Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak against the motions which have been introduced. These motions are for the purposes of amending Bill C-45, an act to amend the Criminal Code, judicial review of parole ineligibility and another act.
There are six motions on the Order Paper. Three have been introduced by the hon. member for Bellechasse and three have been introduced by the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands.
However, as I am sure the hon. members will have observed, all six motions come down to the same thing. All of them seek to change the proposed amendment in Bill C-45 that would require that a section 745 jury be unanimous in order to grant an offender a reduction in his or her parole ineligibility period.
As anyone who has followed the debates on this issue will know, at present section 745 allows a review jury to reduce an offender's parole ineligibility period with a two-thirds vote, or 8 members out of 12 on the jury. In Bill C-45 the government proposes to change that standard from two-thirds of the jury to unanimity so that all members of the review jury reviewing section 745 applications must agree in order to reduce the ineligibility period for parole.
The motions before us today seek to do is to replace the government's proposed standard of 12 votes out of 12 in order to reduce the parole ineligibility period, with a lower standard of 10 votes out of 12, in the case of the motions introduced by the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands, and 9 votes out of 12 in the case of motions introduced by the hon. member for Bellechasse. These motions then would provide a standard that is somewhat higher than that under the current law but is still significantly lower than the standard proposed by Bill C-45.
When the government introduced Bill C-45, its aim was among other things to strengthen the role of the community jury in section 745 proceedings by strengthening the statement made by the jury in making their decision. In those cases where the jury decides to reduce the offender's parole ineligibility period, under the government's amendments it could only be done by unanimous decision,
the strongest possible statement by a jury of ordinary Canadians drawn from the community.
In addition, the government's intention was to return to the time honoured standard in our criminal justice system that a jury's verdict must be unanimous. The standard for conviction or acquittal in the Canadian justice system is and always has been that the jury must be unanimous in their decision. Why, I would ask, would the standard be anything less for a section 745 application?
Perhaps it would help to recall that section 745 is an exceptional mechanism under which a person convicted of the most serious offence in the Criminal Code may obtain a grant of clemency with respect to their parole ineligibility period. Why should an offender not have to convince all members of the jury that he or she deserves to have his or her parole ineligibility period reduced in order to obtain such a grant of clemency? A unanimous decision by the review jury is a clear statement that the offender deserves clemency.
I have already noted that there is a difference between the hon. member's motions with respect to this bill in terms of the number at which they would place the standard. One set of motions would establish the standard at 9 while the other set of motions would establish the standard at 10. The current standard is at 8.
More than anything else it seems to me that this difference points to the complete arbitrariness involved in establishing a standard short of unanimity. Should it be the current regulations which is 8 votes, or should it be set at 9, 10 or even 11? What possible rationale is there for establishing any of these standards?
In the face of this conundrum the government has proposed in Bill C-45 that we utilize the only sensible standard, the time honoured standard of our criminal justice system: the standard that requires that the verdict of the jury be unanimous.
For all of these reasons the government cannot accept these changes to Bill C-45. Therefore, I would ask that hon. members defeat these motions.
During my comments made with respect to these motions which are restricted to reducing the proposed standard for the jury at unanimity in reaching a decision to 9 or even 10 votes, I have restricted my comments very specifically to those issues. I will be speaking again in general terms with respect to Bill C-45 and particularly section 745 of the Criminal Code at third reading.
In wrapping up, we cannot accept these changes as proposed in these motions. I ask hon. members to defeat these motions.