Bill C-4 (Historical)

Sébastien's Law (Protecting the Public from Violent Young Offenders)

An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the sentencing and general principles of the Youth Criminal Justice Act, as well as its provisions relating to judicial interim release, adult and youth sentences, publication bans, and placement in youth custody facilities. It defines the terms “violent offence” and “serious offence”, amends the definition “serious violent offence” and repeals the definition “presumptive offence”. It also requires police forces to keep records of extrajudicial measures used to deal with young persons.

[Graeme Norton]

In brief, that's my assessment of that one.

On the civil forfeiture issue, this is something we've had a problem with for quite some time. It is, as you've mentioned, the lower standard of proof, the balance of probabilities. We were involved in the Chatterjee case, which went up to the Supreme Court of Canada, where they did endorse the Ontario legislation and found it to be constitutional. But in our view, the standard of balance of probabilities is too low for what is effectively something comparable to a criminal sanction to be taken against a person.

When you're dealing with potentially taking enormous sums of money from somebody or enormous sums of property, in our view there needs to be something higher demonstrated than simply a balance of probabilities case that those are in fact the proceeds of crime.

Number three, since I am proceeding very quickly here, is Bill C-4. We have another chance to thoroughly vet and review the provisions of Bill C-4. Our general position is that youth are less culpable for their crimes than adults--that's a rule that courts have generally accepted--and they need to be treated differently in the justice system.

In terms of how Bill C-4 does or doesn't do that, I'm not in a position to comment completely. I know it has raised the issue of greater reporting of names and that type of thing. I'm not sure exactly what that would advance, but I'd want to take a closer look at the legislation and see exactly what's being proposed.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

Thank you.

Thanks to the witnesses for coming this morning. As usual we are learning a lot, and we continue to do so. Thank you for that.

Mr. Trudell, I was expecting sort of the same thing: that whatever we're doing in government is wrong, it won't pass the charter test, you're against it, and stay with the status quo. I'm glad you went off into a different area, because it's an area that I think is very important.

I agree with some of the things you mentioned, such as collaboration, the need for police forces to collaborate, the need for the folks in the justice envelope—judges, lawyers, crown attorneys, and police officers—to continue their discussion. I think that's what you mean by collaboration.

You went further and talked about collaboration among all the different levels within the community. Thank you for that, because I think that's the way we get things done--from the ground up, as it were--instead of having the so-called experts come to give us the philosophical reasons why we shouldn't do something. In the end it's the people who live it every day—that's why I believe Mr. Henry is here—who have the best information and sometimes the best solutions.

I wonder, Mr. Trudell, if you and perhaps Mr. Henry would comment on whether these things are happening. I'm almost positive they are. I listen to CFRB, so I know some of the things that are occurring in the Scarborough area. And things are improving, by the way.

Mr. Trudell, picking up on your theme, we very recently had the Minister of Justice come to a round table in Northumberland County on public safety and justice issues. We heard from a mix of all the police departments in the area, the victims groups, the police services board, the community policing committee, and representatives of youth--youth groups. The theme was almost identical right across the board.

You say we need to find out what they're thinking. When it came to proceeds of crime, the local police said we needed the proceeds of crime that occur in our community to come back to the police in that community, perhaps through the municipal government, so they can use them for a broad range of crime prevention programs and victims' assistance groups. So I wonder if you'd comment on whether you think that's appropriate, and whether Mr. Henry thinks that's appropriate.

They also talked about the need for more investment in youth anti-crime and anti-drug strategies. At the same time, they said that for those who are repeat offenders there needs to be more accounting. So we went from restorative justice that is happening in that community, which I think really works.... As we know, it started in New Zealand with the Maori Indians and worked its way up into our justice system. It works very well, in my view. But for the worst of the worst--the people who are captured under Bill C-4--that doesn't deal with first or even second offences. That piece of legislation deals with somebody who's been through the system so many times and continues with serious offences, usually bodily injury offences. So we're not dealing with that group.

When it comes to collaboration, as I left the policing background.... As a result of the Bernardo series of murders, we learned the reason why there was a successful conclusion to the investigation. Police forces were previously operating in silos and weren't sharing information, so the joint force operations that currently occur.... I would suggest, Mr. Trudell, that collaboration is occurring even more and better all the time, even internationally.

So I've hit on an eclectic mix of things. I wonder if you can make some short comments on it, and leave sufficient time for Mr. Henry to discuss how his community deals with the police.

Is there a community policing group there that collaborates with the police to look at these socio-economic as well as social justice...?

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank the witnesses for coming. I'm very interested in Mr. Henry's statements. I think we should all take a turn at that. I'll save the second round of questioning from our team for that very interesting stuff.

But in the first round, I'd like to ask both Mr. Trudell and Mr. Norton the same questions. I'd summarize it by saying that in their realm of charter protection and civil liberties protections, balanced with society's need to have public safety—which is something that every member of this committee would agree with, the need to have public safety, security—there seem to be some themes coming from these hearings that I think everybody could agree with. Mr. Trudell's comments on collaboration and the working of the forces together—community forces, police forces, prosecutorial, etc.—hits home very much. It's a way to make things more effective.

I think what we're also hearing from law enforcement officials is the need to be more surgical in the tooling up of how to combat needs. It's no longer the idea, as a municipal council might think, of having a policeman walking the beat. It's all marketplace politics. But what we hear is that we need the resources directed to specific problem-oriented policing types of deals, and that's how we can help as a parliament.

In that regard I want to ask about three areas. One is any legislation that might compel telecommunications companies, ISP providers, and device manufacturers to use devices that are susceptible to interception. I take very seriously what you both say about the need to have judicial oversight and protection of privacy rights, but right now there are devices used in organized crime that can't even be intercepted. The judge can make an order, but it's an order that goes into the ether. So I want to know your opinion on whether you think that's safeguarded if there are judicial protections.

The second aspect is forfeiture of the proceeds of crime. Many provinces are doing great work in that, and we learned in Vancouver that if you take the money out of the system, sometimes that's what organized crime is all about. It's very much about taking the money out of the system. In 2005, the Liberal government reversed the onus on the balance of probabilities to show why something shouldn't be forfeited. I wonder how far you think is too far in going after proceeds of crime, before a finding of guilt, pending or during a trial.

The final aspect, if you have time, is that as Bill C-4 rears its head, regarding amendments to the Youth Criminal Justice Act, we're talking about youth being—and I'm in agreement—the pawns in many organized crime activities. Yet they are being used, and some of the provisions are carefully drafted to attack the organized crime units that are using these pawns, by the lifting of publication bans on the names of some of these youths and by doing extrajudicial measures to get at the problem.

I want to know the civil liberties and charter implications of those three areas.

Justice

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, youth centres in Quebec remind us that the Quebec model, based on the rehabilitation and reintegration of young offenders, is an exemplary model cited around the world. Social workers and lawyers agree. Yet Bill C-4 goes against Quebec's approach and promotes repression, denunciation, deterrence and exemplary sentences.

Will the government amend its bill and respect Quebec's rehabilitation model?

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Good afternoon, Mr. Minister.

Good afternoon, Mr. Sims.

I would like to start off with a brief comment. Very often, we look at the statistics that are provided to us to help us assess bills, such as the young offenders measure we want to bring in.

I will give you an example. In Quebec, there is a fellow by the name of Vincent Lacroix who defrauded 9,200 people. The statistics will show just a single crime; the 9,200 people will not be represented. In the case of Earl Jones, 150 people were defrauded, and only one person will be mentioned. In the case of young offenders, in Quebec—which I know especially well—all of the cases are not reported. I do not want to know the name; I want to know the crime that was committed to see if progress is being made in society, and so forth. That is important; nothing is reported, and Statistics Canada cannot report on the total number.

In Quebec, between 125 and 175 people disappear every year, and 41% of those are found, while 59% are not, such as Cédrika Provencher. We do not know whether she was killed or raped; we do not know anything. There is no possibility of finding information that can help us.

I am coming to my next question. I am very proud of the bill that we are introducing. Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts, includes amendments for violent repeat offenders—in Quebec, it is for youth 16 and 17 years of age—who have committed irreparable harm, in other words, murder, attempted murder, manslaughter and serious violence.

You mentioned it a bit earlier, but how do you plan to allow the judge... This week, youth advocacy groups in Quebec said it was a good idea for the judge to know what had happened in the past. Do you plan to establish a link with the provinces to make it possible to obtain as much information as possible so that the judge can make a proper ruling, because, ultimately, it is the judge who decides?

Sébastien's Law (Protecting the Public from Violent Young Offenders)

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to join in the debate today on Bill C-4, a bill to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act. This is certainly an issue which is of concern and interest across Canada.

One thing that concerns me, though, is that when we hear the Conservatives talk about young people, most of the time it is about putting them in jail. My experience with many young people in my riding of Halifax West is very different and very positive. I think most people in this chamber would recognize that most of their experiences with youth have been positive, I hope.

For instance, I recently attended the Bedford Lions Speak Out in my riding where seven or eight high school students spoke extremely well, which made it difficult for the judges. I was not a judge but I was asked to ask questions of the students after they had made their speeches to help make it a little more challenging for them. These were young leaders in the community who offered arguments and advocated that other young people should be more involved in the community and in volunteerism. These were terrific young people.

My son is a Scout and I went with his Scout troop on a winter camping trip on one of the coldest Saturday nights of February. It has been a mild winter but it was about minus 20° that night, if I recall correctly. I spent a couple of hours on the Saturday morning with them, helping them set up and taking some pictures of them. I was glad not to have to stay too much longer because it was cold. Sure, I was concerned about my son, but he was well-equipped, very happy and enjoyed it thoroughly. There again was a group of young people doing good things.

The Scout movement is involved in setting goals. My son wants to be a chief Scout, for example, which is an important goal and there are steps one works at toward that. That is the kind of activity in which we want to see young people involved. We should want to see more encouragement of that kind of activity. They have positive role models involved, which is very important because it is so often lacking which is why young people get involved in criminal activities. This is part of the heart of the problem. We need to examine the reasons why young people sometime get into trouble. They often do not have mentors or positive role models. They often have terrible home lives because they are living in poverty. We need to examine that.

In terms of other positive examples, I recently attended the launch of the Girls Soar Physical Activity Week. We saw some terrific young people from a school in my riding. In fact, I saw a young runner from the riding of Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, my colleague's riding, who is on the national team and is a tremendous young role model.

There are so many examples of young people doing good things, I would like to see the Conservative government thinking about them a little more and thinking about how we get more young people to be like that. We need to deal with the issues of youth crime in a way that says that part of the solution here is to recognize the causes of these crimes and what is behind these problems, and then try to address them more effectively.

People in my province have and have had a great interest in this issue for some years, particularly following, which I know my colleague from West Nova will recall, the tragic death of a well-liked teacher named Theresa McEvoy. Justice Merlin Nunn was appointed by the provincial government to do a study and he did an excellent examination into the situation that led to her death by a young offender, 16-year-old Archie Billard. It was a very sad case but Justice Nunn did an excellent job and his report was highly regarded across the province.

It is important to look at the history of this situation. Before the Youth Criminal Justice Act, Canada at one time had one of the highest rates of incarceration of young people in the world. We should consider whether that will really work and whether that is really the answer. The government wants to incarcerate more and more people and wants to have more prisons at great expense but is not willing to put the money into things that will reduce poverty, and that is the concern.

The idea of the Youth Criminal Justice Act, in many parts, was to deal appropriately with young people, to deal with people who were not violent offenders in a way that is appropriate. There is no question that, as Justice Nunn recommended, there needs to be some changes to the act.

This is very important, which is why I brought forward a bill. I had great assistance from the lawyer for the McEvoy family, Hugh Wright, a lawyer in Halifax who kindly worked hard and drafted the bill that I introduced to try to implement the recommendations of Justice Nunn.

I am pleased to see in this bill some of the elements of what I was proposing, but I do not see others. I see other elements that were not at all recommended by Justice Nunn, which concern me. I want to talk about this issue, because it seems to me that the government has chosen to cherry-pick from the Nunn report the kinds of things that suited its own ideology and reject those that did not. It is a bit like its attitude toward evidence generally, and I will talk about that some more.

The Nunn report has been out for several years now, and it is curious to me that it has taken so long for the government to come forward with a response to it. We had Bill C-25 introduced in the last Parliament, but the government did nothing to move it forward. That is so often the case with so many of its so-called tough on crime bills. It talked about them a lot, but it did not actually take action to move those bills forward. It would not even introduce them sometimes for debate, which is curious and bizarre to me.

By the way, if this bill passes second reading and does go to committee, I hope that Justice Nunn will be asked to appear at committee to give his expert advice. I think he is very knowledgeable and has done a very thorough review.

There are some good things in this bill. There are numerous amendments to the act and the youth justice regime as a whole, including changes to the general sentencing principles of the Youth Criminal Justice Act. Other amendments include changes to the definitions of terms such as “violent offence” and provisions relating to publication bans and repeat offenders.

I think it would be worthwhile for the House to hear some of the words that Justice Nunn wrote in his report on the McEvoy case, because they are important to knowing the background of this situation and what is happening in youth crime in Canada and what the response to it should be. He said:

[I]t is important to state that not one of the parties with standing took exception to the philosophy behind the act or to the majority of its provisions. Rather, they identified a number of sections causing concern and recommended changes.

He further said:

I can categorically state that the Youth Criminal Justice Act is legislation that provides an intelligent, modern, and advanced approach to dealing with youths involved in criminal activities. Canada is now far ahead of other countries in its treatment of youth in conflict with the law—

He went on to say:

This is not to say that there are not those who are opposed to the [Youth Criminal Justice Act], just as there were those opposed to the previous acts, the Juvenile Delinquents Act and the Young Offenders Act. Many of these critics believe that jail is the answer: “There they'll learn the errors of their ways.” These critics pay little attention to contrary evidence, nor do they understand that with young persons jail for the terms they recommend does not correct or rehabilitate, but rather often turns out a person whose behaviour is much worse than it was. Others espouse the vengeful adage “adult crime—adult time,” paying no attention to the fact that it is a youth crime and not an adult crime.

He continued:

Such an attitude is in direct conflict with modern approaches to treating criminal behaviour. Most of the adherents of these views refuse to accept that youth should be treated differently and separately from any adult system.

Nevertheless, they are entitled to the views and opinions they express. Unfortunately, in the present state of our youth criminal justice system, they are unable to make any contribution to reform even when some reform is not only reasonable but desirable.

He went on to say on page 230 of his report:

The witnesses and counsel for all parties in this inquiry have indicated full support for the aims and goals of the act while recognizing, at the same time, a need for a number of amendments to give flexibility to the courts in dealing with repeat offenders, primarily by opening a door to pre-trial custody and enlarging the gateways to custody.

He went on to say:

I cannot overestimate the importance of taking a balanced approach. Parts of the [Youth Criminal Justice Act] must be changed in order to create a workable and effective approach to handling repeat offenders in a manner based upon protection of the public as a primary concern, as well as providing a means to step in to halt unacceptable criminal behaviour in a timely manner. This is not an option. It is critical.

Here is the last quotation I will provide from him, from page 233 of his 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 intent of the act. They accept it as a vast improvement over the previous legislation.

Thus I think it is important that as we examine this bill and examine what should be done to change the Youth Criminal Justice Act, we consider those thoughts and the need not just to change it but also to get it right. We need to be thoughtful about this. We need to provide a balanced approach and be smart on crime and on youth crime in this case.

I have serious concerns about this particular bill, which I hope will be addressed in committee, if in fact it gets to committee. These are sweeping changes to the act and some elements of the bill seem to favour punishment more than rehabilitation.

The government has done virtually nothing to ensure that youth do not get into the justice system in the first place, and that is a concern. What we have seen instead are cuts to anti-poverty programs and child care, and a lack of funding for aboriginal communities, as we would have had in the Kelowna accord, et cetera.

I also believe that youth must be treated differently from adults, and that is an important consideration. The Canadian justice system has recognized for decades that while their crimes may be similar, we need to treat youth differently from adults. The Conservative Party has never held that view.

It reminds me of the fact that children at age 14 have brains that are not fully developed; their brains are still developing and changing. I think anybody who has been a parent of a 13- or 14-year-old ought to be aware of it. Maybe some of us have forgotten that, but young people are terrific. My son is 13 and he is terrific, but there is no question that he is still growing and learning and that his thinking will change in the coming years. It is important to remember that when we think about how to deal with these situations.

In the past, the Conservatives and the Reformers before them have fought to reduce the barriers between youth and adult offenders. In fact, during the last election they said they wanted to put 14-year-olds into our prison system, institutions with hardened adult prisoners. Why would we put a 14-year-old in a prison, the same place as murderers, rapists and gang members, if our intention is not to make them better at crime and more hardened criminals?

There are weaknesses in this bill. Parts of it are poorly drafted. I suspect it may be the result of the fact this really comes from government ideology, as opposed to the bill being drafted by the department, because it usually produces very high quality legislation.

However, there are good provisions in it and I want to give credit where credit is due. For example, the bill would make it mandatory that no youth, regardless of their crime, would spend time in an adult institution. We need to see what the government will do to ensure that the provinces have the capacity to deal with this provision and be able to comply with it. I think we know the government recognizes that it could not get away with what it was suggesting in the last election, that is, putting young people in the same place as adult criminals. At any rate, I am pleased to see this has been modified and is an important provision in the bill.

Another example is the provision that allows courts in sentencing to lift a ban on publication of the accused or convicted person's name. I would hope this would happen rarely, not often, but I can personally see that this could be needed in exceptional cases and would be helpful in protecting the public. That is my own view.

Let me talk for a moment about some of the recommendations in particular that Justice Nunn made and how this bill responds to them. I think he made some 36 recommendations. Some of them related to the provincial justice system, the system for youth incarceration and so forth, and a certain number of them related to federal legislation. I am going to talk in particular about those that relate to the bill we are talking about today.

Recommendation 20 said:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend the “Declaration of Principle” in section 3 of the Youth Criminal Justice Act to add a clause indicating that protection of the public is one of the primary goals of the act.

The government has certainly made the protection of the public a major part of this act now, but it has also gone far beyond what Justice Nunn recommended. My feeling is that what the government has done in this bill is in fact a rejection of the recommendation I just read. Justice Nunn made it very clear that it was important to be balanced in how this was done and he wanted this to be just one of the principles, because the other principles were still important. The government has made it the overriding principle, and that is a concern.

In recommendation 21, he said:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend the definition of “violent offence” in section 39(1)(a) of the Youth Criminal Justice Act to include conduct that endangers or is likely to endanger the life or safety of another person.

I am pleased to see that the government has done this in section 3(c) of this bill.

In recommendation 22, Justice Nunn said:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend section 39(1)(c) of the Youth Criminal Justice Act so that the requirement for a demonstrated “pattern of findings of guilt” is changed to “a pattern of offences,” or similar wording, with the goal that both a young person’s prior findings of guilt and pending charges are to be considered when determining the appropriateness of pre-trial detention.

In this case, in clause 8 of the bill, the government has resorted to the phrase “either extrajudicial sanctions or of findings of guilt or of both”. Instead of looking at what the pattern of offences was, it has talked about them quite differently with the terms, “extrajudicial sanctions”. It will be interesting to have a discussion about what that would mean.

Does it mean that if a police officer stops a young person and reprimands them or drives them home for some reason, or whatever, that would be an extrajudicial sanction? It is not clear to me, and I am a little concerned that this particular provision might be subject to a charter challenge, because it may bring in things where there has not been due process. Obviously, we should be careful of that because we want to have laws that are actually going to work and not be overturned by courts. Most of us would prefer that we designed these laws and determined what they should be here in Parliament.

In recommendation 25, Justice Nunn said:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend section 31(6) of the Youth Criminal Justice Act to remove the requirement of a new bail hearing for the young person before being placed in pre-trial custody if the designated “responsible person” is relieved of his or her obligations under a “responsible person undertaking.”

This is a very important recommendation at the heart of what Justice Nunn was talking about. It is not clear to me that this is in the bill. I have looked for a provision like this and have not seen it, but I hope we will have some answers from the government on that question of why we do not see an amendment to that section of the act in the bill as presented.

To me, this is at the heart of the matter because in the McEvoy case, the mother of the accused had agreed to look after and be responsible for the accused young person, but then at some point before his trial said she could not handle it any more and could not take responsibility. She wanted to be relieved of her responsibility.

There was no provision for that young person to then be held to their undertaking and be taken into custody. This is one the key things that Justice Nunn wanted to see changed. I am concerned that we do not see it in the bill. I raised this issue with the minister just before speaking here, and I hope he will be looking into it. I think he will perhaps be looking into it and at whether or not we need an amendment to the bill. I hope we will see that coming forward.

Recommendation 23 from Justice Nunn reads:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend and simplify the statutory provisions relating to the pre-trial detention of young persons so that section 29 will stand on its own without interaction with other statutes or other provisions of the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

I am pleased to see that clause 4 of the bill appears to do this, though I only received the bill yesterday and only had a good look through it last night. These things take time to digest and we would like to look further at this and have some good discussion among colleagues on it. However, I am encouraged to see that it appears to be going in the right direction.

Recommendation 24 states:

The Province should advocate that the federal government amend section 31(5)(a) of the Youth Criminal Justice Act so that if the designated “responsible person” is relieved of his or her obligations under a “responsible person undertaking” the young person’s undertaking made under section 31(3)(b) nevertheless remains in full force and effect, particularly any requirement to keep the peace and be of good behaviour and other conditions imposed by a youth court judge.

Again, this is one of the issues I raised with the minister and I am pleased he has agreed to look into it.

I am gravely concerned about the provisions on denunciation and deterrence that are in the bill, because they are contrary to all the evidence. The fact is that we know that a 15-year-old generally thinks he or she is invincible and is not going to get caught. So these provisions do not really work.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today on behalf of the Bloc Québécois to speak to Bill C-4.

This bill amends the Youth Criminal Justice Act and makes consequential and related amendments to other acts. It also amends the sentencing and general principles of the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

I would like to begin by saying that the Bloc Québécois would like to do a thorough, professional job of studying this bill in committee. The Bloc will therefore support an agreement in principle to study the bill and hear all witnesses to improve it.

Although the bill is not as excessive as we were led to believe it would be in January, it still contains quite a few irritants, including an ideological change in the act, which is a fairly dramatic change.

Like many experts, we condemn this philosophical change that makes public protection the main benchmark, at the expense of prevention.

The bill adds new criteria to consider in sentencing young offenders. For example, the sentence should have a deterrent effect. This means that public perception, rather than the offence itself, would condition how a young offender is punished. In short, the government is asking judges to make examples of people.

The government is amending a law that works well. What is more, many experts condemn this amendment, because the law had already been toughened. Still, because of the Bloc's efforts, the bill we have before us is much more moderate than what we are used to seeing from the Conservatives. We have to say that our work to raise awareness and fight against an even tougher bill paid off; the government listened.

The government admits that it misled us when it said there were no young offenders in adult prisons. That is an important admission. I feel it is worth mentioning, because the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles spent last summer going around saying that there were no offenders under 18 in the prisons in Quebec and Canada.

It is worthwhile going over some figures. I do not think that the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles dispute the source of these figures. It is the Correctional Service of Canada.

I do not especially like quoting statistics in my remarks, but I will do so this time because I want to correct the figures cited by the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, among others. I hope that after hearing these statistics, the member will offer an apology for reporting incorrect figures.

In all, 10 offenders under the age of 18 have been placed in a federal penitentiary since January 1, 2004. They were all 17 at the time. Here is the number of young people placed by year, that is from January to December 31—2004, 4; 2005, 1; 2006, 3; 2007, 1; 2008, none; 2009, 1.

I have some more statistics to help the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles clearly understand the situation. According to a reliable source, the public security department in Quebec, in all a total of 39 offenders under 18 have been put in prison in Quebec since April 1, 2003. Here are the figures by fiscal year, that is, from April 1 to March 31: 12 in 2003-04; 10 in 2004-05, 3 in 2005-06; 9 in 2006-07; 5 in 2007-08; and none in 2008-09.

The statistics are based on the age at the time of admission. We must also realize that a single individual can be admitted more than once a year. Now that this has been clarified, we can hope that the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles will get the facts straight.

The Bloc Québécois as well shares many of the concerns raised by many professional stakeholders in Quebec on the repercussions of this bill. Accordingly, the Bloc will analyze it in depth, as is its custom, when it is being studied in committee. We want to hear all those involved in order to improve whatever may be improved. The Bloc wants to get to the bottom of things and will certainly not tolerate rushing through a matter of such importance. If it is passed, the bill will change the way young people are dealt with. We must therefore take the time needed to invite as many experts to speak to the matter so as to properly debate and examine it.

I would also like to speak to the Bloc's philosophy on justice. It firmly believes that the most effective approach is still prevention. We must go after the causes of crime, delinquency and violence rather than wait for problems to occur and try to fix them after the fact. The wisest and certainly the most profitable approach, in both social and financial terms, consists in working at problems in order to avoid youth crime and incarceration. It could not be clearer. We must fight poverty, inequality and exclusion, all fertile ground for frustrations and the escape valves that violence and crime constitute.

Justice for youth is no different in this regard. Young people should benefit from a healthy environment, they should not be living in extreme poverty, they should have access to affordable education and so on. In all these areas, the Quebec nation has made good choices, which sets it apart. Education costs, for example, are among the lowest in North America. Our network of daycare centres is a model in the field, and so on.

Obviously, the Bloc Québécois is aware that young people commit crimes, for which they should be held to account, including in the courts. The government has a duty to act and to use all the tools available to it to ensure that Quebeckers and Canadians are able to live in peace and safety. But the measures brought forward have got to have a real positive impact on crime, they have got to be more than rhetoric, or fear-mongering. They have got to be more than just an imitation of the American model, which, it should be noted, has completely failed to reduce crime. The American model has produced very weak results and is now on the brink of complete breakdown. Some states are questioning that model because it has failed to reduce youth crime.

A few statistics show that one quarter of prisoners on the planet, over 7 million people, are in prison or on parole. The United States is starting to move away from that model, the “law and order” model. In July 2009, the Vera Institute of Justice determined that at least 22 American states are preparing to depart from tough-on-crime policies and the present system is at the point of human and financial breakdown.

On the other hand, the Quebec model, based on rehabilitation and reintegration, produces real results, results that can be measured using statistics showing the decline in crime.

So we would say that what Canada wants is to copy a completely outdated model instead of drawing on the Quebec model, which is working very well.

A moment ago I listened carefully to the speech by my NDP colleague, the member for Windsor—Tecumseh. He said that the government should draw on the Quebec model which has produced good results because the people of Quebec, with their various taxes, have created a health system, a social safety net, that means they can take action to prevent crime and poverty. One thing it means is that young people can be given help and support. Quebec is the province that in 2006 succeeded in reducing its crime rate by 4%, unlike the rest of Canada, where the crime rate rose.

And so I invite the government members to investigate the Quebec model, to look at its successes and its results, rather than trying to copy a completely outdated model that, on the contrary, is of such dubious worth that some American states are now questioning it and are looking for a different model.

Quebec has a good system because we have experts who provide us with sound advice and who have worked, year in and year out, to build a model that works well. These experts are telling us that the Government of Canada is completely off track. The Association des centres jeunesse du Québec, a Quebec organization that provides services to young offenders and troubled youth, and the provincial directors also believe in the rehabilitation and reintegration of young offenders, which have been successful in Quebec. Numerous experts from other countries come to Quebec to observe, learn about and watch our system, so they can then emulate it. I do not say it often enough, but I am saying it now: our results are very telling and very inspiring.

The Association des centres jeunesse du Québec says that it, too, cares about the victims, but that the government is really on the wrong track when it states that protection of society will be improved by implementing more coercive measures because the current legislation deals with these situations and ensures the protection of society. As we saw in the statistics that I quoted earlier, there are youth under the age of 18 in prison, but such a sentence is rarely handed out by judges. They do so if the crime was very serious. It is rare that they decide that a youth should be in prison and should serve the entire sentence.

The bill refers to Sébastien's situation, which illustrates the reach of the current legislation. The young offender concerned was handed an adult sentence upon the recommendation of the provincial director of the Quebec court, youth division. The youth who murdered Sébastien is currently serving his sentence in an adult prison. This example perfectly illustrates that the current law contains a legislative tool that is used in Quebec when this type of circumstance with a youth arises.

Clearly, the Association des centres jeunesse du Québec will want to testify before the committee to share its 30 years of expertise and explain the very serious repercussions this bill would have if it were passed as is.

I would like to give some background on this bill. The Youth Criminal Justice Act, which replaced the Young Offenders Act, received royal assent in February 2002 and officially took effect on April 1, 2003.

The Youth Criminal Justice Act was quite imperfect and was challenged by the Government of Quebec. But in spite of that, in spite of history, the government is still pushing ahead with Bill C-4. We know that the National Assembly of Quebec will also be opposed to this bill as it currently stands.

For years, Quebec's justice minister has been calling on the federal government to exempt Quebec and allow it to implement its own youth intervention model.

The Government of Quebec has shown its opposition to the federal government for a dozen years now. The strong consensus in Quebec is that rehabilitation and prevention are the answer and that Quebec must develop ways of preventing young people from committing acts of physical or sexual violence or serious crimes. Quebec is working hard to put such measures in place. This is the system that Quebeckers have developed to prevent these crimes as much as possible.

I said earlier that I would give some statistics about the decrease in crime. Crime dominates the media: the trials of violent offenders and notorious fraud artists get extensive media coverage. The public often forms an opinion from sensational stories in the papers or on radio or television. We sometimes get the wrong impression and think that crime is on the rise, but that is not entirely true.

I think we can count on Statistics Canada to provide Canadian statistics. I am not accusing Statistics Canada of partisanship, because its statistics are rather clear.

Youth courts are seeing fewer and fewer cases. In 2005-06, 56,271 cases were heard, a decrease of 2% from the previous year. While it is true that the youth crime rate increased 3% in 2006, I must point out that that was the first increase since 2003. We cannot conclude that there is a strong upward trend. However, in 2006 in Quebec—as I mentioned earlier—the crime rate dropped by 4%. All the provinces saw increases in the youth crime rate, except Quebec, which saw a decrease in its crime rate thanks to its focus on rehabilitation and reintegration.

I do not think that is a coincidence. It proves that our model is inspiring and that it should inspire the current Conservative government. Instead of putting up a smokescreen, the government should be able to look at the big picture and recognize that there is a model that is working in Canada and that they can use. As my NDP colleague said so well, why focus on outdated measures, on intervention methods that do not work with young people and that are modelled after the United States, when here, the Quebec nation has a proven, effective system that is intelligent and respectful?

The Association des centres jeunesse du Québec and some specialized lawyers say that the current legislation did not need to be changed. They urge Parliament to be cautious. We are not talking about a few changes to sections of the act here. These are fundamental changes to the ideology and philosophy behind the legislation. This could very negatively impact young people in Quebec and Canada.

The House resumed from March 16 consideration of the motion that Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the members of the Liberal Party who were kind enough to switch with me today because I need to get back to my riding for an event this evening.

Bill C-4 is a significant attempt to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and the NDP will be supporting it at second reading to send it to committee. However, having said that, we have some significant reservations about the bill in terms of the drafting of it. Frankly, I find it quite clumsy in some areas. Some amendments will be needed just to clean up the language. The other concern is that the wording seems to have two agendas, the one that is on the surface and then the one that is behind it. I will come back to that in a moment.

We need to set in context the bill. The major amendments in the bill coming into effect are not very old. They were made in 2003 when the bill was brought into effect. In my legal career, we have actually had four separate pieces of legislation dealing with youth who are in conflict with society, who have committed anywhere from fairly minor criminal offences to very serious ones, including murder.

As a society, we have been struggling since at least the 1960s to find that right balance between treating them as youth, different from adult criminals, but at the same time recognizing that they are not adults even though they may commit offences similar to adults.

That pattern goes back at least 100 years in this country, probably even a bit longer than that. The original young offenders bill, which was called the Juvenile Delinquents Act at that time, dates back to the early part of the 1900s. However, even prior to that, our criminal justice system accepted that there would be two systems: one for youth, the age being a variable one over the last 100 years; and a separate major one for adults. Our courts and our legislatures, both at the provincial and the federal levels, have recognized that for well over 100 years.

One of the concerns I have with this legislation, and perhaps this is where the hidden agenda may be, is that the government has repeatedly indicated in speeches and in its party platform that it wants to significantly alter the barrier between youth offenders and adult offenders. It became a major issue in the last election.

I want to acknowledge the role that the citizenry generally of the province of Quebec played in attacking the Conservative Party during that election on the proposals that were floated during that election of lowering the age to nothing so that any youth could be charged as an adult and sentenced as an adult. That provoked a serious negative response from the people of Quebec and I want to acknowledge the role and the leadership they provided in that regard.

The other point I want to make about the way we have treated youth crime historically in this country is that it has in fact varied quite dramatically across the provinces. Here, I want to acknowledge again that Quebec has been the most successful province, the most successful jurisdiction, in dealing with youth crime. It has the lowest rates of youth crime in the country. It has the most developed and sophisticated system in the country to deal with youth who are in conflict with the law and actively engaged in anti-social behaviour. Quebec does this better than anybody does in Canada, and I want to acknowledge that.

With regard to this particular bill, we need to set it in the context of it being really a direct outcropping, not so much of the ideology coming from the Conservatives, but of the push from the Nunn Commission of Inquiry in Nova Scotia and the McMurtry report on victim compensation in Ontario.

Justice Nunn, who was appointed to that special inquiry, certainly had the most detailed recommendations. He and his commission had seven specific recommendations that the government is claiming it has responded to.

I want to be very clear that Justice Nunn, both in the report and in any number of interviews he did afterwards, was very clear that the act, as is, is a good piece of legislation. It is a workable piece of legislation. The term he used constantly was that it needed to be tweaked. On the surface that is what it appears the government is doing here, but in a number of areas Bill C-4 has weaknesses. I want to address a few of those.

Before I do that, I again want to point out that we will be supporting this bill because it has at least two provisions in it that are badly needed.

One is that it makes it absolutely mandatory that no youth, no matter what crime they are accused of or convicted of and sentenced for, will spend time in an adult institution. That is a principle the province of Quebec has followed quite diligently. Other provinces have not, sometimes because of an ideological approach to punishment of youth, but more often because they simply do not have the facilities to incarcerate youth in a contained setting, especially in the rural and frontier areas of this country. The government has done nothing to assist the provinces in developing those institutional settings.

When the bill gets to committee, as I fully expect it will, this will be an issue that we will be raising with the Department of Justice and perhaps with the Correctional Service about what they are going to do to help the provinces meet the requirements of the statute not to incarcerate any youth in an adult prison. I do not believe they have done any planning for this.

As is so often the case with the government, especially with its crime bills, this bill provides no specific date when it will come into effect. I am afraid that what we are going to see because of this particular provision is the provinces sitting back, which happened in one of the prior incarnations of legislation on youth crime. I know that in the province of Ontario specifically we went almost a decade without being in compliance with the statute and that we were not providing the necessary facilities, even though we were the wealthiest province in the country at the time.

Hence, I am afraid we are going to have a piece of legislation passed in this House mandating that youth not be incarcerated in adult prisons and a number of the provinces will have no ability to comply with that. It is an issue that will need to be explored at committee. It is a good policy, a good paragraph in the legislation, but we must have the provinces in a position to be able to carry it out.

The other point I want to make, and I have to say that we have had some division over this in my caucus, is that there is a provision in the bill that will allow the courts who are sentencing individuals, particularly for serious offences, to lift the historically solid ban on any publication of the name of the accused or convicted person. That is one provision that we would expect to be used rarely.

While I am concerned about the criteria the government has built in as to when the judge would be able to do that, we can see this provision as necessary in exceptional cases, for the protection of society. I am thinking in particular of an accused person who has been convicted and sentenced as an adult, who has very severe psychological health problems and is not likely to be rehabilitated and who is, in the extreme, even a serial killer. That person should be identified to society, both in terms of the police knowing the individual and society more generally. Those will be rare cases. We may not even get one a year. However, I believe that for the protection of society, it is important that we analyze that, set proper criteria in place, and allow that discretion for our judges.

With regard to the negative parts of the bill where I see some hidden agenda items, I think it is necessary to go back to the last Parliament. Pretty late in that Parliament, in spite of all the other crime bills the government was introducing, some of which were silly quite frankly, and in spite of the fact it had been in power at that point for over three years and the Nunn report had come out, the government finally got around to drafting Bill C-25 and presenting it to the House. It was late in the 39th Parliament and that bill just sat and nothing happened to it. The bill included a provision that the Conservatives claimed was a denunciation, but it also had a very clear provision for general deterrence as a sentencing principle. That flies in the face of the hundred-plus years of our history in this jurisdiction of Canada, and generally in western democracies, of treating youth separately, recognizing that because of their lack of maturity, general deterrence does not work with them, generally speaking. It specifically is of no value when we are dealing with youth. That has been accepted in many courts and in all jurisdictions in the western democracies. However, what the Conservatives were trying to do was to introduce in that bill, very clearly, right up front, a general deterrence principle.

The government has backed off that in this bill. It has dropped that, I think, in part because of what happened in the last election in the province of Quebec. The government has maintained specific deterrents, that is, individual deterrents. I am not sure even those will survive a challenge in our courts. The Supreme Court of Canada, as recently as a few months ago and in a series of its decisions, made it very clear that the sentencing principles to be applied to youth who are in conflict with the law must take into account exclusively that they are youth, that courts cannot use principles of sentencing applicable in the adult setting. The Conservatives have recognized that and have limited the bill to specific deterrents, at least on the surface in one of the clauses.

However, when one looks at the amendments to the act overall, there are a number of other places where it would appear they are trying to get general deterrence in, if I could put it this way, through the back door. There is some really clumsy wording for what a judge does in determining whether a person should be tried as an adult, accepting of course the application from the Crown, and separate criteria as to whether they should be sentenced as an adult.

There is also wording in there that does not appear any place else in any youth justice act that we have had in the past, that does not appear in any parts of the Criminal Code, either currently or, as far as I know, historically. But it basically introduces moral culpability, and this may come out of a court decision that I think they may be taking out of context. It is introducing morality and asking the judges, in effect, to interpret that and to apply it on a day-to-day, case-by-case basis.

Knowing a lot of judges and judges who work extensively in the youth criminal justice system, I think this is going to pose a major problem of interpretation. I am not sure the legislation worded in this way will survive a challenge, because it is so vague. That is always a principle when looking at criminal law, including sentencing guidelines. Therefore, it is a major problem confronting us in dealing with this bill.

I want to address one other issue that came out of the Nunn Commission report and recommendations. The Nunn Commission arose as a result of a specific case in Nova Scotia. Justice Nunn was quite concerned about a limitation in the discretionary powers judges had around the issue of protection of society when sentencing an individual.

I do not want to sound trite here because it is a serious concern and one of the times when Commissioner Nunn said that tweaking was needed, but what the government has done here is not tweaking. I think it is just nothing: it is smoke and mirrors. Under the existing law the protection of society is a set of criteria for what a judge can take into account, and at the bottom of the full text of the paragraph in the bill, it talks about the protection of society. However, all I see the government doing here is moving that paragraph from the bottom to the top.

In the press releases and minister's press conferences, where he trots out one of the victim's family members, using them for photo-ops, he is forecasting and extolling the virtues of the bill, saying that it in fact addresses this issue. I have to say that I do not see that. This simply seem to be window dressing. The government has combined moving that clause from the bottom to the top with some new wording that I believe, if anything, when interpreted by our judges across the country, will further limit their discretion in taking into account the protection of society.

It is an example of what I said earlier about the bill, that is both clumsy and, in some cases, poorly drafted. I think there is some ideology behind this coming from the government rather than the officials in the Department of Justice, because this is not a bill of the quality I usually see coming from the Department of Justice. The department is usually quite good in drafting, if not excellent, but there are some problems here.

There are also a number of places where the government replaces sections. It takes sections out and repeals them and replaces them with others. From my reading of the bill, and this is another reason we will be looking at it very closely at committee, the government has in fact left gaps, and we are going to end up with the judiciary and prosecutors in this country not being able to prosecute and/or move to sentencing of adults, because the government has left gaps in the drafting of the bill. So we will be looking at that at committee.

To conclude, we are going to support the bill going to committee. We have serious reservations about parts of it and strong support for other parts. We will do what we can at committee to strengthen the bill and provide greater protection for people who are victims of youth crime.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member said that violent crime went up in 2006 but that is not enough because it did not go up in another year. I generally do not even get into those discussions. We do look at the crime rates and are always concerned about the rate of crime in this country, but the hon. member makes the case that if it goes up one year that is not good enough. I am saying that these are very reasonable measures.

With respect to diversion, we are all of the opinion that we have a better chance rehabilitating a 16-year-old offender than a 36 or 46-year-old offender. I have made the point before that 36 or 46-year-old criminals may be career criminals and they are much more difficult to rehabilitate. It is much more difficult to get them back on the right track than a 16 or 17-year-old.

The bill is very specific. It goes after repeat violent offenders, the kind of individuals who Justice Nunn identified as not only a danger to society but a danger to themselves. Some individuals have said that if they had been detained, they would have had a better chance of not recommitting the offence. That is what came out of the Nunn report.

Bill C-4 is very focused. We applaud the efforts taken for the most part at the provincial level, but there were of course efforts taken at the national level. The national anti-drug strategy is a very good example of where we are encouraging people not to get involved with the kind of activities that could wreck and ruin their life. These are good measures.

This bill is specific. It goes after those individuals who are a danger to themselves and a danger to society. It is very focused legislation and it should have the support of the Bloc.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

moved that Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, for almost 100 years, Canada has provided separate laws and procedures applicable to youth who commit crimes. The fair and appropriate application of criminal accountability to our youth is one of the most challenging areas of justice and social policy.

The law must be adequate to hold them appropriately accountable for the offences committed, consistent with their degree of responsibility in a manner that protects the public.

Canadians look to their government to ensure that the justice system is working effectively and that the country's citizens are safe. Since we were first elected, our government has taken action to tackle crime and protect Canadians.

Our approach is balanced. It includes: prevention, enforcement and rehabilitation. But there is more to be done.

We recognize that we need to strengthen the way the young offenders system deals with violent and repeat young offenders.

I am proud to speak today in this House to Bill C-4, which will bring amendments to the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

Sébastien's law will make the protection of society a primary goal of our youth criminal justice system, and it will give Canadians greater confidence that violent and repeat young offenders will be held accountable through sentences that are proportionate to the severity of their crimes.

Bill C-4 proposes amendments to the Youth Criminal Justice Act that would make the protection of society a primary goal of the act; simplify pretrial detention rules to help ensure that, when necessary, violent and repeat young offenders are kept off the streets while awaiting trial; strengthen sentencing provisions and reduce barriers to custody for violent and repeat young offenders, where appropriate; and require the Crown to consider seeking adult sentences for youth convicted of the most serious crimes, such as murder, attempted murder, manslaughter and aggravated assault.

The Crown would also be required to inform the court if it chooses not to apply for an adult sentence. We will require the courts to consider publishing the name of a violent young offender when necessary for the protection of the public.

We will require police to keep records when extrajudicial measures are used in order to make it easier to identify patterns of reoffending, and ensure that all youth under 18, who are given a custodial sentence, will serve it in a youth facility.

I would like to make a couple of comments about the changes that we are proposing.

First, we would make the protection of society a primary goal of the act. As it currently stands, the objective of protecting society is not stated strongly enough in either the preamble to the YCJA or its declaration of principles. This deficiency was identified by the Hon. D. Merlin Nunn in his report entitled “Spiralling Out of Control: Lessons Learned From a Boy in Trouble”. This was a comprehensive review of the youth justice system in Nova Scotia.

Justice Nunn concluded that highlighting public safety as one of the goals or principles of the act was necessary to improve the handling of violent and repeat offenders. Highlighting this objective within the principles of the act would give the courts a necessary tool to ensure that the protection of society is taken into account in sentencing youth who commit violent and repeat offences.

Again, related to one of the recommendations of the Nunn report, we will simplify the pretrial detention rules to help ensure that, when necessary, violent and repeat young offenders are kept off the streets while awaiting trial.

The current law on pretrial detention has been viewed by some as confusing and has, on occasion, been inconsistently applied. As a result, the system is often powerless to hold violent or reckless youth in custody, even when they pose a danger to themselves and to society.

The act therefore will be amended to simplify pretrial detention rules to ensure that youth can be detained while awaiting trial if they are charged with a serious offence, and there is a substantial likelihood that the youth will commit a serious offence if released.

A serious offence will be defined as any indictable offence for which the maximum punishment is imprisonment for five years or more, including: violent offences; property offences, such as theft over $5,000 which can include car theft; and offences that could endanger the public such as public mischief, unauthorized possession of a firearm, possession of a firearm, sexual exploitation, robbery and, of course, murder.

The third provision will strengthen sentencing provisions and reduce barriers to custody where appropriate for violent and repeat young offenders.

Canadians lose confidence in the justice system when a sentence is insufficient to hold offenders accountable for their actions or to protect society. The law will be amended to broaden the sentencing principles and remove barriers to custody to ensure that violent or repeat young offenders will receive sentences that reflect the seriousness of their offences.

The government is proposing to strengthen the sentencing provisions by adding specific deterrence and denunciation to the principles of sentencing to discourage a particular offender from committing further offences.

As it stands now, deterrence and denunciation cannot be considered by a judge as part of sentencing. Adding specific deterrence and denunciation would allow the courts to impose sanctions designed to discourage the particular offender from committing further offences when the circumstances of the individual case indicate that this is necessary.

We will expand the meaning of violent offence to include offences that endanger the public. Currently, under the act, the general rule is that a young person cannot be sentenced to custody unless certain conditions are met. For example, young offenders may not be sentenced to custody unless they have committed a violent offence.

The Supreme Court of Canada in 2006 interpreted violent offence under the act as an offence where the young person causes, attempts to cause, or threatens to cause bodily harm. The definition does not capture situations in which, while no one was injured, reckless behaviour nonetheless posed a risk to others. For example, at the moment, a young offender who leads police on a high speed chase through a residential neighbourhood could be given a custodial sentence only if someone was injured as a result.

The government proposes to expand the definition of violent offence to include offences where the young person endangers the life or safety of others by creating a substantial likelihood of causing bodily harm. This change would give the courts a necessary tool to help ensure accountability and the protection of society, when the circumstances of the offence require it.

We are proposing to reduce barriers to custodial sentences by allowing custody to be imposed on youth who have a pattern of findings of guilt or extrajudicial sanctions. The act currently allows for custodial sentences in situations where the young person has committed an indictable offence for which an adult would be liable to imprisonment for a term of more than two years, and the young person has a history indicating a pattern of findings of guilt under the act or its predecessor.

The current requirement for establishing a pattern of criminal activity based on findings of guilt has been criticized by some as being too restrictive when a young person may have committed other offences which have not been dealt with through the formal justice system. As a result, in cases where the offender's history indicates that a custodial sentence is necessary to protect society or to hold the offender accountable, it is sometimes impossible to demonstrate that necessity.

The proposed amendment would give the courts the necessary tools to establish a pattern of criminal activity, either through findings of guilt or through showing that the young person has a history of extrajudicial sanctions or through a combination of both. This would allow the court to take the offender's full history into account to help determine what sentence is appropriate.

The new legislation would also require the Crown to consider adult sentences for youth convicted of the most serious violent offences. These are offences such as murder, attempted murder, manslaughter and aggravated assault. Currently, under the act, judges may impose adult sentences on youth 14 years of age and over convicted of serious violent offences when appropriate. However, the Crown does not always apply for an adult sentence in such cases and is not required to consider doing so, even in the most serious cases.

The proposed amendments will require the Crown to consider seeking an adult sentence for youth who commit serious violent offences. The Crown will be required to inform the court if it chooses not to apply for an adult sentence. Provinces and territories will still have the discretion to set the age at which this requirement would apply. For instance, no province that sets the age at 15 or 16 would be required to change.

This brings me to the fifth provision we are proposing: requiring the courts to consider publishing the name of a violent young offender when necessary for the protection of society. Currently, under the act, the publication ban is automatically lifted where an adult sentence is imposed. However, if the Crown applies, the court can consider lifting the ban in appropriate cases where a youth sentence has been imposed for an offence for which the Crown was seeking an adult sentence.

In practice, the violent offenders who are given youth sentences are normally released into the community anonymously. The implications for public safety can be significant. For example, parents may have no way of knowing that a sex offender is in the area. The amendment would require judges to consider lifting the name publication ban for youth convicted of a violent offence and given a youth sentence when the protection of society requires it.

Finally, the other amendments we are proposing will require police to keep records when extrajudicial measures are imposed to make it easier to identify patterns of reoffending. The amended act will now make it clear that no young offenders under 18 will serve their sentence in an adult institution, regardless of whether they are given an adult or youth sentence.

Our government believes that the law must uphold the rights of victims and ensure the safety of our communities. If in any way our justice system fails to do so, we must take action.

By introducing Sébastien's law, our government is taking action to strengthen the way the young offenders system deals with violent and repeat young offenders.

We are helping to ensure that these offenders will be held accountable and that the protection of society will be a primary consideration in the system as a whole.

I would like to urge fellow members of the House to support these amendments. These are all very reasonable amendments and they should have the support of all hon. members of the House.

Business of the House

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, let me begin by saying how much I appreciate your sending me the photocopy of the rules that govern our operations in the House, in particular the rules on the scope and asking of the Thursday question and my response.

Hence, I am going to hesitate this week from launching into a full-blown debate with my hon. colleague about prorogation and the fact that so many of his colleagues seem not to understand that prorogation is over and the House is back in business.

When it comes to the business leading up to next Thursday, I would note that we will continue today with the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne.

Tomorrow we will begin debate on second reading of Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act , known as Sébastien's Law.

Monday, March 22, will be day three of the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne.

Tuesday will be the last supply day for the opposition. Hopefully, we will get some meaningful motions put forward by the official opposition and they will show up for the debate.

We will continue with the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne, followed by Bill C-2, the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement.

If time permits, we could start Bill C-3, An Act to promote gender equity in Indian registration by responding to the Court of Appeal for British Columbia decision in McIvor v. Canada (Registrar of Indian and Northern Affairs).

Young Offenders

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, today the Minister of Justice tabled legislation to strengthen our young offender system. Bill C-4 would give Canadians greater confidence that violent and repeat young offenders will be held accountable. It would also ensure that the protection of society is given due consideration when young offenders are sentenced. All too often, a young offender who commits a serious crime such as murder or aggravated sexual assault receives a sentence that is much shorter than Canadians expect. Our new law would require the courts to consider adult sentences for youth who are convicted of these serious crimes.

In some cases, a youth who is convicted of a violent offence is quietly released into the community without anyone knowing about it. This means residents have no way of knowing a convicted sex offender is in the area. Bill C-4 would, in some cases, require the courts to publish the name of a violent young offender when necessary for the protection of society.

This bill is just another way in which our Conservative government is improving the safety and security of Canadians.

Sébastien's Law (Protecting the Public from Violent Young Offenders)

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)