moved that Bill C-211, an act to amend the Criminal Code (arrest of those in breach of condition of parole or statutory or temporary release), be read the second time and referred to a committee.
Madam Speaker, I believe this bill is before us today because as members of this House we are truly concerned with the need to improve the safety and security of our citizens.
This bill was not my idea. It is a product of many discussions between police officers and politicians across the country. I hope to be able to influence members of the House enough so that we get this bill into committee. I do hope members opposite do not take the view that this is already law because it is not.
Police officers in all of our ridings need our help on this issue. I will explain why. But first we should know that many politicians look at new ideas and ask, why? Good politicians should look at new ideas as a challenge and say, why not? That is where we are today.
I will first explain what Bill C-211 does. The bill establishes that a police officer may arrest without warrant, detain and bring before a justice a person the officer reasonably believes is in breach of a condition of a bail or a probation order, a condition of a conditional sentence or a condition of statutory release, parole or unescorted temporary absence.
Why is this necessary? Today if an offender, perhaps a pedophile, is in your community on unescorted temporary absence from a prison, and is at a children's playground, where he is not obviously permitted to be under the conditions of his unescorted temporary absence and someone recognizes him in the playground where children are and calls a policeman. That policeman must attempt to get a warrant for his arrest before arresting him.
Most of us understand the rationale of what it takes to get a warrant for arrest. It is difficult and it is time consuming. That is to say the least. It is abundantly clear that such a pedophile will not stay in that area very long knowing full well that a policeman is on his track.
To try to apprehend a pedophile on a release, on conditions, who is at a playground by getting a warrant signed by a judge somewhere in a community is just unreasonable to expect. The outcome of such a story unfortunately is all too often the same. The police do not apprehend the individual who is breaking the condition because they do not have a warrant. They know they cannot get it fast enough and the criminal gets away. Worse yet, in many cases, some unsuspecting person becomes a victim.
Our police need our help and understanding, not our fighting. Let us get this bill to a committee and have the police speak to it. They will tell us all in the justice committee exactly what the problems are. We will surely hear stories that will shake Canadians across the country.
We are today in a situation where I have police coming to me describing time and time again situations that are happening. Let me give some of the conditions imposed that a police officer may operationally find himself confronting when the officer encounters an offender in our community during the course of his duties. In the course of a policeman's duties, he may respond to calls of service, traffic enforcement, field interviews, all those sorts of things that a policeman does in his everyday business.
Conditions given to a person on UTA, unescorted temporary absence or on parole, are like this: remain at all times within the territorial boundaries fixed by the parole supervisor. There are times when policemen find somebody outside those boundaries. Obey the law and keep the peace: they often find a person on UTA in a fight.
The person on UTA must at all times carry the release certificate and the identity card provided by the releasing authority and produce them on request for identification to peace officers. In many cases, police may ask for that identification card. If a person does not have it on them, what do the police do? They have to get a warrant. They have to say “Excuse me, would you wait here for six hours? I will be back”. It just does not work.
A person on UTA cannot own, possess or have control of any weapon as defined in section 2 of the Criminal Code, except as authorized by a parole supervisor.
A person on UTA has to abstain from the use of alcohol. This happens in my community many times where a person out on a temporary absence or out from one of the many prisons we have in my area—at least seven federal and something like 10 provincial—is found in a bar. They know they are not supposed to be there.
It is not rational for a policeman to say “Just hang on there. Don't drink. Stay there. I'll be back in a little while”. The reason the condition is put on that person in the first place is because that person got into trouble and ended up in a prison because they were drinking.
What happens when the policeman goes? Typically, the individual gets into trouble and it is an unsuspecting individual who is on the wrong end of the stick.
Another condition for a person on UTA is submitting to a breathalyzer on demand of a peace officer where reasonable grounds exist to believe the offender is breaching a condition of abstinence from alcohol or abstaining from the use of drugs other than prescribed medication and over the counter drugs.
Non-communication with specified individuals. More than once an individual out on UTA is right back with the bad crowd again. The police officer comes across the bad crowd in his normal course of business, knows the individual is there but cannot do anything about it.
Another condition is not to own or operate a motor vehicle. These conditions go on and on but I wanted to give the House an idea of all of the restraints or conditions that are on people who come out of prison where a police officer is basically hamstrung because he needs a warrant to arrest.
For example, an offender is released on parole with a condition to abstain from alcohol. Some of these examples actually have been given to me by police operating in this country. During contact with the police, the offender is found to be intoxicated, a direct violation of his parole.
The police officer has no authority to arrest the offender as a result of the condition of breach. Instead, the offender's parole supervisor must be notified. The parole may be suspended and then the police officer may take action if the offender is subsequently located again and arrested on the authority of a warrant issued pursuant to sections 118, 135 or 136 of the Canada Corrections Act.
Members can see why policemen basically look at the situation and say “I just can't get a warrant” and this is going to happen. It is in the process of happening so no action can be taken.
In the meantime, the offender has posed a risk to the community, say most police. To further frustrate the situation, the offender may have to submit to a breathalyzer on demand. If the offender is intoxicated and is demanded to submit to a breathalyzer but refuses, the police officer has no immediate authority to take the offender into custody.
Peace officers are given the responsibility to protect life and property, prevent crime, apprehend criminals and enforce the law.
A peace officer may arrest a person and assist in the prosecution of that person. Where the offence is disposed of by conviction, there are several avenues open to the court in dealing with the person.
If the person is placed on probation various conditions may be imposed on the person. Section 495 of the conditional release act permits the arrest of the person, without warrant, when a peace officer finds the person breaching any of the conditions of probation. However, an offender who is convicted and sentenced to a term of incarceration in a penitentiary, which is generally reserved for those more serious offences and repeat offences, may subsequently be released into the community with conditions.
Ironically, many of these conditions of release are similar to the conditions of probation. However, a peace officer has no authority to apprehend the offender whom the peace officer finds in violation of the condition. They can be actually very similar to the conditions of probation, yet they can arrest.
I talked to a young policeman in my riding, Mike Novakowski, who will be receiving a meritorious award for working so hard on this particular bill. He gives me this example.
He gives this example. If a person steals a chocolate bar from a grocery store and is charged and convicted of theft, it is not uncommon that when the person is sentenced they are placed on probation. When the person violates a condition of their probation and is caught by the police, police may arrest the person without a warrant and detain that person according to the law. That person may be charged and convicted of an additional crime, which is breach of probation.
However, says Mike, if a person is charged and convicted of aggravated sexual assault and is sentenced to a penitentiary, he or she may be released prior to expiration of the sentence on parole, on statutory release or unescorted temporary absence with conditions. If that person violates a condition of that release and is caught by the police, the police may not arrest that person without a warrant. Canada corrections must make an after the fact judgement, issue a warrant and then that warrant may subsequently be executed by police.
I know what I might hear from the other side, that this can be taken care of through other routes. That is what I am trying to explain. The other routes are going to Canada corrections, trying to get action taken for the particular situation the police are in and perhaps they might get a warrant or an after the fact judgement. The problem is you could be dealing with, in many cases are dealing with in my community, pedophiles, sexual offenders. Policemen cannot wait and even expect the convict, the offender, to stay there while they fetch a warrant. It is unreasonable to even ask.
The purpose of this bill is to protect our citizens even more by helping our police. This is really, and should be, a non-partisan issue in this House, an issue that can be resolved with the help of my colleagues. There are no financial implications to this bill and no inappropriate power given to our police officers; just more protection for you, me and our families as a Canadian people.
I know in this House that private members bills are an interesting subject and the subject of much debate. There is much controversy with private members bills because many of us believe they do not go anywhere unless the cabinet agrees. Many private members bills are not votable. Those that are seem to end up dying after second reading.
If they get to committee we seldom see them get out of committee and return to the House for report stage and third reading. I recall very few bills which have been successful. These bills would help ordinary Canadians.
The motivation behind this bill did not come from a politician, it came from the police. They are asking for our assistance.
What we have to do is wake up to the fact that the people out there in the communities, the grassroots people, are going to their members of Parliament and asking for private members bills. They want them to be debated, voted on and carefully assessed.
I have seen bills enter this House which most people in Canada do not relate to in any way. Quite frankly, they could not care less. Many of the bills I see coming from my colleagues in the House are grassroots bills. They are effective. They do things. They protect. They change our society.
On April 29, I introduced a private member's bill in the House on victims rights. I guess I was a little naive at that time. I thought that when we all accepted it in the House it would go somewhere. Several million Canadians were hoping that one day they would see a national victims bill of rights.
We had a great debate in the House that day. Everybody agreed with it. It got stuck somewhere in committee. Parliament was dissolved for an election and the bill died on the order paper. No one on the government side resurrected it.
We had an interesting discussion in the House the other day when we debated a private member's bill on drunk driving. It was a votable motion put forward by the Reform Party. My concern at the time was what was going to happen next. Everybody in the House agreed with it. Where will it go? What assurances do we have when these bills go to committee that they will be put into effect?
Constable Novakowski, an Abbotsford policeman, put a lot of work into this bill. He did a lot of research. He and his colleagues believe in the House. They believe in what we are doing. They believe we can effect change for them and for their families and our families. We cannot disappoint these people time and time again. If truly good private members bills are introduced, regardless of who introduces them, we cannot continue to disappoint these people.
This is a practical common issue. I hope my colleagues on the other side do not once again say that it is already in place, that there are laws which affect it and that we can arrest these people. I can assure them that if they let this get to committee they will have police from every force in the country come to the committees to tell them that it does not work.
We must have change. There is nothing more frustrating than a policeman coming on the scene, knowing that an offender is ready to snap, ready to break, ready to reoffend, and there is virtually nothing they can do until that person perpetrates yet another crime.
That says nothing at all about our willingness.
I ask my colleagues to look at this and trust that we will do something within committees and bring these peace officers forward and say we will try to help them and try to help ourselves in doing so.
I ask members to vote positively for Bill C-211.