Mr. Speaker, I will relate to the member a situation that took place in Calgary some months back, where a sex offender who had offended not only in Canada but in the United States finished serving his time in Bowden penitentiary in Calgary. He served his complete time. Of course there was no registry in the province of Alberta and it just so happened that this offender moved to Oklahoma. He did not tell anyone. Through family and friends, word came back to my office that this offender was down there. He was a serious sex offender who had served several years in prison.
What do we do in a situation like that? It is difficult. We took the initiative and phoned the local sheriff where we knew he was staying in Oklahoma. The local sheriff was quite surprised that he had such an offender in his area and said that according to Oklahoma law the onus is on the offender to register in that area. Of course the offender had been in the States and knew what the laws were there, so the sheriff sought him out. The driving force for a pedophile or a sex offender to react to the registry in a positive way in Oklahoma is a five year sentence if he fails to do so. This is quite significant and it is cut and dried.
Would the member see something like that working in this jurisdiction of Canada? If so, what form should it take?