed appropriate.

Previously, the judge could not impose this condition unless the offender were sentenced to life imprisonment. It is important to point out that the judge can only impose this new condition when the accused is found guilty of an offence punishable by life imprisonment.

Once again, as mentioned earlier, judges ought to be given some latitude. We have set up an entire judiciary system and asked magistrates and judges to make laws. In fact, we are the ones passing legislation while judges set sentences. In our wisdom, we have put them in charge of that. This was done by our predecessors in this House. Such is the judiciary system that was established. Essentially, decision makers and legislators before us created a judicial system based on legislation contained in the Criminal Code, the enforcement of which was put in the hands of the judiciary, which means competent human beings responsible for making balanced decisions, that is, to make the punishment fit the crime.

It is therefore important to be able to assist them in their task and to allow them to rely increasingly on their wisdom and insight. Indeed, each crime is unique and no two crimes are committed the exact same way or under the same circumstances. The judiciary, the judges, have to be able to form an opinion and, naturally, the accused have to be able to defend themselves with lawyers. Our judicial system is the envy of a number of societies around the world. They look at us and find that our criminal system is one that is balanced and which, hopefully, allows the real criminals to be punished and the innocent to defend themselves and argue their case.

That is how our criminal justice system works. It is important that we be able to strengthen it and to give judges every opportunity to select sentences based on their wisdom and insight. Of course, one way of doing so is through this clause of the new bill.

Another amendment is in the same vein and shows the same kind of vision. Clause 42 of Bill C-23 allows the sentencing judge to issue an order prohibiting the offender from communicating with any person identified in the order—victim, witness or other—during the custodial period of the sentence, in order to protect that person. Anyone who does not comply with the order is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.

This extends even more power to the judges. If ever an individual who commits a crime is a danger to others, witnesses or other persons, the judges require that individual not to contact those witnesses. The judges are given the latitude to designate persons with whom the accused must not come in contact.

It is a choice, yet again, in the same vein as the philosophy the Bloc Québécois defends. In other words, leave it up to the judges—who are the best suited for this—to decide the sentences, among other things, and also to designate the persons with whom the accused cannot come in contact.

That is how we advance society.

Bill C-23 also introduces the power for judges to delay sentencing proceedings when they deem it appropriate so that an offender can participate in a treatment program, detoxification program or other provincially recognized programs. Such a measure is useful because in the rehabilitation process it is important not to hinder the efforts made outside the legal system.

If a judge in his or her great wisdom decides that the accused must undergo treatment first, the sentence can be delayed, awaiting the results of treatment. The judge decides to consider the whole context of the crime. It is important to see whether the person can be rehabilitated and to allow him to undergo treatment to see how he progresses before handing down the sentence. I think this leaves some flexibility to the judge.

As I say, we are not the ones who invented everything in Bill C-23. It is an initiative of the entire legal community. All the stakeholders, the crown attorneys, police forces and public servants in different justice departments in both Quebec and the other Canadian provinces, got together. They have been asking for a number of years now for the Criminal Code to be modernized. These are amendments to modernize the situation. Among other things, we want to judges to have more latitude in certain specific cases. That is one way to modernize the justice system.

Today's therapies are not the same as those 20, 15 or even 10 years ago. Things have changed. There are new approaches. What we want, in the end, is not to have as few citizens as possible but as many involved in the development of our society. If people commit a crime, therefore, the first thing to do is to enable them to rehabilitate themselves through appropriate punishments and sentences. Give them a chance, and if they can be rehabilitated, that is what should be done. One of the ways of doing this, embodied in the bill, is to allow judges to ensure that appropriate treatments are provided before handing down the sentence.

The Bloc Québécois has always advocated rehabilitation-based justice and flexible rules to give judges the ability to determine the most appropriate penalty. We believe that judges are the people who are best placed to decide the penalty that will best meet the basic sentencing objectives. The basic sentencing objective is that the sentence should be proportionate to the seriousness of the offence.

It is important to understand that when a reprehensible act is committed, there will be a punishment. But what punishment? The punishment has to be proportionate to the offence. All too often, the punishment is not considered in relation to the offence that was committed. That is the philosophy that the Conservative government is busy instituting with minimum sentences, mandatory sentences, etc.

What we are saying is that this is not the way our parents, our grandparents and our great-grandparents conceived of the system. The society we have today is the society that we inherited from our ancestors and it is a society based on justice, balance and fairness. That was our ancestors’ wish. So why today try to take the place of judges as the Conservative Party wishes to do, following in the footsteps and inspired by the values of the American Republican right. Why do that? That is not what our ancestors wanted for our society. They did not want to have a society like the Americans’. That was the choice our ancestors made. Why, today, would we wish to change this completely by imposing sentences that follow the example of American decisions. That is not what we want.

That is what the men and women of the Bloc Québécois are defending here, in this House. These are values given to us by our ancestors. That is what we are defending today. That is why Quebeckers elected members from the Bloc Québécois to defend their values. That is what we are doing.

One of the best ways, one of the great values that we can defend is the value of justice. The justice that our ancestors who founded the Quebec of today wanted is a justice based on fairness and balance between the offence committed and the punishment. The only way of doing this is to entrust these duties to magistrates, to independent persons. Too often in this House we hear of judicial appointments being made by a political party. The judiciary must really be independent of politics so as to be able to make decisions that are consistent with what our ancestors wanted, that is, a fair and just society. We must have punishments that truly fit the crime, whatever crime has been committed. These are the values that we are defending.

Bill C-23 was not proposed by the members of this House. Parliamentarians apprised the House of this bill, since we are the legislators, but it was proposed by the whole legal community, the crown attorneys, the police departments and the employees of the departments of justice in the various provinces.

Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the time you have given me. Quebeckers have yet one more reason to vote for members of the Bloc Québécois to defend their values.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

I declare the motion carried. Accordingly, the bill stands referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

(Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and referred to a committee)