Thank you very much, Chair, and thank you to our witnesses for being here.
I'm someone we call in the vernacular a “layperson”, since I'm not a lawyer. I was on a jury once, mind you, as a foreperson, but that's as close to the court system as I would care to be: the jury box.
It's interesting to listen to both of you from the perspective of what we've been talking about to a certain degree—summary trials, and our concerns with them. In debate at second reading in the House there was this issue about there being only a small number, and I believe, Mr. Ruby, you articulated a number around 30.
I'd like both of you to comment further on summary trial.
Colonel Drapeau, thank you very much, obviously, for your service. I couldn't agree with you more, by the way, when you talk about the service we ask for and get from our personnel in the forces. As legislators, we ask them to do certain things, and they simply perform. That is a duty that we owe back to them, it seems to me, in getting this legislation right. Since we are always asking them, this is one opportunity for us as legislators to give something back in return, besides our thanks after the performance of their duty, which they always give. There's never a question of whether they do or don't; they always just do it—to steal from Nike, if you will, which I think is so inadequate.
Let me ask you to go back to the summary conviction aspect, because I'm intrigued by how a summary trial could give someone a conviction with a criminal record when it couldn't happen to a civilian, and how we would impose that on someone simply because they wear a uniform and they happen to be in one wing of the armed forces or another. How is it possible for that to happen and that we wouldn't want to find a way to clear that up?
Can you help me understand how we can actually do that? it seems to me we owe them no less than that.