Mr. Speaker, I was not planning to speak on this bill but I listened to the people speaking before me and they certainly made it very clear that Bill C-205 is a very important piece of legislation.
However, I think I can add to the debate on a very sombre note. Over the past few weeks I have been reading a series of Alfred Hitchcock mysteries. I have been reading this series of mysteries, which are short stories, in French as a way of practising that language.
As it happens one of those stories deals with a plot wherein a novelist is very successful in writing various kinds of crime stories. The plot revolves around the fact that he gets the sense of verisimilitude or the sense of reality by actually committing the crimes himself. He does a number of murders. He also attempts suicide and the twist of the story is that in order to get the reality for his novels he kills his own child. He is subsequently murdered by his wife as a result.
That may seem a very improbable scenario, just fiction and crime and mystery fiction at that. I draw the House's attention to a reality that has come today. I find it difficult to even speak of it because it is the Bernardo case in which Canadians learn through the reporting of the court case of the torture and murder of two young girls. One aspect of that case that was revealed was the fact that the murderer, Paul Bernardo, took videotapes of the actual torturing of these two young ladies. He did not actually film the murders but he certainly did film the rest.
I am someone who has been in the communications business for a long time. In talking to my friends I learned that behind this business of videotaping a crime, and a terrible crime at that, is an international trade in what are called snuff films. Because of the advances of technology it is possible to very cheaply produce high quality films on video. There has become a very lucrative trade in movies and videotapes which involve the actual torturing or killing of people. This is a trade that is active worldwide.
Obviously this is the sickest of the sickest types of crime, a crime that is motivated by the crass profit of killing somebody and marketing the film. It is a very lucrative trade.
The advantage to Bill C-205 is that it directly addresses this terrible problem in that it will make it impossible for a murderer who is convicted of the crime to take advantage of the proceeds of the film that might be for sale as a result of a murder. I am suggesting a murder that is conducted solely for the purpose of creating a film for sale. This is the type of crime I am talking about.
Unfortunately there is a downside to not having capital punishment. The type of individual who would be so depraved as to kill someone in order to film it and sell it is the type of person who would stop at nothing short of the prospect of capital punishment. This is a person who, when caught, would still be in a position of going to jail and yet theoretically would have the film and still be able to sell it on the international market.
Bill C-205 in my mind adequately addresses this terrible prospect not only because it changes the Criminal Code and makes it impossible for the convicted killer to profit from his crime but more important because it addresses the copyright issue.
Because the crown takes possession of the copyright of any such film, play or novel that is based on an actual crime done by the person who would otherwise owned the copyright, it prevents this type of activity from occurring in Canada. It would discourage someone participating in easy money in creating a film of this nature.
I am not talking about something that is really very improbable. We learned in the news only recently of events on the high seas which demonstrated that the value of human life in other jurisdictions is held very low.
We also learn that there is international traffic in child prostitution and that kind of thing. These things are going on and are part of the really negative costs of the global economy that we are entering.
I support Bill C-205 very much. I took note of the criticisms of the member for Saskatoon-Dundurn who pointed out that there were problems with the Berne convention when other countries might take exception to Canada ruling that criminals cannot have a right to their own copyright and market it abroad. I answer that by saying that Canada leads the way in so many things. This is a case where we should not look abroad for instruction. We should lead the way ourselves. In that sense, I support 100 per cent the initiative of the member for Scarborough West.
This is a fine piece of legislation. I would like to see it get the unanimous support of the House.