Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on Bill C-242, an Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act, the Criminal Code, and the Young Offenders Act. I know that the hon. member from Scarborough-Rouge River has invested a great deal of time and energy in bringing this piece of legislation before the House.
The thrust of the hon. member's proposals is to deal more stringently with repeat offenders, particularly those who commit crimes while on day parole, full parole or statutory release.
In particular, these proposals address anomalies in the current legislation which have been of concern to various interest groups, particularly the police and justice system officials.
Under that legislation, many offenders who commit multiple crimes or who re-offend during their sentence may remain eligible for release and may even avoid custody altogether.
On June 21, 1994, the Solicitor General introduced Bill C-45, an Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and related statutes.
The bill received third reading and is now before the Senate.
The amendments contained in Bill C-45 will ensure that offenders who get new sentences will feel the effect of those sentences. This will help restore confidence in the sentence calculation process in the following way.
Under the government's proposals, any offender who receives a new custodial sentence while on conditional release would be automatically returned to custody.
In the case of a consecutive sentence, the offender would have to serve the parole ineligibility portion of the new sentence before becoming eligible again for parole.
This means a third of the new sentence, or one-half of the sentence in cases where the court has made an order that this would have to be served. The net effect is proportionate to the new sentence and respects the decision of the court to serve an additional period of time in custody.
These proposals were developed on the basis of extensive consultations with a broad range of groups and individuals including judges, lawyers, police, provincial corrections and justice officials, as well as representatives of various voluntary service organizations.
Last March the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs conducted a review of Bill C-45. During that process, the committee heard from over 60 witnesses who represented 32 different organizations, including victims groups, police organizations, professional groups, women's groups, aboriginal organizations, as well as a range of organizations from the voluntary sector.
During its clause by clause review, the committee debated a number of motions to amend the sentence calculation provisions of Bill C-45 and endorsed them in their entirety. These provisions were also recently passed by the House of Commons.
While I believe that the hon. member's bill is well-intentioned, I am also concerned that it falls short of the impact intended by Bill C-45 for the following reasons. First, the changes proposed in Bill C-242 do not take into account the inter-relation of the various
sentence calculation provisions in the Corrections and Conditional Release Act.
By changing two aspects of the law, we will create an imbalance with other aspects of the legislation. This would necessitate significant re-drafting of the law as it now stands. Bill C-242 also deals with the complex issue of sentence calculation in a limited manner. Implicit in these proposals is the assumption that an offender under sentence will receive only one new sentence.
In such cases, sentence calculation is simple and straightforward. The offender would lose any eligibilities for conditional release on the original sentence, and would have to wait out the parole ineligibility period of the new sentence before becoming eligible again for conditional release.
But how would a sentence be calculated if the offender receives four or five new sentences of varying durations, some consecutive and some concurrent, at different points in the original sentence? The bill fails to address this complex and very realistic matter.
The law must be equipped to deal with multiple sentences and all possible combinations of sentences in an equitable manner consistent with the court's intent. And while this government supports the principle that repeat criminal behaviour should be dealt with more stringently, particularly when it occurs during conditional release, I also believe that the courts can take this into consideration when imposing a new sentence.
Bill C-45 will address the shortcomings of the current sentence calculation provisions I mentioned earlier. In doing so, the bill does not lose sight of the purpose of statutory release which is to provide offenders released from prison with a gradual controlled transition period back to the community to assist them with their reintegration and minimize public safety risk.
I would like to assure the members of this House that where any offender is at high risk of committing a violent or serious drug offence before sentence expiry, the National Parole Board has the authority to detain the offender until warrant expiry. All the measures I have mentioned aim to ensure that offenders are not arbitrarily held in prison longer than necessary, and that due consideration is given to their individual cases and level of risk to the community.
We must take heed that discretion is fundamental for ensuring that all cases are dealt with fairly. I believe that an individualized approach based on risk assessment is preferable to blanket removal of statutory release for a category of offenders.
During witness hearings on Bills C-45 and C-41 regarding sentencing reforms, it was frequently heard that imprisonment should be used as a last resort for the most serious offences. Many witnesses who appeared before the justice and legal affairs committee also stressed the merit of providing offenders with gradual, structured release programs combined with ongoing treatment and support to ensure long term community protection. It is well known that simply locking them up for longer periods of time will not achieve the goal shared by all Canadians for improved public safety.
The proposals set out in Bill C-45 are a thoughtful reflection of the collaboration with many groups and individuals, including members of the opposition.
I look forward to seeing effective and balanced reform-such as that presented by the government in Bill C-45-move forward, and anticipate that Parliament will deal fairly in addressing the anomalies which the hon. member for Scarborough-Rouge River has brought to our attention.