Thank you.
My question is for Mrs. Treacy.
I am very interested in the proposed amendments to the Criminal Code. Provisions respecting drug screening, or more specifically impairment-causing narcotics, are set out in greater detail. In your brief, you described a test which is assessed by drug recognition experts. They are trying to determine whether it is possible to administer this as a roadside test, meaning in a police station. I would ask you to give us more details about this. With regard to the drug recognition experts program, known as DRE, we are well aware that the RCMP and some American states have done studies. In fact, 45 of them have used this program.
According to the experts, this program is 98% accurate. You have read what we have proposed putting in the Criminal Code with regard to this program. In your opinion, is this a good enough tool to incarcerate individuals who use narcotics? I must clarify that this is our goal. In Quebec, when I sit in a restaurant with my friends and I smoke a cigarette, I can be charged with an offence and fined $50. And yet we would allow people who use drugs to get behind the wheel and kill one of my children? Not on your life! That is why I'm asking you, Mrs. Treacy, if you are able to tell me whether this test works well.