Debates of Feb. 24th, 1995

Questions Passed As Orders For Returns

[Peter Milliken, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Shall the remaining questions stand?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

The House resumed consideration of the motion. That Bill C-37, an act to amend the Young Offenders Act and the Criminal Code, be read the third time and passed.

Young Offenders Act

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to speak once more against the bill before us, Bill C-37.

I am sad to see that the government keeps wanting us to pass yet another bill tinted with a social policy that goes against the wishes and reality of the people of Quebec as well as the interests of the people of Canada.

On this issue as on many others, we, in Quebec, do not regard or live the juvenile delinquency problem the same way as English Canada does. As I said eight months ago, the rate of juvenile delinquency in Quebec is the second lowest in Canada, after Prince Edward Island. In Quebec, the detention rate for young offenders is the lowest in Canada.

When you put these two facts together, you can see that a more systematic and lengthy detention, as proposed in the bill, has no bearing on the rate of juvenile delinquency. That is what we found out in Quebec.

In Quebec, we believe that where the real problems with the judicial handling of young offenders lie is with undue delays before sentencing and a settlement rate of 29 per cent at best for problems related to crime. This means that 71 per cent of young offenders get the idea they can do it again with complete impunity.

In Quebec, we also believe that the first thing to do is to deal with the social roots of violence. We believe in eradicating poverty affecting women and their children. In Quebec, we believe in making easier the access of women and their children to shelters, so that they can escape family violence. In Quebec, we believe in improving access to social housing so that young people can brought up in a healthy environment. In Quebec, this is the approach generally favoured.

These points quite naturally demonstrate that Quebec society is opposed to any change to the existing legislation, because, if used wisely, it can achieve different results depending on the situation. Unfortunately, it is not the Quebec approach that the federal government wants to impose on us. The quick fix the government would have us adopt is a heavy-handed approach.

This government is inconsistency personified. For instance, it blithely reneges on its campaign promise that it would not reduce transfer payments to the provinces, payments which help to improve the quality of life of the neediest in our society, including women and children, while it insists on keeping those with more devious public appeal.

How do we reconcile statements by the minister that there has been no increase in violent crime in Canada with Bill C-37? The answer is simple: this bill fits nicely into the latter categories: the promises the party has to keep if it is to maintain its standing in the polls.

This is outrageous, and this so-called social policy should be seen for what it really is: a campaign promise based not on reality but on myth, a campaign promise whose impact will be extremely harmful, and finally, a campaign promise that smacks of the extreme right wing.

We condemn this clumsy attempt by the government to make political gains at the expense of minors. This is not the Quebec way. The end, the means and the probable results are equally unacceptable.

It is common knowledge that increased sentencing and the incarceration of young offenders in prisons for adults are the easy way out and are more likely to provide opportunities for the homosexual exploitation of young people than for rehabilitation and for training these people to be responsible citizens. It is also common knowledge that the amount of time spent in custody is not a factor in treatment and social reintegration, and that five years are ample, since the impact on young people is different.

Two experiments conducted in the United States, which were similar to those proposed by the Minister of Justice, produced negative results.

I would now like to discuss the position of the victims who are supposed to benefit as a result of amendments to the legislation, and I am referring to women. I have already pointed out that a number of women's groups do not support the proposed amendments.

During the six months elapsed since the second reading of this bill, the government has failed to convince women that the proposed changes will help reduce violence against women. Women know perfectly well that young boys, who constitute the vast majority of offenders affected by the legislation, do not represent a threat to women, although the legislation is also supposed to be a way to reduce violence against women. I may refer hon. members to the findings of a wide ranging survey by Statistics Canada on violence against women, published in November 1993. According to the survey, one woman out of two was a victim of violence and, in the vast majority of cases, the aggressor was known to the victim.

In this instance, aggressor refers to the spouse or ex-spouse, not an unknown adolescent. We must look at the facts. Women who fall prey to violence are the targets of someone with whom they are having or have had an intimate relationship. In discussing the problem of violence against women, a possible role of a juvenile delinquent does not even come to mind.

Other important players, by virtue of their position in society, have also spoken out against this government bill. Think for example of religious communities whose apostolic mandate permits them to evaluate social policies from a global perspective. Moreover, the Church Council on Justice and Corrections argues that these presumably draconian measures do not provide a legitimate solution to juvenile delinquency. The "law and order" approach seems to calm public fears for the time being, but it does not address the true problems of juvenile crime. What is worse, it fosters false hopes given the ad hoc and simplistic nature of the legislation.

I would like to point out that this view is shared by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Quakers, the Mennonite Central Committee of Canada, the United Church of Canada and the Oblate Community of Manitoba.

There is also the scientific community whose research on dealing with juvenile delinquency does not in any way support the conclusions reached by the justice minister.

This would be the result of the proposed amendments. They would help neither the victims nor the young persons. They do not in any way address the problems with which young Canadians are grappling.

Above all, no consideration whatsoever is given to the specific nature of Quebec. What a great example of federalism. This bill, conceived purely with elections in mind, will unfortunately harm individuals who in fact need the government's help, that is the victims and young persons. Instead of giving women's organizations the necessary funding to help deal with the effects of violence, it would imprison the most vulnerable in our society, our young people. Another opportunity wasted.

[Bob Ringma, Reform, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to address Bill C-37, an act to amend the Young Offenders Act.

This is an issue about which my constituents feel very strongly. That is probably true across Canada. Not a day goes by without my office receiving a letter on this subject. Two weeks ago I presented a petition with 16,300 names calling on Parliament to revise this act in a more meaningful way.

The organizer of the petition is a constituent of mine, Mr. Bernard Castet. Mr. Castet became involved in this issue after his young son, André, was brutally and senselessly beaten and killed by two youths.

It is hard enough for a parent to handle the loss of a child but Mr. Castet's grief was further compounded by the fact that these two young offenders would be tried in youth court for this vicious and unprovoked attack.

It is a sad reality of the current act that Mr. Castet had to go to court to fight the system in an effort to have the two youths raised to adult court where, if found guilty, they could receive the type of sentence that would match the crime. After months of hearings, the court has now ruled that these two accused killers will be tried as adults. However if the government had accepted Reform's amendments to the bill, others like Mr. Castet would not have to go through this same trauma.

One such amendment called for any young offender charged with murder, attempted murder, manslaughter, aggravated sexual assault and aggravated assault to be tried in adult court. This is also the substance of Mr. Castet's petition.

The Reform Party, along with Mr. Castet and the more than 16,300 people who signed that petition, believe such an amendment would be a positive step, not only in terms of meting out punishment to fit the crime, but also as a deterrent factor. Admittedly the justice committee did put forward a compromise amendment but it is still less than what the public demands and desires.

Reform also called for a lowering of the age definition by two years from 12 to 17 years inclusive to 10 to 15 years. Most people, except the government, seem to agree that if a person is old enough to get a driver's licence and have many other societal responsibilities, that person is old enough to be accountable for his or her actions in adult court. Such a change in age limits would also prevent young offenders from slipping through the cracks of the current legislation.

Mr. Castet and his 16,300 petitioners also agree with the Reform Party that the extra privacy provisions of the Young Offenders Act are inappropriate for violent or repeat young offenders. In these cases, the publishing of names would make protection of the community the number one priority.

Reform also supports amendments to make parents more accountable for the actions of their children. This accountability would take the form of compensating victims for property crimes if it can be demonstrated that there was not a reasonable effort to exercise parental control.

While Reform members advocate such things as stiffer penalties for serious crimes, we are not looking to lock up all young offenders nor do we believe that even the most hardened young offender is beyond rehabilitation. A further Reform amendment posed just such an approach, calling for rehabilitation opportunities to be emphasized in a disciplined environment.

I would like to take a minute to address another item that I have brought up in the House before. I would like the House to consider seriously the whole matter of the punishment of young offenders.

Looking at the situation facing us today, young offenders are put away but they lose none of their rights. They can go with their hair whatever length they want. They have colour TV. They have all the rights in the world. There is no sense of punishment or discipline. A movement was started in the United States called boot camps. I approve of the thrust of this movement because it disciplines young offenders. They cannot go into a punishment facility with their own agenda. If they are found guilty of something they have to follow the agenda of the boot camp.

I have stood here before and spoken of my experience in the past, not as an inmate of a Canadian army detention barracks but as an observer of one. The basic thing about a detention barracks was that the inmate obeyed every rule immediately. After having served his minimal time he swore that he would never go back to that facility again. He was not abused. He was not beaten. He was simply made to toe the line. This works.

The other big benefit of this scheme where inmates are disciplined and made to follow our agenda and not their own agenda is that it is cost effective. Young offenders or anyone else for that matter, even an older offender, can be put in such a facility and in 30 days they are ready to obey the rules of society. It will have an effect that 60 days or 90 days or half a year of doing what they want in a youth facility will not have.

I will wind down that portion of my pitch to the House in pleading with all members to please let us take a look at the effectiveness of such discipline on young offenders particularly, but on others as well.

In conclusion, in carefully reviewing the bill I fully appreciate the efforts the Minister of Justice has made to try and satisfy the various special interest groups which make up the Liberal Party. It is a formidable task. However, in doing so the minister has put forward yet another piece of middle of the road legislation which has become the trademark of all Liberal governments.

Unfortunately the vast majority of Canadians want decisive action on this issue, not this watered down liberalism. On behalf of Mr. Castet and his late son André, I urge the government to hop off the fence and make the necessary changes to this important legislation.

If I have two minutes left I am going to once again return to my pitch and plead with the public as well as the members of the House to consider running boot camps or military style detention camps. For a minimum period of incarceration these camps will have a disciplinary effect for life on the people subject to that sort of punishment. It does not inflict physical harm. It simply says: "You obey the rules of this establishment. You do not have rules of your own". In so doing, it brings them around to saying: "Yes. Maybe I had better pay attention and listen to what society is telling me".

[Roger Pomerleau, Bloc, Anjou—Rivière-Des-Prairies, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is of course my pleasure to take my turn to speak on Bill C-37. As my colleagues already mentioned several times, the Bloc Quebecois finds this bill totally unacceptable for many reasons. The short time I have been allotted only allows me to gloss over the four main reasons.

As I said, there are four major reasons why we do not accept this bill. Firstly, the bill's methodology is incoherent; secondly, in many respects, it is poorly designed and is very ambiguous;

thirdly, it imposes on Quebec nation wide legislation, although we already have the best system in this area in Canada; fourthly, it is doubtful the bill will be effective.

This bill is incoherent. I hope that my hon. colleague will listen, and he will see what I mean. The minister is proposing important changes to the act that the committee will be carefully studying later on. Obviously, the time to do a study is before and not after the changes are made. This is a classic case of putting the cart before the horse. Furthermore, the Quebec Bar Association's paper, from which I will read a few passages, fully agrees with this analysis.

The bar association stated that, regarding this issue, it could only deplore the decision to start by amending the law, and then to backtrack and carefully study the legislation and juvenile delinquency. In addition to acknowledging Quebec's success in the area, starting at the other end would have made it easier to identify the specific mechanisms needed for the system to work well and the preliminary study of juvenile delinquency would have allowed to take stock of the outcome of the 1992 changes. This bill has already been amended. No one has evaluated the consequences, yet, we are getting ready to once again amend it and to do studies after the fact.

And the bar association ended by saying that it had reached the inevitable conclusion that Bill C-37, currently under consideration, should be withdrawn. It acknowledged that this was politically out of the question and that the minister had doubtless already made a public commitment. It proposed that the minister at least suspend consideration and first study the situation of crime among young people and look at the overall structure of the Young Offenders Act and then only return to the legislative amendments.

There is a another reason we find this awkward and highly ambiguous bill unacceptable. We have cited many ambiguities here in the House in the past few days, since we started discussing the bill. I would like to draw attention to some of them, in passing, before going on to other points.

Clause 1 of Bill C-37 introduces statements of principles into the act to the effect that crime prevention is essential to the protection of society and that a multidisciplinary approach is required to put an end to the problem.

Clause 15 of the bill provides that custody is not a substitute for appropriate child protection or health measures. It also provides that the courts should consider other alternatives before contemplating custody. Such statements are entirely in keeping with the Bloc's statements, of course. However, the bill does not speak about the actual alternatives. The bill talks of alternative solutions, but no effective measures are provided to carry them out.

Another argument is as follows. One of the major points of this bill is the amendment to arrangements for transfer to an adult court. Under the current system, youth court is supposed to bear society's interests in mind, notably public protection and social reintegration of the young person; at the same time, it must ascertain whether these two objectives can be reconciled while retaining jurisdiction over young persons. Otherwise, the young person must be transferred to adult court.

Clauses 3 and 8 of Bill C-37 introduce amendments providing for 16 or 17 year olds charged with criminal offences involving serious bodily harm to be automatically transferred to adult court. These criminal offences are first or second degree murder, attempt to commit murder, manslaughter, aggravated sexual assault and assault. Bill C-37 stipulates that a young person sent directly to adult court could nevertheless ask a youth court judge to hear his case.

In cases of 16 or 17 year olds charged with serious bodily harm, the burden of proof is thus reversed in regard to transfer to adult court. This young person would in fact have to convince the youth court that it is suited to judge his case. Under present provisions, the crown must convince the judge to transfer the young person to adult court.

Thus this serves to a create of a hierarchy of age groups in respect of the courts. However, while the legislation does not distinguish between 12 to 15 year olds and 16 and 17 year olds, these amendments will change the way they are dealt with for offences involving serious bodily harm. Certain lawyers might argue that this represents a violation of the right to equality before the law granted under section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

On the other hand, subclause 13(3) of the same bill provides that maximum sentences imposed for first and second degree murder be increased from five years to ten and seven years respectively. In cases of first degree murder, the maximum period of custody is six years to be served continuously and seven years for second degree murder, with four years served continuously.

These harsher sentences are not justified given that homicide rates have dropped since the 1970s. Furthermore, it seems that 16 and 17 year olds are responsible for the vast majority, or about 60 per cent, of murders committed by teenagers. The bill provides that they will be transferred to adult court and tried according to adult rules. The impact of these increased sentences will not be as significant as one would think at first. Everything seems to indicate that the burden will fall mostly on the shoulders of 12 to 15 year olds, something which is not justified by crime statistics.

Finally, the act was amended before in 1992, as was pointed out earlier, to increase sentences to five years in murder cases. Since statistics are not up to date, there is no way to check the effect of the 1992 amendment at the present time. How can another amendment be justified at this stage? Why not wait to find out the impact of the 1992 amendment before taking more repressive measures? That is what the bar association is wondering.

Finally, this is a Canada-wide piece of legislation, which would force Quebec to adopt procedures when Quebec already has its own rather remarkable ways of doing things. I would like to, once again, quote some of the comments made by the bar association: "It is important to note that Quebec did not address the problems in the same way as the rest of Canada. As a result, the problems are rarely experienced in Quebec and it would therefore be more appropriate to preserve the overall status quo than to modify a proven system. On the other hand, we must conclude that the same results could be achieved in the rest of Canada with adequate material resources".

The bar association recognizes that one of the major flaws in this bill is the lack of resources that we are willing to allocate to our young people's social reintegration. I would also like to mention what a colleague from the Liberal Party, the hon. member for London West, said recently. I think she is absolutely right. She said: "If I were a youth in trouble with the law today, I would much rather be in Quebec than anywhere else in Canada. Quebec takes a much more progressive interpretation of the Young Offenders Act. More diversions tactics are used to prevent young people from being tried. I think that we can and must follow its lead".

But it is not the case here. The federal government is not following the lead of Quebec, but rather trying to impose upon Quebec an unduly punitive legislation under the circumstances, since, as we know and as my hon. colleague from Quebec just mentioned, Quebec is the province who achieves the best results while using the least repression.

Finally, one can very seriously doubt the effectiveness of this legislation because nothing, at present, indicates that crime is reduced in inverse proportion to the length of sentences. I will conclude on this. At the same time, and many of our colleagues raised this point, the public is being hugely sensitized to crime nowadays.

Just take the United States, the best example of a place where you find both maximum repression and maximum crime. We do not think that the present circumstances justify a stiffening of legislation to solve what is more than anything else a profound social problem that requires a multidisciplinary approach. And in this respect, Quebec's lead should be followed.

[Keith Martin, Reform, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to speak to something as important as Bill C-37, an act to amend the Young Offenders Act and Criminal Code.

This bill is in response to the increasing tide of violent crime. It especially is in response to the cries for justice from a public that is fed up with being terrorized by criminals, youth and adult alike, and seeing a judicial system inadequate to protect them and their property. It also responds to the cries from police who find the system which has been set out to deal with convicted criminals to be completely inadequate.

The frustration has been so extreme that some individuals in my riding who have been harassed by youth criminals have even suggested corporal punishment as a disincentive. Given some of the situations these people have been in, I cannot say I disagree with them.

I agree with this bill's initiative and will support it. However, I and my party believe the bill does not go far enough. In my speech I will deal with the principles of the bill and put forth some constructive criticisms and additions that I hope the minister will consider.

I agree with the increased penalties particularly for violent offences such as first degree and second degree murder and also the movement of 16 and 17 year olds to adult court at the discretion of the judges for violent offences.

I would agree with the principle of discouraging lengthening incarcerations in secure custody for non-violent offenders as I do not think it will serve the offender nor will it serve society well. However, we must also ask ourselves what this will be replaced with. Nowhere in this bill do I see this addressed.

One of the greatest problems in youth criminal behaviour is not only the violence but also the non-violent criminal acts which encompass a much larger number of criminal behaviour. Many youths who commit these acts for example, break and enter and auto theft, often repeat them many times over. They are convicted, penalized, incarcerated and released, only to repeat the sad cycle of breaking the law once again. The public and the police are understandably frustrated.

Justice must be served in a number of functions. The first one is the protection of society. The second one is the rehabilitation of the criminal. The third is the restitution to society and the victim. There should also be a disincentive to offend. The justice system has failed in many cases on all three fronts. All you need to do, as I said before, is to speak to those individuals who work in the system to know this is so.

We in the Reform Party have suggested that the convicted must pay back to the victim or society in some substantive fashion, for example by way of work or money. Also, to effect rehabilitation part of the penalty must be obligatory; the youth

must engage in school or a training program to provide him or her with the skills needed to be a productive member of society. This can similarly be applied to counselling and psychiatric services that the courts feel the offender must take. The offender must also be an active and willing participant in this, for not to do this would defeat the whole purpose of rehabilitation.

Relating to the rehabilitation of the young offender or lack thereof, many of these youths offend and reoffend. We must ask ourselves why this is so. Part of the reason is that tragically many of them themselves find that secure custody is a better environment than the one they come from.

This was graphically illustrated to me by a patient I saw not too many years ago. This young man of 15 stood in front of me prior to his release and pleaded with me to stay in the maximum security youth detention centre. He said: "Dr. Martin, if you let me go, I will go out and reoffend". That broke my heart. It was tragic. It brought to my mind that there was something desperately in need in our system if we had a young offender who had to say that. These young people need to be removed from the environment they find themselves and sent far away from the city to perhaps a setting in a rural area away from the drugs, the alcohol, the sexual abuse and the violence they are subjected to.

A change in environment is absolutely imperative for their rehabilitation. Also important is the length of time they are subjected to this change. They must be away from these destructive environments for a long period of time. I cannot emphasize that enough. It requires a long period of time to effect a change in behaviour and undo the damage of the many years of destructive influence they have been subjected to during their formative years. Repeat young offenders need stable, disciplined and constructive environments not for months but for a year or preferably longer.

Some may consider this suggestion harsh, but the idea is to get them into an secure and safe environment of normalcy where they can start to address the psychological and behavioural reasons they commit crimes. This cannot be done in the destructive environment in which many offenders find themselves, regardless how many dollars are spent on social workers and counselling. It will not work.

We will not change much by putting these individuals either into halfway houses or community rehabilitation centres for a few months, the reason being that they are in close proximity to the same environment they were in before. Therefore they are subjected to the same stresses that bred criminal behaviour in the first place that we see manifested in society.

Also the Reform Party has suggested that parents who wilfully abrogate responsibility for their children must also be held accountable. This could be in the form of fines imposed on parents.

Finally I address the penalty for violent crime. I agree with the lengthening of sentences. I suggest to the minister that another aspect is not addressed in the bill. Youth and adults who commit violent offences and are deemed to likely reoffend at the end of their sentences should continue to be held in custody until such time as they do not pose a threat to innocent people.

The rationale behind this idea comes from our belief that the rights and protection of victims in society are of the greatest importance with regard to justice. In the past I believe the rights of the victim have been violated and in our perception the rights of the convicted have been held at a higher level than those of the innocent.

The bill talks about the consideration of victim impact statements along those lines prior to sentencing. Rather than making them a consideration they should be made obligatory. It should be the right of the victim to give an impact statement at the time of sentencing.

I will address the prevention of crime. I do not have the answer but I would like to give a few insights having worked in the system both as a guard and as a physician. As we have all agreed the causes of crime are multifaceted. As I have said before many youths who commit crimes tragically come from horrendous family situations, often broken families, and are subject to the improper or inadequate parenting, sexual or physical abuse and alcohol and drug abuse often rampant in their history. Many children are born into these tragic situations and develop personality and psychological traits and behaviours that can lead to criminal behaviour.

The number of individuals subjected to such a tragic environment are increasing. Thus the number of people who suffer psychological dislocations as children that are manifested in criminal behaviour as adults will also increase. This will result in an increase in social costs in many areas, only one of which is criminal behaviour.

We should address the contributing factors that produce criminal behaviour. Children must be taught early at the beginning of their school years about appropriate behaviour, self-respect, respect for others, personal responsibility, what drugs, alcohol and sexual abuse are about, in addition to their a, b, c 's. It must happen at a very early age, at the age of five or six.

The parents could also be brought into the classroom so that they too could learn the value of important parenting and those lessons they may not have been subjected to as children. As

individuals we must learn these things if we are collectively to have a safe, responsible and law-abiding society.

If we are to address the antecedent issues to youth crime it will serve not only current youth offenders but will hopefully prevent those who normally take the path to criminal behaviour from doing so. It is an advantage to them and for the protection of society.

[Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral, Bloc, Laval Centre, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in June 1994, the Minister of Justice proposed the second reading of Bill C-37 and its referral to a committee for review.

The standing committee on justice recently made 28 amendments which do not significantly change the original piece of legislation. Indeed, the repressive nature of the bill remains intact and the current version once again overlooks the issue of social reintegration and rehabilitation of young offenders.

Today, Bill C-37 still only meets one objective: to silence Liberal hard-liners and to try to please those of the Reform Party.

The bill is very simple; yet, its scope will greatly change the government's view of the issue of juvenile delinquency and the way to deal with it.

Indeed, this legislation significantly changes the statement of principle governing the current law by stating the following, and I quote: "the protection of society, which is a primary objective of the criminal law applicable to youth, is best served by rehabilitation, wherever possible, of young persons".

Bill C-37 also provides harsher sentences for young offenders, as well as an automatic appearance before an adult court for 16 and 17 year olds who commit serious crimes.

Finally, Bill C-37 proposes a major change to the current legislation by specifying that the professionals involved will be allowed to exchange information on young offenders, and that the records of these young offenders will be retained by police authorities for a period of ten years in the case of serious crimes and three years for other offences.

In 1984, the Juvenile Delinquents Act was replaced by the Young Offenders Act, which then applied exclusively to young people aged 12 to 17.

Its purpose was to make young offenders accountable for their criminal behaviour, even though their degree of responsibility may differ largely from that of adults. A responsibility was also put on society in the sense that, while the population has the right to be protected from acts which threaten its safety, crime prevention does remain an important social responsibility.

As a result, young offenders had the right to equitable treatment, since their youth and degree of maturity required particular assistance of a sort not available from the justice system for adults.

In this spirit, the 1984 act prohibited the media from divulging the identity of an accused young person or that of witnesses called to appear. The ban did not last long. In 1986 the act was amended to allow the disclosure of the identity of a young person sought in connection with, charged with or found guilty of an offence and considered to be a threat to public security.

In 1992 the Conservative government again amended the Young Offenders Act, increasing the sentence for murder from 3 to 5 years. Also introduced at this time was the principle that a young offender could be tried before an adult court if measures to ensure public safety were inadequate.

There is no doubt that this bill will mean harsher sentences for young persons and an important shift in the act's declaration of principle.

In actual fact, the harshness of sentences for serious crimes or offences will be reflected in an increase in the number of years of detention. Thus, in the case of first degree murder, the sentence will be increased from 5 to 10 years, and in the case of second degree murder, it will be increased from 5 to 7 years, during which time these young persons will not be eligible for parole.

A number of specialists and other parties interested in the field of juvenile delinquency have observed that the severity of sentences for serious crimes plays a very small role in deterring young offenders.

A number of studies, need I remind you, have shown clearly that individuals who commit serious crime are unable to contemplate the consequences of what they have done or of what they are about to do. Generally speaking, there are three categories of young delinquents involved in serious crime. The first category comprises those whose psychological state or mental health is fragile. With the help of appropriate rehabilitation programs, the young people in this category have every chance of recovering and finding their place in society.

The second category comprises young delinquents who commit misdemeanours, and, under unforseen circumstances, do the irreparable and commit murder or some other serious crime.

Finally, the third category comprises 16 and 17 year olds guilty of serious crime, because their delinquent past has led them to where they are. This is juvenile delinquency at its most serious. These young people are referred to adult court, because prevention and rehabilitation have failed.

It must be said that the majority of young offenders are in the first two categories.

A number of studies would tend to indicate that the rate of homicide among young people has hardly increased in recent years. A document published by the Department of Justice in May 1994 reveals that, in recent years, the number of people under the age of 18 suspected of homicide has been considerably lower than in the 1970s. Between 1974 and 1979, police had an average of 60 homicide suspects under 18 years of age annually, whereas, between 1986 and 1992, the average was only 46.

The public appears more sensitive to violence among young people, however. It really seems that people overestimate the incidence of acts of serious violence. Consider for example a survey carried out in 1992 indicating that "Canadians believed that violent crimes accounted for 30 per cent of all crimes committed".

In reality, only 10 per cent of crimes are violent. Reality is often distorted by the media which for obvious reasons often stress sensational crimes, thus leading the public to believe that the rate of violent crime has risen sharply.

In the opinion of the official opposition, the repressive measures contained in the present bill are far from being justifiable in all cases of juvenile delinquency. All the more so since the present legislation already includes measures to punish offenders guilty of serious offfences.

The statement of principle proposed by the justice minister in Bill C-37 leaves the door wide open for repressing crime rather than preventing it. How else does one explain that this bill does not contain a single new provision in respect of prevention, rehabilitation or reintegration.

In Quebec and certain provinces in Canada, such as Ontario, the approach to young offenders focuses on prevention, rehabilitation and reintegration. Several studies including the Boscoville study have demonstrated the advantages of this approach.

It is true that several provinces in Canada do not have sufficient structures and resources at their disposal to proceed this way. So one might think that repression is the easiest option to choose.

Over the last few months, everyone in the judicial sector has criticized this bill because it ignores the issue of rehabilitation and reintegration. Juvenile delinquency cannot be looked at in isolation from a strictly judicial point of view; other much deeper factors that cause delinquent behaviour in young people must be taken into consideration.

Juvenile delinquency as we now see it is like a mirror held up to society. Without facing this reality, we cannot stem delinquency at its root.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask you the following question: Does Canadian society have the right to choose the simplistic solution of punishment, and to pass this off as the fulfilment of its responsibilities in this matter?

The official opposition thinks not, and I am certain that this is not what Canada wants.

[Ted White, Reform, North Vancouver, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this bill. I have had a lot of feedback from my riding that people are very dissatisfied with the way the Young Offenders Act works at present. I know from the feedback I am getting that they are also dissatisfied that the provisions of the bill do not go nearly far enough.

I conducted an electronic referendum on the Young Offenders Act, the first of its type, certainly in North America, during last year. I would like to cover a few of its results which fortify the belief that this bill does not go far enough.

I would like to cover a bit of the background on the Young Offenders Act so we know what we are talking about. The Young Offenders Act, Bill C-61 at the time, was passed in 1984, replacing the 76-year old Juvenile Deliquents Act of 1908. It had been around for a long time and it was generally recognized to be out of date and overly rigid.

Shortly after its passage the Young Offenders Act was also found to be somewhat rigid in certain aspects. Therefore, in 1986 Bill C-106 was passed, making changes to the sections of the Young Offenders Act dealing with the short term incarceration of juveniles awaiting preliminary hearings, the compilation and disclosure of criminal records of young offenders, and some other aspects of the law. Sentencing rules for first and second degree murder were toughened in 1992 by Bill C-12.

The government of the day carried out a poll in 1991 when it had made some changes to the Young Offenders Act in early 1990. The poll question asked: "The federal government has recently introduced legislation which would increase the sentences received by young offenders, 18 years or younger who commit crimes like murder. Do you approve or disagree with this legislation?" The results were remarkable. Eighty-eight to 90 per cent of the people polled felt that the sentences were not nearly tough enough.

I still see the same sort of result coming today from the referendum that I held in my riding. In answer to the question of whether there should be automatic transfer to adult court for serious crimes such as murder, over 95 per cent of the 5,500 people who responded said yes. To the question of whether there

should be a special category in the Young Offenders Act for repeat and dangerous offenders, 97 per cent answered yes. There is a sense in the community that people are not safe under the present Young Offenders Act.

My office is in a building that has a McDonald's on the bottom floor, and often a crowd of young people gather there on the weekends. Sometimes graffiti, urine and other things appear over the weekend. I have spoken to the RCMP about it, as have many people who live in the area. The police seem to be very limited in their ability to deal with the situation.

The residents who live in the area are very upset that nothing gets done. They see the police arrive to try to break up minor fights and so on and they hear these young offenders telling the police to f-off and get out of there. It has reached the stage that if the average person on the street witnesses a youth crime and tries to do something about it by calling the police, the whole exercise will turn out to be totally unsatisfactory for everyone involved; for the person who reported it, for the police, and for the people who had the damage done to their property. The only person who seems to get off scot free is this young offender who gets released right away and does not seem to have to pay any penalty for what he or she did.

In a semi-famous case that was printed in our local newspaper, I recently had the mother of a young offender come to my office. Shortly after arriving she burst into tears. She could hardly tell me the story. She had a son who was a young offender. He was a repeat offender. She had pleaded with judges. She had pleaded with people to get tough on this young guy and give him a sentence.

Unfortunately it seemed this kid was constantly given another chance. His crimes progressively got worse. Finally he was picked up on a series of break and enter charges and minor assault. The mother decided this time she would not bail him out; she would not do anything to get him out. She begged that he be put in jail. Of course a lawyer was engaged to defend the young man when he appeared in the courts. He was let out right away.

The first thing he did was to set fire to his family home. That same evening he burned down the family home because his mother had stood up and said something has to be done about this young man. The next day he was back in our local area serving pizzas as usual.

It is a pretty bad situation to have that going on in our society. The people in my riding certainly feel this bill is not going to address those sorts of problems.

I go back to the referendum that was held in my riding. It was one of the biggest samples ever taken on this issue. Over 7,000 votes were cast. We provided a very comprehensive householder. I know I cannot use props in the House so I cannot hold it up for everyone to see.

We set out the background of the Young Offenders Act in the householder and gave both sides of the argument. We quoted from a speech that the Minister of Justice made in a debate on March 17, 1994:

-the act substantially has been a success and that in principle it is the right approach. I am certain improvements are needed but I am equally certain this process will result in a confirmation of the enlightened approach which the Young Offenders Act contemplates.

That is not what the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police think. In its 1994 response to the Department of Justice report "Toward Safer Communities" we get the quote: "It is our view that the Young Offenders Act requires amendment in many areas and a piecemeal approach will prove ineffective. A comprehensive approach, which includes not only legislative change but also functional changes, is fundamental to addressing the problems of troubled youth".

I have a quotation from the working paper on the victims of violence with respect to the Young Offenders Act. It was also included in my householder: "Instead of becoming more responsible for their behaviour, young offenders are hiding behind the act. Society's right to protection from illegal behaviour has been eroded to the point that nothing short of a major shake-up of the Young Offenders Act will regain its confidence". That is absolutely true.

I have mentioned before in the House that I have gone into the schools in my area and we have discussed the Young Offenders Act. I have asked the young people there what they think of the Young Offenders Act. They think it is a sham. Many of the young people in the schools are afraid of it because it does not protect them from the gang violence that occurs in society.

I said to one young class: "Are you sure you are not just making this judgment that the Young Offenders Act is not working based on the hysteria in the community, that really you do not know what is in it and you are just making an emotional judgment?" Those hands went up again. About 35 out of 37 students in the class said: "No, it is not an emotional decision. We know what happens with the Young Offenders Act. We know how these gang members get off. We want something done about it".

Within the referendum that was held in my riding we had a separate electronic referendum for students. They too confirmed by over 95 per cent that they wanted the Young Offenders Act dramatically revised.

I do not think there is any question that the rate of youths charged with violent crimes per 100,000 population has increased dramatically since 1986. The rate of youths charged

with violent crimes has increased by an average of 14 per cent annually.

During this time the rate of adults charged with violent crimes increased only an average of 7 per cent. Therefore youth crime of a violent nature has really accelerated away from those that are happening at the adult level. This has to be because there is no deterrent in the present Young Offenders Act. Young people can do practically anything they want.

I am extremely disappointed that this bill does not give us what we really need to make a difference. I hope that eventually the minister will see the light, change his mind and bring in some tough provisions.

Besides all that, the Deputy Prime Minister promised to resign if the GST was not gone in one year and she still has not done it.

[Darrel Stinson, Reform, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Mr. Speaker, recently I received a letter from one of my constituents, Mr. Brian Gregory of Enderby, B.C. Although I have never met Mr. Gregory, I would like to quote from his letter. He says in part:

As time passes, it appears that more and more people are developing a lack of respect for the law and even outright indignation- If laws are unfair or unjust, then it is up to you, the lawmakers, to change the laws. This brings me to the main purpose of my letter: the criminal justice system.

The terrible tragedies recently involving Rodney Bell, Mindy Tran, and now, Melanie Carpenter, have exposed a weak, tattered criminal justice system.

Last night, my wife and I sat down and brainstormed a list of changes that we think would improve our criminal justice system.

Here is our list of changes which we'd like you to consider bringing to the attention of Parliament.

1. The law-abiding citizens must be protected at all costs.

2. An environment must be created where people regain respect and trust for the law. Justice must prevail.

3. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms should not apply to any criminal (including white collar) who is incarcerated. A separate set of minimum rights for criminals should be legislated.

4. Young offenders should attend adult court and their identities must not be hidden. Teenagers who are old enough to perform criminal acts are old enough to attend adult court and do "adult time". I do believe, however, they should be segregated from adults in separate prisons. These kids are old enough to know right from wrong.

5. Prisons should be located in remote areas.

6. Sentences for violent crimes must be increased and there should be no early release for "good behaviour".

7. Life sentences must mean life with no parole.

8. The law requiring mandatory release after serving two-thirds of a sentence must be rescinded.

9. If a prisoner refuses rehabilitation counselling, he should not be released even if he serves his entire sentence.

10. The public has the right to know if a violent offender lives in their neighbourhood.

11. Work camps should be reinstated so that criminals could put something back into society.

12. While I am not a big proponent of capital punishment, this may be necessary for violent repeat offenders or serial killers. An alternative would be life sentences with no parole.

As we have seen recently, the human element of the justice system makes it too risky that an innocent person will be put to death.

Mr. Gregory went on to write that these are the views of an average, middle class Canadian citizen. However, I am convinced that most Canadians share similar viewpoints:

Please do not be influenced by a few elite academics who say that the crime rate is decreasing. One preventable murder is one too many. Let us bring common sense and justice back to our justice system.

My staff phoned Mr. Gregory at 7 a.m. B.C. time this morning to ask if I could quote his letter today. His wife said that she was sure he would be tickled to have me do that. I was tickled to get such down to earth letter on the complex subject of the reforms that ordinary Canadians want to see enacted by Parliament so that law-abiding citizens will once again feel safe in their homes and in their communities.

By contrast, the puny little baby steps that are proposed by Bill C-37 do not begin to answer the need people have to see our young people regain respect for the law.

The Young Offenders Act today does just the opposite. It makes young people look at the law as if it were a joke.

In November many of us attended the justice for Joshua rally. We met here on November 3, which would have been Joshua's fifth birthday except that he died September 15 from head injuries received when a 16-year old in a stolen car fled police at high speed and rammed a van driven by Joshua's grandmother. The young offender was sentenced to one year in closed custody for criminal negligence causing death, one year in open custody, served at the same time, one year of probation and a five year driving prohibition.

In Ottawa-Hull some 10,000 motor vehicles per year are stolen, mostly by young offenders. Many of them will try to get away from police, thereby threatening public safety. Even in my own relatively law-abiding riding of Okanagan-Shuswap last year nearly 200 motor vehicles were stolen in the Vernon area, and more than 50 motor vehicles were stolen in Salmon Arm.

At the justice for Joshua rally Ottawa talk show host Steve Madely claimed that 20 per cent of young offenders have reoffended five times or more. For young victims like Joshua, there is no second chance.

Canadians are fed up with going easy on young offenders and especially violent offenders. Repeatedly they have called on us as law makers to put the justice back into our criminal justice system. Instead, Bill C-37 will not permit 10 and 11 year old offenders to be charged at an age when there is still hope of setting them straight.

[The Deputy Speaker]

My apologies to the hon. member but the time is 1.30 p.m. and we must proceed to private members' hour.

Property Rights

[Mike Scott, Reform, Skeena, BC]

moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should initiate an amendment to section 7 of the Constitution Act, 1982, to recognize the right of the individual to enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.

Mr. Speaker, it gives me a great deal of pleasure to rise in the Chamber to move that in the opinion of this House the government should initiate an amendment to section 7 of the Constitution Act, 1982, to recognize the right of the individual to enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice. Nothing is more important to a system of government than this.

In rising in this Chamber today I am following many people of greater stature and ability than myself who have fought for this most fundamental right. I follow, however unworthily, in the footsteps of those who have made the glorious revolution. I follow in the footsteps of those who confronted King John and compelled him to sign the Magna Carta. I follow in the footsteps of those who for 1,000 years or more have worked and when necessary have fought and died to ensure that governments serve the rights of their citizens rather than oppress them.

I intend to continue the fight for property rights, the core of our ancient liberties. Since this is not how most people understand the concept of property rights, I have three primary purposes in my remarks today. First, I would like to begin by explaining what property rights really are. Second, I would like to outline why they are central to the problem of good government. Then I would like to explain how my motion would address that problem.

Property rights begin with the concept of self-ownership. It is vital to stress this point because when people hear the term property they generally think of real property: houses, boats, mansions and yachts. They generally think not just of real property, but of real property of a luxurious nature. They think of property rights as protecting the rich, or as protecting the existing order of things. This is fundamentally and entirely wrong.

The essence of property rights is the concept of self-ownership, of the individual's conscience and the individual's judgment as inviolable, even sacred. People have the right to make their own decisions. That is my most fundamental belief.

Our property is ourselves, our labour, our imagination and our courage. The right to control one's own actions is what property rights is all about. Only by extension is property material.

In a universe of material things and in a universe in which time passes, a respect for self-ownership of others must mean a respect for the things they make or modify. Property does mean things too, but fundamentally, the right to own property is a right to own oneself, to make one's own decisions, to trade voluntarily with others, to labour freely and for oneself and not for others as a slave.

It is therefore profoundly mistaken to believe that property rights favour the rich. Take half of a rich man's things and he will still be well off, but take half of a poor man's or a middle class man's things away and what hope do they have of one day being comfortable?

It is also unsound to say that one can be free without ownership of the things one makes with one's labour. It is unsound to contrast mere material things with higher matters such as love. However bright the eye of a beloved child, food, clothing and shelter are essential to that child, but they are not the end of that child's material needs. It is not a case of satisfying material needs and then moving to a higher plateau. Toys, games, books and the very arms with which a parent hugs a child are all material. No parent who cannot make a thing and keep it or trade it for another, whether simple food or a book of poetry can express their love effectively and freely.

The right of self-ownership is fundamental. It must imply the right to control the material things that one owns, makes or alters. However, its origin is in self-ownership: the ownership of ourselves, our labour and our imagination.

Those who deny the right to own property, deny not the right of the exploiter to hoard, but the right of the ordinary citizen to live according to his or her own lights. That right is fundamental to human dignity.

That brings me to my second point, the problem of good government. However sound the right of self-ownership may be in abstract theory, it is threatened in practice from two directions.

People may be subject to force and fraud from within their own community. Their rights may be insecure either in theory or in practice, if theft is legal or if it is unpunished. If that is the case, nothing we may do to make the world a better place as we understand it can persist. Whatever is achieved is snatched away. Then whatever a person may dream will be only a dream. It will never be realized.

People may be subjected to force and fraud from outside. Whatever system of rights they possess, an attack from outside may overwhelm that system and leave them raped and murdered in their burning houses. Whatever they have achieved may be taken away this way also.

Therefore people combine into societies and create governments. Through them they seek to define a system of rights and enforce it internally and also protect the system as a whole from attack from the outside. Sometimes they fail and if they do the results are clearly catastrophic. A government too weak to protect the lives, liberty and property of its citizens is unbearable, but the usual problem is quite the reverse.

Through most of human history the problem has been that governments wield too much power. The usual result of having a government too weak to protect people's rights is to have it displaced by one strong enough to do it, but unwilling to.

The historical problem is that governments have had the ability to protect citizens but not the will. Instead, they themselves have taken these rights away. What they have done is to treat citizens as means and not ends. They declare some higher purpose and then force citizens to seek to fulfil it, whatever it may be.

In most parts of the world the problem of government quite simply has never been solved. The Romans considered it. "Quis custodiet custodientes?" they asked. Who shall guard the guardians? But they did not solve it.

In the Anglo-American tradition it was solved, if imperfectly. The solution was partly theoretical and partly practical, but the larger and more impersonal societies and governments became the more important, the theory was. In Britain the Anglo-Saxon councils seemed somehow to have solved the problem of government, to give chiefs and leaders some power but not too much. They could defend rights but not take them away.

After the Norman conquest it seemed that government had triumphed over society, but it had not. At swordpoint at Runnymede, civil society told King John he would sign the Magna Carta or he would die and it told him he would abide by it or he would die.

When the Stuarts sought to shake free of it the people revolted. Charles I lost his head over it, literally. When Oliver Cromwell sought to use power to engage in social engineering, the people withdrew their consent to be governed. Shortly after his death the Commonwealth was abolished.

The monarchy was brought back under strictly limited terms after James II showed he would not keep the bargain. The glorious revolution brought William and Mary to the throne but also the 1689 Bill of Rights. Again the right of the citizen to be free from his or her own government triumphed.

Governments, however, have a real tendency to encroach. The guardians must be guarded. It was that which led to the revolt in the 13 colonies in the 1770s. It was the danger of another revolt that led to the Durham report urging self-government in this country. For most of our history the common law and its protection of the right to own property withstood any attempt to undermine it.

Unfortunately what wise men create clever men can undo. And so it was here. The Right Hon. Pierre Elliot Trudeau neither fully understood nor cared much about the notion of citizens as ends rather than means, nor did he understand or sympathize with the British parliamentary tradition and the supremacy of common law.

In 1982, quite casually, he traded away our most fundamental right in a slick and clever political calculation, but he should not have done it. Since 1982 things have gone downhill very fast in this country. Since 1982 we have somehow had the idea that government is the master and the citizen is the servant.

Mr. Trudeau felt very clever because he had reached agreement with the premiers to have the Constitution repatriated. However, when one level of government agrees with another to abolish citizens' protection against government, a protection 1,000 years old or more, it is not good and it is not wise. Therefore, I want this House to take steps to restore it to the Constitution.

The Canadian people were denied a chance to vote on property rights in 1982 when the Constitution was repatriated. Nobody asked them. They were denied it again in 1992 when the right to own property was deliberately omitted from the Charlottetown accord, against the wishes of the Canadian people I might add. They have been denied it here because hon. members opposite have denied the House a chance to vote on this motion, to stand up and be counted with the Commons or with bad King John. However, it is time we restored it.

What I am proposing is very precise, that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms should be amended to include the following:

The federal government shall take no property from any citizen, in whole or in part, through eminent domain, regulation, or any other way, except for public use, through due process and with just and timely compensation.

This does not encroach on provincial jurisdiction. It only binds the federal government. It does not paralyse public policy. It only holds it to a reasonable standard of serving the public and not abusing it. It does not forbid takings. It only insists that they must be done in a legitimate way and for a legitimate purpose.

What it does do is admit the existence of the paradox of government and to seek to apply the solution of wise men to the problems created by those who were merely clever. It seeks to restore government to its proper function: protecting the rights of citizens, not usurping them, not taking them away.

The most important of these rights is the right to own property. That right is the right to own oneself, to be a free person and not a slave. I therefore urge this House to express itself in favour of the entrenchment of the right to own private property in the Constitution.

Many of my colleagues will have an opportunity to speak to this motion today but many others will not. It is an additional unfortunate consequence of being denied votable status that the time for debate is drastically restricted.

Those of my colleagues who would like to speak but cannot have therefore asked me to read into the record a statement of their support. On behalf of the members for Calgary Northeast, Lethbridge, Mission-Coquitlam, Prince George-Peace River, Port Moody-Coquitlam, Prince George-Bulkley Valley, Vegreville and Wetaskiwin, I would like to conclude with this statement:

"Mr. Speaker, hon. colleagues and fellow Canadians, we believe the right to own property and not to be deprived thereof, except for public use, through due process and with just compensation is at the core of Canadians' ancient liberties as free people. Each of us would like to be able to rise in the Chamber today to voice our support for the entrenchment of that right in the Constitution. In case we do not have that opportunity today, we have asked our colleague, the member for Skeena, to place this statement of our support for this measure into the record".

I hope that all members of whatever party in this House will share and endorse that sentiment. This is most emphatically not a partisan issue but a matter of fundamental justice and human rights.

[Shaughnessy Cohen, Liberal, Windsor—St. Clair, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this motion. I want to thank the hon. member opposite for bringing this issue to the fore.

He seeks to initiate an amendment to section 7 of the great Canadian Charter of Rights to recognize the right of the individual to the enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof, except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice, a right which exists.

I caution the member to recall-he seems to be quite the student of history-that there was another great revolution against the crown of Britain, the American revolution. As a result of that, it also has a constitution. It is a constitution that has created a tremendous problem in its courts with the issue of the entrenchment of property rights.

We have had a pleasant visit this week from the President of the United States. Perhaps it is timely to raise this issue today, even as he departs from our country.

It is probably a good idea to look at what happened down south when we look at the question of the entrenchment of property rights. As I understand it, the courts in the United States have extended property rights beyond traditional forms of property such as land or housing to include such things as social security benefits, drivers' licences and employment with the government; entitlements, I think they are called. These are considered to be forms of property in the United States to which constitutional property rights protections apply.

This is an interesting notion, particularly when one contrasts this with what I think is the traditional view of the Reform Party. If the reform Party in its infancy can have any tradition, surely it is its opposition to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and its opposition to what it thinks is government involvement in the activities of ordinary citizens.

I would suggest that an amendment to section 7 conflicts with those fundamental beliefs it purports to have. Certainly the American experience raises questions about how Canadian courts would interpret a property rights amendment if such rights were added to the charter.

One wonders what the impact would be. The impact would be an unwarranted interference in the property rights of Canadians. Our American neighbours also had some unfortunate experience with constitutional property rights during the first half of this century. This was under what became known as the doctrine of substantive due process. Under this doctrine the American courts, the United States Supreme Court included, struck down some important social legislation such as laws regulating the maximum hours of work, laws regulating minimum wage and child labour laws.

Child labour laws were struck down because they were seen to be violations of the employer's property rights, or should I say the slave owner's property rights.

The United States Supreme Court ultimately repudiated this approach in the 1930s. Nevertheless the American courts have continued to apply American constitutional protections in a variety of areas.

Canadian courts would be free to follow their own approach to constitutional rights issues and have done so even where provisions in our Constitution and our charter are similar to American constitutional provisions.

Given that we share so much in common with the United States in terms of our legal foundations, I would suggest to the members opposite that it would be well worth studying the American experience.

Undoubtedly this effort would be repaid in the greater understanding that we would develop about the meaning of property rights and their potential impact on our system.

The more one delves into this matter, the more one realizes that it is not easy and it is not clear. Nevertheless, the Reform Party typically puts forward the quick fix, the simple solution to a problem that exists primarily in its mind.

We should start with the simple and basic idea of the right to own and enjoy property. Your home, your property should not arbitrarily be interfered with. How could anyone dispute that?

When we start to examine the concept of property and when we start to see its actual and possible scope, when we begin to understand the range and the extent of laws that regulate or affect property, when we begin to understand all of these concepts, we need to take a step back and look at this in a concerted fashion.

It is one thing to talk about this in general and abstract terms but it is quite another thing when we consider the entrenchment of these kinds of rights in our constitution, an action that would result in power to the courts to review a whole range of laws which in some way may affect ownership or use of property.

Entrenching property rights in the Constitution would require the approval of the majority of the provinces. Given that the Constitution already gives the provinces jurisdiction over property and civil rights within their boundaries, I would assume they would have a rather prominent interest in this and certainly a real and valid one. Given that their agreement would be required for any change to the Constitution, I would argue that this is not the sort of step that could or should be accomplished through unilateral measures.

Students of the Constitution will tell members that this may be the kind of measure that a province could opt out of under the amending formulas set out in section 38 of the Constitution Act of 1982.

The parliamentary record from the debates leading up to the patriation of the Constitution and since that time indicates that some provinces have had concerns about constitutional changes that would constrain their ability to regulate property.

I do not know where the provinces stand on this issue at the present time but I am fairly certain that it is not a priority for them. The party opposite should know very well that reopening the Constitution is not a priority for the vast majority of Canadians at this time.

We have evolved elaborate laws regulating and protecting the ownership and enjoyment of property. Real and personal property laws regulate acquisition and disposition of all kinds of property and they regulate in some cases how property is managed or the use to which it is put.

The point of these laws is not, as the member opposite suggests, to burden individuals, but rather to ensure that these transactions occur in an orderly and fair fashion and to guard against mistakes or fraud in the purchase, sale and management of property.

In Quebec the civil code provides for the disposition of real and personal property and in other provinces statutes and common law deal with the same issues.

These common law rules can be traced back hundreds of years in English law. While we are on that, they can be traced back farther than the Magna Carta.

I cannot stand on this side of the House and not comment on my friend's argument concerning the glorious revolution. I would suggest that the glorious revolution and the Reform Party cannot be seen to be synonymous. The Magna Carta, which really is a predecessor and a direct line to our own charter, provided basic fundamental rights.

The Reform Party today stands in the House and seeks by this amendment to narrow those rights. The present charter for Canada was a part of and proof of the glorious revolution; the glorious revolution in Canada being the revolution that entrenched for us forever basic human rights and other basic civil liberties, my friend says the most important of which is the right to own property.

There are other views on which of these rights is more important. One of those rights is clearly the right of the citizen to live freely in this country.

The glorious revolution, an amendment to entrench property rights in the Constitution. I say that is an attempt by those who

support it to limit the rights of Canadians and to prevent Canadians through their government from protecting themselves.

[Bernard St-Laurent, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, amending the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms so as to include the right to enjoyment of property is not a new idea. The entrenchment of a property right was an objective of the former Liberal government of 1968. Indeed, the Prime Minister of the time, Mr. Pierre Elliott Trudeau, who had also been a Minister of Justice, proposed the adoption of a charter designed to ensure the constitutional protection of certain rights including, of course, the right to enjoyment of property.

As you know, that motion was rejected. In 1978, some provinces squarely opposed the idea, which was included in a bill on constitutional reform, Bill C-60. As I recall, those provinces included Manitoba and Prince Edward Island.

In 1980, the federal government proposed a new measure to guarantee the right to enjoyment of property. Again, the provinces strongly opposed the idea. Consequently, I have to tell the hon. member that, if he hopes to see section 7 of the Constitution Act, 1982, amended so as to include such a right, he has a very difficult task ahead of him. To give you an idea of how difficult this would be, assuming it can be done, it is important to look at the technical aspects of the issue for a moment.

First, since the charter is part of the Constitution, it can only be changed by way of an amendment to the Constitution itself. This first requires resolutions from the Senate and the House of Commons, something which is not easily obtained, and, second, resolutions from the legislative assemblies of at least two thirds of the provinces, the latter representing at least 50 per cent of the Canadian population. That also is not going to be easy to get.

This latter condition implies that Ontario or Quebec will have to be one of the provinces that support a draft amendment, since together, they represent more than 50 per cent of the population. Furthermore, the Constitution Act, 1982 provides under section 38(2), I believe, that the resolution must be adopted by a majority of the members of a legislative assembly, as opposed to a majority of the members present at the time of voting, if the proposed amendment derogates from the legislative powers, the proprietary rights or any other rights or privileges of the legislature or government of a province. That would be the case here if the Charter were amended to include property rights. As the hon. member can see, his motion is practically dead in the water.

So far, judgments up to the Supreme Court, have failed to establish that property rights should be protected under the 1982 Charter. This was even ruled out in the Irwin Toys Ltd. judgment, an important decision supported by a majority on the Supreme Court, which stated that the intentional exclusion of property rights from section 7 and its replacement by the "security of the person" had a twofold effect. First, one can conclude that on the whole, economic rights, generally designated by the term "property rights", are not covered by section 7. However, that does not mean that no rights with economic overtones could not be covered by the term "security of the person".

In other words, there are some serious reservations because of the potential negative impact. Many groups have expressed their concerns about the possible entrenchment of property rights in the Constitution. I will mention some of their concerns as well as some of their priorities.

Aboriginal people are, for instance, apprehensive about the potential impact on their land claims and property rights. Nowadays this is a sensitive issue, and land claims are sacro-sanct. The unions are worried about a conflict between the rights of workers and the rights of those who own the resources. Environmental groups wonder about the legislative impact if property rights were entrenched in the Constitution, rights that are entirely legitimate.

The provinces should be concerned that entrenchment of property rights would allow the courts to obstruct the application of laws that protect important community interests, including legislation on planning and land use, ownership of moveable goods and real estate, and even legislation on health and safety.

Entrenchment would have clearly unpredictable and even absurd consequences for municipal by-laws on zoning, environmental regulations and spousal property rights in the case of marriage breakdown.

Take, for example, the case of a man and a woman who separate, who get a divorce. The family patrimony act, a provincial statute, provides that in case of marriage dissolution, the house shall be sold and the proceeds of sale divided between the ex-spouses. In the event that the Constitution is amended to include the right to property, as is being proposed by my Reform colleague, that would mean that the ex-spouse who bought the house could contest the provincial legislation under the Canadian Charter simply by saying that his or her right to enjoyment of property is being interfered with. The other spouse would thus be completely deprived of his rights under the provincial legislation. There would be no solution to the dispute. The lack of sense of such an amendment is therefore readily apparent.

The entrenchment of the right to property in the Canadian Charter is also dangerous and represents an intrusion of the federal government into an area of jurisdiction reserved exclusively for the provinces under section 92(13) of the Constitution

Act, 1867, which states that only the provinces may make laws regarding property and civil rights in each province.

Furthermore, how will the courts interpret the right to property, since in Quebec, the civil law governs this right and the courts interpret it from a civil law point of view, while in the other provinces a common law interpretation is used?

In conclusion, I would like to point out that no one can say that this right is less respected in Canada than elsewhere in the world. It is clear that, for the official opposition, the real interest in such an amendment probably stems from considerations of a completely different sort. It is clear that the addition of such a right to legislation transcending the powers of the federal and provincial governments, such as the Charter of Rights, and entrenching enduring values for regulating the life of society constitutes, for the federal government, a powerful means of once again interfering in an exclusively provincial area of jurisdiction.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bellemare)]

As no government member wishes to speak, I now go to the Reform Party.

The members of the Reform Party have asked me if there is consent to split the ten minute period between the member for Yorkton-Melville and the member for Nanaimo-Cowichan, allowing each five minutes.

Is there unanimous consent?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Garry Breitkreuz, Reform, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it is unusual to find champions of property rights who are active in politics.

A lot of people reacted to the Reform Party with surprise and with a sense that we did not belong in federal politics. There is a real sense in which they were right, though not for the reason that they believed. We are not typical politicians. It is that we really do not like big government. That is why we are here. We think we have to be here. It is not just because we want to be.

I have been trying to understand why Canadians are in such a bad mood these days and why government seems to be at the centre of all their complaints. I believe it is because of the issue before us today.

The right to own property means the right to live unmolested by government. I listened very carefully to the arguments of the member from Windsor, but the objections are those that are typical of the Liberal Party that believes in more big government. I listened carefully to the argument the Bloc presented, that this was a provincial matter.

Who will protect the people of Canada from more big federal government? Will it be the provinces? I think there is a real contradiction in what Bloc members are saying about their own policies and their own beliefs. In a democracy government is not them; it is us. It is not the government molesting us. It is one another through government.

We have decided we can vote ourselves free money and we can. The more we try to beat wealth out of one another and tolerance and all other virtues, the more angry we get not just with government but with one another. Democracy is the practice of voting for public authorities. That is a way of keeping government under control, not a way of legitimizing any action it may take.

The right to own and use private property means the right to live unmolested by government. It really is not the government taking our hard earned tax dollars, our property; it is all of us molesting and taking property from each other through government.

Government is not benevolent. Government is force. The more wealth we try to get from each other through government, the more angry we get not just with government but with each other. We have trouble seeing what the lack of property rights has caused us and society. Too many of us believe that democracy gives the government the ultimate authority to take away our fundamental rights and our property. However this is just using democracy as an excuse. What we have in Canada is not a true democracy. We vote every four or five years to elect another bunch of tax and spend specialists who disregard our fundamental right to own and use our own property.

That is not what democracy is. Democracy is supposed to be a way of keeping government under control, not a way of legitimizing the confiscation of private property without due process of law and without fair and timely compensation. Voting should be a way of preventing government from taking our property. Instead we have become addicted to using it as a tool to take one another's wealth. That is socialism.

This is what I think is wrong with Canada and no amount of voting can fix it. For example, if private property rights were in our Constitution, the justice minister could not implement his gun control laws and we would all be better off. Unless we hold a referendum to include the right of private property in the Constitution we have little hope of getting true democracy in Canada. We need true democracy in our country and we need it desperately.

We in the House need to amend the Constitution or hold a referendum on the subject of putting the right to own property into the Constitution.

The member for Skeena has asked me to read a statement into the record in support of the motion. The principle and policy is our blue book policy and that would therefore include all

Reform MPs. Hopefully the government will consider carefully what we have presented in our reasoned argument.

[Bob Ringma, Reform, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I like to think Canadians live in a democratic and just society. I like to believe Canada is a country which respects the rule of law.

However when I look at our Constitution including the Charter of Rights and Freedoms I become concerned. Property rights constitute the most fundamental of rights: the right to keep what we earn, to acquire what we need through fair exchange and to enjoy those freedoms while respecting the rights of others.

Thomas Bethell wrote in Property and Justice : ``There is a close relationship between the operation of a private property system and the idea of justice itself''. As Canadians we believe we have an inherent right to justice. That means if a criminal steals something we expect to be compensated and we expect the criminal to be punished. If neither happens we are morally outraged.

It is our fundamental belief in justice that has motivated many Canadians to demand stiffer penalties for criminals, to demand more accountability of government spending of their tax dollars, and to demand the retrenchment of their property rights.

In a just society the weak do not have to fear the strong or the corrupt because they know their rights will be respected and the rule of law will protect them. In a just society the state will defend individual property rights from those who would take them. One reason for the state having a police force is to prevent criminals from violating the rights of other citizens.

Likewise when the state arbitrarily confiscates private property without regard to the rule of law justice has failed. Our justice system is built on the concept of private ownership, on the premise that when someone takes something from another they have broken a fundamental law of our society. This is because or possessions are privately owned, not commonly owned. Property can generally be state owned, privately owned or commonly owned. In Canada we like to think we have private ownership, but how can we guarantee it without constitutional protection?

A system of common ownership is by its very nature unjust. Anyone can take the fruits of our labours but it is not called stealing. It is called redistribution because everyone in the community owns whatever is produced. This ultimately leads to a society where justice means from each according to his ability and to each according to their need. Have we heard that one before? Inevitably under this system the needy are merely the greedy and the honest workers are the destitute.

In a society where the state claims ownership or control over property and arbitrarily denies its citizens the right to use and enjoy their property then it has broken its covenant with the people.

Individual liberty and freedom is lost and a state that does not respect the rule of law is a tyranny. Sometimes Canadians have a hard time defining what it is to be Canadian but I do not think communal or state ownership of property fits with that definition.

There is something wrong when Canadians have a fundamental belief in property rights and yet nowhere is that right expressly protected. Why does the government not recognize this right?

There is something wrong when a minister can arbitrarily impose his personal beliefs on society and enact legislation to deprive law-abiding citizens of their property because he does not like guns. This means that Canadians are being governed by people who do not believe in basic property rights. This is not comforting.

In support of M-301 I would sleep better at night knowing that my property rights were protected. I therefore wholly support this motion.

[The Deputy Speaker]

We would normally pass to the other side of the floor but the member I see rising has already spoken and may not speak again. Accordingly, the hon. member for Kindersley-Lloydminster will divide his time with unanimous consent among three members.

[Elwin Hermanson, Reform, Kindersley—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I would like consent to divide my time with the member for Vancouver North and the member for Saanich-Gulf Islands.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Do we have unanimous consent for the members to do that?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Deputy Speaker]

There are three and a third minutes for the hon. member.

[Elwin Hermanson, Reform, Kindersley—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure you will have your stop watch out.

I am very pleased to express my support for property rights in Canada. The issue of property rights is an important one for all Canadians. It is not merely an issue for the wealthy or for those with business interests.

It is not an issue that can be labelled left or right. It is about personal freedom which is fundamental to free societies. It is a tragedy that a mature democracy like Canada has excluded the right to own property from its constitutional and legal tradition. I will explain how the issue of property rights, or rather a lack of them, adversely affects prairie farmers.

The effect of inadequate property provisions in our legal system means that these farmers do not really own all the commodities they produce. To own something means that one can choose how one uses one's property so long as it does not harm others.

Wheat is not a hazardous substance, therefore the farmer should be able to sell his grain to anyone he pleases by the marketing mechanisms he or she with colleagues choose at whatever price the buyer and seller mutually agree to.

Moreover, the farmer would have the choice of the means of transportation and the route taken to ship the wheat. After all, it is his grain, is it not? In the prairies wheat does not belong to the farmer. It is not his because he cannot sell it freely. He is told who he will sell the grain to. He is told what the price will be and he is told how he must ship the grain. Because of the lack of property rights in Canada, farmers do not own the wheat they produce with their own labour. By implication, the farmer does not own his own labour and therefore he does not own himself.

The farmer is reduced to being an agent of the state, paid for his efforts whatever the government decides to pay him for the produce. If property rights were honoured, all farmers would have the choice whether they wanted to market collectively. I am sure many farmers would make that choice. That is fine as long as it is the farmer's free choice and not one mandated by government.

It is said all that a man owns is himself and his labour. Because of that he then owns the fruit of his labour. By introducing property rights into the Canadian legal tradition we would be freeing farmers to make their own choices about how to meet their own needs using their own resources and the fruits of their own labour. Property rights legislation would give each farmer the authority to make his or own decision as to how to meet those needs.

I would urge all members of this House, particularly members from farm communities, to support the principle of property rights in Canada.