Justice Committee on May 6th, 2022

[Brian Sauvé]

I think we have to delineate the two.

On the one hand, we're talking about police officers who are trained and highly regulated within their use of force continuum, and we're talking about specifics—and they are rare—where a police officer may get convicted or charged for a use of force incident using deadly force such as a firearm.

That is where that particular lobby perspective is: to allow the judiciary to use discretion, because we trust them to use that authority on a very, very rare basis, and it is extremely rare that it is used in Canada.

When you start talking about broader perspectives, it is a bigger discussion and, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, we really are opening up a can of worms that touches on many of the social safety networks that our communities across Canada—both large and small—rely upon.

Whether it's overrepresentation within the justice system or whether it's treatment programs, there needs to be a consistent approach in every community across Canada if we're going to look at the elimination of mandatory minimum penalties.

[Lena Metlege Diab, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

I hear you on resources, and I hear you on the need for effective social programs. I think we hear that and we agree with that. Thank you.

Does that green folder mean my time is up, Mr. Chair?

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Randeep Sarai]

No. You have 30 seconds.

[Lena Metlege Diab, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Okay.

For my final question, can you talk about diversion in appropriate circumstances? Do you think that's good for the individual, their family members and their community?

[Brian Sauvé]

In my experience, when we're not talking about violence and we're not talking about firearms, diversionary programs and treatment programs are extremely effective, and they are supportive of the rehabilitative nature of Canada's justice system.

[Lena Metlege Diab, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Randeep Sarai]

Thank you, Ms. Diab.

Now we have Monsieur Fortin for six minutes.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being here today. We thank them very much. This is an important bill, and all viewpoints are important to us.

I want to let the witnesses know that they can listen to my comments through the interpretation. I'll be speaking in French, so I hope my questions will be understood.

Mr. Davis, I'm interested in your views, and you said something at the end of your comments that caught my attention. According to you, the way Bill C‑5 is drafted right now could give victims of crime the impression that they are being left out in the cold to some extent. That struck me.

In general, I have confidence in our legal system. I think judges have sound judgment—if not all the time, in 99.9% of cases—and they hand down the appropriate sentences. What's more, when necessary, decisions can be appealed. I have quite a bit of confidence in the legal system, but the perception that society has of the legal system worries me. I think it's important for people to feel that they are heard and that they be aware that lawmakers are concerned about their point of view. That's our job.

I would like to know whether I've understood your remarks correctly and whether I'm interpreting them correctly. For example, judges could be given some flexibility. Mandatory minimum sentences could be maintained for crimes committed with a firearm, and judges could be given the possibility of waving the maximum minimum sentence in exceptional circumstances.

In your opinion, could that meet the requirements regarding the public perception, or do we really need to take a hard line and maintain mandatory minimum sentences?

[Chief Robert A. Davis]

Could you repeat just the tail end of your question, please? There was a gap in the translation.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Bill C‑5 could be passed with a few amendments, and judges could be allowed to waive mandatory minimum sentences in exceptional cases. Minimum mandatory sentences would be maintained for crimes involving a firearm, but judges would be allowed to waive mandatory minimum sentences in exceptional circumstances.

In your opinion, and based on what you've seen in your work, could that meet the public's need for justice?

[Chief Robert A. Davis]

If the situations were exceptional, and if what makes them exceptional were conveyed clearly to the Canadian public and the victims of crime, I believe that's reasonable.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Davis.

I would like to ask the same question of Ms. Huggins or Mr. Rowe. I don't know which one would be best able to answer my question.

Based on what you have seen on the ground, would a provision like that provide the flexibility needed for judges to hand down a sound judgment, while maintaining the public's confidence in our legal system and our laws?

[S/Sgt Michael Rowe]

Thank you.

As I suggested, the use of a legislative clause or safety valve, as it's known, to allow judges in exceptional circumstances to examine the offender and offence in question would allow the establishing of a fit and proper sentence for serious crimes—specifically, those with firearms. It would let the public know that the government has set a fit and proper sentence but also allowed exceptional circumstances to be considered. This would provide judges with the legislative discretion to examine the individual offender in those exceptional circumstances.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you.

I'll continue along the same lines.

At this time, there's a lot of talk about firearms trafficking through indigenous reserves, and attempts are being made to reassure the public. At one point, we proposed a joint squad made up of officers from the RCMP and provincial police from Ontario and Quebec, peacekeepers and U.S. police officers to try to truly address the issue of firearms trafficking.

Mr. Davis, in your opinion, could that reassure the public and reduce the negative impact or the negative perception of Bill C‑5?

[Chief Robert A. Davis]

I think it would definitely help. One of the struggles I've experienced in my time in indigenous policing, as well as in municipal policing, is task forces typically being administered and run by the RCMP because of their multi-jurisdictional, cross-border or interprovincial nature. It goes in ebbs and flows—this lack of funding to allow municipal police services to second members.

Through my previous experience and my current work—I work very closely, daily, with the Six Nations Police Service—I feel indigenous policing is still treated as a program in this country. There needs to be a commitment from the government to make indigenous policing more than a program, so those services know they have the resources to take part in such task forces.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Davis.

Since I have 30 seconds left, I'll close—

[The Chair, Liberal, Randeep Sarai]

Unfortunately, your time is up.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Do I not have 30 seconds left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Randeep Sarai]

It's been six minutes, yes. You have maybe 10 seconds, to be exact.

I'll go now to Mr. Garrison for six minutes.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank Chief Davis and the National Police Federation for bringing the resource question to the table. It's simply not enough to pass law. We have to make sure programs are properly resourced.

I want to start with a question for Mr. Rowe from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. It's about the idea of a safety valve for mandatory minimums—something I personally favour. It's difficult for me to see how that could be added into Bill C-5.

Have you had any discussions, either among yourselves or with the government, about how we might get such a safety valve into Bill C-5? It would deal with overall judicial discretion, and the bill's a bit narrower than that.

[S/Sgt Michael Rowe]

Thank you, sir.

I did note that the United Kingdom has had mandatory minimum penalties for firearm offences for quite a while. Their mandatory minimum penalties are, in fact, more severe and strict than what Canada is proposing, but they have been successfully upheld in courts. They have been successful in using this idea of a safety valve or legislative clause. I believe there is precedent for it to be applied and to function well in the courts.

As I mentioned in my statement, the other benefit is that it would allow the individual offenders and offences to be examined, rather than having to rely on the reasonable hypothetical or imagined offender, in order to challenge compliance with current mandatory minimum penalties against the charter.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thanks for that.

It is, of course, very persuasive for me, but—again—we have a narrower bill in front of us, so it's difficult to imagine how we'd get there from here.

I want to turn to Mr. Sauvé and talk about that gap he noted in the existence of diversion programs in rural, remote and indigenous communities.

Mr. Sauvé, how will we fill that gap? Who now funds most of those programs? Having noted the lack of programming, do you have any suggestions about how the government could make sure that gap gets filled?

[Brian Sauvé]

This is a big discussion. When I mentioned in my opening remarks the whole of government, we're not talking about just federal, obviously, because your health care systems are run provincially. All of those challenges are with respect to federal and provincial funding, not to mention access municipally.

Just yesterday I was talking to some legislators up in one of the territories. There we were talking about the challenges for health care simply just in rural and remote communities, without even broaching the subject of treatment and diversionary programs. For us, what our members are seeing—and the majority of our members in uniform out in Canada are in smaller communities outside of the Burnabys or the Surreys and the Edmonton areas—is exactly that. The government representatives on the ground might be Canada Post and the RCMP. If you're lucky, you have both.

Our members actually end up working with the community. We had a story from one of our members who was a chef before they joined the RCMP, and they started cooking classes for underprivileged youth. They brought in food and showed them how to sustain themselves. That kind of example is there. It's just off the cuff, off the side of a desk. It has an impact for the community ahead of time.

How do we get there, so that everyone in Canada has access to the same types of programs? That's a really big discussion. I'd love to be a part of it, but I think it involves more than just this table.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Just following along on that, in the experience of your members, is there a differential impact in the sense of incarceration when it comes to those in rural, remote and indigenous communities versus those in urban communities?

[Brian Sauvé]

Yes. That's why in the opening remarks we mentioned how in different smaller communities there is sometimes a lack of access to precharged diversionary programs or treatment and diversionary programs. Just in terms of mental health act apprehensions, sometimes for our members that means an apprehension and a flight to the closest health care centre that has a psychiatric nurse. We could be talking about hours of police resources just to bring someone to the care they need.

Now you have to think about other precharged or charged diversionary programs and funding in those rural and remote communities. Eventually, you get to a point—and I think that's where we are now—where the systemic problem is that we're ending up with overrepresentation of those underfunded or neglected communities in Canada in the justice system.

We need to do better at the front end versus at the back end.