That will be me as well.
You mentioned some high-profile cases. Certainly those have brought to light the issue of peremptory challenges and representativeness in Canada's criminal justice system. It's important for the committee to know that the issue of peremptory challenges and the role they play in our justice system has been flagged for many years, many decades in fact, going back as far as 1991 and the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry, led by Senator Sinclair, recommending that peremptory challenges be abolished.
You asked about the rationale for doing so, and whether or not removing peremptory challenges would improve representativeness. Certainly the goal of the proposal to remove peremptory challenges is to ensure they cannot be used in a discriminatory way. Providing some form of peremptory challenges creates the possibility for their use in a discriminatory fashion. Abolishing them eliminates that possibility, and doing so is consistent with what other jurisdictions have done as well, including the United Kingdom, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.