Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question of my colleague from West Nova. I know that he and all members of the House are very concerned about this type of scenario. He poses a very practical question.
Earlier I referred to the commentary by Judge Clyde F. MacDonald in Pictou county when he made that exact analogy. I suggested that the current criminal code provisions spoke to murder and manslaughter when alcohol was involved. Oftentimes that is the case, particularly in domestic situations. It seems in those cases it is only an aggravating circumstance. Or, sometimes defence lawyers use it as a mitigating circumstance as to the state of mind of the individual who committed the murder.
Surely impaired people, who voluntarily put alcohol in their systems and get behind the wheel and go out on the highway and kill someone, have to be dealt with very harshly under the current provisions of the criminal code.