Mr. Speaker, I rise on behalf of the official opposition to do something I thought I would never do in this House and have not done to this time, support a government bill. It is not easy to do but for a good cause we will sometimes support government bills. This is a well constructed and designed bill and a thoughtful approach to a problem we have in controlling criminal activity coming across our borders.
What Bill C-18 does, as the hon. parliamentary secretary outlined, is extend the ordinary powers of peace officers to detain and to arrest people who are either under criminal warrants or suspected of engaging in certain forms of criminal activity, principally impaired driving. This is something which is most sensible.
The notion that several thousand impaired drivers cross our borders each year but cannot be detained by our custom officers is a troubling one. There are many customs and entry ports in this country where we do not have full time regular peace officers, RCMP officers, staffing those ports. The customs agents are the only official representatives of our government and are the only eyes that are watching what kind of people cross those borders.
For these customs agents not to have the capacity to stop, detain and arrest people suspected of driving on to our highways impaired and endangering law abiding Canadian drivers I think is troubling. We are encouraged by Bill C-18's empowerment of those custom agents so that they can essentially act as a first response capability at our borders, a first response capability for criminals and for those suspected of impaired driving.
We understand that over the past year, according to estimates made by our customs officers, over 8,500 suspected impaired drivers have entered Canada. None of these people could be detained or stopped legally by customs agents for impaired driving. There are other reasons why they could be stopped, but not necessarily for that offence.
There have been an estimated 200 incidents of suspected child abduction where customs agents have not been empowered to stop the alleged abductors of children. There have been over 2,000 individuals subject to arrest warrants and more than 500 individuals in possession of suspected stolen property, mostly vehicles, again in instances where our customs agents have not been able to detain these people.
This is a sensible approach and one which we understand is supported by, among other groups, the customs union, Canadians Against Violence Everywhere Advocating its Termination, CAVEAT, and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, as well as various police forces. It seems to have a broad range of support both by those concerned about the potential for the overzealous use of peace officer force as well as the police officers themselves. They all seem to be in support of this bill.
However, we do have several questions which are not addressed in the information the government has provided with respect to Bill C-18 and which were not really explained adequately by the parliamentary secretary. Among other questions, the government clearly will incur costs to implement this bill, costs which will derive from the training of customs agents so that they will know how and under what circumstances they may exercise these new criminal law powers. What exactly are those costs for training those public servants in this respect?
There will also be costs associated with establishing new facilities, detention facilities at many ports of entrance. Again, we have seen no estimate of what costs are associated with that. I would therefore ask the hon. members opposite, perhaps the parliamentary secretary if she has an opportunity, to provide this House with information on what costs will be associated with this bill.
Another question we have is the question of how these officers will be empowered to enforce the law. We understand, as the hon. parliamentary secretary just admitted, that they will not be issued firearms. While we are giving them in this bill partial police officer powers, the power to arrest and detain, among other people, suspected gun smugglers and drug smugglers, we will be issuing them pepper spray and, I gather, batons to protect themselves and Canadians and to enforce the law against potentially violent law breakers.
It seems to me this raises a question about the safety of our customs officers and the seriousness that the government has in terms of empowering these officers to apply and enforce the law. My second question to the government would be why will it not issue these quasi-peace officers the tools that peace officers need to execute the law, to arrest and detain potentially violent and dangerous criminals.
I do not understand why the former minister of revenue, the current minister of Indian affairs, introduced substantially the same bill in the last Parliament. In justifying not issuing firearms to these officers she simply said that she did not feel it was appropriate. She did not really explain why. She just said “Under my watch they will not be armed. As far as guns, the message there changes the whole perspective of our border and the risk of increased violence is not acceptable to me”.
If these agents were properly empowered and issued firearms, the risk of violence would not, I think, come from them. The risk of violence comes from violent criminals who cross our borders. To suggest that peace officers who are issued the necessary tools to do their jobs somehow poses a threat of violence at our borders is, I think, a rather backward way of looking at it. It is those peace officers who use those tools who prevent violent criminals coming into Canada.
I would again ask for a more compelling justification for these peace officers' not being issued with the appropriate tools to do the job that most peace officers have.
We also wonder about the common practice at Customs Canada of employing student customs officers. When the question is asked “O Canada, who stands on guard for thee”, in too many cases the answer is poorly trained students at ports of entry in this country, not fully trained customs agents. These student officers are in some places such as Pearson airport. Some 80% of customs agents, the first line of defence Canada has in the protection and enforcements of its laws, are undertrained student agents and are not full-fledged customs officers.
We understand that in other jurisdictions such as the United States and the United Kingdom this simply is not the case. One hundred per cent of the customs agents representing those governments are fully trained, fully empowered, fully certified customs agents, and not quasi-customs agents.
I have another question for the government. Why does it continue to staff our borders with people who are not fully trained officers of the law? That is a reasonable question. These student agents will not have the powers given to full customs agents under Bill C-18. Quite understandably they will not have the certification or the training to exercise peace officers powers. Even though this is a good step forward, many thousands of our customs agents at many of our customs ports and ports of entry will not have the power to arrest or detain people under the Criminal Code.
If student agents are on duty at a particular port of entry and find somebody who may be suspected of criminal activity, a suspected child abductor, kidnapper, smuggler of contraband or an impaired driver, they can do nothing to arrest or detain those people. They had better hope that there is a full-fledged customs agent immediately available to them or a full-fledged peace officer. If there is not then there is no protection for Canadians and there is no discharging of Canadian law at those ports of entry. That is an important point to us.
I have another question. The revenue minister has not indicated whether or not there will be additional training or the extent to which there will be additional training for newly empowered customs officers. What kind of training will they receive? Will it be in a police college atmosphere? Will it be within the current customs college, or will they receive a kind of briefing? How do we know they will be properly trained to exercise the ultimate power of government, that is its police power? That question is not outlined.
I do not understand in a very sensible bill like this one why the government would not anticipate some of these questions and answer them. Perhaps it will in the course of this debate.
This is a worthwhile objective. It is a good and honest effort by the government to plug a loophole that too many criminals have taken advantage of to seek entry into the country. I would only ask why this kind of legislation was not passed years if not decades ago.
Why does it take so long for us to plug loopholes in terms of enforcing the criminal law in Canada? Why have we allowed 8,500 suspected impaired drivers to cross our borders in the past without having the power to stop them? How many innocent Canadians have died on Canadian roads because customs officers were not able to stop, detain or arrest suspected impaired drivers?
Those are good questions. They are not only directed to this government but to predecessor governments as well.
In conclusion, the position of the Reform Party with respect to impaired driving and the application of the criminal law is well known. We stand for a criminal law regime which can be enforced. We want our peace officers and officers of the government to be able to enforce laws and protect Canadians.
A couple of weeks ago our party introduced a motion in this place calling for stiffer penalties for impaired driving. Any effort which can potentially remove even one impaired driver from our roads and can make society even incrementally safer is one that my party will support.