This bill was last introduced in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session, which ended in September 2019.
Ralph Goodale Liberal
This bill has received Royal Assent and is now law.
This is from the published bill.
This enactment amends the Criminal Records Act to, among other things, allow persons who have been convicted under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, the Narcotic Control Act and the National Defence Act only of simple possession of cannabis offences committed before October 17, 2018 to apply for a record suspension without being subject to the period required by the Criminal Records Act for other offences or to the fee that is otherwise payable in applying for a suspension.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from the Library of Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Mélanie Joly Liberal Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC
moved that Bill C-93, An Act to provide no-cost, expedited record suspensions for simple possession of cannabis, be read the third time and passed.
Karen McCrimmon LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to start off the debate at third reading of Bill C-93. This measure will make the pardon process simpler and quicker for Canadians convicted only of simple possession of cannabis. This is the next logical step in our efforts to establish a safer and more efficient system for cannabis.
During the last election, we committed to legalizing and regulating cannabis. We did that last fall. At that time, we committed to establishing a way for people to get their records pardoned with no waiting period or application fee. Now we are on the cusp of passing legislation to do just that.
I am very appreciative of the members of Parliament who have participated in the debate on the bill in the chamber. I would especially like to thank all the members of the public safety committee for their usual thorough analysis. My thanks go out as well to the witnesses and to those who provided written briefs.
Ordinarily, to apply for a pardon, people have to serve their full sentence, wait five or up to 10 years, collect and submit police and court records, and pay a $631 application fee. People also have to convince a member of the Parole Board that they meet certain subjective criteria, namely, that they have been of good conduct, that the pardon would give them a measurable benefit and that granting them a pardon would not bring the administration of justice into disrepute.
It is an expensive and time-consuming process, but people go through it because of how valuable a pardon really is. The public safety committee has studied pardons at length, not only in the context of this bill, but as part of a broader study initiated by Motion No. 161 from the member for Saint John—Rothesay.
During that study, a witness from the Elizabeth Fry Society said that a pardon is like “being able to turn that page over” and allows people “to pursue paths that were closed to them.” A witness from the John Howard Society testified that pardons “allow the person to be restored to the community, as a contributing member without the continuing penalization of the past wrong.”
Getting a pardon means that when a person undergoes a criminal records check, it comes up empty. That makes it easier to get a job, get an education, rent an apartment, travel, volunteer in a community and simply live life without the burden and the stigma of a criminal record.
Clearly, now that possession of cannabis is legal, people who have been convicted of nothing but that should be able to shed their criminal records. Given the reality that the prohibition of cannabis had disproportionate impacts on marginalized communities, it is important for the process to be as simple, straightforward and accessible as possible.
That is why, with Bill C-93, we are taking the unprecedented step of completely eliminating the $631 application fee and completely eliminating the waiting period. We are also completely eliminating the possibility that the Parole Board could deny such an application on the basis of subjective criteria like good conduct.
Also, thanks to an amendment at committee from the member for Toronto—Danforth, people will be able to apply even if they have outstanding fines associated with their cannabis possession conviction.
Due to an amendment we voted on at report stage yesterday, people whose only sentence was a fine will not be required to submit court documents as part of their application. That is because the main purpose of court documents for those applicants would be to show that the fine was paid, and that just will not matter anymore. Taken together, these measures remove many of the expenses and obstacles that could otherwise prevent people from getting pardons and moving on with their lives.
I was glad to see that the bill received overwhelming support from hon. members in the House yesterday. We have a process that will be created by Bill C-93 that is simple and straightforward without unnecessary obstacles placed in the path of applicants.
One of the issues that has come up over the course of the study of Bill C-93 is the question of why it proposes an application-based system. Some have asked why not just do it like some California municipalities and erase all the records with the press of a button? We do have an electronic police database of criminal records here in Canada, however, that database does not contain enough information to allow for a proactive amnesty.
For one thing, it generally does not contain information related to summary conviction offences, which is how cannabis possession is most often charged. And for another, it generally does not say whether a person possessed cannabis or an entirely different substance.
Information is entered into the database by individual police officers right across the country. Most of the time for a drug possession charge, the officer just enters “possession of a controlled substance”. It could be cannabis but it also could be cocaine.
To get the details and to find out about summary convictions as well as indictable offences, police and court documents have to be checked. Unlike in California, those documents are kept by many different jurisdictions. They are housed in provincial and municipal repositories across the country, each with its own individual record-keeping system.
Many Canadian jurisdictions have not digitized their records. They exist in boxes and filing cabinets in the basements of local courthouses and police stations. Without applications that enable the Parole Board to zero in on the relevant documents, it would take a huge amount of staff and many years to go through it all. Quite simply, a flick of a switch option that we have seen in California would be wonderful and we would like nothing better than to do just that. In Canada however, that is simply not physically possible in any reasonable time frame. Nevertheless, we are certainly aware of the importance of making the application system under Bill C-93 as simple and accessible as we possibly can.
The public safety committee has made recommendations to continue seeking ways of further reducing the cost to applicants. We have responded with a report stage amendment removing the need for court records for some applicants, and we will keep working to this end.
The committee also encouraged the Parole Board to explore options for moving towards a more digitized system capable of receiving applications electronically, something particularly important for Canadians in rural areas.
For the reasons I mentioned earlier, enabling a truly electronic system would involve technological enhancements not only at the Parole Board but in provinces, territories and municipalities as well. That is a considerable undertaking, but I think we all know that one day it must be done. Our grandchildren should not be breathing the dust off the paper records that we use today. Therefore, I agree with the committee's recommendation to make that advancement happen sooner rather than later.
In the meantime, the Parole Board is taking a number of steps to simplify the application process in other ways. It is simplifying its website and application form. It is creating a dedicated, toll-free phone number and an email address to help people with their applications. It is developing a community outreach strategy with a particular focus on the communities most affected by the criminalization of cannabis to make sure that people know about this new expedited process and how to access it, because accessibility is the most important element of this. The goal is for as many Canadians as possible to take advantage of this opportunity to clear their criminal records and to move on with their lives. It is to their benefit and to the benefit of all of us that they be able to do so.
I would like to conclude by reminding the House just how far the cannabis file has come during this Parliament, from the blue ribbon panel chaired by Anne McLellan, to the massive cross-country consultations in communities from coast to coast to coast, to the passage of Bill C-45 and Bill C-46, both of which received extensive study in both chambers of Parliament, and the coming into force of Bill C-45 this past October.
We legalized and regulated cannabis, as promised, with the goal of keeping it out of the hands of children and keeping profits out of the hands of criminals, and early signs are encouraging. In the first three months of 2019, according to Statistics Canada, the criminal share of the overall cannabis market dropped to just 38%, which is down from 51% over the same period a year before. Reporting on those numbers recently in L'actualité magazine, journalist Alec Castonguay said, “Organized crime no longer has a stranglehold on the cannabis market. It is in decline”.
The prohibition of cannabis was counterproductive. It was a public policy failure. The new regime we put in place last October is already showing encouraging signs, and Bill C-93 is the logical next step. I encourage all hon. members to join with the government to pass this bill so that the Senate can begin its consideration, and so that Canadians can begin benefiting from this new simplified, expedited pardon process as soon as possible.
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Mr. Speaker, Bill C-93 recommends a no-cost pardon and waiver for cannabis convictions, but there are still going to be potentially those who have fines still owing. I want to know if the government has consulted with the provinces where those fines would be owed and roughly what that cost would be.
Karen McCrimmon Liberal Kanata—Carleton, ON
Mr. Speaker, that is indeed one of the challenges, because we wanted to eliminate administrative fines related to these same convictions. However, not all of the fines are owed to the federal government. All the federal government can do is wipe its fines, but it has to discuss this with provinces and municipalities and encourage them to do the same. That kind of discussion is ongoing, but it will take a while to come to an understanding of how provinces and municipalities can actually contribute to this process.
Jenny Kwan NDP Vancouver East, BC
Mr. Speaker, in my riding of Vancouver East, I have been receiving correspondence from my constituents who raise this issue. They are particularly concerned that Bill C-93 does not go far enough and that what is needed is for the criminal records to be expunged. They have said very clearly that record suspensions do not erase a convicted offence but merely set it aside. Therefore, without an expungement, individuals convicted of possession remain vulnerable to having their convictions reinstated. My constituents are saying we should be permanently eliminating rather than merely suspending the harms that stem from a previous cannabis conviction. To that end, I know the NDP tried to move such amendments at committee, which the government rejected.
I think there is one more chance to do the right thing here. Will the parliamentary secretary consider what I think thousands of Canadians are calling for, which is for the government to do it right and move forward with expungement?
Karen McCrimmon Liberal Kanata—Carleton, ON
Mr. Speaker, this really was a very key part of the debate. We came up against a couple of challenges that would make that avenue particularly difficult, one of them being the technological challenges, in that all of our records are not held at the federal level in a federal database. Many of them are held at provincial and municipal levels and are not digitized. Therefore, we have no way of knowing where all those convictions are.
For us to go and do that, we would have to go and search for each and every one of those records. Some of those people might have already passed on. Some of these records are so old they could be from 50 years ago and that would take a lot of time and staff effort. We thought that if we made it inexpensive, easily available and we worked with the non-government organizations on the ground that work with these communities that were particularly hit with these kinds of convictions we could do as good a job by using an application method.
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of concerns about the pardons and the way they are structured in the bill. One thing I tried to do at committee, which was based on advice from a number of witnesses, is this. There is a condition that a pardon cannot proceed until the sentence has been fulfilled or the fine has been paid. The people who are the most marginalized would be those very people who cannot afford to pay the fine so the pardon becomes out of reach. I do not know if we can pursue this at this stage. I tried to at committee.
However, I would like the hon. parliamentary secretary's thoughts on whether we can deal with this so that the people who are in the greatest need of having the pardon applied are able to get a job to pay the fine to have this limitation removed.
Karen McCrimmon Liberal Kanata—Carleton, ON
Mr. Speaker, again the challenge comes down to whether those fines are owed to the federal government or not. If they are owed to the federal government, then it is easy for us to say those fines do not need to be paid. If they are fines owed to another level of government or another jurisdiction, then it is not as easy for us to forgive those fines. However, if the fines are only owed to the federal government, those fines will be forgiven and that person can proceed with the pardon.
However, when a criminal records check is done on people who have been pardoned, those fines at the provincial or municipal levels may not even appear. Therefore, the federal government is forgiving those federal fines that need to be paid, but there is a challenge at the provincial and municipal levels.
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate our hon. colleague's candour and honesty in answering questions.
One of the questions I have goes back to the fines that are owed, specifically in terms of municipalities. The number one cost to municipalities is policing. With the passing of Bill C-45, there have been additional costs that have been downloaded to the municipalities. They are still trying to work out how they recover those added costs between the provincial governments. There is still a lot of what-ifs up in the air. One of the ways municipalities would be able to actually mitigate some of the costs would be the fines that would be owed to them through these convictions.
If they are left owing, there is still another what-if. Is the federal government prepared to step in and assist these municipalities in terms of the offloading, paying or assisting with the payment of those fines?
Karen McCrimmon Liberal Kanata—Carleton, ON
Mr. Speaker, I believe how it would work, at a provincial or municipal level, is that payment of those fines, if they are not granted amnesty on those fines, would be through civil recourse.
I know that the federal government wants to help the provinces and the municipalities succeed in this, because we do want this pardon process to be a success. We believe it is really important for our society as a whole, not just for the individuals who are carrying this burden. There have been discussions and I imagine there will be more in the future.
Larry Bagnell Liberal Yukon, YT
Mr. Speaker, for people watching, I just want to make a point about pardons and expungement in Canada.
If a person has a record in the United States, it does not really matter what Canada does, expunge or pardon, they still have a record. The Americans do not often erase that. Expungement, in some cases, could actually hurt a Canadian. When Americans call Canada to say that this person had a record and ask whether it is still a problem, and Canada says that we cannot find any records of it, because it was expunged, the Americans may say that person has committed a crime and there is no evidence that it is not a problem.
If the crime is pardoned, Canada can then say that it was pardoned and it is not a problem for us anymore. That may help the person who has had a problem with the United States records, which they can keep forever. They might be better off.
Karen McCrimmon Liberal Kanata—Carleton, ON
Mr. Speaker, I would have to agree with my hon. colleague.
When people are entering another country, they might not be asked if they have a criminal conviction. They could be asked if they had ever been in possession of cannabis. That would actually make that difficult as well. If people have a pardon, they actually would have paperwork to prove that they have been pardoned. There is no guarantee that this would make a difference to the border officer, but they would have that paperwork.
Pierre Paul-Hus Conservative Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-93, an act to provide no-cost, expedited record suspensions for simple possession of cannabis.
Before talking about Bill C-93, I have to say a few words about Bill C-45, because Bill C-93 builds on it. One of the Prime Minister's rare accomplishments from the past four years is a completely botched bill. From the start, Bill C-45, the Cannabis Act, was not well received, especially because of the way the bill was originally put together. Bill C-45 was poorly received because marijuana legalization was by far the most pressing national issue for the Prime Minister. Instead of addressing organized crime, violence against women, or the economy, the government chose to focus on Bill C-45 to legalize marijuana. It was very urgent.
In her speech, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness mentioned information obtained from journalist Alec Castonguay of L'actualité. According to Mr. Castonguay, organized crime has experienced a drop in sales. I wonder if my colleague could provide more information that could be verified with police forces like the RCMP and the Canadian Police Association, which are on the ground and must receive much more technical information that is also available to the government. Unfortunately, we cannot consult that information. Mr. Castonguay is an excellent journalist, but I think the government could provide us with more specific information.
What mattered most to the Prime Minister was giving Canadians from coast to coast to coast access to cannabis. The House may recall that that was his first campaign promise. Now that Bill C-45 has become law, the Prime Minister is realizing that he forgot a step. That is why, at the end of this session of Parliament, we now have to study Bill C-93.
In 2015, the Prime Minister promised an open and transparent government. He promised to save Canada from the bad Stephen Harper. He made many, many promises. Many Canadians put their trust in him and voted for him. Some of them believed so strongly in his message of hope that they decided to run in the last election “because it is 2015”. Today, in 2019, after becoming disillusioned and witnessing the Prime Minister's many mistakes, many Canadians and even some Liberal members have basically thrown in the towel.
Canadians are tired of seeing the Prime Minister dance around when it comes time to work. They are frustrated with seeing the Prime Minister talk when he should be taking action. They are worried that the Prime Minister is welcoming terrorists, contract killers and other criminals without lifting a finger to help victims of human trafficking and our veterans who gave everything for Canada. They are sick of seeing the Liberals go after law-abiding citizens and ignoring organized crime and ISIS traitors. They are sick of it.
They saw the Prime Minister go after women in his cabinet because they resisted. What was their crime? They simply wanted to obey the law.
Canadians and the Liberal MPs who have decided not to come back are sick of seeing the Prime Minister refuse to take responsibility for his blunders, and this October, Canadians will take action. A number of Liberal members have already taken action, in fact. Several have quit the caucus, and others have already announced that they are leaving politics. The Toronto Star is already touting a potential replacement for the position of leader of the Liberal Party. They are sick of all this too, but that is another story.
Bill C-93 would change the pardon process and eliminate fees for Canadians previously convicted of marijuana possession. With cannabis legal as of October 2018, this bill would help Canadians who were convicted of something that is now legal by allowing them to apply for a record suspension without being subject to the usual waiting period or fees. Offenders usually have to wait five to 10 years after serving their sentence, depending on the type of conviction, and the application fee is $631.
This legislative measure seems to be another proposal that was hastily brought forward for political purposes. It is obvious that the Liberals did not take the time to do a thorough analysis. As it stands, this bill proposes a new type of record suspension that cannot be easily revoked and that can be granted automatically without any knowledge of an individual's past history. As with Bill C-45, we are committed to fixing this bill in October, when we form the next government. We want to ensure that we maintain the integrity of our record suspension system.
We support the idea of an expedited pardon process, but we want to ensure that it is a fair process. That is why we proposed amendments. We very quickly realized that the bill could be improved. However, the Liberals have a majority in committee and in the House, so they no longer feel the need to listen to Canadians. For example, we proposed that applications for a record suspension be submitted through an online portal. My colleague spoke about this earlier, and I would like to thank her, because this is new to me. The Liberals have finally listened to the Conservative MPs, but the fact remains that the amendment was rejected. Not only would this measure have saved taxpayers money, but it would also have made it easier for Canadians to apply.
We proposed a measure to allow applicants whose records were destroyed to swear an affidavit explaining their situation and certifying that they are eligible. This would have made the process even more fair. The Liberals agreed to this amendment in committee but changed their minds at report stage and decided to reject it. Once again, I remain doubtful.
Why would they refuse a measure proposed by the Conservatives that would help the public? We do not agree much on the process overall, but we tried to improve it. Our Liberal colleagues agreed with this change in committee. Why, then, did the government reject the idea at report stage? We still do not understand why this amendment was rejected.
We also proposed to restore the Parole Board's discretion to conduct inquiries to determine the applicant's conduct since the date of the conviction. Obviously, someone who has committed other crimes since the original conviction should not be eligible for a pardon like someone else who did not commit another crime. The Liberals also rejected this proposal.
Another one of our amendments would have restored the Parole Board's discretion to conduct an inquiry into all of the factors it could consider to determine whether granting a record suspension would bring the administration of justice into disrepute. The Liberals obviously defeated this amendment.
Our proposals were therefore serious and balanced, but the Liberals, with their majority on the committee and in the House, did what they wanted. They agreed to only one of our amendments, the one requiring the board to include a review of the law's success rate and the associated costs in its annual report. Of course that was only to appease us. I thank them, but it is still a little insulting to have those amendments rejected, considering how we worked in committee.
Ideological fights often erupt in the House. The NDP thinks one way, the Liberals think a certain way, the Conservatives think a certain way and the Green Party thinks a certain way. However, during the committee study, we managed to set ideology aside and come up with technical amendments that had nothing to do with ideology. If we try to co-operate and that does not work, the members opposite should not be surprised when there is some friction on certain issues.
There are many examples to show that the Liberals do not take crime seriously. The amendments we proposed would have improved the bill's procedural fairness and given the Parole Board of Canada better tools to enforce this new law more effectively.
As currently worded, this bill allows for a pardon before the fines are even paid. That seems to be very bad accounting to me. In other words, the fines will remain on the individuals' records, but the provinces will have no way of collecting them. We see that Bill C-93 is poorly crafted, just like Bill C-45. These are aspects of a bill that was rushed in order to fulfill a promise at the last minute. In her speech, the parliamentary secretary said that all this would be fixed later. In trying to rush things, the government is taking shortcuts.
In October, when a new Conservative government is elected, we will have to redo all this work to ensure that all the actors involved, the agencies, organizations, and the provinces, have the answers to their questions. There are many, many questions that remain unanswered.
With respect to the record suspension process, the Department of Public Safety estimates that this measure will cost roughly $2.5 million. Jean Chrétien said that the gun registry would cost $2 million and it ended up costing $2 billion. We know that likely will not happen, but we know what those evaluations are worth.
Moreover, while approximately 250,000 people have previously been charged with simple possession of marijuana in Canada, officials estimate that only 10,000 people will apply, possibly less. That is puzzling. To come up with the figure of $2.5 million, it was estimated that this would cost the government $250 per person. That is less than the current amount of $631 per application because there will be no need to do a background check, as is normally the case.
That being said, the 10,000-people estimate does not seem very high to me. At first, the information we had indicated that 500,000 people had been charged with simple possession of marijuana. In the end, officials told us that it was in fact only 250,000. It is also surprising that they expect only 10,000 people to apply. Based on various assessment criteria, the government does not expect more people than that to apply for a pardon.
The other option, expungement, would involve minimal cost, but it would not apply to individuals charged with more serious offences who negotiated lesser charges or who were in possession of a quantity above the current legal limit. That could be problematic. Judges, Crown prosecutors and the police negotiate deals with individuals who are guilty of other crimes to speed up the process, but if we do not take people's criminal records into account in the pardon process, they could be let off the hook for a different crime.
In that regard, Tom Stamatakis, president of the Canadian Police Association, said the following:
In those circumstances, it is possible that both the Crown and the court may have accepted the plea agreement based on the assumption that the conviction would be a permanent record of the offence and would not have accepted the lesser charge if they knew this would be cleared without any possibility of review at a future date.
That is why, after hearing the testimony of the Canadian Police Association, we proposed an amendment to the bill to delete clause 6.
In his haste to deliver on his self-imposed legislative agenda, the Prime Minister failed to consider the many concerns of municipalities, law enforcement, employers, scientists and doctors regarding the legalization of cannabis. Similarly, the Liberals adopted this bill related to cannabis legalization in the last few weeks of this Parliament without consulting the main stakeholders, including law enforcement.
Now that cannabis is legal, Conservatives understand that criminal records for simple possession of cannabis should not place an unfair burden on Canadians, but we will be monitoring the implementation of this bill, and we promise to assess how well it is working and how fair it is when we take office in October.
As with Bill C-45, the Conservatives will also amend Bill C-93 in order to ensure that it effectively provides appropriate access to no-fee record suspension. We believe that Canadians should have timely access to no-fee record suspension and we will ensure that the law upholds the integrity of the Parole Board of Canada so that Canadians can have their records suspended.
Come October, when we form the government, we will have a lot of cleaning up to do. Our priority will be the real needs of Canadians, including their safety and their prosperity. Everything we do will be for Canadians. When we go to India, it will not be to dance and wear costumes. When we go to Washington, it will be to work and to clean up the mess made of the new free trade agreement. When we invest taxpayers' money, I guarantee it will not be to reward murderers, terrorists or dictatorships that are detaining our citizens on bogus charges. We will also clean up the mess at our borders. We will prioritize new Canadians who obey Canadian laws, and we will crack down on those who cheat and jump the queue. As a government, we will show compassion to those in need, as well as taxpayers. We will take action to improve the environment, but not by dipping into taxpayers' pockets.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Mr. Speaker, I had the opportunity to listen to a great deal of the debate that has been taking place on this issue and the whole legalization issue about cannabis. It is a major change in public policy with the way in which it has evolved to where we are today.
It is quite interesting that back in 2015 it was only the Liberal Party talking about the legalization of cannabis. The NDP wanted to decriminalize it and I think the Conservatives were somewhat for decriminalization, but not really advertising it. In fact, they were sending out a lot of misinformation about the legalization of cannabis. Now we are talking about that issue having been resolved as it is legalized.
My understanding is that the Conservative Party now supports legalization of cannabis. If that is not the case, maybe the member can provide a little bit more information on that aspect from his party. Second, if he could clearly indicate where he stands as an individual on the idea of the pardon, given the comments he just made.
Pierre Paul-Hus Conservative Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Mr. Speaker, that was a long question, but my answer will be brief.
Regarding the legalization of marijuana, we had a debate and we voted against the bill. We had our reasons for doing so. One of the main reasons was that the bill was botched. It had nothing to do with any philosophical idea about whether cannabis should be legalized or not. The government's approach was sloppy. I would still argue that today. Certain aspects are still causing problems in our society. Police are having problems, and medical professionals are having lots of problems. That is another debate. Today we are debating pardons.
Do I support granting pardons to people who have done something that used to be a criminal offence? That is what we are debating. Some people are claiming today that we should erase the past, since those acts are no longer considered a criminal offence. Some people agree with that, while others, including myself, have certain reservations in that regard. People cannot be criminals one day but not the next. The fact remains that even in the case of simple possession of marijuana, some young people have tried marijuana and gotten caught. People can separate these things. They are not dumb. We are not talking about another crime on an entirely different level.
Our position is as follows. We were willing to decriminalize marijuana, but we felt that legalizing marijuana was more about creating an industry that would primarily benefit the Liberals' friends. All the government's goals, such as keeping profits out of the hands of criminals, are nowhere near being met. Nothing about the health of young people has been improved in any way.