Mr. Chair, I understand my colleague's comments with regard to this being a mental illness case rather than a law enforcement case, but I do not believe that for a minute. I do not think anyone living in our communities believes this man was insane. He was a master manipulator who had manipulated the court system since he was 12 years old. He received over 30 convictions. That is not the issue here.
The issue is that we have this one incident and woe to the House if we do not take note of it. We have to understand that we have a problem in society and in our criminal justice system. We have a serious situation and it has developed over a number of years. We had better wake up and do something about it because it will get worse and we will see a repeat of what happened in Mayerthorpe.
There are individuals like Mr. Roszko in every riding across the country. We had better understand that this could happen in any one of our ridings. Our police officers are doing their very best with the resources they have. Our court system has failed them. We have failed them with their resources. We will continue to fail them in the House with weak laws that do not allow them to do their job properly.
I would ask the hon. member to seriously consider that this was not mental illness. If he wants to use that as an argument, I would say the government has serious problems dealing with mental illness, if we are looking at that as an issue.
That is not the case with respect to this incident. Nor is it the case with respect to the criminal element that is loose in our society. We continue to return them to our communities. These offenders will keep repeating if we do not do something about them.
I implore the House to understand the importance of taking note of this incident.