Mr. Speaker, this bill has some extremely important human implications.
I would like to begin by reading a very short quote from a brief presented to the committee studying Bill C-251. It says, in substance:
“We cannot rely exclusively on the sentence in finding just the right number of years to satisfy what can never be satisfied fully and certainly not in a courtroom or a penitentiary. No number of years, be they 25, 50 or 150 or more can return a loved one nor restore innocence”.
This quote is from the Church Council on Justice and Corrections.
Having said that, the amendments we are discussing today came along very late, and we could have done with a little more time to examine them in depth in order to make informed decisions.
I would prefer to speak, if I may, of the underlying principles that guide me, as well as of certain myths that need to be done away with. Then at the end I shall indicate my support or non-support of this bill.
First of all, let us deal with the myths. We often hear it said that life sentences are not life sentences. This is false. A life sentence means that the inmate will never again be free in his entire lifetime.
There is much reference made to the Bernardo and Olson cases. People seem to forget that there have already been amendments made to the Criminal Code to deal with this type of problem. Section 745.6 of the Criminal Code does not authorize a judicial review for such cases.
Obviously, the present Criminal Code allows judges to impose consecutive sentences. They have that latitude. Judges already take recidivism into account. Do they take it sufficiently into account? Should they accord more importance to it? Are there messages that should be sent? All this is possible, but, technically, these tools are already in the hands of the judiciary.
Another popular myth is that the Canadian justice system is not very tough. Our justice system is the toughest, after the United States, of all comparable nations. I am thinking of France, Great Britain, Japan, Australia, and so on. We have the second toughest justice system of all these countries.
For example, the average time someone sentenced to life spends incarcerated—meaning behind bars—is over 28 years. This puts us second behind the United States.
I am not passing a value judgment. I am not saying that this is good or bad. I am merely pointing out the facts. This is how it is.
In the United States, mandatory consecutive sentencing is not working. Like me, members have probably read the article in Time magazine. This was not for sex-related crimes. It was for drugs in particular. The principle was the same.
The title in question is “A get tough policy that failed”. Mandatory sentencing was once America's law and order panacea. Here is why it is not working.
I am pleased to see that the amendments proposed today include a return to judicial discretion and a departure from this kind of automatism. I would like to explain why I think this is important.
First, I will speak to judicial discretion. Canada's first Criminal Code, in 1892, already gave judges discretionary power. This power still exists today. I am referring to section 718.3(4) of the Criminal Code.
Judges must give reasons for their decisions. This means that the public has access to the reasons on which the judge based his or her decision whether or not to impose consecutive sentences. It is important to maintain judiciary discretion because, if judges do not want to do it, it will be done by the crown attorneys, who are not required to make their reasons public. Therefore, it is important that judiciary discretion be maintained.
Automatic sentences would be more or less like having the sentence determined by a computer. A person would feed all the data regarding the circumstances of a crime into the computer and it would indicate what sentence must be imposed. That is why I am against automatic sentences. I believe an amendment was put forward to change that. I am looking forward to reviewing it in detail.
Before deciding whether I will support this new version, I will need to make sure that nothing will get in the way of judiciary discretion.
I will need to make sure that nothing in this bill will perpetuate the myths I mentioned a few moments ago.
I will need to make sure that this bill is consistent with the charter as well as with the decisions already handed down by the supreme court with regard to offences to which this bill applies.
In short, I will need to make sure that this bill is consistent and that it is fair to victims while recognizing the fact that justice does not mean revenge, but correction and justice.