Bill C-25 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act

This enactment amends the Youth Criminal Justice Act by adding deterrence and denunciation to the principles that a court must consider when determining a youth sentence. It also clarifies that the presumption against the pre-trial detention of a young person is rebuttable and specifies the circumstances in which the presumption does not apply.

Youth Criminal Justice Act

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in the history of the Bloc Québécois, the question of young offenders has been extremely important. Those who have sat in this House since 1993 or 1997 will recall that we had a colleague by the name of Michel Bellehumeur, who today has been raised to the bench. He was the member for Berthier—Montcalm and was our critic on justice and matters relating to the Attorney General. In 1999 he fought a fine battle on behalf of Bloc Québécois members. The minister at that time was Ms. McLellan, from Alberta. I am not sure whether I am recalling good or bad memories for the House, but she was the justice minister. She was succeeded by Allan Rock and, after that, Martin Cauchon.

At the time, we were examining a bill that was extremely negative concerning practices of the Government of Quebec. The National Assembly had unanimously passed a motion demanding that the bill be withdrawn. The Quebec Minister of Justice at the time was a Quebec City lawyer. We all know how the Quebec City area has always appreciated wisdom in the field of justice. The Quebec City lawyer, now minister, Linda Goupil, formally wrote to the Government of Canada asking for withdrawal of the bill.

What were the issues involved? The Government of Quebec was very resistant to pretrial detention and any kind of measure that had the consequence of prematurely incarcerating people, especially young people. Let us remember that the Liberal bill wanted to refer young people of 14 and 15 to adult courts.

The philosophy of the National Assembly, regardless of government, whether Parti Québécois or Liberal, was to use the right measure at the right time. In some circumstances it could be appropriate to send a youth to a youth centre, while in other cases, the young person should be kept in the community under the guidance of a responsible adult.

There are actually few cases where early incarceration is the appropriate avenue. Of course, it cannot be totally excluded. We can understand that there may be cases of very violent youth, with psychotic behaviour, who have difficulty in controlling their sex drive. Obviously, no one in this House would want that kind of young person to go free in the community. However, that is the exception, rather than the rule.

Minister McLellan’s bill nevertheless had one merit. Although it was a badly defined bill that, in far too many cases, would send young people into adult courts, it did address the issue of pretrial detention.

We made the following observation. The federal and provincial ministers and those who analyzed the issue of young people in the justice system recognized that instead of providing meaningful interventions or offering measures of support, they were opting for the most repressive measures by allowing pretrial detention.

The bill that is now before us not only re-opens that debate over pre-trial detention but it would also deal with an extremely unsettling principle, that of including the principle of deterrence among the very objectives of the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

We are well acquainted with the principle of deterrence. It is common knowledge that my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue is a renowned jurist, a progressive spirit in all circumstances. In any case, that is my wish. I believe that my colleague from Quebec City will join me in paying tribute to the member from Abitibi-Témiscamingue and acknowledging his wisdom in the area of law.

Even though we know that the goal of deterrence is found in section 718 of the Criminal Code and that it may be appropriate to resort to it, the fact remains that there is a very specific reason why Parliament did not include it in section 2 of the Youth Criminal Justice Act . In terms of youth criminal justice, deterrence must not be the priority. Naturally, when someone is kept in prison, in detention, the judge will bear these considerations in mind when handing down a sentence; however, this must not be our priority.

I would like to read an excerpt from Supreme Court decision R. v. B.W.P.; R. v. B.V.N. It deals simultaneously with two appeals. It makes it very clear why it is undesirable for deterrence to be included in the stated objectives in the Youth Criminal Justice Act. It says:

Unlike some other factors in sentencing, general deterrence has a unilateral effect on the sentence. When it is applied as a factor in sentencing, it will always serve to increase the penalty or make it harsher; its effect is never mitigating. The application of general deterrence as a sentencing principle, of course, does not always result in a custodial sentence; however, it can only contribute to the increased use of incarceration, not its reduction. Hence, the exclusion of general deterrence from the new regime is consistent with Parliament’s express intention to reduce the over-reliance of incarceration for non-violent young persons. I am not persuaded by the Crown’s argument—

Those are the words of Justice Charron who wrote the decision. She continues:

I am not persuaded by the Crown’s argument that the words of the preamble referring to the public availability of information indicate that Parliament somehow intended by those words to include general deterrence as part of the new regime. The reference in the preamble to the desirability that certain information be available to the public, in and of itself and in context, cannot reasonably support such an interpretation.

So we can see in which direction the government wants to take us. I know that all the Bloc Québécois members will oppose this bill and will ask that it be withdrawn. Furthermore, this bill is not what the National Assembly wants. Again, focusing on deterrence, an objective of criminal law or penology, is not the way to address the issue of youth justice. The exemplary nature of sentences is the deterrent, and that can only be achieved by longer sentences.

I know that other Bloc Québécois members will expand on this, but I am calling on the government to be very careful about the precedents it could set. It would be very irresponsible for members elected by the people of Quebec to support a bill like this one. That does not mean we should not look at the issue of youth crime, but I must remind everyone that youth crime is going down, as is crime in general.

Since my time has expired, I will stop here, but I would like to say that the Bloc Québécois will not support this ill-advised bill, which is legally unsound and does not respect the wishes of the National Assembly.

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the bill on youth crime. While we believe the bill falls short in many ways, we believe it should be debated and amended in committee.

As previous speakers have said, the bill contains two specific sections, one dealing with youth and pre-trial custody and the other dealing with sentencing provisions. We support the notion that judges should be allowed the discretion to impose pre-trial restrictions on those who pose a serious threat to society. The section dealing with pre-trial detention maintains judicial discretion and simply entrenches principles that are already being practised by most courts, so it is not a huge change.

The sections in the bill dealing with sentencing principles are more problematic. There is no evidence to suggest that the adult principles of deterrence and denunciation will have any positive outcome for public safety. Blurring the differences between adults and youth is something that the courts and surely society does not sanction. Therefore, we believe this part needs to be amended and improved on.

I will take a step back and speak a bit about some of the challenges that youth face today.

I come from the city of Toronto. I was there today when the United Way of greater Toronto released its report called “Losing Ground: The Persistent Growth of Family Poverty in Canada’s Largest City”. I want to share with the House some of the findings of this very serious report, which I believe ought to ring alarm bells with the government if it is serious about crime prevention and the need for greater safety in our communities.

Let me cite some of the findings from the United Way study.

The study found that the median income of Toronto families with children under 17 had fallen well behind the median income of families throughout the rest of Canada. It found that one in five two-parent families lived in poverty. That is twice the rate of families in the rest of Canada.

The study found that over 50% of single parent families lived in poverty compared with one in three at the beginning of the last decade, in 1990. One in four Toronto families struggled with poverty. Our poverty rate in Toronto is at 28.8% compared with 19.5% in the rest of Canada. Therefore, we are 10 percentage points higher in the city of Toronto for family poverty.

A lot of people are taking on high debt and we are finding bankruptcies. Insolvency rates in Toronto were up 52.3%, between 2000 and 2005, compared with a 16.8% increase nationally. Eviction applications have increased by 26% over the last seven years. Debt management caseloads have increased 50%, between 2001 and 2007. Payday loan and cheque cashing outlets have increased from 39 in 1995 to over 317 in 2007, with most concentrated in high poverty neighbourhoods.

I believe these statistics are even more pressing and compelling than even these numbers show because Toronto is the most expensive city in the country. Therefore, people who are experiencing these greater levels of poverty are trying to live in the most expensive city in the country.

Behind all these statistics, as devastating as they are, are individuals, families and children trying to survive in extremely stressful and hostile circumstances.

How did we get here? We have seen a massive de-industrialization in the city of Toronto. We have lost over 125,000 manufacturing jobs over the last few years. These were jobs in which people made a decent wage with benefits, with some security and stability of hours of work. They were able to support themselves and their families.

The government will say that jobs have been created. Where are those jobs? They are increasingly in the low wage, precarious, part time, contract jobs. Many people working in these jobs, even if they manage to get 40 hours a week, or the equivalent of a full time job, are living below the poverty level. More than one million people working in the city of Toronto make less than the poverty level; that is they make less than $10 an hour, which is disgraceful. We have these precarious jobs.

Then the previous Liberal government abolished our national minimum wage. We have no national minimum standard that would protect these workers from falling below the poverty line, which is why I introduced a bill to re-establish a national minimum wage and set it at $10 an hour. This would help workers get out of poverty.

One of the major challenges for families in the city of Toronto is to find affordable housing. The previous government got out of providing affordable housing. We have no national housing strategy. The real estate market in Toronto is sky-high. People trying to pay rent or maintain a mortgage are finding the costs really unsustainable.

I hear from many people in my community who tell me, especially single parents trying to pay $1,000 a month in rent when they are working in a fairly low wage job, that it is simply untenable.

What does it mean for children growing up in this environment? It means their parents are working longer hours. The parents are often away from home. The children do not have supervision when they need it, or the guidance and the resources that are needed.

If we truly want to prevent crime among young people, if we truly want to make alternatives to negative activity in society, if we want to make those more attractive, then we have to invest in families. The government has to invest in a city such as Toronto, which ought to be the engine of our national economy.

A situation that I find quite shocking is the rise of payday loan companies. They charge outrageous and exorbitant levels of interest. These companies are blossoming in poor neighbourhoods. People become locked into debt perhaps to get an advance on a paycheque. Suddenly they are into these spiralling loans that can charge hundreds of percentage points on a very small loan and suck people in.

Another problem that people in Toronto face and that affects young people is when a parent loses a job or they are between jobs. They cannot access employment insurance. Almost 80% of unemployed workers in the city of Toronto do not receive benefits from employment insurance. Therefore, they are denied the benefits they pay into.

The challenges are huge. I believe the best way to deal with youth crime is to invest in prevention. We need to invest in affordable housing. We need to get the loan sharks and the payday loan people out of the communities. We need to provide clear banking alternatives for people. We need to invest in good paying jobs that allow people to support themselves and their families. We ought to invest in programs for young people that help them succeed in school, develop leadership qualities and prepare them for the world of further education or the world of work.

Clearly, we are failing our young people and our families. I believe the report today from the United Way is a national shame. Every Canadian ought to hear an alarm bell. We ought to take action on this report immediately.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to commend the hon. member on her clear presentation on poverty issues.

I would like her to get into the problems in connection with housing in particular, because we very recently received a new report from the Co-operative Housing Federation of Canada on the number of households in difficulty. If I am not mistaken, 1.85 million Canadian households, or more than 3 million people, are in core housing need.

The hon. member talked about the situation in Toronto. In this report, I notice that the situation is pretty much the same across Canada and very poorly addressed.

I would like the hon. member to explain how important housing is in connection with the poverty of households, particularly single parent ones.

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question.

Affordable housing does play an important part in the rise in poverty. In Toronto, housing is expensive, especially for single parent families. These families cannot afford the housing they need. The problem is that the federal government has abandoned Canadian families, as we can still see in Toronto, and in Quebec as well.

This is a matter of real urgency because we live in a northern country. Living and surviving on the streets is not an option. To promote successful families and prevent crime, we must invest in families and affordable housing. This is an urgent matter across the country.

In light of this report today, and the one released last week about affordable housing, this is indeed an urgent matter. It is truly a national disgrace that no immediate action was taken. It is a disgrace that the federal government is not acting.

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

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to what my colleague had to say. I have a specific question for her. There is talk of repression and deterrence with young offenders.

I would like my colleague to explain something. I heard her say that she was from the greater Toronto area. Our Conservative friends tell us that Toronto has a street gang problem, and I would like to understand. Has my colleague experienced this problem? Does she think Bill C-25 could solve the problem of street gangs in the Toronto area?

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

Yes, there are problems related to street gangs in Toronto, as there are in other cities in this country. However, I do not see anything in this bill that would prevent young people from joining street gangs.

I already spoke about the issues of poverty in Toronto, but much could be done in terms of training young people and investing in youth leadership programs. We must invest in youth so that they can have a secure future and can aspire to success, instead of seeing street gangs as the only alternative.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today and take part in this debate on Bill C-25. Some excellent points have been brought up through the course of this debate. I hope to add to them.

I bring to the debate 25 years of experience in coaching and working with young people through recreational activities as a former recreation professional. I am comfortable in speaking to the fact that the vast majority of the young people I had an opportunity to work with were very good young individuals. They were fairly focused. They understood the difference between right and wrong. For the most part, they just wanted to make their way in this world and find their own place and in some way try to contribute to whatever they were involved in at the time.

Unfortunately, a lot of these average young Canadians might make a bad decision on occasion. They could be with the wrong group on a particular night or in the wrong place at the wrong time, or whatever the circumstances might be, and sometimes the results are not great. However, I have known a number who have benefited from the current approach to dealing with youth crime.

The Young Offenders Act was improved upon by the legislation brought forward through the Youth Criminal Justice Act, but again we stand here tonight to try to improve it. I am comfortable in saying that the Youth Criminal Justice Act was an improvement over the Young Offenders Act, but there are gaps. There are aspects that certainly deserve to be looked at again and improved upon so we can better deal with these particular issues.

I think crime changes from community to community. Some of my colleagues from urban areas have spoken about their experiences. There is not as much gang related crime in rural areas, not that this is a youth crime, but we do see our share.

We have been very active in my own community in Cape Breton--Canso. The Cape Breton Regional Municipality and the police services board, under the direction of Dave Wilson and Myles Burke, have done an excellent job.

The past chief, Edgar MacLeod, just recently stepped down. He was a leading advocate in this country for community based policing. He did a tremendous amount of work in community based policing and had a very solid line in with the youth of our community. I know that went a long way toward finding out the needs, the wants and the concerns of the youth in our community. I think that is at least the beginning of communication with young people at risk. It is a positive step.

These individuals are to be commended for their efforts.

Our justice critic, the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, joined us in Cape Breton, where we sat down with a number of different stakeholders to talk about some of the issues around youth criminal justice and other justice activities. What we heard from most of the stakeholders is that when we are talking about youth, the Nunn report, which has been referred to during the course of the debate, has very significant measures that can go a long way toward ratifying some of the gaps in the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

All of us here in the House know of the terrible tragedy of Theresa McEvoy, a 52 year old mother who lost her life when a 16 year old offender drove his car into hers. It was a terrible tragedy and it was significant because just two days before it happened he had been released from custody.

The young offender had 36 charges against him at the time, but the courts could not hold him. There was miscommunication on the part of those doing the administering, but nonetheless, the officials did not believe they had the power to keep this young person incarcerated, so he was on the streets and that terrible tragedy occurred.

In June 2005 the Nunn commission was struck. Eighteen months later, it delivered its report. I want to read from the report for members. As I have said, the Youth Criminal Justice Act does serve the vast majority of young people in this country very well. Those young people who come in contact with our legal system are very well served by the act. Mr. Justice Nunn said in the report that the act:

--has been highly successful in the manner in which the vast majority of youth is handled....

The challenge is whether the [Youth Criminal Justice Act] in its present form is adequate to deal with that smaller number of repeat offenders that the justice system is concerned with on a regular basis.

Much credence was given to this report. It was an excellent report as it was tabled, but also, there was input from those who deal with those issues on a day to day basis. I want to put this on the record as well. This is a comment from Mr. Justice Nunn's report:

--I must make it absolutely clear and not open to question that all the witnesses I heard--police, prosecutors, defence counsel, and experts--agree with and support the aims and the intent of the act. They accept it as a vast improvement over the previous legislation. All are convinced it is working well for the vast majority of young offenders, though it needs to be fine-tuned to provide effective means to handle the smaller, but regular number of repeat young offenders.

The two issues that are identified more specifically and which we hear about the majority of time when we speak with stakeholders are violent offences and of course repeat offences.

With regard to the violent offences, Justice Nunn boiled it down. His concern was pretrial detention. His concern was that the Youth Criminal Justice Act went too far in restricting any pretrial detention. In order to strike a balance between the rights of young offenders and public safety, he recommended that the definition of “violent offence” be changed to include “endangerment to the public”. That is significant. I am sure that we on this side can support that. His recommendation was the change in that context.

The other issue was repeat offenders. I want to talk about repeat offenders because again we go back to the classic adage that a few apples spoil the whole bunch. I do not think that is uncommon, but the recommendation that came from Justice Nunn, and I know that we on this side can support it, is:

--that the federal government should amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act so that the requirement for a demonstrated “pattern of findings of guilt” is changed to “a pattern of offences”....

In this case, I believe the young man who was involved in the McEvoy tragedy probably would not have been out had that change already been made to the legislation. I hope we will see that as this goes forward.

I believe this legislation as put forward today should go to the justice committee. We should hear expert witness testimony and then it should be brought to the House for a vote. We certainly support the movement of the legislation to committee.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, hon. members have been talking about poverty as a cause for youth crime. I would like to ask my colleague how he sees the current role of police.

We now have a police force that we could describe as trying to stop crimes, not prevent them. There used to be constables in the cities and police officers walking a beat. They knew everyone and were close to young people. There is something else going on now. I live in a riding that only has small towns. There were plans this year to bring in people who would play the role police officers used to play and no longer play, and that is to be close to young people to give them advice and to help them. The current government blocked all those plans. It seems to me that it is not just through legislation that the crime rate could be brought down.

My question for the hon. member is the following. Does he think a change in attitude and a different concept of the role of police, which the government could develop, could change the attitude of many young people?

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, as I said in my comments, we have been very fortunate in my own riding that community-based policing has been a priority for the local police department. However, there are also a number of my communities that are policed by the RCMP as well and I know that they make every effort to engage with young people. In one particular community, Cheticamp, a French Acadian community on the west coast of Cape Breton, the officers are very well-engaged with the community.

However, what the member said is exactly right. I think if we were to walk up to a group of young people who were ready to perpetrate an act and asked them whether they knew that would get them three years in jail, or whatever that term might be, I question whether that would be a deterrent. However, if there is a relationship with local law enforcement agencies and local law enforcement officers, I would suggest that out of respect for the law and out of respect for those members, maybe that act would not take place.

[Roy Cullen, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know my colleague, the member for Cape Breton—Canso, has a lot of experience working with young people and I certainly appreciated what he had to say.

Regrettably, in my riding of Etobicoke North, there has been a lot of youth violence, gangs, and drugs, and it is one of the ridings that the member from the Bloc was asking about. Fortunately, there was a police raid last year where they rounded up 50-odd young people involved with gangs and drugs. So things have been more quiet since. I am hoping that they stay that way because it was a terrible problem.

What is often misunderstood is that our Liberal government made changes to what used to be called the Young Offenders Act. We brought in the Youth Criminal Justice Act and with that, we made a number of changes. I will just cite a couple.

One is that with the legislation we allowed for transfer of information back and forth between the schools and the police, which is an important thing, and the police are using that information with good effect.

A second change is that under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, and it is often misunderstood, a judge, at his or her discretion, can try a 14-year-old as an adult if this is, in the wisdom of the judge, the appropriate way to proceed.

I think those are some additional teeth we put into the act. However, ultimately, I think it comes back to the young people. What do we do with them at a certain young age? We cannot lock them up forever. They are going--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. I do not like to cut off the hon. member, but I do have to leave enough time for the hon. member for Cape Breton--Canso to respond. So we will have to end the question there and I will hand it over to the hon. member for Cape Breton--Canso.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I was enjoying the preamble to his question. However, with regard to the points that were being made by the member, obviously, we have to invest with issues of poverty, with issues of keeping our youth active, and investing in infrastructures in local communities, so that we can keep these young people active.

To be fair to the government, too, the minister of defence had mentioned deterrences through this legislation. The vast majority of the old information suggests that deterrence is not a significant factor. I know that there is some new information that we have access to now that might suggest otherwise. I think that is why it is important to bring this forward to committee, so that we can hash this out, have the experts present their information, and go forward from there.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this very important debate. What we are talking about is the future of our young people in our communities. From the outset I want to say that I am against this bill and that the Bloc Québécois is also against it. There need to be very specific examples. People need to realize, and I hope the members opposite will realize, that rehabilitation and reintegration exist and are working. What is more, this works much better than repression and deterrence.

In 32 years of practising criminal law, I spent a number of years working with young offenders. We saw the Young Offenders Act, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and all sorts of legislation to try to deal with youth crime. I can assure you that in Quebec, this works. I do not understand why it does not work elsewhere.

In the 1970s, my colleague from Hochelaga will remember, there was the hippie culture. In the 1990s, it was something else and now we have street gangs. I guess the purpose of this bill is to try to address these street gangs that very quickly recruit our young people and incite them to commit crime. We are going down the wrong path.

There are plenty of examples. I attended meetings of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights for several months. Experts who appeared before the committee said that cracking down on crime is working in the United States. That is not true. All kinds of evidence and statistics were provided. The Conservatives are basing their bill on false data from the United States. Cracking down has not reduced the crime rate. That is simply not true. The homicide rate in the United States has not dropped despite the fact that they put more people in jail than anyone else and even though they have the death penalty. Are the Conservatives trying to reopen the debate on the death penalty with this bill? I would not be surprised if that was what they wanted. I hope that is not the case and that they will provide some reassurance to that effect.

A basic tenet of law states that onus must not be placed on the accused when seeking interim release if doing so would violate the presumption of innocence. Therein lies the problem. That is a fundamental principle. Why reverse the onus? There are articles in the Criminal Code that cover this, and they have applied until now. Young people who committed repeat offences were not released. That is not the problem; the problem is reintegration.

I do not know what has gotten into the Conservatives. They need to understand, once and for all, that putting people in jail as often as possible and for as long as possible does not stop crime. The real causes of crime—as they themselves will say—are poverty, poor social environment and so on. It seems strange that even though they know this, they have never put forward any solutions to these problems.

When I was with clients in court, sentences were decided case by case. The judge had to explain the sentence to the individual. It is hard enough for a judge to determine an appropriate sentence for individuals over 18.

Now imagine the problem they have with those under 18. The closer a person is to 14, the harder it is.

A young, 14-year-old person, whether the Conservatives like it or not, does not think the same as someone who is 18, 20, 22 or 24. Kids should be kids. Yes, crime does exist among young people and it must be dealt with severely. I agree—I am not saying that we should all give them our blessing and trust them implicitly. They must be dealt with by the courts and sanctioned appropriately.

I would point out that, as legislators, we talked about sanctions for young offenders and not sentences. There is a significant difference. The sentence must then be explained, the sanction that is about to be given to an individual. The younger the offender, the more careful we must be, the more we must customize the sanction, and focus on rehabilitation and reintegration. This is what I want to explain to the Conservatives, given that “rehabilitation” and “reintegration” do not seem to be part of their vocabulary.

Someone who commits an offence—and that is what we are talking about—must be given the opportunity to return to society. We must explain to them and make sure they understand the risks, and take steps to ensure they do not reoffend. Among young offenders—dozens of whom I have represented—it is foolish to believe there is any reverence for crime, that they want to return to crime, that they like committing offences, that they like breaking and entering, that they like committing murder. This is all false. It is an urban legend.

Quite often, the young person is put in a certain situation. Here are some examples. The most common crimes committed by young people are breaking and entering and car theft, or using illegal substances, of course. It does not involve hard drugs, but rather using marijuana and hashish. However, when someone begins using cocaine, certain measures must definitely be taken. I am not saying that we should not intervene, but that we must do so while considering the needs of young people. And what young people need is rehabilitation and, above all, reintegration.

We have to remember that the young person must return to society and become a productive member. Bill C-25 provides for the opposite. Consequently, they will start out slowly by keeping youth in a crime school. They even want to send young people to adult jail more often. I would like my friends opposite to go and see what goes on in a penitentiary. That is no place for a young person. We have to think in terms of rehabilitation and reintegration.

My wise colleague from Hochelaga spoke of Supreme Court decisions where the justices stated:

Parliament has sought preferably to promote the long-term protection of the public by addressing the circumstances underlying the offending behaviour, by rehabilitating and reintegrating young persons into society and by holding young persons accountable through the imposition of meaningful sanctions related to the harm done.

As I have only one minute left, I will conclude by saying that with this bill we run the risk of going in the wrong direction. We run the risk of being entangled in something very difficult from which we will not be able to extricate ourselves, namely repression and sanction.

What we should be doing is talking to our young people, explaining to them, making them understand and reiterating that crime does not pay, that you must live up to your obligations and that a solution must be found when a sentence is handed down. We have to explain this to the youth so that he accepts the sentence. If he does not, he is headed straight to the school of crime known as prison.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in this debate I think one of the greatest dangers we face is the danger of polarizing the differences between rehabilitation and deterrence. We are not talking about an either/or approach.

My colleague mentioned that we were talking about putting people in prison for as long as possible but that is not at all factual. My colleague must have missed the announcement that our government made in terms of the $22 million that we are investing in prevention and rehabilitation programs.

One of the objectives of this bill is to deter and prevent youth from entering deeper and deeper levels of criminal activity. I remember a parent in my riding begging the judge to have her son sentenced to a treatment or jail facility so he would be protected from further criminal activity.

Does my colleague not agree that within the huge spectrum of different treatment options that we have, such as prevention, rehabilitation and restorative justice, which are all important, one of the key factors needs to be the element of deterring behaviour that would end up causing further damage, not only to the victims but to the offender himself or herself?

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

Mr. Speaker, there is a fundamental difference. I do not share the opinion of my hon. colleague across the floor. If he would amend the bill by removing clause 2, I am sure we could agree easily.

However, as soon as anyone says, as it does in clause 2, that the judge should add deterrence to the sentencing criteria, this goes against a Supreme Court ruling. Actually, this would mean setting aside rehabilitation, social reintegration, and the notion of guiding and protecting young people. No!

At some point, what is the judge going to say? That since this is the offender's 15th or 18th break and enter, he or she will be put away for three years. That is what will happen. However, a young person who commits 15 breaking and entering offences must have some sort of a problem. To date, in such a case, questions would be raised, the situation would be looked at, and the family and background would be examined. We would try to understand why this person committed such offences and make decisions accordingly.

Under the proposed amendment, unfortunately, we would lock them up and throw away the key, if possible.