Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm going to try one last time to seek reassurance about the part of the bill that worries me.
If I understand the law correctly, if someone steals everything I own, which could have a value of $30,000, he will not be charged according to his success or lack of success in selling what he stole from my home. The offence is serious because the person has stolen goods of a value of $30,000 from an individual.
Can you assure me that with this new bill, a judge will have the leeway needed to decide that the offender has committed a major offence, if the theft is one of $8 million?
There was a robbery. The resources of honest fishermen have been stolen. Even if no profit was made and the individuals did not have time to develop a market to liquidate all of the merchandise, will a judge have the necessary leeway to say that the intention was serious enough and the value so high that he will impose a fine of more than $500,000, which is the current ceiling, because of the gravity of the offence? We are talking about millions of dollars that could potentially be liquidated and the intention of doing so on an illegal market. Will the judge have the necessary leeway not only to impose a $500,000 fine, but also to impose a higher fine, higher by some hundreds of thousands of dollars, even if there has not been any profit in the short term, because of the seriousness of the crime? Will the judge have the necessary room to manoeuver to do that?
If you tell me that according to the current wording of the bill, the judge could impose a sentence proportional to the seriousness of the crime, regardless of the fact that the individual has or has not had time to make a profit on the market, I will stop asking the question. I will trust you.
Can you really confirm that the court will have the necessary leeway to conclude that, given the seriousness of the offence, the fine need not be limited to $500,000 even if no profit was made with the stock that is worth millions of dollars and which was caught illegally?