Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses.
In particular, thank you, Mr. Kennedy. I know this is not easy for you. You have led a charge to shine light on areas in which there does legitimately need to be change.
In that regard, I think we have to separate this debate into two parts. It's been portrayed, frankly, disgustingly dishonestly. When we began deliberating over this matter, we started talking about very heinous offences, offences of an extreme nature, particularly of violence, sexual violence against a child. We stated at the onset that we feel—and I heard many of the witnesses say—that there are instances in which there shouldn't be eligibility for a pardon. But that's one side of it.
The other side of it is, as we heard from Mr. Myette and as we also heard from three witnesses the other day, that a good number of people would be locked into this new regime whom I don't think even Conservative members intended to be in it. In their testimony a couple of days ago they expressed sympathy and concern and said these weren't the type of people they were going after. Of course the next day in the House of Commons they attacked me for standing with convicts.
But here's the question, to Mr. Myette. You described a situation in which, when you were younger, you committed a number of property offences. If you throw yourself back to that point in time, if this legislation had been in place and you were 18 years old and had committed three property offences that turned out to be three indictable offences, and it turned out that this bill was in place and you never had the opportunity to apply for a pardon, what impact would it have on your life, if it were something that was never granted to you, if this bill had been there and that chance had been taken from you?