I'll be brief, Mr. Chair. Actually, this part of Bill C-10 is much too discretionary and too vague. It uses the expression “may take into account”. It will be extremely difficult in cases of disputes that will be made based on that. A lot of people here will remember the Khadr case, and many other cases where Canada made specific decisions.
We hope to amend a provision that sets out that the minister may take into account factors that are mentioned, or any other factor that the minister deems relevant. The minister will be able to judge the relevance of those factors, which are relevant and which are not. It's the type of provision that leads to all kinds of disputes.
Since this is a bill that is supposed to be tough on crime, I would have thought that the minister would have to take into account all these criteria that may seem entirely reasonable. If it says “may take into account”, that means that we do not know if he will apply it in the same way for everyone. These provisions are not really clear.
So we object based on these considerations. Obviously, we always want to protect the public, but we want to do it in a way that is based on criteria that are known to everyone, and we want justice be applied in the same way to everybody.