Mr. Speaker, in the dying days of the last session of Parliament I stood in the House to voice my opposition to what the justice minister was doing with section 745. I have listened to the justice minister over the summer and I have come to the conclusion that the minister just does not get it.
Instead of talking to my lawyer friends in Calgary and the inmates and criminals that the justice minister wants to coddle, I talked with some of the people that Bill C-45 would affect: my constituents. I sent out surveys to see what my constituents thought and I have never received more responses in the three years I have been an MP, 1,702 to be exact.
Of the people who responded, 85 per cent felt that the people who were convicted of first degree premeditated murder should not have their sentence reduced at all. Eighty-five per cent. Not only that but two-thirds of the people who responded felt that those who committed first degree premeditated murder should be subject to capital punishment. Based on the questionnaire, I believe that a nationwide referendum on the issue is becoming more and more mandatory.
One question asked was: What do you believe should be the penalty for first degree premeditated murder? This does not need much explanation. Most people know what premeditated first degree murder, the taking of a life, is. The response was that 1,144
favoured capital punishment, not the lifetime with parole after 25 years which is being bandied around in the House by the bleeding heart government members.
The second question was: Do you think that people convicted of first degree murder should have the ability to go before a jury after 15 years and present a case to have the time they are required to serve in jail reduced? In response, 1,469 said no. A high number of those responding said no, serve the full time.
The third question was: Should people serving a sentence for first degree murder have their sentence reduced at all? After all, in the wisdom of the House back in the seventies the penalty was supposed to be life. One thousand, four hundred and fifty-three said no, the sentence should not be reduced.
The public is scared. Our streets are not safe. Violent crime is on the rise. Even the justice minister admitted that in the House. Canadians expect and deserve a country where they can feel secure in their homes and communities and where they can grow old without fear. Canada has been shaken by crime and a defective criminal justice system which the Liberal government has been slow to fix. When will the minister get this?
Why does the government place less value on one life than it does on two or 20 lives? Corrections Canada's mission is to contribute to the protection of society by exercising lawful control. The government will send peacekeepers around the world to prevent people from murdering one another, yet it will release rehabilitated murderers onto Canadian streets. Why do two people have to die before the government will step in to lock these criminals up?
Where are the government's priorities? Has it forgotten that its first responsibility is to law-abiding Canadians and that it must do everything to protect their safety? Is it any wonder that people do not trust our justice system?
It is time to place the rights of victims, the survivors of crime, and law-abiding citizens ahead of the rights of criminals. Let us remember that a victim's sentence is forever; it is a lifetime sentence served in a graveyard. The murderer gets life with a reprieve, an opportunity to get out.
The justice minister has never offered the Boyd or Rosenfeldt families compensation for the horrific murders of their children, but the government will give inmates compensation for slipping in a stairwell. The government paid Clifford Olson compensation to the tune of $100,000 and will even allow him to publish books and to make videos while in jail. What a slap in the face to those families. Where is the justice in all of this? There is none. This is protecting the criminals' rights more than the victims'. It is not a strong enough deterrent.
Despite the justice minister's claims, the public interest will not be served by keeping first degree murderers in prison for any less than 25 years, even if they just kill once. The government must repeal section 745. The safety and the lives of Canadians depend on it.
When we were debating the gun control bill, Bill C-68, many members on the government side stood and talked about the justification of the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars which will be sucked out of the system in order for law-abiding citizens to register their firearms. The argument was an emotional one which came from the heart: If it saves just one life the gun registration system is well worth it.
If that is the logic the government used to justify the gun control bill, why does it not apply the same logic in this instance and repeal section 745? If by repealing section 745 a murderer must serve the full life sentence with a parole opportunity after 25 years, why not do that? Why not try it to see if it would be a stronger deterrent? Why not implement that?
If the repeal of section 745, despite all the great arguments on both sides of the House, saves one life, then why not? If it saves one single life then why not repeal section 745? Why is the government not consistent? The justice minister speaks about the multiple murderer syndrome. The life I am talking about that could be saved with the repeal of section 745 is that life the murderer would not get a chance to murder.
The member for York South-Weston said that most murderers do not repeat their crime. Notice that he said "most". If after the passage of Bill C-45 a murderer who has killed once does it again, if it just saves that one life, the repeal of section 745 is worth it.
I have one other objection to this whole farce and fiasco that this justice minister perpetrates on the House of Commons and the way he operates his department, this business of sending bills after second reading to the House. Even when they come back from the House and the standing committee and they are in his hands, for example, Bill C-41, the so-called tougher sentencing bill and Bill C-68, gun control, it sits in his department and then eight days before we leave or break he has to force it and limit debate for opposition members, not allowing them to fully discuss the issues at hand.
That is not the way you do justice in this country. That is an injustice to Canadians. That is not the way he should be running his department. He did it on Bills C-41 and C-68 and now he will probably end up doing it on Bill C-45. He did it as well on Bill C-33.
There is one other injustice that is being perpetrated by the justice minister of this government. The private member's bill, Bill C-234 from the hon. member for York South-Weston, was sent to committee. That is supposed to come back from the committee and be reported. In the wisdom of the standing committee on justice I
understand it is not going to report it back to the House. It is going to ignore it.
As members of the House of Commons we sent that bill to that standing committee and it is supposed to come back. It is not allowing this member of Parliament representing Calgary Centre to speak to Calgary Centre constituents about the fate of that particular bill, the status that it is at and what this government thinks about it. That is an injustice and this justice minister should be applying what his title calls for, justice, not injustice.