Mr. Speaker, I am honoured today to support the private member's bill by the hon. member for Mississauga East. This is a good bill. It is therefore regrettable that it has not been deemed votable.
The member who moved this bill has given one of the most eloquent speeches I have ever heard made in this House. It so clearly described the control that the bleeding heart mentality has had upon the justice system for the past 25 years.
The Liberals campaigned on a promise to give backbenchers more weight in this government through added private members' bills. By the admission of the member for Mississauga East, one of the Liberal's own backbenchers, this promise has been broken. The government backbencher accused the Liberal dominated four member committee that determines which private members' bills will be votable of short circuiting controversial bills such as this bill.
The Mississauga East MP said: "We supposedly have open government but we have secret committees and I would guarantee that no member of that committee would oppose the bill openly. They were just encouraged in secret. I am not suggesting it is a kangaroo court. It is more like a cockroach court. You cannot see them at work and they run".
The hon. member was also quoted in the Hill Times a couple of months ago as saying: ``If I had a bill on lawn care, I bet I would have success in getting it through the committee. If I had a bill that offered better treatment for criminals it would race through the place in a week. But if you have a bill that wants to side with the victims or correct an obscene injustice in our system you can expect resistance and many years of effort and debate''.
I could not agree with a member more. The member made these comments in reference to her private member's bill on consecutive sentencing, Bill C-321, which was rejected by her colleagues.
Harsher comments appeared in the Hill Times yesterday in reference to Private Members' Business. These words, which I would like to reiterate, are from Debbie Mahaffy, the mother of murder victim Leslie Mahaffy:
I am disgusted but not surprised by the heartless comments on the issue of consecutive sentencing that came out of the flapping mouths of government Liberal members as recorded in your paper on November 11, "MPs Slag Private Members' Business".
-the Secretary of State for the Status of Women says she was not familiar with this serious issue for victims' families because she had not attended caucus that week and as a result had nothing to say. Could it be that the issue of consecutive sentencing has been at more caucus meetings than she? Or perhaps she simply doesn't read newspapers about serious issues of crime.
Another cruel remark dealing with sentencing of serial predators made by another bright light Liberal-
She named the Liberal which I am not allowed to do, but that Liberal happens to be the chair of the women's caucus.
-chair of the women's caucus is equally inane. Her diatribe that she might support consecutive sentencing if (the member for Mississauga East) brings the issue to the forefront again is mindless and absurd to say the least. The fact that she made this comment after consulting with the justice minister and the Liberal (member for Mississauga West) adds to the obscenity. With this calibre of consultants, I suggest it is time for (the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore) to seek better advisers.
I have omitted a small portion of Mrs. Mahaffy's letter to the Hill Times but I would like to read her last paragraph which has been quoted already in this House but deserves being quoted again. She said: ``Shame on all of you for adding to our pain and for your lack of humanity and the lack of wisdom to make a difference''.
I will also read from an article which appeared on November 27 in a B.C. newspaper regarding the justice committee's national forum on youth justice. For the record, I did not support the expenditure of $60,000 to host this meeting because I felt we would be going over old ground by hearing from a number of witnesses who had already appeared before the committee. My opposition to this wasteful use of taxpayers' money caused me to endure a berating and to have obscenities thrown at me by the chair of the committee.
Nevertheless I quote from that article:
Ottawa was a bust for Chuck Cadman. Cadman, whose teenage son Jesse was stabbed to death by another teen four years ago, was invited to speak before the federal standing committee on justice affairs last weekend in Canada's capital city. But the Guildford dad who founded the victims rights group Crime, Responsibility and Youth (CRY) after his son was murdered, says the trip was a waste of time. "I spoke maybe five minutes total", he said. "It was a joke. I shouldn't have even bothered going. The meeting was poorly chaired", he charged.
Of 33 participants, Cadman said, only himself and a representative of Canadians Against Violence Everywhere Advocating its Termination (CAVEAT), another victims' rights group, spoke from the victims' perspective. The other participants were lawyers, criminologists and members of groups like the John Howard society, a group advocating convicts' rights. Everything else was geared to the rights of offenders Cadman said. "I was the only person in the whole bunch who took the victims' side to anything", he said, "and someone from CAVEAT". He said he appreciated being asked to attend, but added, "it was so obviously one-sided".
It certainly is not the first time a witness or an observer has called the committee a bust or a sham. The mayor of Cornwall walked out on the committee calling it a complete waste of time and accusing the committee of being predisposed. I am a member of that committee and sometimes I cannot disagree with the observations of Mr. Cadman and the mayor of Cornwall.
So far in this Parliament, 16 private members' bills have been introduced to reform Canada's criminal justice system. What has happened to the vast majority of these bills? Absolutely nothing.
This includes Bill C-234 of the member for York South-Weston. This very necessary bill has not become law. It did not even come back to the floor of the House of Commons because the Liberal members of the justice committee killed it. They did this despite the fact that Bill C-234 has the overwhelming support of the Canadian Police Association, Victims of Violence, and tens of thousands of Canadians who have written letters and signed petitions.
Bill C-234 most certainly has the support of the Reform Party because this private member's bill would repeal section 745 of the Criminal Code. It would extinguish a killer's glimmer of hope for being released before serving his full life sentence. It is an injustice that members of this House who gave life to Bill C-234 were denied the opportunity to dispense with or pass this most important private member's bill.
It is also an injustice that the bill of the member for Mississauga East has not been deemed votable. This bill should become law.
Bill C-321 provides for truth in sentencing, a true Reform principle. Bill C-321 provides for the imposition of consecutive sentences on a person who commits sexual assault and another offence arising out of the same event or where the person is already serving another sentence at the time.
Bill C-321 should be expanded to include all offences. No one should get a free crime ride but that is precisely what we do in this country. We permit sexual offenders and other offenders to commit two, three or more offences and serve only one sentence as the other sentences are served concurrently. This is absolutely absurd.
It is also absurd that we permit multiple murderers such as Clifford Olson who killed 11 children to serve only one life sentence when he should be serving 11 sentences. Each of the innocent lives he stole should be validated. Each life is worth at the very least a life sentence. Likewise a person who commits multiple crimes should be given an appropriate sentence for each and every crime. Bill C-321 would end this absurdity. It would put an end to freebie crimes in this country. Therefore I support the member and her bill. I support truth in sentencing.
At this time I would ask for unanimous consent one more time from this House that this motion become a votable motion.