First of all, I will say I am not a criminal lawyer; I am a maritime lawyer, so I don't deal with criminal courts.
The Sault Ste. Marie case you speak of is certainly a very well-known case that I remember from my law school days. But we're talking about something different here from that dealt with in Sault Ste. Marie. We're talking about pieces of legislation that have extremely large monetary penalties and that carry terms of imprisonment. This is a different creature from the standard quasi-criminal, strict liability sort of offence. Given the size of the penalties and because of the size of the penalties, the moral opprobrium that affixes itself to these kinds of offences really makes it much more in the character of a criminal offence than a quasi-criminal regulatory offence.
I think it's important to recognize too that internationally there is a very great deal of concern over the imposition of what are perceived to be unfair and unjust criminal sanctions against seafarers in respect to marine pollution incidents. Many of us are familiar with the Prestige incident, where the master was detained for...I think it was two years, and the Hebei Spirit in Korea, where the master and chief engineer are still being detained.
There's a real concern about this movement towards excessive penalties and imprisonment and imposing them automatically without really going through due process. It is almost as if we've forgotten the Magna Carta and all our history about due process and why it's important.