Mr. Chairman, I've listened to the arguments put forth as to why the Judge Advocate General's analysis has moved to a larger sphere of offences, but I still have the problem here where he or the office has done an analysis based on what I think he called the “objective seriousness”, in the sense of the maximum sentence provided for a particular offence. We see the same thing in the regular criminal law, where someone who's charged with breaking and entering into a dwelling house is liable to life imprisonment. If it's a first offence, usually they get a suspended sentence or something of that nature.
So that still causes me a lot of problems, because you have somebody who is charged with an offence that might attract these serious penalties in certain circumstances, but in fact the circumstances may be so minor as to be something that would offend the sense we raised here at committee in terms of concerns about what having a criminal record would do. On disobeying an officer, if someone tells you to shine your shoes, and you don't shine your shoes and you get fined $100, that's a criminal record offence, whereas some of these other ones that we now have on the list, while they're not the most serious offences, are serious offences and are certainly worse than the kinds of things that could attract a criminal record.
There really is a sense of arbitrariness about this. I'm wondering if we can find a way to amend the proposed motion here to add, in addition to the list of offences there, something to the effect of “or other offences not mentioned for which the offender is sentenced to these”...A, B, C, D, or one, two, three, four. So if you had a case in which someone was charged with some technical violation of one of the other offences that we're now talking about--and that aren't on the list--and ends up getting a rather modest penalty within this list in terms of reprimand, severe reprimand, fine, or other minor punishment, that person would not have to go through the criminal records process and go to the parole board to get a pardon.
If we can come up with the wording, I think.... I see that we're almost at 5:30, and if I want to talk it out, I suppose I can just keep talking, but if we can find the wording that would allow us to do that, then perhaps I can have the satisfaction that we're getting significant progress here, and that not only are these offences listed, but there may be other offences--even though they're not on your list--where there's a minor penalty such that the person doesn't have to go through the process, doesn't end up with a criminal record, and doesn't have to go to a pardon.
Is there simple wording that can do that, in your view?