In our brief, I included a quote from the Supreme Court of Canada's decision in Innisfil Township v. Vespra Township about the importance of cross-examination. It's on page 9 of our brief.
It refers to the fact that “the adversarial system, founded on cross-examination and the right to meet the case being made against the litigant, civil or criminal, is the procedural substructure upon which the common law itself has been built”. The court goes on to say, “For two centuries past, the policy of the Anglo-American system of evidence has been to regard the necessity of testing by cross-examination as a vital feature of the law.” This has to remain a vital feature of our justice system.
The mechanism being proposed in Bill C-75 to deal with the testimony of police through affidavit fails to even set up a system by which you can determine whether cross-examination is necessary. It identifies factors to be considered, but it puts no time limits on notice and whether that's going to come on the day of trial, the day before trial, responding to that notice, or when applications for cross-examination are to be heard. Whose application is it? Is it the Crown's application to not have the officer testify or the defence application to have the officer testify? None of that is made clear. At the very least, if the ability, the right, of cross-examination in a criminal trial is going to take place, very clear guidelines need to be set out in the legislation for when that can be avoided so that defence lawyers know what is going on.
The last point I'll make very briefly is with respect to the reversal of the onus in these bail hearings involving spousal assaults. I think this bill neglects the impact that's going to have on families, and not only in separating people from their children and the negative impact that will have on those familial relationships. It also neglects the impact that it will have on the reporting of domestic abuse. We've seen similar circumstances in the United States, in incidents cited in the brief, where the jailing of domestic offenders has led to under-reporting because people are concerned about losing the primary source of income or the mother or father to their children as a result of jailing individuals. The impact on families cannot be understated.
Both my colleague and I welcome any questions this committee has.