Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on Bill C-3 at third reading. I have some concerns about this bill.
The Reform Party is firmly committed to restoring confidence in our justice system and providing Canadians with a truer sense of security. This includes strengthening our law enforcement agencies by providing them with the latest technological tools to quickly detect and apprehend the perpetrators of the most violent crimes committed in our society. DNA identification is that kind of tool.
If used to its full potential, the DNA databank could be the single most important development in fighting crime since the introduction of fingerprints. To deny our police the full use of this technology in their fight against crime, as Bill C-3 in its present form does, is reprehensible and unacceptable because it maintains an unnecessary level of risk to the lives and safety of our citizens. If passed unamended, Bill C-3, an act respecting DNA identification, will provide Canadians with at least a false sense of security. Therefore the Reform Party cannot support this inadequate piece of legislation. The Reform Party fully supports the creation of a DNA databank. However, we do not support the limited scope of Bill C-3.
Bill C-3 does not grant our police forces full use of the DNA technology so readily at their disposal. It is a tool that would help close hundreds of unsolved murders and rapes with an enormous potential to save lives by removing predators from the streets.
Bill C-3 does not allow for the taking of a DNA sample at the time of charge. It does not permit samples to be taken from incarcerated criminals other than designated dangerous offenders, multiple sex offenders and multiple murderers. If a multiple murderer commits the murders on the same night we cannot take a sample from him. The murders must be committed separately. Again, it is unacceptable from that point of view.
Bill C-3 provides a dangerous and unnecessary exemption. It authorizes judges not to issue warrants for the taking of samples if they believe that in doing so the impact on the individual's privacy and security would be grossly disproportionate to the public interest in the protection of society. We asked during committee hearings for an example of that. I did not hear a reasonable or common sense example of what that meant, what that part of the bill is really addressing.
There are hundreds of unsolved assaults, rapes and homicides where DNA evidence has been left at the scene by the perpetrator. DNA identification now offers an unparalleled opportunity to solve many of these cases and bring the perpetrators to justice. However, because of the government's irrational fear of violating the privacy rights of those responsible for these heinous crimes, it is restricting the use of this very important technology by our law enforcement people.
As it stands now Bill C-3 is a hindrance to more effective law enforcement and a safer society by these limitations. Those responsible for shaping our justice system continue to express a willingness to place the lives and safety of innocent people in jeopardy. I sometimes wonder if the government does not consider the lives of Canadians very cheap.
It is very unconcerned about the lives and safety of people in society although it expresses comments contrary to that. Life is pretty cheap when we look at some of the decisions being made as a result of legislation passed by this place and the refusal of the government to move where it is obvious that it could move and where there is no obstruction except its irrational fear of what the Supreme Court of Canada might do with regard to the charter of rights and freedoms.
Those responsible for shaping our justice system continue to express a willingness to place the lives and safety of innocent people in jeopardy whether by paroling violent offenders who go on to rape and murder again or by freeing convicted violent offenders through conditional sentencing or by tying the hands of our police officers through Bill C-3. The safety of society seems to be a secondary issue to this government.
During report stage of this bill I introduced an amendment which would allow for the taking of samples at the time of charge from offenders with one previous conviction and retained for analysis upon conviction. Our original amendment introduced during clause by clause review was to allow for the taking of samples from all persons charged with primary designated offences. Since this amendment was defeated, we put forward an amended version at report stage taking into consideration the concerns raised by the government.
The government cited finances as one reason why it would not expand the DNA bank and allow for samples to be taken and analysed at the time of charge rather than conviction. I specifically addressed the issue of cost, proposing that samples be taken upon charge but not analysed until conviction. This would satisfy the Canadian Police Association's concerns regarding offenders who are released on bail pending trial skipping out.
If offenders are guilty of a previous offence for which they have not been charged, they may not appear for their trial if they realize that upon conviction their DNA sample may be compared to DNA evidence left at the scene of unsolved crimes. This amendment was recommended by the Canadian Police Association.
The other reason supplied by the justice minister for refusing to allow samples to be taken at the time of charge was that it would not withstand a constitutional challenge. To date, a number of this government's bills have resulted in court challenges.
Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Ontario and the two territories are awaiting the Alberta Court of Appeal's decision on the constitutionality of Bill C-68, the firearms legislation.
The rape shield law, brought in by the former justice minister, has been deemed unconstitutional. Conditional sentencing, also courtesy of the former justice minister, has been the subject of controversy in the courts. In January a three judge panel from the Alberta Court of Appeal issued a ripping indictment of what it termed unimaginative and skimpy attempts to apply the new law.
In the 50 page ruling the appeal justices detailed several major complaints they have on the way judges and lawyers have been applying the reform. The Alberta court blasted judges for handing out poorly reasoned and lenient conditional sentences that amount to little more than house arrest.
After Bill C-3 was reported out of committee and ready for report stage, the justice minister circulated to members of the standing committee three legal opinions on the constitutionality of taking DNA samples at the time of charge. The legal opinions were expressed by the hon. Claude Bisson, the hon. Martin Taylor and the hon. Charles Dubin. They all stated that the taking of DNA samples at the time of charge would be unconstitutional. The minister failed to provide any dissenting opinions such as that prepared by Tim Danson for the Canadian Police Association.
I have examined the three opinions hurriedly provided to indicate that the taking of DNA samples at the time of charge would be unconstitutional. They seem shallow and unconvincing perhaps because of their hurried nature. The opinion prepared by Tim Danson for the Canadian Police Association was presented before the committee and we had an opportunity to examine it. We have not had an opportunity to examine the three legal opinions by the authorities that I quoted. The committee has not had an opportunity to call witnesses or to ask witnesses who appeared before the committee questions about the three legal opinions.
I want to just touch on why I have a grave concern in this area and to quote from legal opinions. The honourable Claude Bisson does not deal with the authority of police to obtain a blood sample from a person suspected of impaired driving from alcohol or drugs. That authority is contained within the Criminal Code now.
Why would he not deal with that? If there is authority to take a blood sample now for impaired driving, why is there concern about taking a blood sample or a hair sample or a swab from the mouth? Why, if the authority is there now and it is constitutional, would an amendment allowing for a blood sample to be taken at the time of charge for a primary designated offence for the purpose of DNA sampling be unconstitutional in the bill?
I do not understand why the honourable Claude Bisson did not address this issue in his legal opinion. Also, the legal opinion prepared by the honourable Charles L. Dubin makes the same omission. It does not deal with the authority of police to take blood samples when individuals are suspected of driving while impaired by alcohol or drugs.
That issue is covered to a certain degree by the honourable Martin R. Taylor in his legal opinion. Yet it is difficult for me to understand the reasoning in this document, why it is constitutional to take a blood sample today under certain circumstances but unconstitutional to take a blood sample from someone not suspected of a crime but charged with a crime, of committing a primary designated offence.
I say with consideration and respect that these three legal opinions appear to be hurried and not well thought through. I want to quote one of them. This is the legal opinion submitted by the honourable Martin R. Taylor, Q.C., who stated on page 4:
Certainly some scepticism is to be expected in Canada today regarding the handling of bodily substances by public authorities. When DNA samples pass out of the control of the arrested person into that of the State, the uses to which they may be put depend not only on the law as it is and may become, but also on the competence of those who take control of them and their willingness to obey the law. The uses to which DNA may be put in providing personal information regarding the individual, while known to go well beyond the field of criminal identification, are at present only partly and imperfectly understood. Such factors as these will, in my opinion, be found by the courts to render the taking of DNA samples against the will of the individual particularly significant in terms of both denial of reasonable expectation of privacy and invasion of security of the person.
It seems it is all right to take a blood sample in the case of a suspected impaired driver but when we start to talk about DNA it is altogether different. The word DNA seems to create a degree of apprehension, a degree of perhaps even fear. The consequences of not properly guarding and protecting a DNA sample, whether we call it a blood sample taken for the purposes of determining if a person is impaired by alcohol or drugs, or whether it is a sample to compare with a DNA sample left at the scene of a crime, does not really matter. The invasion of privacy has taken place. We already have that in the criminal code. It is already there. What is the difference?
When we talk about the security of the person there is no justification to deny on the grounds of privacy because the authority is already there, as I have said, to take a blood sample in the case of impaired driving. That authority is there and overrules the privacy of the individual.
Let us look at the other reason the honourable Martin R. Taylor pointed out, the invasion of the security of the person. Privacy and security. The point I am making and I am coming to is that thousands and thousands of blood samples are taken every day by doctors. There are blood banks in clinics. Every time we go for an annual check-up and a blood sample is taken it goes into a bank. Every time a child is born a blood sample is taken from that child for obvious reasons.
Those samples are there for at least a period time. I do not know how long banks hold them. If there was a realistic concern as expressed in this legal opinion that the privacy of the individual were at stake and that somehow these samples would be used improperly, why is that not happening? Why is there no evidence of that happening?
Surely the bank, the taking of samples and the databank designed through Bill C-3 provide the greatest protection of the gathering of blood samples and other samples anywhere in the country today.
These people are telling us different through their legal opinions. They are trying to convince us that somehow there is lurking in the wings a successful charter challenge against doing what is being done all over the land based upon the fact that someone may use these samples incorrectly.
There is no evidence that has ever been done. There is no criminal offence as there is in the legislation for the improper use of DNA samples. There is no offence legislated for anyone misusing the blood sample that I give during my annual check-up or those of anyone or the samples taken from human beings at the time of birth. There is no evidence of this and this is not addressed in the legal opinions.
This is very important. With the greatest respect, the government has obtained legal opinions that suit its purposes and has brought them forward to attempt to negate the clear legal opinion by Mr. Danson who prepared and submitted a legal opinion for the committee by the Canadian Police Association, clearly indicating that there is no constitutional concern about taking samples at the time of charge.
The three legal opinions were obtained after we had an opportunity to call witnesses and to examine the contents of their findings, their recommendations and their decisions on this question. I am prepared to move:
That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following therefor:
“Bill C-3, An Act respecting DNA identification and to make consequential amendments to the Criminal Code and others Acts, be not now read a third time but be referred back to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights for the purpose of reconsidering Clause 17, in order to ensure that the taking of DNA samples at the time of charge be subject to review”.