Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak on the motion that this House give second reading to and concur in the amendment made by the Senate to Bill C-42, an act to amend the Judges Act and to make consequential amendments to another act.
As hon. members will recall, Bill C-42 received third reading in this Chamber on June 18, 1996. In the Senate the government moved and the Senate agreed to an amendment to one clause of the bill, clause 5, which was passed by this House. It was a provision of general application regarding international activities of federally appointed judges.
The original purpose of the clause was to clarify the terms on which judges could engage in activities abroad, such as technical assistance projects in developing countries. It would have changed the existing law by allowing judges who participated in such activities, with the authorization of Canada, to receive expenses directly from an international organization.
The original clause 5 would also have established a framework within which judges could, with the authorization of Canada, work for an international organization of states or an institution thereof. Such a judge could, with the approval of the governor in council and after consultation with the chairman of the Canadian Judicial Council, request a leave of absence without pay in order to be paid directly by the international organization.
During the consideration of Bill C-42 in the Senate certain concerns were expressed about the implications for judicial independence of certain aspects of clause 5. It became evident that to obtain passage of the bill without further delay, the government had to agree to amend clause 5 to restrict its application to one specific case, that of Madam Justice Louise Arbour.
As hon. members will recall, Madam Justice Arbour of the Ontario Court of Appeal had been appointed by unanimous resolution of the United Nations Security Council following the recommendation of the UN secretary-general to the position of chief prosecutor of the United Nations war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. For independence reasons the UN insists that the chief prosecutor not receive his or her salary and expenses from a member state but instead directly from the United Nations.
Clause 5, as passed by the House in June, reflected sound policy and practical considerations and fully respected the principle of judicial independence. By moving an amendment to clause 5 in the Senate, the government did not accept that the arguments of those who said that clause 5 as originally worded would have threatened judicial independence.
The government moved its amendment for the sole and simple reason that it saw no other way to proceed quickly with the bill. The Senate's amendment to clause 5 would specifically authorize Madam Justice Arbour alone to take a leave of absence for the purpose of serving as the chief prosecutor of the UN war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.
It would also permit her to elect to leave without pay and to receive salary and expenses directly from the UN in connection with her service as the chief prosecutor. In other words, by this amendment, clause 5 would cease to be a general amendment to cover the use of Canadian judges for international activities.
I would add that while the Canadian Judicial Council would have preferred to see the passage of clause 5 as originally approved by the House, the council has no objection to the amended version of this clause.
Bill C-42 would permit Madam Justice Arbour to respond to the request of the United Nations secretary-general and the security council to take on an international assignment of enormous importance to the world at large. They are counting on Canada to undertake the necessary measures to allow her to serve in accordance with reasonable and understandable needs of the UN.
Certainly all Canadians can be proud that one of our citizens, one of our judges, is representing this country and indeed the world at large in such an important forum. Therefore, I urge hon. members to approve the Senate's amendment to clause 5 of Bill C-42 as quickly as possible.
All other aspects of Bill C-42 as passed by the House in June remain unchanged. The bill would transfer from cabinet to chief justices the authority to approve judicial leaves of absence of up to six months as recommended by the last two triennial commissions on judges' salaries and benefits and endorsed by the Canadian Judicial Council.
The bill recognizes the importance of the Court Martial Appeal Court of Canada by including the chief justice of that court on the membership of the Canadian Judicial Council and authorizes the payment of a modest accountable representational allowance of up to $5,000 per year to the head of that court.
The chief justices of the courts of appeal of the Yukon and the Northwest Territories would also be granted similar representational allowances.
Bill C-42 would also permit the appointments of up to three additional judges Canada-wide to the provincial courts of appeal which have been experiencing increasing workloads and backlogs over the past number of years.
It is the minister's stated opinion to recommend that two of these new appointments be made to the British Columbia Court of Appeal which needs more judges to deal with its workload and one to the Ontario Court of Appeal to replace Madam Justice Arbour.
Finally, the bill would correct some of the technical errors and clarify some ambiguous language that exists in the Judges Act. Therefore, I call on all hon. members to support these changes to the Judges Act.