Madam Speaker, Bill C-22 would reduce penalties for all those crimes with firearms, except the member gave me a perfect segue. With Bill C-22, the Liberals would also soften consequences for other violent crimes, like prison breaches, criminal harassment, motor vehicle theft, theft over $5,000, breaking and entering a place other than a dwelling house, being unlawfully in a dwelling house, arson for a fraudulent purpose, causing bodily harm by criminal negligence, assault causing bodily harm or with a weapon, assaulting a peace officer causing bodily harm or with a weapon.
To summarize, under Bill C-22, someone could break out of prison, steal a car to escape, break into several businesses, steal massive amounts of goods and cash, break into a home, assault the occupants with a weapon and then attack a police officer with a weapon. Apparently, according to the Liberal government, that is all worthy of a slap on the wrist and definitely no baseline consequence set by elected representatives.
In Canada, during the first six months of last year, there were 17,602 opioid deaths. That is 24 people per day, and a 54% increase over the same period of the previous year. Opioid deaths jumped nearly 60% last year in Ontario. In Alberta, 2020 was the deadliest year on record for overdoses.
Dr. Jennifer Jackson, an associate professor at the U of C's nursing program, says, “From the data we have available, more people are dying in Alberta from opioids than they are from COVID.”
As the opioid and overdose crisis grows, Canadians will be concerned to know that Bill C-22 would reduce consequences for drug trafficking; possession for the purpose of trafficking; importing, exporting or producing hard drugs such as heroin, cocaine and crystal meth, with increasingly deadly fentanyl.
The Liberals talk about how this would help those suffering with addiction, but the reality is that the police already have the tools and discretion to take alternative approaches with addicts other than only criminal charges and there are no mandatory minimum sentences for simple possession.
The truth is that the Liberals are not helping the vulnerable or acting with compassion in this measure in Bill C-22. Instead, they are enabling and enlightening the consequences for the very criminals who prey on people struggling with addictions during an unprecedented national overdose crisis.
One of the most galling aspects of Bill C-22 would be creating situations for offenders to revictimize by allowing those who commit violent crimes against women to return home instead of facing jail time. The sentences for these heinous criminal acts could be completed in the very places they occurred, next to the very people they victimized.
Incredibly, in Bill C-22, the Liberals aim to allow house arrests for kidnapping, abduction of a person under 14, sexual assault and human trafficking. The Liberal Bill C-22 says that criminals who kidnap, rape and enslave or trade human beings for sex should be at home in their own beds in our neighbourhoods instead of behind bars. It has not even been two full months since this House designated February 22 as National Human Trafficking Day.
StatsCan says that about 4.7 million Canadian women, 30% of all women in Canada, 15 years of age and older, have been victims of sexual assault at least once and 55% of women who identify as being in an indigenous group have experienced violence since the age of 15. The justice department says that in 86% of sexual assaults, the victim knows the accused; 41% were assaulted by an acquaintance; 28% by a family member; 10% by a friend; and 20% were victimized by a stranger. It is unjust and unconscionable that the government would enable convicted abusers to be sent to the places where they are most likely to have easy access to 86% of their victims, and even living under the same roof.
Human trafficking in Canada must end. There is not a single MP who disagrees. It is also true that human trafficking victims should not be at risk of being exposed to further heinous acts by the action of the government. Human trafficking victims and witnesses are often reluctant to come forward due to feelings of shame and mistrust of authorities. Certainly, Bill C-22 would do nothing to instill confidence in the system for victims or their loved ones.
StatsCan says that 1,400 human trafficking victims were reported by Canadian police over a 10-year period. Half involved other offences related to sexual services, physical assaults, sexual assaults or other sexual offences where Bill C-22 would reduce penalties. It is a fact that 97% of human trafficking victims are women and girls, half between the ages of 18 and 24, a third of them minors below the age of 18.
Several hundred kids in Canada are victims of this unimaginable evil and 92% of the victims know their abusers. Therefore, where do children go to escape when their abusers are put right back in the same place they found them? Violent crime victims already do not necessarily get notified when their abusers re-enter neighbourhoods. Bill C-22 would make it incumbent on the victims to uproot their lives to protect their personal safety. It says to victims that through some fault of their own, the burden now rests with them. One of the hallmarks of abusers is a shifting of responsibility and blame to victims, something that Bill C-22 does repeatedly.
Twice this year on February 18 and March 19, in written statements, the public safety minister said:
We are working together to build a safer and more resilient Canada, where all people are protected from human trafficking and its harms.
His department says that there were over 107,000 victims of police reported intimate partner violence in Canada in 2019; 80% were women.
How can the minister say that he is protecting Canadians from human trafficking and days later bring in a bill that would reduce the penalties for it and many of the other crimes abusers inflict on their victims? It is heartbreaking and it is infuriating.
On International Women's Day, the Prime Minister talked about reaffirming gender equality so all women and girls could contribute to their full potential and be in a better, safe and more inclusive world. However, Kelly Franklin, the founder of Ontario-based Courage for Freedom says that predators are hiding in plain sight and that victims are younger and younger. She says that every 30 seconds another person becomes a victim of human trafficking.
The lives of women and girls are being stolen away more and more, but the Liberal plan is to go softer and easier on criminals that specifically target them.
Let us all vote against Bill C-22, because it is the right thing to do.
