Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak on Bill C-78 today. As my colleague for Wild Rose said, it is one of the few pieces of legislation we have seen in the criminal justice system today from the Liberal government which actually directly and successfully address a concern we have in our society, the protection of witnesses.
The protection of witnesses is actually quite an informal program today managed by the RCMP. Certainly there is no overriding national program that looks after the interests of the victim.
Regardless of what the government says, it is necessary to take the country back from the criminal element. Time and time again I hear that crime is not on the increase. I would denounce that theory of the government. We only have to stand in a circle of friends anywhere in the country and ask who has been the victim of a crime. I am not just talking about serious sexual crimes or the high profile crimes we see in Vancouver, Toronto and so on. I am talking about major everyday crime: break and enters, stolen vehicles and so on.
We have to somehow get to the nub of the issue. We have to get back to punishment for disobeying laws. That includes actually getting the criminal incarcerated.
A victims protection act gives confidence to those out there who are intimidated by the process. It gives them some confidence of protection. I can think of several instances in my community which I have been involved with where intimidation was a very large part of an exercise of the criminal.
I can think of a lady named Joan who was sexually assaulted by a pretty hardened individual who had spent more time on the inside than on the outside. He has been in and out of parole board hearings. Every time he gets out, he commits another crime and goes back in.
This time good old Karel sexually assaulted Joan with a weapon. The weapon was a needle with cocaine in it. Joan was 63 years old. All through the process, through the court hearings and so on when I was there with Joan, the individual was intimidating her by way of looks and other things that were done. The intimidation was there.
Not only did it happen in the courtroom but subsequent to his incarceration when he was in Vancouver remand waiting for his little trip to the regional psychiatric centre, good old Karel started to send threatening letters to Joan. It just brought home to me very clearly why witnesses need protection. Joan had no one to look after her.
We finally got the letters stopped. Imagine, he was in Vancouver remand for such a horrendous crime and used stamps paid for by the taxpayer to threaten the very person he attacked. That is the kind of thing which is going on.
Hopefully Bill C-78 will do something about those sorts of things. There are other people who need protection. Joan was not only a witness but was a victim at the same time. There are people who see things today and are just plain afraid to take that step forward because of the intimidation.
Along with my colleague from Wild Rose, I spent some time yesterday with the mayor of Cornwall who has some serious problems in that community. There are serious criminal activities. He is a pretty sure and very responsible individual. I am certain that with the intimidation he has been under, the threats and so on, there are times that people like him who want to stand up for their community and provide public service but are being threatened by gangs and organized crime need formal protection.
The mayor of Cornwall and other brave individuals who are willing to stand up and be counted and people who witness the crimes that are going on down there right off the reserves need the protection. They need the confidence they will get the protection.
The witness protection program will strengthen the existing RCMP source witness protection program. Hopefully the process will be formalized so that both the witness and the RCMP know and understand it. It is a loose program today. People do not understand their rights.
Victims rights do not discontinue with such things as witness protection programs. There are all kinds of other things which also need attention as far as victims rights go. There will be a victims rights bill in the House of Commons this year. Within that bill there are things that have to be addressed.
For instance, victims should have the right to give oral and written statements at parole board hearings. Today they are at times allowed a written statement but in many cases the statements are vetted. I have seen victims' statements in sentencing hearings of murder cases. I am not a lawyer but I attend these cases when my riding is involved. I was at one where the victim's statement was actually vetted which is wrong. The Liberal government has to
understand that victims should have the right to have oral and written statements put forward.
There are other things about the criminal justice system that have just got to be said. It is about the intimidation of witnesses. I am looking here at a document produced by a colleague on the government side concerning judicial review decisions of people who were sentenced to death. That sentence was revoked and put into the current life sentence, which is 25 years, and now under section 745 the sentencing decision is being reduced further. That is appalling. It is truly appalling to be reducing these sentences.
Let me give two examples in which I was involved. Dwight Lucas was sentenced to 20 years for a non-capital murder. That was reduced to 16 years. An individual from Quebec has had his 25-year sentence for killing a police officer reduced to 15 years. At the time of the killing the individual would have been put to death but they said: "No, we will make it 25 years". Now, after time has gone by, the individual's sentence has been reduced to 15 years. That is wrong. These people are out on the streets and ultimately, when other crimes are committed, witnesses are going to need protection against the very people we are letting out who should not have been let out in the first place.
The thinking over there is truly convoluted. It does not wash with the greater portion of people. The government thinks it is right. What is it going to take to convince the Liberal government that its laws in the criminal justice system are just too liberal?
It will take a removal of the government in the next election. For those folk who are listening, it will come down to some very specific issues in the next election: the economy, the criminal justice system and just how democratic or undemocratic the process in the House of Commons actually is.