Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Wild Rose for his question. I believe the hon. member was not referring to consecutive sentences but rather to multiple sentences contained in section 139 of the Corrections and Conditional Release Act. If there is a section of the Corrections and Conditional Release Act which might qualify as the word my friend used in his previous speech, gobbledegook, it is that section.
We struggled with the section when we initially went through the Corrections and Conditional Release Act. We had flow charts. We had chiefs of police showing us what would happen if someone sentenced to 20 years for armed robbery committed another robbery while on parole. He would get out even before he ended up serving any time on the first offence.
The solicitor general at the time, Mr. Lewis, acknowledged there was a serious problem, that there was a lot of difficulty, and that he would set up a commission or a group of people to examine the matter and come back with some recommendations.
My understanding is that it has been dealt with to some extent in Bill C-45. However I think there is a lot of room for improvement with respect to the multiple sentence calculation. As I said, we missed the Wray Budreo situation but when that situation arose we dealt with it. Tragically it may very well be that the amendments to multiple sentencing, the changes to the calculations, have not dealt with all the problems. It is a very complicated section and a very complicated area of the law.
However if a case comes down that slips through the cracks or exposes an egregious error in the calculations that Canadians simply cannot abide, we will have to come up with an amendment. I am certain the government of the day will do so. No government is in the business of permitting loopholes to legislation. No government is in the business of wanting wild animals to walk the streets to threaten ordinary law-abiding citizens.
We have made an effort to change section 139. I do not know that it is perfect. If it is not perfect we will soon know about it. Whatever government is in power at whatever time will make whatever changes are necessary to tighten the multiple sentence calculations.
I cannot sit down without a word about the Bernardo case, which my friend has raised a number of times. Canadians may not like the reality of the law, but it is that Paul Bernardo has been sentenced to life in prison. I am not talking about when and if he will ever be paroled. He is under a sentence of life and as long as he lives he will be under a sentence of life imprisonment. As the law currently stands-and never mind the 15-year faint hope clause for the time being-he cannot even be considered eligible to apply for parole until he serves 25 years of his sentence. When he applies for parole, assuming he does, after that 25 years there is no guarantee he will get parole. The parole board can refuse him parole for the rest of his natural life and he can spend the rest of his natural life in prison.
Even if he gets parole 25 or 30 years from now, he is still under a sentence of life imprisonment. If he breaches any of the conditions of his parole at that time, 25 or 30 years from now, he can be brought back into the prison system to serve the rest of his sentence.
I want to make it clear that it is incorrect to say that persons who commit first degree murder is sentenced to 25 years. That is false. They are sentenced to life in prison and they have the opportunity to apply for parole after 25 years.
It is up to the parole board to decide on a case by case basis whether or not a particular murderer should be granted parole. For my part I certainly hope that neither Bernardo, Clifford Olson nor the people who murdered Emanuel Jacques, the shoe shine boy, ever get out of prison. I hope they rot in their cells, daily remembering the tragedies they have wrought.
Let us talk facts. These people are under sentences of imprisonment for life.