Mr. Speaker, on March 3, the Westwood Plateau Community Association hosted a town hall meeting to discuss the issue of marijuana grow ops in my community.
I congratulate the organizers of the event for providing a forum for what has become a major concern for my constituents.
From top to bottom, we need to reform our laws to fight marijuana grow ops. We need to reform our search and seizure powers, provide more resources for the Port Moody Police and Coquitlam RCMP, establish effective port security to cut down on marijuana smuggling, enact stiffer penalties for irresponsible landlords, impose tougher sentencing for criminals involved in grow ops, and break our social indifference to the slow invasion of our communities by the organized criminals involved.
The first step of the state is to protect those who obey our laws from those who do not. Before all else, a peaceful and orderly society must always be at the top of our agenda.
I pledge to all my constituents that I will do all I can to stop marijuana grow ops from attacking our quality of life.
Much work needs to be done, but in order to begin we need a government here in Ottawa that both recognizes the problem and is committed to tough new solutions.