Okay. I want to re-focus on two sections of the bill.
One question I want to direct to the lawyers from the Criminal Lawyers' Association. I've raised the idea before. Proposed section 172.2 creates this new offence of facilitating an arrangement. It's like an attempted offence. It's new, and it will probably work in some cases, but it's unclear how well it will work.
I'm concerned about the possibility for entrapment or for a setup of some person, for example Bob from Moose Jaw, who happens to be visiting Vancouver. The section creates this pseudo-attempt to make an arrangement with somebody. It removes the defence of mens rea in terms of the knowledge of the age of the person, and then it imposes a presumption that the person was under 18, if there was any representation that the person was under 18. It imposes a presumption. Then it removes another defence that says that even if the person about whom the arrangement was being made didn't exist, it doesn't matter and the person is still guilty.
That is the setup, entrapment of Bob from Moose Jaw problem. I don't like the look of that at all. I'm nervous about it, and yet I realize there are these people out there who do go around trying to make arrangements with kids for a criminal purpose. I would ask that.
Perhaps this could be directed to any of the other witnesses. Second is the new mandatory minimums imposed on the sexual offence of indecent acts; that is, section 173 as rewritten. This is not an Internet offence. It's subsection (2):
Every person who, in any place, for a sexual purpose, exposes his or her genital organs to a person who is under the age of 16 years....
That's an exposure. That's exposing the sexual organs by a male or a female.
If that happens in some little village in the Northwest Territories, even though it seems like a relatively minor offence, there is a mandatory minimum imposed. Whoever the person was, as misguided as they were, as difficult as the circumstances may be, inside or outside of a family, that person is going to be taken away. The person may have to be flown out 500 miles or put on a dogsled. I don't know what happens. I'm just trying to figure how that mandatory minimum helps or doesn't. I don't see it as a fit in the far north. In the city, there is a local jail. In the rural areas, there isn't. That's simply a difference.
I would ask the first question to the lawyers and the second question to the panel.