Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and through you to the witness.
Thank you for being here today, Mr. Sweet, and for this piece of legislation.
I know some of the young people might fall off their chair when I say this, but some 44 years ago when I was a young police officer I can tell you very little attention was paid to victims of crime. As a matter of fact I don't recall ever there being even victim impact statements until well into my career. Of course, today we do have a whole plethora of services to victims in our court system.
I think what you're doing with this bill is accentuating the responsibility of not only the offender but to the feelings and to society's relationship to the victim, and making sure the person is adequately prepared as you just recently said in your testimony to Ms. Lefebvre.
I want to get into some of the meat and potatoes of the bill now if you don't mind. There are a couple of questions, but I'll run the first two together.
I was wondering why you feel it's important to expand the mandatory review period from two to five years for violent criminals. I think you specified “violent” is an important part of this.
Beyond that could you also discuss why it's important to expand the review period following the cancellation of termination of parole.