Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to speak to the bill introduced by the hon. member for York South-Weston, a trial balloon being launched by the Liberal government on the issue of young offenders.
Since the opening of the 35th Parliament, the Department of Justice has been discussing amendments to the Young Offenders Act. For reasons known to the department, it seems this was one of its priorities.
Furthermore, in the famous red book people have been talking about since October 25, the Liberal party proposed to reform the Young Offenders Act, to offer real rehabilitation while cracking down on young criminals.
Since I assume no one is against real rehabilitation, today the Liberal government is testing the temper and sensibilities of voters on the issue of cracking down on young criminals. Considering the bill the hon. member has introduced, I understand why he sits on the extreme right of the Prime Minister.
Unfortunately, this shift to the right on the young offenders issue is based on a skewed equation of violence and young people. To the average citizen, youth is equated with violence and adolescence is synonymous with delinquency. However, nothing could be further from the truth.
In Quebec, since 1979, all crimes committed by young people have decreased substantially, by nearly 8 per cent across Quebec and by 34 per cent in the Montreal area. Was the government, or should I say, was the hon. member aware of these figures before he introduced the kind of bill we have before us today?
We cannot go on being alarmist to this degree, because it gives a false picture of reality and we end up with bills like this one which I consider to be very alarming indeed.
It is all well and good to ask for zero tolerance, but should this necessarily mean lowering the age limit of offenders covered by the youth courts, should this mean more severe sentencing and releasing the names of repeat young offenders? This interpretation of zero tolerance is tantamount to telling all young offenders: get in there and stay there. That is the easy way out.
That is a fifties petit bourgeois attitude. The emphasis should not be on the sentencing aspect as much as on assistance, guidance and reintegration of the young offender.
Obviously, I am against the simplistic bill before the House today. If this proposal would help the government save money, a government that is flat broke, perhaps we could discuss it and consider the benefits from that angle. However, by increasing sentences and lowering the age at which one is considered to be young offender, we are merely filling up our prisons faster and adding to the number of unproductive young people who will be a burden on society for the rest of their lives.
Current public pressure for a stricter Young Offenders Act is understandable, especially in western Canada. Sensational cases reported in the media add to the skewed perception of the problem. However, reaching directly with amendments like these reflects some confusion about, and represents a major departure from, the objectives pursued by the Young Offenders Act passed in 1984, in other words, deterrence, rehabilitation and the protection of society.
In Quebec, we understand the main principles behind the protection of youth and society. When dealing with young offenders, we rely on rehabilitation and reintegration. As much as possible, we avoid criminalizing cases involving young offenders.
The Quebec Department of Health and Social Services and the Youth Protection Branch take care of young offenders and assist them. The results have been astonishing. In Quebec, we invest in rehabilitation because we believe in it. Statistics are extremely revealing in that respect. According to a very sound study conducted in Quebec between 1968 and 1983, it takes society less than five years to recoup the money it invests to rehabilitate young murderers and turn them into productive young adults who work, pay taxes and spend money, all of which keep the economy going.
In western Canada, they are understandably intolerant because they do not invest in their youth as we do. It is not one of their concerns. They do not seem to have the resources; they do not take care of young offenders who are left to fend for themselves. They just lock them up in a different part of the prison than the adults.
Our assessment of this bill illustrates how distinct a society Quebec is. You know, it is not only our language and culture which make us different from the rest of Canada, but also our beliefs, concerns and philosophy. We just do not see things the same way and the bill before us this morning is a case in point.
I would be remiss if I did not mention that the goal aimed at by the amendments proposed in this bill could be achieved through a stricter enforcement of the present Young Offenders Act. It appears that, in his bill, the Liberal member is seeking to make
young offenders accountable and responsible for their illegal actions so that they can be tried in a regular court.
In our justice system, teenagers charged with indictable offences are seldom tried in adult court, even though the April 1992 amendments make it easier.
Being doubly concerned with the rehabilitation of the young offender and the protection of society, lawyers and judges are not surprisingly very reluctant, one to ask for a trial in adult court, and the other to order it.
In Quebec, according to the information I have, transfer to an adult court is requested in no more than 5 per cent of all cases.
This reluctance is easily explained: If a young offender is found guilty in adult court he will receive a very stiff sentence, offering very little opportunity for rehabilitation. Moreover, he will be eligible for parole only after five or ten years, depending on whether the crime was first or second degree murder.
Why force the hand of the courts if, for legal and social reasons, they do not do it? Even though they can try some young offenders as adults, accountable and responsible for their actions, they rarely choose to do it. If the hon. member wishes to help society, he should instead introduce a bill to make the public more aware that a program offering help in a responsible manner affords better protection than a punitive measure, which is effective only as long as it is in force.
More than that, he should support a complete transfer of jurisdiction to the provinces, with the necessary budget. This way each province could deal with its young offenders as it chooses.
The deterrent effect sought by imposing longer sentences is not supported by the information available. In fact, the reverse in true according to Crime and Delinquency which, in its January issue, published the results of a study carried out in several American States proving that.
Like his government, the hon. member misses the target completely with this bill. If the Criminal Code needed amendments, it would be to force rehabilitation and reentry into the community for young offenders, but this is outside the jurisdiction of this House.
Society should be more tolerant and its objective should not be to make all young persons conform with what their environment, their family, their school and society itself expect of them, but to make them able to become independent, with the minimum of limitations, and to make their reentry a success.