Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for Joliette for her kind words. We are very much aware of this important and sensitive issue.
The RCMP does have a detachment in the vast region of Joliette. Joliette is one of the largest cities in the Lanaudière area, and the RCMP detachment helps make our homes and streets safer.
However, this professional but rather modest detachment cannot ensure the safety and security of everyone in the region. As in several areas in Quebec and in Canada, I am sure, but especially in our region, which I am very familiar with, the role of an RCMP detachment is to bring together the various stakeholders.
The role of the RCMP is to educate the public about their rights and the law and to ensure public safety. To this end, it works in cooperation with the Sûreté du Québec, the appropriate municipal police forces and public safety agencies, like Avenue Jeunesse and the Maison des jeunes.
I see the role of the RCMP as being more preventive, in cooperation with our communities. I see the RCMP as a group which, together with others, prevents our youth from falling into organized crime or committing a crime by preparing them in advance and not only by being coercive.
Their involvement in our community is very important. In this regard, I appreciate the question and comments from my colleague and I support the comments made by the member for Joliette. We want to keep this detachment that has been a part of our communities for a very long time in order to ensure this security.
However, if the government should one day decide to follow up on the RCMP report and abolish this detachment, we would at least ask for financial compensation, not because we want money, but because that would create a void that would have to be filled to ensure that the services previously provided could continue to be offered.
As to whether removing the RCMP detachment would be a good thing or a bad thing, we could look at it from another angle. If I remember correctly, in 1998, 1999, the New Brunswick Provincial Police was abolished and replaced by the RCMP. Frank McKenna was the premier at the time.
I have friends who lost their job. They were members of the New Brunswick Provincial Police. I do not know—I have not done any studies and I am asking you or rather us—if all the concerns and all the expectations were addressed.
We would have to look at the crime rate. We would also have to look at the issue of speeding on the highways and fatal accidents. We would have to look at what people hoped to achieve by eliminating the provincial police in a province and replacing it with the RCMP and see if all the objectives were met.
That would give us an example of the role of the RCMP and of the importance of its presence in our communities. Of course, in Quebec, the RCMP is not as present and as visible in our daily lives. However, it is there to a modest degree in Joliette and in the Lanaudière area and we want to preserve what we have come to rely on, or at least be compensated if we lose it.