I beg two points in response. For exactly the reason I just described, on a functional basis the attributes that are required of the court are best fulfilled by people with that military experience. Justice Ritchie agreed with that in the MacKay case, and specifically said that with all respect to people with a contrary view, that function was best performed by officers with military experience.
I think the bottom line is that there are differences between the civilian justice system and the military justice system, and those differences exist for a reason. The real question should not be why it isn't the same as the civilian system; the real issue is whether it is constitutionally compliant and effective for the purposes it needs to fulfill. Those two purposes are: to enhance the operational effectiveness of the Canadian Forces through the promotion and maintenance of discipline, cohesion, and morale; and to do justice.
You'll see that in Bill C-15, clause 62, our statutory articulation of sentencing, we've tried to set out the fundamental purposes of the system to exactly delineate in statute--