Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Longueuil for his unexpected question. I heard some members yawn across the way while his asked his question. What we get are unexpected questions. I would like the people watching us or following question period to realize that, when a Liberal member puts a question to a Liberal minister, the minister has received the text of the question ahead of time and is then able to read his answer. Conversely, when the question comes from the official opposition, they do not get the text ahead of time. Just between us, the questions we are asking one another are real questions. I did not know ahead of time what my colleague, the hon. member for Longueuil was going to ask me.
I will answer him by expressing a difference.
I am talking about the distinction made in this bill between a superior court judge, be it the Quebec superior court, the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court, and the judges sitting on administrative tribunals.
At the superior court level, judges normally remain on the bench until the age of 75, unless removal is considered in extremely serious and rare cases. A resolution has even to be passed by Parliament to have a remove federal jurisdiction judge.
It is like this case that was almost referred to us-it is common knowledge-the case of Judge Bienvenue, who eventually decided to retire. I think that was a wise decision on his part. Perhaps he suspected how the House of Commons would vote. Following a serious investigation conducted by the judicial council, judges from various provinces recommended that Judge Bienvenue be
removed from the bench. That is the procedure to have a superior court judge removed.
The offence has to be really very serious to warrant such action, while, with this bill, if the trust of the jurisprudence is not to the liking of the government, a judge may be removed, because, unlike the situation I described earlier, where judges were appointed for a fixed period, which provided a degree of job security and ensured a degree of independence in the decision making process during the three, five, or seven years of the mandate, they are now designated. "I designate you today and I can take your designation away the next day. You can get sacked whenever the minister feels like it." That is the difference.