Madam Speaker, I had a few notes on what I wanted to say about this government amendment, and perhaps I will get to some of those things. Listening to the hon. member for Mississauga South gave me some new points that I thought were more worthy of discussion.
One point goes to the heart of the problem. The government does not listen to people. Something the member said really drew my attention to that. When he referred to capital punishment he said "the government of the day decided". The government of the day is not supposed to decide. I do not know about the government over there. I do not know about the Liberal Party. I was not elected to rule over anybody. I was not elected to think for other people. I was elected to listen, to react to what I hear and to carry that message here to Ottawa.
The government of the day decided. That was said in all innocence and I do not wish it to be a reflection specifically on the hon. member who said that, but I think the concept of that is absolutely disgusting. It has brought us to the mess we are in in many things and most particularly the criminal justice system, the concept of somebody having a faint hope clause after 15 years. The member said there may be no useful purpose in having that criminal fulfil the final portion of the sentence.
The criminals in this case were sentenced to life but they are not necessarily held for life. That concept is there but maybe there is no useful purpose in taking someone who is 20-years old and keeping them in there for 60 years until they are 80 or 85 or whatever. It specifically says 25 years and then after that a decision is made. That is where the so-called faint hope is. If you behave, if you show remorse, if you show you have understood the wrong you have done and you are going to try to live a better life, they have already said when you are going to be considered from the actual sentence which is not 25 years, it is life.
Now we are saying that maybe you will get out after 15 or 20 years. If we go along with that maybe we should look at 10 years. The jails are crowded, he did not kill anybody important, so we will let you out. Or, we are going to keep this guy for 15 or 20 years because he killed 10 people, but you only killed 2 or 3 so you are not so bad so we have to let you out early in order to keep things proportionate. Does that not sound ridiculous? I am trying to sound ridiculous because that is exactly the whole concept of this idea.
In some cases like the Clifford Olsons and the Bernardos of this world, 25 years is a very light sentence. The very thought that they should even be remotely considered for parole after 15 years is absolutely nauseating.
I agree with the hon. member for Mississauga South that the Clifford Olsons of this world are not going to get out after 15 years but they are going to get a podium to spout all kinds of garbage that only comes out of sick mind like his in the first place. That is going to retorture the families that have already had the ultimate torture visited upon them. Why give him a chance to revictimize the victims he has created? I do not see that it serves any useful purpose whatsoever.
The hon. member also spoke about the honourable judiciary who was going to prevent this from happening. I had a case in British Columbia where the parents of a girl who was murdered lived in my constituency. The murder did not take place there but her parents lived there. Although this was a provincial matter, they were getting absolutely no help or comfort from the provincial government whatsoever and so they came to me. Their daughter was stabbed 43 times by her husband. It was a vicious, violent death. He dumped her in the back of a pickup truck, drove to the
family home where their daughter was inside and waited until the lights went out because she was up watching TV.
He parked the car with her mother's dead body in the back in the family garage. He went in and packed his cloths, took off into town, closed out the bank accounts, collected some debts from other people, sold his car and took off to Mexico until, in his own words, he could get his story straight.
He was discovered and faced extradition. He returned and consulted with his lawyer and turned himself in. He said: "Yes, I stabbed her but it was not my fault". I do not recall the legal term for it but he had a momentary blankout. He went on the stand and said: "I am a wonderful guy and I just thought my wife was great until I snapped because she was nagging at me. I have always treated her right".
The prosecution tried to bring in his former wife, whom he had beaten on many occasions. It was not allowed. The judge in this case, this wonderful judiciary who was going to take care of undeserving people like Clifford Olson, decided that because it happened more than six months before it was irrelevant.
Then the prosecution said: "Okay, we will bring in something more relevant. We will bring in independent witnesses who saw the accused on at least two occasions beating the victim in public so severely that she had to be rescued by bystanders". The honourable member of the judiciary decided that was not appropriate either because it was only hearsay and the victim was not there to be cross-examined.
That is the judiciary which the hon. member says will prevent the Clifford Olsons of this country from getting an opportunity to ask for a chance to get away.
There is a term. It was not designed specifically to be used against the government. The term is bleeding heart Liberals. It is a generality. It does not refer specifically, or at least necessarily, to the Liberal Party, but it sure fits. It fits incredibly in this case. Bleeding heart Liberals.
That is not so bad. There is nothing wrong with having a bleeding heart, provided they bleed for the right people. When we have the victims of Clifford Olson, all those young children, the parents, the families, the relatives, and we come in with some clause which will give an opportunity to the murderer of all those children, the person who brought all that misery to the families of those victims, when we start bleeding for them, we have a major problem. Right now we have a major problem. It is called the Liberal Party.
For years I was a building contractor. If something goes wrong with a foundation, if it is a small area, sometimes it can be fixed. However, when the whole foundation is rotten the whole thing has to be taken out. It cannot be patched and repaired. We cannot patch and repair something which is so absolutely disgusting as section 745. It has to be removed in its entirety.
I recently bought a car. I paid $25,000 for it. However, I did not go in when the car was ready and say: "I am only going to give you $15,000 because I want to have some faint hope that I will save money".
If there is a sentence out there, if it is what the people of the country decide on, 25 years is the minimum. It is not the maximum. They may stay in much longer. We have already gone to the judiciary, which the hon. member for Mississauga South said is so honourable and will protect us. If he accepts that, why do we not listen to the judiciary which said that 25 years is the minimum? Why does the government want to interfere and say: "It might be the minimum, but we are going to consider making it considerably less". That makes absolutely no sense.
Section 745 needs to be eliminated. Something that is totally rotten cannot be fixed. We have to get rid of it. That applies to every other segment of our society and it applies here as well.