Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to support the amendment put forward by my colleague from Crowfoot.
The amendment initiates the process to scrutinize and review the commission's report calling for witnesses and reporting its findings to the House.
For the record I would like to say that the concern is that the commission, which is comprised of three members appointed by the governor in council: one nominated by the judiciary; one nominated by the Minister of Justice; and one, who shall act as a chair, nominated by the first two nominees. Does anyone think they will be objective in their deliberations? That is precisely the point and it is the concern of the public and our constituents. These members may not be objective as they have a vested interest in increasing their and their colleagues' salaries and benefits.
The issue here is optics in that it just does not look right and it will not sell. From a political point of view I cannot understand why the government would put forth such a bill with such an amendment.
I would like to briefly return to the issue of the 8.3% pay raise over four years. The bottom line salary today of judges is $162,300. If this bill passes there will be a retroactive raise of $13,000. A lot of my constituents in Dauphin—Swan River do not even make $13,000 on an annual basis.
The real issue is not about a pay increase for judges. If this government really wants to do some real work in terms of reforming our judicial system, it needs to deal with those issues and not about pay.
How many people in my own riding would support this pay increase? I do not think too many would. My constituents would say that there are lots of issues and problems in the judiciary system so why are we not addressing them first?
More and more people are feeling unsafe these days because of youth crimes. For years we have talked about the Young Offenders Act. In fact as early as 1991 when I was first elected as a councillor I remember very well a municipal initiative calling on the federal government to deal with the Young Offenders Act. I remember filling out surveys sent out by the solicitor general's office asking for input on how the Young Offenders Act could be changed and reformed. Fortunately the municipal organization co-operated and did submit its surveys but unfortunately there was no response on the part of the government, and this is going back as early as 1991 and 1992. The people of this country want to see change but unfortunately the government at this level at that time did not deem it important enough to follow through on.
Therefore people have very little faith in our judicial system, the lack of a justice system. We have heard figures of 52% of the country having very little faith in the justice system. Bill C-68 is another indicator where the government is treating law-abiding citizens like criminals. The government knows that with expenditures of $1.2 billion projected to implement the registration of all firearms this has no effect whatsoever on crime control. A whole new bureaucracy has been established and I am sure thousands of people will be hired to implement another bureaucracy which will cost taxpayers more money.
There are many components to a justice system. My colleagues speaking on this subject indicated that politicians are included. I agree, politicians are part of the problem. Perhaps they are the problem. Politicians know that people want changes in sentencing practices. The public wants changes victims rights to be addressed by the politicians. As I indicated, we all know the public wants changes in the Young Offenders Act. The government has to be more accountable for this current situation. The government can respond to make judges more accountable and to make changes to the Young Offenders Act.
What I am basically trying to say is although we have said many things about judges I think the politicians need to take some of the heat as well.
Governments cannot use the judicial system as a vehicle when they believe it is expedient, as we have experienced in these latter years of our history. Judges need to answer to this House because this is the supreme house of this country.
I ask all members in the name of democracy to support the amendment put forth by the member for Crowfoot.