Mr. Speaker, I rise to enter the debate on Bill C-45. I wish to ask three questions this morning. First, what is the value of a life? Second, what message does Bill C-45 send to the Canadian people? Finally, what are the Canadian people saying?
Not too long ago a young little girl was playing on the street. She disappeared. Her name was Mindy Tran. She was found dead. I got a phone call about six months ago from a man whom I did not know. It was from the employer of Mr. Tran, Mindy's father. He said Mr. Tran was afraid to come and talk to me because he was a new immigrant to Canada and did not know exactly how to approach an elected government member. I told him to bring him in. He said: "He wants me to come within. Is that okay?" I said: "That is more than okay, please come". Mr. Tran sat across the
table from me. He said: "What can we do to make sure that my other little girl is not killed like this one was?"
It is an extremely difficult situation when the father of a young girl comes to a member and asks what the government is doing to protect him, his family and his little girl. It is serious when one looks at this kind of a question and one has to ask the question: What is the value of a life? What is the value of this little girl's life, Mindy Tran?
Mindy Tran in her death mobilized the community like I have never seen a community mobilized. There was not a police officer who was not personally stirred in trying to find the person who had perpetrated this crime. All kinds of neighbours, relatives, friends and the whole community got together to search first of all for the body because it was lost. Somehow they could not find it. It took days and nights. Twenty-four hours a day there was a search going on throughout that community. Finally they did find the body of Mindy Tran. The community is still in sorrow over that particular incident.
I ask the question again: What is the value of that life? According to this bill the life is worth 15 years of imprisonment for the perpetrator.
One can look at the value of a life in economic terms, which is what insurance companies do. It is what judges do in determining the liability when someone has been killed in an automobile accident. The economic value of a key man in a business is determined when key man insurance is purchased to replace the money that person would provide for that company in order to replace them.
There is an economic value to a person when they take out loan insurance, mortgage insurance and things of that sort. Insurance companies provide for personal insurance so that the individual who is the main breadwinner or the two breadwinners can supply food, clothing and shelter to the persons remaining after the death has occurred.
There is more than an economic value to a life. There is also the value of emotion, the feelings that we have, the love that we have for one another; parents, one for each other and parents for their children, as demonstrated by Mr. Tran and his young daughter who was killed. How does one replace that?
Yesterday we heard the story of Laurie Boyd and the trauma that created in the lives of the parents who had to recall that incident when they heard that Bill C-45 said that section 745 was not going to be deleted from the Criminal Code because the bill had not been allowed to be presented to this House.
Mr. Tran is thinking today about the possibility of parole for the person who murdered his family member. He says: "Mr. Schmidt, will you allow that to happen?" I said: "Mr. Tran, it is not for me to decide. I wish I were in that position. I am not".
We have a government in this land that was elected. Its members have decided and they are the ones who are responsible. "But Mr. Schmidt, can you not do anything?" I said to Mr. Tran: "I will do what I can".
He broke down and cried. He said: "Is that all my daughter's life is worth, you will try?" This is the question I ask every member of this House. Is that all Mindy Tran's life is worth, and the other person who has been murdered?
Parole creates that second trauma again for the indirect victims, not the ones who have been killed but the ones who remain who have the emotional tie. It is for them that the trauma is repeated.
There is another cost to a life, the life to the nation. It destroys the talents and takes away the skills and the abilities that person would have brought to our society, the untold talents and abilities found in these people, especially in the children who have been killed. The question we need to ask ourselves is what is suitable punishment for that kind of behaviour.
It draws me to the second question which is what message does Bill C-45 send to our people. What message does it send to other criminals? It says there is the hope of relief after 15 years. Really, the consequences of first degree murder are really not so great. Society paid with a life and now the criminal who did that says that society will pay to keep them and eventually release them back into society.
What is the message that it sends to our young people? It sends to them the message that life really is cheap. It is worth 15 years. It does not really matter very much what the victim's rights are. It does not really matter very much that all the victim's rights, the person who was killed, were taken away.
Society protects the rights of the person who perpetrated the crime. That is protecting, but it does not seem to matter that the rights of the person who was killed are destroyed.
Therefore the young people can say to themselves: "I can commit almost anything and get away with relative impunity". Where does that kind of thinking end? What does it do to all the other crimes that are not as severe as killing another person? It ultimately creates disrespect for law and order. The end result of that is chaos.
If this government or any government has any role to play, it is to push back the walls of evil and to prevent evil from taking over in our society.
Finally, what example does it set for our children? If that is how we as government officials behave and treat the worst possible crime that one person can perpetrate against another with 15 years of incarceration, what message is that to our children?
I want to ask why does the government not let the people speak. I cannot believe the kinds of responses I got from a recent householder where I asked: "What is bugging you about the government? What are your concerns about the government, the present government?" The response that came through hundreds and hundreds of times was: "When will you do something with the justice system? We do not feel safe in our streets. We do not feel safe in our homes. We feel that the time has come for us to do something serious about crime in our society".
They came up with some suggestions. They asked why we do not conduct a referendum on capital punishment in this country. "Let us tell the government clearly and unequivocally what it is we want".
Yesterday morning Parliament stopped Bill C-234 from entering the floor of this House. The member for York South-Weston understood very very clearly what his people were telling him. He listened to them. He presented to this House a private member's bill.
I support that bill. There are many of our constituents who are speaking the same kind of language. I am sure that his constituency is not an isolated example. And so I would urge the government to bring that bill back. Pass it. That would eliminate section 745 of the Criminal Code.
We need to recognize that with Bill C-45 we have an indication that the government is really not serious, that it is a wimpy, snivelling flirtation with what is just and fair. It sends a message that is symbolic of justice but which lacks the essence of all that is noble, upright and fair. It should not be passed.