Debates of Oct. 17th, 2005

Criminal Code

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I concur with the member about the importance of the severity of the punishment and in terms of his referencing the American legislation, which we examined, with regard to the sentencing principles that we follow.

I might add that three new indictable offences to address human trafficking would be created by the legislation. The main offence, which is trafficking in persons, would prohibit anyone from engaging in specified acts for the purposes of exploiting or facilitating the exploitation of a person. The key things to that would be that it would carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment where it involves kidnapping, aggravated assault or sexual assault, or death, or 14 years in all other cases.

On the matter of giving expression and reflection to this global slave trade when it is dealing with the kidnapping, aggravated assault, sexual assault, things short of murder, when that is involving that kind of exploitative trafficking, the maximum penalty here is life imprisonment.

The second offence would prohibit anyone from receiving a financial or other material benefit resulting from the commission of a trafficking offence and they themselves are not the perpetrators of that offence, that would be punishable by a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment.

The third offence would prohibit withholding or destroying documents, such as identification or travel documents, for the purpose of committing or facilitating the commission of a trafficking offence and would carry a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.

We have created a framework for severe punishment to reflect the gravity of the offence to which we have referred as a global slave trade. We did consult the American legislation. I met with the former attorney general, Mr. Ashcroft, on a number of occasions with regard to this legislation. We held inter-ministerial meetings not only in Canada but between our two countries. We believe we have an appropriate and proportional sentencing and punishment structure for this most heinous of crimes.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, like the other parties, the NDP will be supporting the bill. We are pleased to do so because of the signals that it would give and some expansion of legislative authority for police officers who would be enforcing it.

However one of the reservations we have with the bill is that, as we know, a good number of the individual criminals, as well as the victims, are coming from other countries, that the source of the problem is coming from a country offshore and is coming through our territory often times for these people to be trafficked into Canada, but more often to be trafficked into the United States with us being a conduit. The real problem in the vast majority of cases is that we need to get back to those countries of origin and press them to do more to regulate this crime and prohibit this crime in those countries.

I wonder if the minister could address what we are doing as a country to in fact try to press those countries to have a better performance.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's question identifies the international dimension of trafficking and it highlights the importance of prevention, to which reference was made by the other hon. member as well. For that reason, we have made prevention a component of our overall anti-trafficking strategy outside a legislative framework. The reason all our embassies abroad have been provided with pamphlets in 14 languages is to provide that kind of sensibilisation internationally with regard to the prevention aspect.

Those things are brought up at meetings of the G8 ministers of justice and at international fora. We now have, which has been accentuated over the last number of years, a series of international conventions on protocols, which have received an increased number of ratifications, so as to better involve and coordinate the prevention and protection aspects. We are looking at this from a threefold aspect: the prevention of trafficking to begin with; the protection of victims, in this instance, those who are the tragic outcomes of this process we are seeking to prevent where we are unsuccessful in doing that; and then bringing the perpetrator to justice and providing severe penalties for that purpose.

However our involvement here is at the law enforcement level. The RCMP have developed their own international protocol with which they work with law enforcement officers in other countries. We are working informationally and educationally with other countries. We have civil society involved, again, internationally in this regard. We trust that kind of approach will bring about the results that we all collectively seek.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, this is an issue of great importance and I predict that most members on this side of the House will be supporting the legislation because it is going in the right direction. However we could probably support it with enthusiasm if it had some real teeth in it.

The minister is quite happy to talk about these sentences but he uses the words maximum sentences which means that a judge cannot exceed that amount. For example, if the maximum time of incarceration were five years that would mean it could actually be four years, or three years, or two years, or one year, or less. The sentence cannot be over five years.

We believe certain criminal offences should carry minimum sentences. In other words, discretion should be taken away from the judge so that he or she has to impose a minimum sentence of at least two years, or three years or something of that nature. This is a grave problem.

Why does the minister have the aversion, in this act and other acts that are so important to Canadians, to putting into the bills minimum sentences?

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have no aversion, neither personally nor professionally, with regard to mandatory minimum penalties.

I have studied the evidence both domestically and internationally and, as I have said, I am always open to any other evidentiary appreciations that I am not aware of. I have done a very comprehensive study of the evidence domestically and internationally which shows that mandatory minimum penalties serve neither as a deterrent nor are they effective.

I found that counter-intuitive. I thought when I looked into it that mandatory minimums would work but the evidence has shown that they do not. The evidence has shown that mandatory minimums have outcomes for the criminal justice system that are prejudicial to the very purposes we are seeking to bring about, namely that they tend to bring about lower imprisonments. In other words, mandatory minimums become the maximum rather than the minimum. We have protracted cases where less people enter guilty pleas.

That is why, for example, the American Bar Association in 2004 called for the repeal of all mandatory minimum sentences in the United States. The United States Supreme Court, during a case in 2005, said that it would be unconstitutional to require mandatory guidelines and said that it should look to sentencing in terms of an advisory approach.

A comprehensive study done in Canada looked at the situation internationally as well as domestically and came to the conclusion that mandatory minimum sentences were neither effective nor deterrents. If it can be shown that they would be deterrents, that they would be effective and that they would not be prejudicial to our shared objectives in the criminal justice system of deterring crime I would have no aversion to it.

Our approach is based on the proportionality principle in sentencing namely, that the sentence should reflect the gravity of the offence and the responsibility of the offender. I want to state something that I think on this point the courts appreciate with regard to this offence. A review of Criminal Code cases from March 2004 to February 2005 identified at least 31 individuals who were charged with traffic and related offences. This resulted in 19 convictions and the remaining 12 cases are before the courts. In all cases, sentences were imposed of up to 9.5 years imprisonment, and I am talking about before this legislation with its maximum life imprisonment and the signal that sends to would-be offenders.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to stand in the House of Commons to speak to Bill C-49, a very important bill. We do have unanimous consent that this move forward to protect the most vulnerable.

I will start off by addressing some of the comments made by the justice minister. He made the comment that mandatory sentencing results in lower sentencing. Canadians are frustrated that the sentencing the courts provide for very serious offences result in conditional sentencing, meaning offenders are serving their sentences at home. Canadians are not confident that the sentencing is adequate, which is why there is an outcry to have mandatory minimum sentencing so there will be at least jail sentences for these heinous crimes.

We had a recent announcement regarding crystal meth which is now a schedule one drug. Traffickers in this drug would receive life imprisonment. The typical sentence for that type of offence is three and a half years. The government comes out with these proclamations, these phony bills saying that it will get tough on crime. Every member of the justice committee wants to make sure that these victims are protected, that this does not happen any more in Canada and that there is a serious message.

As a Conservative, I believe that mandatory minimum sentencing has to be part of the bill. We support having the bill go ahead. Why? I would like to go back to the late 1700s. There was a man by the name of William Wilberforce who was known as the conscience of Parliament. He fought against slavery.

It came to the attention of the United Nations that trafficking in people was still going on, primarily of women and children being drawn into the sex trade. It is offensive, it needs to be dealt with and it is a world concern. As we have heard, $10 billion U.S. a year is what organized crime is reaping in benefits from this. It is a very big problem and we need to deal with it.

William Wilberforce in the late 1700s stood against slavery and yet it is still happening today. We need to come up with legislation that deals with this modern day form of slavery.

Trafficking in persons has been described, as I said, as human slavery in this year. The United Nations reported that trafficking is the fastest growing form of transnational organized crime. Local crime organizations are drawn to this industry because of the relatively low risk of being caught and it is run by multinational criminal networks that are well-funded, well-organized and extremely adaptable to changing technologies.

The United Nations estimates that 700,000 people are trafficked annually worldwide and most of them are women and children. Most victims are forced into commercial sexual exploitation as well as involuntary servitude or debt bondage. Others may be exploited through hard labour and, in some countries, children are trafficked to work even as soldiers.

Trafficked persons are often duped into their new profession, deceived with seemingly legitimate employment contracts or marriage abroad. Others are simply abducted.

People are being told they can come to Canada and get a job and that it is a wonderful country. It is a wonderful country, but they are brought into Canada under false pretences. When they arrive here they are told that the job they were promised is no longer there but that they do have another job, which turns out to be that of a sex trade worker. It is terrible to trap people into that. The visas and passports are seized and taken from these people. These people are afraid to go to the police in case they will be deported from Canada, so they keep quiet and they are trapped.

The government is right that it is an abhorrent crime against humanity, against human rights and we need to stand against it as a country.

In dealing with victim protection, international attention to the issue of trafficking is very important. The status of the victim is often very complex. Although there are some universally recognized victims such as, for example, children who are exploited through the sex trade, others often are perceived as illegal migrants and criminals.

Women trafficked into the sex trade are sometimes seen as simply violating immigration or criminal laws relating to prostitution. Because of these perceptions and because of threats from traffickers, many victims are reluctant to turn to the police for protection.

The social stigma from prostitution is also a problem. Women who have been trafficked internationally and who are returned to their home countries may be ostracized within their communities and their families. It is a very big problem.

In Canada there are no hard statistics, but the RCMP estimates that 600 women and children are smuggled and coerced into the Canadian sex trade every year. If we include in that figure people who are forced into other forms of labour, it numbers about 800 people a year. This should not go on.

Canada has a relatively good record on the international stage in terms of efforts to stem this trade. In June of last year, the U.S. state department reported that British Columbia has become an attractive hub for East Asian human traffickers, who smuggle South Korean women through Canada and into the United States. In large part this is attributed to the fact that South Koreans do not need a visa to enter Canada.

The only thing these thugs understand is the full force of the law. We must have legislation. Bill C-49 must have teeth. We need to involve heavy prison time and confiscation of all profits. As a Conservative government, we would want to have Bill C-49 amended to deal with things properly.

The proposed amendments to the Criminal Code in Bill C-49 would create three new indictable offences that specifically address human trafficking. The first contains the global prohibition on trafficking persons. The second prohibits a person from benefiting economically from trafficking. The third prohibits the withholding or destruction of identity, immigration or travel documents to facilitate trafficking in persons.

The legislation also ensures that trafficking may form the basis of a warrant to intercept private communications, to take bodily samples for DNA analysis and to permit inclusion of the offender in the sex offender registry. Bill C-49 also expands the ability to seek restitution to the victims who are subjected to bodily or psychological harm.

Again, without serious penalties for these very serious, abhorrent crimes, the exploitation and abuse will continue. In this legislation, there are no mandatory minimum prison sentences. We need to send a clear message that slavery is wrong.

About five months ago, the justice committee passed Bill C-2, the child pornography legislation. It received third reading and went to the Senate and received royal assent, but Bill C-2 is sitting on the Prime Minister's desk. As well, Bill C-13, the DNA legislation, passed through this House, went to the Senate and received royal assent, but it also is sitting on the Prime Minister's desk, waiting to be enacted. These are very important pieces of legislation and I would like the justice minister to answer us as to why Bill C-2, the child pornography legislation, and Bill C-13, the DNA legislation, are sitting on the Prime Minister's desk waiting to be enacted.

Bill C-49 is such an important bill. There is a will in this House to see it go on to the Senate and receive royal assent. Is it going to sit on the Prime Minister's desk, just like Bill C-2 and Bill C-13? I hope not.

We also have heard of the Liberal-NDP coalition's plan to legalize prostitution solicitation. We have heard that there is a report coming, which has been made public. This is a very serious problem. If we go down the path of legalizing prostitution solicitation, it will exacerbate the problem.

We already know that the government wants the age of sexual consent to be 14, one of the lowest in the world. It causes us problems. We have pedophiles looking at our children. They lure them through the Internet. Now there is a plan from the government to legalize prostitution and solicitation. With a low age of consent and the plan regarding prostitution, we must have multiple types of legislation to protect our vulnerable children and our women.

This is what I want to know. We need to know from the justice minister what kind of legislation we are going to have. Are we going to have Bill C-49, which is what Canadians want, with some teeth? Would he accept amendments?

We have other pieces of legislation in our Criminal Code that have mandatory prison sentences. Is not trafficking in persons one of the most abhorrent crimes in the world today? I would argue that it is.

If we have mandatory minimum sentences for these other violent offences, why not for trafficking in persons? Are the minister and the government saying that it is really not as bad as some of these other offences? I would argue that it is. I think it is one of the worst and I think the United Nations acknowledges that it is one of the worst. If we have mandatory minimums for other criminal offences, why not for this?

I do support Bill C-49 going ahead, but we have to toughen it up.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague gave a very good speech and argued very forcefully for the idea of minimum sentences. In his previous comments, the Minister of Justice said that the evidence is counterintuitive, in his words. We would expect that minimum sentences would act as a deterrent, and yet, he said, the evidence does not show that. Yet my colleague said that the minimum sentences do show some change in the behaviour of those who would be criminals.

I would like to ask my colleague what he thinks of the minister's aversion to the use of minimum sentences.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the question is an important one: what is the government's aversion to mandatory minimum sentences?

We know that mandatory minimum sentences are effective in that they set a benchmark of what society accepts as a minimum sentence for a crime. We trust the courts to have discretion on the vast majority of criminal offences, but on the most heinous crimes we need to have a direction for to the courts. It has been the history of soft-on-crime Liberal governments to tell the courts that we do not want offenders locked up, that we want to provide conditional sentencing and to have conditional sentencing used, that is, the least restrictive type of sentencing for offenders.

Now we have car racers who kill citizens. What sentence do they receive? They serve their sentence at home under conditional sentences. We know that conditional sentencing has been abused.

Mandatory minimum sentences for the most heinous crimes would give a clear message to the courts that the crimes are heinous. Maximums do not give that message, but mandatory minimums would. Dangerous offenders and repeat offenders who put Canadians at risk by the most heinous of crimes need to have mandatory sentencing. It will give the message to the courts. It will give the message to the offenders that if they offend in Canada there will be a consequence.

The message that is there internationally is that Canada is a wonderful country, but there also is the reputation that Canada is soft on crime. We need to change that. How do we do that? We would do it through mandatory minimum sentences. There is evidence that they work. We need to look at them.

[Myron Thompson, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it appears to me as though it is not what it is in the law that is the problem; it is what happens in the courts that seems to be a serious problem.

I have a difficult time understanding why our justice minister does not understand that when there is violent crime, particularly against children, or when there are crimes of a sexual nature, we are hearing about sentences of house arrest and community service.

Recently there were 15 counts of fraud against a certain government official and he was found guilty. I think this official has to be home by nine o'clock every night and has to teach proper business ethics in colleges. That is his sentence.

One day I stood in court and watched farmers being shackled, chained, handcuffed and hauled off to jail for selling their own product. They took it across the border. They broke the law.

What the Minister of Justice fails to understand is that there does not seem to be any match in penalties fitting the crime. The government hauls off farmers in shackles and chains in front of their families for selling their product across the border without a permit from the Wheat Board while letting an individual who defrauded the government of somewhere in the neighbourhood of $1.5 million have house arrest. He is guilty on 15 counts of fraud and he is under house arrest and has been ordered to teach business ethics. Then we also have violent offenders doing house arrest and community service.

Does the member not agree with me that this whole big picture looks really sick and needs repairing? We do not have a Minister of Justice who is willing to repair it. We have a Minister of Justice who continually supports it. That is my whole grievance in this issue.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague from Wild Rose says it from the heart. Canadians are frustrated with the sentencing that dangerous offenders are receiving in Canada.

The member sits on the justice committee, as do I. Canadians are asking for appropriate sentencing. Canadians are asking for sentencing to change. They are asking that we have consequences for dangerous and repeat offenders. Canadians want there to be consequences for those actions.

In my riding of Langley, a young man sexually assaulted two young girls. What sentence did he receive? He received conditional sentencing. It was house arrest. He served out his sentence at home. His victims lived on each side of him.

There has been an actual abuse of discretion. Canadians are calling out for change on how we sentence criminals. Canadians are calling for mandatory minimums because they do not have confidence in this government. Canadians do not have confidence in the weak legislation. They do not have confidence in the phony announcements.

Earlier I brought up the fact that we have Bill C-2, Bill C-13 and now Bill C-49 dealing respectively with child pornography, DNA and trafficking in people. What happens to those bills when there is unanimous consent within this House to have them move forward? Why do these bills sit on the Prime Minister's desk? Why are they not signed and enacted? We have heard about how important these bills are. Why are they not enacted?

What will happen with Bill C-49? Will this bill pass through this process? Will it receive immediate attention and then sit on the Prime Minister's desk? Canadians are asking for a change. The change starts with mandatory minimum sentences for dangerous and repeat offenders.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the comments of the hon. member and I will refrain from any ad hominem personal approaches because they are simply unproductive and inappropriate in a Parliament that should have civil debate. I will address the issue on the merits and with respect to the evidence.

I first want to reaffirm what I said before. I have no personal nor professional aversion with regard to mandatory minimums. If it could be demonstrated to me on the evidence that it would work, then I would be prepared to be responsive. All the evidence that I have studied domestically and internationally says the opposite.

Second, with regard to this bill, which is the subject of our debate, it contains some of the most stringent penalties in the whole of criminal law with regard to this type of criminal activity. Because references have been made to other countries, as I indicated earlier, not only does it compare with respect to the sentencing in the U.S. anti-trafficking legislation, but the United Kingdom, for example, has up to 14 years imprisonment on indictment. Australia has up to 25 years imprisonment for a slavery offence and up to 19 years imprisonment for sexual servitude in matters which we are providing for life imprisonment. New Zealand has up to 14 years imprisonment. Even on a comparative basis, this is not only one of the most stringent penalty frameworks in the whole of our criminal law domestically but it also compares favourably internationally.

In the matter of conditional sentences, the hon. member opposite said that it was the nature of the conditional sentences which had been handed out that developed the groundswell for mandatory minimums. The hon. member knows I have given notice to this Parliament that we will be introducing legislation to reform the conditional sentencing regime, legislation that I trust will have the support of all members of Parliament so that conditional sentencing will be used for the purposes for which it was specifically intended and not to be used for purposes of providing house arrest or any other penalty of that kind where a serious and violent criminal offence has occurred. We will be reforming the conditional sentencing regime.

Finally, when the hon. member says that there is a call of Canadians for mandatory minimums, I would not purport to speak in the name of all Canadians. If he wishes to speak in the name of all Canadians, he can choose to do so. All I am saying is I seek to legislate in the interest of all Canadians and I am doing so on the basis of the best appreciation we can make on the domestic and international evidence as to what will work as a deterrent, what will be effective and what will be helpful for our criminal justice system and which will best protect Canadians and their security and safety.

That is our objective, an objective which we know is shared by members opposite. We do not need to get into ad hominems to make our point. Let us look at the evidence and make our case on the evidence.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments of the justice minister. I believe he honestly means well, but I do not believe his paradigm is in line with what Canadians want. They want justice. They want appropriate sentencing where there is a consequence for the crime. They do not believe in dangerous offenders serving their sentences at home.

Twice, at the beginning of my speech and also at the end, I talked about Bill C-2 and Bill C-13 and why they were sitting on the Prime Minister's desk without being enacted. When we come up with legislation, why does it sit on the Prime Minister's desk? Unfortunately, the minister did not answer those questions.

I think Canadians want conditional sentencing. We support Bill C-49 going ahead, but I am hoping we will get mandatory minimums added at committee stage.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Marcel Proulx)]

It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Calgary Centre-North, Aboriginal Affairs; the hon. member for Elgin—Middlesex—London, Government Aircraft; the hon. member for Edmonton—Strathcona, Citizenship and Immigration.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues who spoke before me on this issue. Let me begin by thanking the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, who introduced this bill that we debated and passed unanimously at the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.

I am pleased to rise in this House for the first time to speak to a bill that was referred to the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, where I began to sit only a few weeks ago. We studied this bill very carefully.

I knew the hon. Minister of Justice in another life when he was a law professor at a famous university in Quebec, since he was one of my professors. The hon. minister could not possibly remember that, as it was a few decades ago.

His great sense of justice allows us to debate today a very important bill that will end modern-day slavery. This type of slavery is practised throughout the world, but in Canada in particular. This bill could provide us with arguments, elements and possibilities to at least deter this modern-day slavery.

I do not want to rehash the debate on whether we should impose minimum sentences or not, or what type of sentence the courts will hand down in light of the bill before us, that I hope will be passed very quickly. No, I do not want to do that.

I have a 30-year career in criminal law behind me. I worked as a defence lawyer over the past 20 years or so. It is now known that minimum sentences have not resolved anything. The minimum sentence for importing narcotics was seven years. That never stopped narcotics trafficking whatsoever.

Traffickers formed groups and we saw the arrival of the Hells Angels and other such criminal gangs. I do not have any statistics before me, but in my career, five or six of my clients were charged, but never sentenced to seven-year minimal sentences. Every possibility was explored, bargaining was used, cases were argued and nothing was resolved.

Under the bill before us, we will be eliminating modern-day slavery by creating “an offence of trafficking in persons that prohibits a person from engaging in specified acts for the purpose of exploiting or facilitating the exploitation of another person”. This bill will put an end to all of that.

This bill will “create an offence that prohibits a person from receiving a financial or other material benefit that they know results from the commission of the offence of trafficking in persons”.

It will “create an offence that prohibits concealing, removing, withholding or destroying travel documents or documents that establish or purport to establish another person’s identity or immigration status for the purpose of committing or facilitating the offence of trafficking in persons”.

Then, as if that were not enough, it will create an offence of causing another person “to provide, or offer to provide, labour or a service by engaging in conduct that, in all the circumstances, could reasonably be expected to cause the other person to believe that their safety or the safety of a person known to them would be threatened if they failed to provide, or offer to provide, the labour or service; or cause them, by means of deception or the use or threat of force or of any other form of coercion, to have an organ or tissue removed.”

To paraphrase that, which is not complicated, from this evening on—it is the hope of us all—anyone who causes another person from any country whatsoever to believe she can come to Canada and work as a babysitter or something else, and then takes away that person's passport and other papers and forces her into prostitution, will be punished. Those who do such things will have to realize that, starting this very night, the game is all over. Unless they take their business elsewhere, they are at risk of some serious jail time. We will make sure that their offences are heavily punished.

I think it is important to underscore this point: forcing someone to work or to provide services, sexual services for example, through behaviour that leads the victim to fear for his or her personal safety, or that of a loved one, if the demands are not met, is the definition of exploitation as far as human trafficking is concerned.

The legal roadblock over the years consisted in defining what constituted exploitation as far as human trafficking is concerned. That is exactly what it is.

This bill contains an important clause dealing with causing a person “by means of deception or the use or threat of force or of any other form of coercion, to have an organ or tissue removed”. It is not true that, in the future, someone who comes to our country can have a kidney removed for any reason. With this bill, this falls under human exploitation. I think it is important to emphasize that. It is one of the key points of this bill, which, as I said, will put an end to modern day slavery.

The victims are often deceived into or forced to work in the sex industry or to perform other kinds of forced labour. That will stop. It is unacceptable that, in Canada alone, more than 800 people are the victims of this new kind of slavery every year. This bill will put an end to that, starting tonight. We believe that it is essential that it be passed, and passed as soon as possible.

There have been reports and studies. The first report, the UN report on trafficking in women published in 2000, indicates that Canada is among the top 30 destination countries for human trafficking. Starting tonight, Canada, Quebec and the other provinces could be taken off that list. It sends a chill up my spine to think that Canada could be one of the top 30 destination countries for human trafficking in recent years. We do hope that this bill will be given quick passage.

Among the issues raised in this 2000 report was the fact that, more often than not, the victims do not expose their employers because, for one thing, once identified by the authorities, they will not be allowed to remain in their country of adoption in order to seek protection or demand redress.

Based on the information provided to us in committee, we believe that this bill will ensure that steps are taken so that the victims of trafficking—and I am addressing my remarks to them—are no longer afraid to expose those who have been holding them hostage or maintaining them in forced slavery for far too long.

As if this were not enough, the International Labour Organization produced a report in which it was estimated that there are at least 2,450,000 people in the world who are kept in situations of forced labour. These people are forced under physical and psychological threats to prostitute themselves or to work for little or no pay in the construction or agricultural sectors.

As of this evening, this will be a thing of the past in Canada. We hope this bill will be passed at the earliest opportunity, and we feel there is a consensus among members of the House to put an end to this exploitation, to this modern day slavery.

Indeed, the United States did pass the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which created new offences, but it was time for us to do the same. This is very important legislation. Bill C-49 is a major piece in the puzzle to fight organized crime. It is a good start and it has the great merit of adding to the tools needed to prosecute individuals involved in the trafficking in persons.

However, since this human trafficking is often run by criminal organizations, it becomes just as urgent to amend the Criminal Code so as to create a reversal of the burden of proof as regards proceeds of crime. This will be another issue, another piece of the puzzle. The House will deal again with this issue very soon. I am referring to Bill C-53, which we also want to be passed at the earliest opportunity. Once it is passed—and here it is the defence lawyer who is speaking—it will give police officers other means to fight organized crime, which has made too many victims in this country, particularly in Quebec.

If I may, I would like to pay tribute to the hon. member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, who is the Bloc Québécois critic on justice, human rights and public safety. My colleague has done a tremendous job regarding the two issues relating to Bill C-49 and Bill C-53. He has been working on these two issues for close to two years. At last, we will begin to move forward, one step at a time. This evening we will be making a step forward with Bill C-49.

Bill C-49, which is before us, will say three things when it is passed by the Senate and ratified by the Governor General. We know that there are two bills currently on the Prime Minister's desk that have yet to come into force. It is probably because there is a shortage of funds somewhere. However, I think that this is a false pretext. Given the budgetary surpluses of this government, the hon. Minister of Justice will be able to argue that the fight against organized crime is essential and important. We must give our police forces the means to implement the fight against organized crime.

As a result of amendments to the bill, human trafficking or profiting from human trafficking will be illegal. This affects all those involved directly or indirectly in such trafficking.

I am thinking of agricultural workers who are brought over and exploited on farms. This would carry a prison sentence. We will punish and launch legal proceedings against anyone who destroys or conceals identity documents in order to facilitate human trafficking.

In conclusion, I was extremely pleased to have taken part in the debate on this bill. The Bloc Québécois will support it without reservation. However, it will ask the Minister of Justice to ensure that this bill comes into force as soon as possible, so that we have the means to effectively and radically fight this crime.

I come from a region called Abitibi—Témiscamingue, where admittedly there is little to no human trafficking. In any case, I have not heard a great deal about it in the last 50 years. However, this phenomenon exists not only in mid-size and large urban centres in Quebec and Canada, but throughout the world.

Canada must be a leader and a model in this area. This evening, we have the opportunity to adopt a bill that will put Canada in the position to call upon other nations to follow our lead and put a stop to this unacceptable form of modern slavery in our world today. So I am calling on the House to pass this bill as soon as possible.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I remember the hon. member as one of my top students, and later an excellent criminal lawyer prior to becoming an MP. His knowledge and expertise in this area are without question. He has shown that today.

He has addressed a point I had neglected and I thank him for that. This bill is important because it concerns organized crime. I support everything the hon. member has said about the importance of combating organized crime and the importance of having resources for that fight.

I would also like to indicate that I endorse his comments with respect to the hon. member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles and his commitment to certain other bills in addition to this one. Like him, I hope to see it passed and implemented as promptly as possible.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. Minister of Justice. When I was one of his students, I would have liked to have seen my marks reflect the kind of praise he has just given me. I was not that bad, but there were others better than me, or so it seems.

That said, I want to pay tribute to the hon. Minister of Justice. He was, in my opinion, one of the best law professors his university ever had. I hope that the university will waste no time in acknowledging that. We are, nevertheless, on opposite sides politically, but we both believe in one thing: organized crime has been rampant for far too long in Quebec. In fact, it has made a lot of money for a certain category of publication.

People must not assume that we will just sit on our hands and wait, once this bill is passed. We will be demanding, insisting—the minister can count on it—that the government come up with the means for putting it into application and thus ensuring that organized crime will find obstacles in its path for what I call modern day slavery.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my hon. colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue on his excellent speech on this bill. I totally agree that human trafficking is a scourge.

I would like him to provide us with some guidance. Often, our listeners include young people, and a word of caution would be in order. The bill deals with white slavery, but without specifying how contacts are established. The Internet has become a scourge. Internet chat groups are one approach that organized crime can use to attract young people from abroad, just as our young people could be attracted abroad.

I would just like my hon. colleague to put into perspective the new ways organized crime has to attract the victims, especially younger ones, of human trafficking.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague. I was not expecting this question, which makes me think about one of the matters for which I am responsible. I do not have it with me, but I know it by heart.

It is true that people operate now using all these chat rooms on the Internet. You go to these sites and you chat, as it is called, by typing messages with someone on the Internet.

One of my clients was victimized by this kind of thing. She found herself in one of the countries of the Maghreb, which I will not name in order to avoid any possibility of her being recognized, washing dishes when she had been promised that she would be a hostess for a so-called prince or oil minister. To get her out of that country took us more than two years of activity. What she told us after getting out was truly incredible.

We hope that this bill will make it possible for victims to complain, for their complaints to be heard and analyzed, and most importantly, for victims to be protected.

Organized crime today uses many systems, especially the Internet. People from Australia, Denmark, Finland, the former eastern bloc countries, people from all over the world, can chat in the space of a minute. Dates are arranged that way. The government has to find ways to intercept these wrongdoers or, at the very least, when a complaint is filed, trace the steps back to the person who set the trap. There is no other word for it; it is a trap set for victims.

I personally doubt very much that Internet dates are so productive. Even though it has been confirmed that extraordinary encounters have taken place over the Internet, unfortunately many bad encounters have ended in the death or serious injury of one of the participants.

I will touch briefly on an incident that occurred in New York. A man ended up in a hotel room at a wild party with some people. Three days later, he was missing a kidney. He does not know who took it. This all came about because he responded to an invitation on the Internet to go to a party at a certain location.

We have to be extremely careful. I want to thank the hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel for this question. By all accounts, having legislation in place will not resolve the problem. However, we are going to provide the tools for attacking this problem, but we still must be careful and pay attention to meetings that may be arranged over the Internet.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first, I want to congratulate my colleague on his remarks on Bill C-49. He knows this subject well, and that knowledge will be an asset to the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.

Like all the members of the Bloc Québécois, I support Bill C-49, which will give the justice system better tools with which to deal with the problem of human trafficking.

I want to ask my colleague two questions. First, is Bill C-49 sufficient in order to improve the human trafficking situation in this country? Could we do more to fix this problem with regard to modern slavery? Second, does this bill provide greater protection for those who are victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation, who are forced to work and provide sexual services?

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his very interesting question. It may not be a cure-all, but it is a good part of the solution. Bill C-49 is a good step in the right direction. But we must also give quick passage to Bill C-53, providing for the reversal of onus. This bill will be debated in this House very shortly.

If we want to fight organized crime, this bill will enable us to go after those who traffic white slaves or workers, or those currently involved in modern day slavery, as I said earlier.

This kind of slavery is a lucrative business, the proceeds of which are often used to buy big mansions, snowmobiles and what not. When the time comes to convict the offenders, we will need the last piece of the puzzle, namely Bill C-53, to reverse the onus of proof. It will require offenders who have been convicted to prove that the money is not the proceeds of the crime they committed, more specifically trafficking in persons.

I hasten to conclude by answering the second question. Indeed, police protection could be provided to witnesses. What is commonly known as witness protection, more specifically in connection with organized crime, will be available.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-49 would make as crimes three additional provisions. First, it would make trafficking in human beings a crime. It is amazing that it is not one already. Second, it would be a crime if anyone were to profit from trafficking. Third, it would be a crime to withhold documents, such as travel documents or identification documents.

The bill is designed to deal with what can only be classified as a horrendous crime and a horrendous set of circumstances that is besetting us worldwide. We are being told, particularly by the United Nations, that crimes of this nature are growing in number.

Until a few years ago when this became very apparent, we had believed that slavery in all of its forms had been eradicated. We certainly think of the steps that were taken back in the 1800s and the role Canada played in outlawing slavery in Canada.

I was recently at a testimonial for a husband, who was an escaped slave from the United States, and his wife. We unveiled a plaque in the west end of the city as a testimony to the work they had done around that period of time, that their predecessors had done in Canada and the work that they had done in the United States to bring what we believed was an end to slavery on this continent.

We were all shocked when we found out that there are all too many cases of people being indentured in one form or another, intimidated, threatened, assaulted, and in some cases even killed, as part of this type of crime. The incidents are largely generated by organized crime operating in gangs right around the globe.

We are late in terms of responding to this. We are doing so as a result of the protocol which we along with a large number of other countries signed at the UN in 2000, and which was ratified in 2002. The protocol is to prevent, suppress and punish trafficking in persons, especially the trafficking in women and children. It is accurate that women and children are mentioned because they tend to be victims of this crime in significantly larger numbers than men are. We are responding to that finally in this bill.

As we heard in the debate so far, all parties will be supporting the bill. It may be one of the few bills that gets through this House with unanimous support, and rightfully so.

I want to address most of my comments today to what the bill does not do and what we as a legislature have to look to do.

The protocol I mentioned a few moments ago does not talk just about defining the crime, condemning the crime, and putting in place enforcement to fight the crime. It also talks about our responsibility as a nation to deal with the victims of the crime. We have not done that in this country up to this point.

The primary thing we have to be looking at, and it is really the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who has to take on this responsibility, is what we do with the victims of this crime who have come in from offshore. We are a focal point to some degree for these victims to be used in Canada in this way. However, Canada is also used as a conduit and probably larger numbers of people are trafficked through Canada into the United States.

On a regular basis we do catch some of the criminals and a significant number of victims. Our pattern now is to deport the victims back to their country of origin, oftentimes into a set of circumstances that have not changed at all since they were first victimized. They are threatened and intimidated again and the same thing happens to their families and friends because of the strength of the organized criminals in those countries and the lack of proper law enforcement to protect them.

I recently saw a documentary from England on this point. England is beginning to identify repeat victims. The victims are found and the criminals are charged. As is done here, the victims are sent back to their country of origin and go through the same thing. The victims are brought back into the criminal system, smuggled back into England and the victimization continues.

We should not be part of that. We need amendments to our immigration legislation to deal with victims whom we have identified clearly as victims. If they are to continue to be victimized, we should not be sending them back to that country. As I said earlier, the protocol which we have ratified calls on us as a nation to take steps to prevent that from happening and to bring our laws into line with humane treatment of those victims.

The protocol also recommends that we provide proper benefits. This would be for the victims in the country who are generated from within this country. There are a significant number. Particularly within the sex trade, victims are not voluntarily recruited, but are recruited in a non-voluntary forceful fashion. They are recruited into the system by the gangs and are victimized in this country.

We need to have in place regulations and resources to deal with the situation when they are identified as victims. This oftentimes means extensive counselling because of the great deal of physical and sexual abuse they have suffered. The legislation does not address that point. It is one which the government should address.

My final point and something on which I believe we should be working is a more forceful position on the international scene. It is beyond our immediate control, but it is almost a moral obligation that we should say to the countries that do not have sufficient law enforcement that they have go begin to do that. We are conveying a message. We are saying to the international community that we will meet our responsibilities, but we also have to say to the international community, specifically to those countries that are not carrying out their responsibilities, that are not protecting their own citizens from this type of abuse who are being recruited non-voluntarily into the system that they have to start doing that.

We may have to move to an even stronger position and in some cases suggest sanctions. Do we reduce our cultural ties or our trade ties with some of these countries until they respond and prevent their own citizens from becoming victims?

We have taken a step forward. I have to say perhaps with some cynicism that it is not nearly as big a step as we have heard from some of the other speakers particularly on the government side, but it is a step forward. It is one that is a bit late. We probably should have done this several years ago in order to meet our responsibilities internationally. We have now accomplished part of the goal that has been set in that protocol, but we are not all the way there. There is still a substantial amount of work that has to be done, particularly in the immigration area.

I would encourage the government to say that we have made the first step, and let us move to fully protect the victims of those crimes.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Madam Speaker, I want to express my appreciation to the hon. member for his comments and highlight two important points that he made.

We see the legislation as a first important step, but as I indicated in my remarks at third reading of the bill, a larger and more comprehensive strategy is needed. We have therefore set up an interim ministerial committee with representatives from 17 departments and agencies. The committee will develop a comprehensive domestic and international strategy which will include the important component of prevention along with protecting victims and bringing perpetrators to justice.

On the second point he mentioned, I want to highlight the importance of protecting victims. We cannot find ourselves in the situation where victims are victimized again through the process of deportation rather than through the domestic processes of protection.

I concur that this effort must be international. It cannot be addressed only at the domestic level. We need to engage the international community and look to countries as demonstrating their responsible global citizenship by how they are treating global slave trade.

I want to commend the hon. member for making these remarks. We will seek to incorporate them in our strategy as well.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Madam Speaker, at the committee when we were doing what was a brief review of the legislation, because it had such overwhelming support, I asked a couple of questions. I was a bit disturbed at the lack of knowledge in responding to them. We have not identified the size of the problem in Canada in terms of criminal activity. I think this is problem because of the way we go about enforcing our laws.

We have this image that this is all about victims and the sex trade. We hear more about this from the Conservatives than from anybody else. I have looked at figures in the United States and less than half of the victims of this crime are being victimized in the sex trade. The majority of the victims are being used on farms in that country, in the garment trades and other types of trades where people are working in horrendous conditions in small out of the way factories with no protection. I am concerned about this. However, the witnesses who appeared at committee were perhaps unable to give us a clear picture of the situation in Canada.

I would encourage the minister, in the ongoing cross-ministerial investigation, to get a better handle on the nature of the problem rather than just concentrating on sex trade victims as much as that is important.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Madam Speaker, I tried to give some data in my remarks today. I acknowledged that because of the clandestine nature of the trafficking phenomenon, we did not always have the data we would like to have and that there were differences with regard to the data itself. The United Nations will identify some 700,000 persons as being trafficked every year. UNICEF will tell us that 1.2 million children alone are trafficked every year. The International Labour Organization will tell us about those who are trafficked into forced labour and the likes.

This is not just a matter of sexual exploitation. It is a phenomenon and we need to get as much data about it as possible so we can address it effectively and properly. Any assistance that could be provided for that purpose from the hon. member would be welcomed as well.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Madam Speaker, I do not want to suggest that I am an expert by any means, but I agree with the minister that there is a problem with definition.

For instance, the UNICEF figures include a good number of children who are being used as child soldiers, almost always domestically but sometimes transported over international boundaries. There is a problem with that and I understand. However, that should not give us any reason not to get full control on what the situation is in Canada.

I have the sense, from everything I have investigated, that there is minimal work being done around farm labour. We have international agreements with a number of countries, Mexico and the Caribbean in particular, where we have a regulated system for workers to be brought in, so there is no particular incentive in that area of the economy for us to be seeing people victimized as part of gangs.

However, the department needs to work on this. The government overall needs to work on this more. We will be unable to effectively enforce this legislation unless we know with what we are confronted.