Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his explanation of Bill C-23 I was most interested in his remarks toward the end of his speech when he dealt with evidence, the rules of evidence and the possibility that some evidence may be deemed inadmissible if it were I believe it is called fruit from the poisoned tree. If the source of which came into question it may preclude the possibility of that valuable evidence being used in some subsequent court hearing.
I would like him to answer a question but I would ask him to dumb it down as much as he can and speak in plain language for those of us who are not lawyers. The issue was raised recently in the House of reverse onus in two different contexts. The concept of innocent until proven guilty is being chipped away at and eroded. In one context that I can point to there was a private member's bill which did not succeed but a version of which did succeed in the province of Manitoba. In the event of the proceeds of crime being seized the onus is on the criminal to show that these are not in fact proceeds of crime. In fact, a Hell's Angel speed boat could be seized if that Hell's Angel could not actually show that he or she bought it with legitimately earned dollars.
I think where the member was going with his reservations about this bill is that if that evidence gleaned, which may be tainted and unusable, that we are getting toward a reverse onus situation and the party would have to demonstrate that it was in fact gleaned in a legitimate way.
Is that the connection that he is making reference to and does he have a comment on the proceeds of crime reverse onus situation?