The role of legislators is always to pass laws while taking into account the most convincing and conclusive facts possible. While Bill C-10 was being studied, we asked the Justice Department on numerous occasions to tell us what the impact of minimum mandatory penalties would be.
Obviously, everyone pointed to the contradiction between the desire to fight crime involving the use of firearms and the elimination of a mechanism to publicly control firearms, namely the gun registry. This stands as a major public policy contradiction, but that's not the focus of our attention today.
We have before us Bill C-10. Can the Justice Department and its research and policy division produce some studies that might convince us that minimum mandatory penalties really do have a deterrent effect?
May I remind you that draft legislation introduced by Minister Allan Rock to establish the gun registry provided for a certain number of minimum mandatory penalties. Why are we revisiting this subject today? The department does not have a single serious study in hand to convince parliamentarians that this is a step in the right direction.
Mr. Chairman, the committee has heard testimony from a number of criminologists. The clerk has forwarded some studies to us. Based on all of the information that we have received, aside for law enforcement officials, few people said that minimum mandatory penalties had a deterrent effect. Yet, this goes to the heart of the bill that we are being asked to vote on.
I am very concerned about crime. In my opinion, the best way of fighting crime is to give police officers the proper investigative tools. The Bloc Québécois is planning to introduce a motion calling for police officers who deal with street gangs and organized crime to be given additional resources to do their job.
Give us some additional conclusive evidence that minimum mandatory penalties do help you to reach your objectives. We would then be better able to assess the situation. However, based on the testimony given here, we cannot make this finding. I don't believe that you have any serious studies to share with us. If you did, I'm sure you would have shared them with us by now.
So then, Mr. Parliamentary Secretary, do you have any probative, conclusive studies that could guide us in our work?