Mr. Speaker, the record is fairly complete here today in describing the background of the legislation. I want to acknowledge the anticipated co-operation of colleagues on all sides of the House to dispose of the issue today and allow the matter to go to a committee where it can be treated with a bit more introspection.
However, I do want to address a particular issue. As a bit of a preamble, lot of MPs are curious about why from time to time we in the House have to revisit legislative areas because of decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada. It should not be a surprise. Since the charter was adopted as part of our Constitution we have had to adapt some of our laws to the guidance and interpretation of that court. It was inevitable that some of this was going to happen.
As one legislator, I wish that when the court deals with these things it would assess the impact of its decisions on criminal procedures on Canadian life. In this case, I gather it did not want to make the decision and then the government lawyers had to go back and ask for a stay of six months. We are now at the end of that six month window and we are attempting to correct that area of law.
I regret that the paradigms within which we must work to do this are set by the courts. I would rather we go back to square one and design a procedure that we all believed was appropriate and in compliance with the charter and fair to Canadians. We will probably have a chance to address some of those issues at the committee stage.
In the interests of brevity, I will get to the issue I want to discuss. As a result of this decision there is a gaping hole in the criminal procedure which applies to police entering private dwelling homes for the purpose of arresting someone or securing evidence.
Prior to this decision, before entering a dwelling home without a warrant for the purpose of executing an arrest peace officers had to have reasonable grounds to believe they could arrest someone in the home, someone they had the right to arrest. The person must have been guilty or believed to be guilty of an indictable offence.
In addition to the reasonable grounds peace officers would have to announce their entry: something equivalent to a knock on the door and a statement as to whom they were, followed by the entry. That was the way it was for almost 100 years based on what is called the Landry test. It seems to have worked relatively well.
I am wondering if the following scenario is proper. Let us say an individual is suspected of either a rape or a bank robbery. Three weeks later the victim spots the perpetrator. The person does not know his or her name but the perpetrator is spotted. The victim then goes to the police and says “I have seen the person who raped me” or “I have seen the person who robbed the bank”.
The police officer under the old rules would have said “Let's go and get him” and if he is in a dwelling house he would have made entry. In this case the peace officer has to obtain a warrant if the accused happens to be in a dwelling house even if it is not his own dwelling house.
The only difficulty is the warrant procedure we have just designed in the bill requires that the accused be identified by name. In my scenario we do not have a name. We have an identification. We know he is there but we do not know his name. Therefore we cannot get a warrant with the bill and the peace officer cannot go into the house. In theory the accused can sit there for 30 years while we figure out how we can get into the house.
It may be a problem with the legislation. We will have a chance to address it in due course. I am sure colleagues will co-operate as we address it. I will leave my further remarks on the legislation for committee stage.