Mr. Speaker, I was delighted to hear the hon. member indicate how I would need help in the next election in order to get elected in Kingston. I attribute that to my rationale for expressing myself yesterday in my speech on Bill C-45.
I have two questions for the hon. member arising out of his remarks. First of all he said at one point that he did not believe, and neither did any of his colleagues, in the policy of locking them up and throwing away the key, that that was not part of the Reform agenda.
The hon. member for Calgary Northeast is laughing at that because he knows that is his position. Indeed, it is the position of many members of his party. They have said repeatedly in this House in the course of the debate-and I am surprised that the hon. member who just spoke was not here listening-that they favoured locking them up and throwing away the key. In their view, when life means life, when someone gets sentenced to life imprisonment, they should go to jail for life. If that is not locking someone up and throwing away the key, I do not know what is. That was the proposal I heard from many of the members opposite.
Perhaps the hon. member for Swift Current-Maple Creek-Assiniboia could get up later and explain his view on this but I think it was lock them up and throw away the key. Then he said that their policy was not that, that they did not approve of that policy, that that was not any part of it. In the next moment he said on crimes of violence when someone got a sentence they stayed in prison for the full length of the sentence.
If it is a life sentence and someone goes to jail for life-I assume he considers murder a crime of violence-is that not locking people up and throwing away the key? I just wanted to clarify this. Is murder a crime of violence for the purpose of his definition? When someone gets sentenced to life for a crime of violence, do they not then go to jail for life under Reform policy? If that is not the policy, I would like to hear about it. I would like him to clarify that and I am happy to give him that opportunity.
The second matter goes back to a subject that nobody opposite dares talk about any more since the hon. member for Calgary Southeast blew the whistle on the member for Calgary Northeast on caning. There are parts of Calgary in different directions which seem to get very confusing. I have trouble remembering which member came from which district but I think I got it right that time because I checked in the book.
The hon. member for Calgary Southeast blew the whistle on extremism in the Reform Party and she got the boot. One of the things she went on about on extremism was caning, which the hon. member for Calgary Northeast said he thought he should have a good look at. He wanted to go to Singapore to learn all about caning.
I am wondering if from the discussions in caucus concerning the problem of caning, which no member on the other side seems to want to talk about, the hon. member for Vegreville could clarify for us what the Reform Party position is in respect of caning. Is that part of the new package of prison and reformatory matters that are dealt with in this bill that Reform will be introducing as amendments later at the committee stage?