Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to both of the ministers. You're both very articulate in explaining the provisions of these acts, and I want to thank you for that.
I had the privilege of serving on this committee in the last Parliament. I stand to be corrected, but if memory serves me, I think our committee spent something in the range of 18 meetings simply studying what was then Bill C-4 regarding young offenders. We heard from quite a number of witnesses over a great many hours of testimony. I was sometimes amazed at the things that witnesses who came in believed about this bill. For example, they seemed to think that we were taking out of the Youth Criminal Justice Act provisions regarding rehabilitation and reintegration and addressing circumstances underlying behaviour. Yet if you look at what we were doing and are still doing, I think all of those things are retained.
My question is for Minister Nicholson. Some of the criticisms were that the bill was focused more on punishing all young offenders rather than rehabilitating them. But my understanding is that Bill C-4 was responding and targeting and focusing on the 5% or so of young offenders who were violent and repeat young offenders and who really posed a threat to public safety. It was those people, that very small number of young and violent offenders, who were being targeted and focused on by Bill C-4, and the balance, the rehabilitation and so on, remained.
Minister Nicholson, does the new Bill C-10 maintain this same approach with respect to young offenders?