Justice Committee on April 6th, 2017

[Rick Woodburn]

I've read studies. I've been in court when individuals who, under domestic violence, have threatened and beaten their partner repeatedly and have said they were going to be killed. We ran a full bail hearing, putting all the information that's mandated here before the court. They were released, and they broke into the house that night and killed their partner and the baby. That happens. It's something we think about all the time. It's the same information. We put it before the court.

With regard to this—

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Would other measures be needed?

[Rick Woodburn]

—I don't want to say catastrophic change, but fairly big change, and a change whose ramifications I'm not sure everybody understands, the ramifications of putting these words....

They're not just words; in law they mean something. We have cases that go to the Supreme Court of Canada on placement of a comma. Changing from our “may” to “shall”—what we have to do—is a big leap. It's rather like when you introduce a mongoose to a strange area: you never know what it's going to do, but it usually takes over. We have the same problem here. I don't think anybody around this table or anybody who testifies can really tell us what's going to happen, but I can tell you it's not going to be good.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Mr. Truax, how would the implementation of this legislation affect police process going forward with respect to providing evidence or to the way they conduct themselves in preparation for bail?

[Supt David Truax]

Bail hearing procedures allow for hearsay evidence. That allows, most commonly, a place for one police officer to provide hearsay evidence while giving testimony at that bail hearing. Some of the language in the bill obviously proves the fact that all of those pieces could obviously require the prosecutor to call each and every individual officer to prove each and every individual fact. That obviously would cause strain on policing resources, requiring more police witnesses, more documentation, certified documentation, affidavits, and the like. Obviously the police would be supporting the prosecutor for that bail hearing.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Okay.

Ms. Huntsman touched on the point about release on consent, and we weren't really sure how this bill would affect consent hearings.

Mr. Woodburn, could you provide clarification on that point?

[Rick Woodburn]

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing you. I don't know whether it's the room or some background, but could you repeat?

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Put your earphones on. That will help.

[Rick Woodburn]

I thought that was for listening to my iPad or something.

Could you repeat the question while I'm trying to untangle this?

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

The bells are ringing.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Do we see a vote? Oh, I'm sorry.

In regard to the bells and the lights requesting our presence for a vote, I think we have thirty minutes. We're here in Centre Block, and I think we're in the middle of a very important study. Can I ask for unanimous consent to continue until five minutes before the vote?

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Yes.

Is everybody good with that suggestion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

It is agreed.

Thank you, Mr. Falk. I didn't even notice. I was fascinated by the witness's testimony.

Go ahead, please.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you. I will repeat my question.

How would this bill affect release on consent?

[Rick Woodburn]

It wouldn't, because we don't present any facts on release on consent. On average, we get somewhere between 10 and 20 people in bail court every day, and then some are carried over, so we have a large number of people. We and the defence lawyers go through the files. We'll consent to the portions that seem appropriate, given all the facts; we write it out, and then one after another they're brought up before the justice, and we will release the individuals. It's almost as a matter of course to senior lawyers to make a decision and put it up there.

That's how it operates. This is not to say that the justice or judge does not have a say, but they don't even hear the circumstances. They don't hear anything—nothing about the individual at all. We've made that decision beforehand.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Thank you very much.

Mr. MacGregor.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

I want to thank every one of you for your testimony. I think your testimony today has illustrated why the committee process is so important. I think many of us at second reading of this bill really were inspired by the intent, but today's testimony has, I think, given some of us pause.

Mr. Denis, the testimony from Mr. Woodburn, who is an individual who represents 7,500 crown counsel across Canada who deal with this on a day-to day basis, has been pretty damning of the content of the bill. I want to hear your opinion. If this committee, and I don't want to prejudge the process, somehow arrives at a point at which this bill is not going to make it through, what could we do in the federal government to ensure, either through resources or policies...? Is there an alternative route that you could see to prevent something like this happening?

[Jonathan Denis]

I believe this is largely an all-or-nothing approach. When you talk about what else could be done, I can tell you that in my home province of Alberta I've seen a significant backlog of criminal and civil matters. Why? It's because the province's explosive growth rate over the last 10 to 15 years has resulted in straining our judicial system.

That could be remedied by appointing more justices. Fortunately, I have to commend this government, because this government has seen fit to fill some of these vacancies. I'm firmly of the opinion, however, that it is just a matter of time, if this bill is not passed, before you have another situation similar to the one we saw in the tragic events of January 17, 2015.

If I may, I want to correct something earlier. One of the panellists indicated that it was a police officer who had handled this particular bail hearing. Recently, Chief Justice Neil Wittmann, the chief justice of the Alberta Court of Queen's Bench, issued a lengthy and very descript decision about that having been actually not appropriate. This was a result of the bail reform that we began shortly after this unfortunate incident.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Woodburn, from the position you have held and all of the experience you bring to the testimony today, do you think, when we look at Bill S-217—and it's not a very long read—there are any ways we could amend it to make it better, or are you suggesting that we just not proceed with it altogether?

[Rick Woodburn]

Not being a legislative drafter, I can't see my way through fixing it per se. I like the idea that the language can change, but once again, if you change a comma you start running into problems.

The bail provisions as they stand work the best way they can. Changing them is not going to prevent another tragedy. Another tragedy is going to happen.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

As you said, it was human error.

I'll follow up with the same question. From your position and with the experience you have, what other things do you think we in the federal government and Parliament can do, in terms of resources and policy decisions, to make sure something like this doesn't happen?

[Rick Woodburn]

Are you giving me a blank cheque, or do I have to be—?

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Well, just give a concise....

[Rick Woodburn]

I will say—and this is something that was unanimous, really, around our table and among other people we have talked to—that CPIC is an issue for us. Having a national database for records is really what we should be working on here. We need to get a good, solid database.

Our criminals are very transient now. It used to be that they liked to stick to their hometown. They are travelling across the country, they know they're mobile, and they're committing various crimes in various areas. The problem is that CPIC is not picking that up.

In Nova Scotia, if I call up my provincial bail and look at CPIC, they have three things on it—one from Alberta, one from B.C., and....but I know there are more out there. As a crown with experience, I end up having to call each one of those jurisdictions. Even in Ontario itself, Toronto has different records from even the outside area.

If they were going to do something and wanted to make an impact upon our ability to ensure that people are remanded properly—we're not wanting to deny bail to everybody—CPIC needs to be fixed, or there has to be a national database of criminal records so that I can put my finger on one and print the whole thing up and know exactly what someone has done across the country, not just a couple of things here and there.