I sat here stupefied listening to the parliamentary secretary, the member of Parliament for Kootenay—Columbia, state today during the debate that the government believes in creating laws that protect the constitutional rights of people. He said that the constitutional court challenges program is inherently flawed in that it encourages special interest groups to promote issues not supported by the majority of Canadians, that the court challenges cases are a misuse and wasteful use of taxpayers' money, and that this new Canadian minority Conservative government has proven its commitment to protect the rights of vulnerable Canadians.
I would like us to look at these statements that were made by the member for Parliament for Kootenay—Columbia on behalf of this new Canadian minority Conservative government. Let us look at the facts.
When the government and the Prime Minister state that the moneys that are used by the court challenges program is a misuse of Canadian funds and it is money that is used simply to finance Liberal lawyers, what are the facts? I have a letter dated October 2, 2006 written to the Prime Minister of Canada by a whole series of organizations that I will list. One of the points they make is as follows.
The Minister of Justice has questioned the accountability of the court challenges program. This is not a sustainable objection. The court challenges program has an established track record as an effective and accountable institution that promotes access to justice. It provides quarterly reports on its activities to the government and publishes an annual report with statistics on the number and types of cases that it has funded.
The annual reports are public documents and are available on the CCP’s website: www.ccppcj.ca. It has been evaluated on three separate occasions by independent evaluators, most recently in 2003-2004, and received an extremely positive report each time.
The CCP is subject to some legal restrictions on disclosing information about cases that are before the courts. This information is protected by solicitor-client privilege and cannot be released by CCP, in the same way that legal aid organizations cannot divulge information about their clients.
I want everyone in this House and those watching this debate on television to hear this: the court challenges program’s responsibility to protect this information was affirmed by a Federal Court ruling in 2000 in Hirondelle v. The Queen.
The Minister of Justice claims that the program is not transparent, that public servants or those in charge of the program are hiding information, but he is the one hiding information from Canadians because he is not telling the whole truth. He knows full well, as the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, that a Federal Court ruling has established when the program can disclose information and when the program cannot.
That is not all.
The member of Parliament for Kootenay—Columbia claimed that the court challenges program is inherently flawed in that it encourages special interest groups to promote issues not supported by Canadians. Let us look at the statement the parliamentary secretary made on behalf of his government.
Let us look at the partial list of organizations in Canada that are making their voices heard to save the court challenges program: Action Canada for Population and Development; Action ontarienne contre la violence faite aux femmes; African Canadian Legal Clinic; Alberta Association for Community Living; Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians; ARCH Disability Law Centre; Association des juristes d'expression française de la Colombie-Britannique; Association des juristes d'expression française du Nouveau-Brunswick; Association of Chinese Canadian Lawyers of Ontario; B.C. Human Rights Coalition; B.C. Coalition of People with Disabilities; Brain Injury Association Network; Breast Cancer Action Montreal; Canadian Arab Federation; Canadian Association for Community Living; Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies; Canadian Association of Law Teachers; Canadian Association of the Deaf; Canadian Auto Workers Union; Canadian Bar Association; Canadian Council for Refugees; Canadian Council of Muslim Women; Canadian Federation of Students; Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action; Canadian Hard of Hearing Association; Canadian Health Coalition; Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic; University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law; Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women; Canadian Union of Public Employees; Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 2204 and Local 3260; Canadian Women's Health Network; Canadians for Equal Families; and Canadians for Equal Marriage.
The list also includes the Centre d'aide et de lutte contre les agressions à caractère sexuel, North Shore region; the Centre d'aide et de lutte contre les agressions à caractère sexuel, CALACS, in Rimouski; the Centre de communication adaptée; the Centre de femmes l'Éclaircie; the Centre d'éducation des femmes; the Centre Entre-Femmes de Rouyn-Noranda and the Centre québécois de la déficience auditive.
The list includes: CFT French Legal Aid Services; Charter Committee on Poverty Issues; Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada; Child Care Workers of Eastern Ontario; Chinese Canadian National Council, Ottawa Chapter; Coalition of Persons with Disabilities; Community Advocates Network; Community Business and Professional Association of Canada.
Also on the list is the Confédération des organismes de personnes handicapées du Québec.
The list includes: Congress of Black Women of Canada, Manitoba Chapter; Council of Canadians with Disabilities; Cross-Disabilities, Genders, and Sexualities Working Group; Dalhousie Legal Aid Service; DisAbled Women's Network, Ontario; DisAbled Women's Network Canada; Disabled Workers' Complex Case Network Inc.; Dundurn Community Legal Services; East Toronto Community Legal Services Inc.; Egale Canada; Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario, Bluewater Local; Elizabeth Fry Society of Manitoba; Ethno Racial People with Disabilities Coalition of Ontario; Excalibur Learning Resource Centre Canada Corp.; Family Alliance Ontario.
In addition, the list includes the DisAbled Women's Network of Ontario; the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne du Canada; the Fédération des associations de juristes d'expression française de common law inc. and the Fédération des femmes du Québec.
Also on the list are: Federation of Post-Secondary Educators of B.C.; Feminist Coalition of Newfoundland and Labrador; Feminists for Just and Equitable Public Policy; Front d'action populaire en réaménagement urbain; Greater Vancouver Association of the Deaf; Grey-Bruce Community Legal Clinic; Halton Community Legal Services; Hamilton Mountain Legal & Community Services; Income Security Advocacy Centre; Institut canadien de recherches sur les femmes; Jamaican Canadian Association, Toronto; Jesuit Centre for Social Faith and Justice; John Howard Society of Manitoba Inc.; Justice for Girls; Kamloops and District Elizabeth Fry Society; Kelowna Women's Resource Centre; Kenora Community Legal Clinic Suite; Kensington Bellwoods Community Legal Services; Kitchen Table Collective.
Also on the list are the Table régionale des organismes volontaires d'éducation populaire de la Montérégie and the Association multi-ethnique pour l'intégration des personnes handicapées.
Included are the Law Office of Mary Eberts and the Law Union of Ontario.
The list also includes the Centre francophone de Toronto; the Official Languages Committee of the Ontario Bar Association; the Front commun des personnes assistées sociales du Québec; the Mouvement action chômage Pabok Inc.; the Regroupement des comités logement et associations de locataires du Québec; the Centres d'accueil Héritage in Toronto; and Les Frères et Sœurs d’Émile Nelligan.
The list includes: Let's Teach About Women; Low Income Families Together, LIFT; Ligue des droits et libertés du Québec; Mad Student's Society; Maison l'Océane; Malaspina Faculty Association; MATCH International; Metro Toronto Chinese & Southeast Asian Legal Clinic; Mokami Status of Women Council--
The list also includes the Mouvement d'éducation populaire autonome de Lanaudière and the Mouvement d'éducation populaire et d'action communautaire du Québec.
Also on the list are: National Action Committee on the Status of Women; National Association of Women and the Law; National Council of Women of Canada; National Eating Disorder Information Centre; Newfoundland and Labrador Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women; Nipissing Community Legal Clinic; North Bay & District Labour Council; North Bay Network for Social Action; Northern Society for Domestic Peace; Nouveau Départ National--
And the list goes on: Okanagan Advocacy and Resource Society; Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants; Osgoode Hall Law Union; Pacific DisAbled Women's Network; Parkdale Community Legal Services; PEI Council of the Disabled; PRAXIS Conflict Consulting.
The list continues: Promotion handicap Estrie Inc.
Also on the list are: Provincial Association of Transition Houses and Services of Saskatchewan; Provincial Council of Women of Manitoba, Inc.; Public Service Alliance of Canada; Quebec Community Groups Network; Quebec English School Boards Association; Quebec Native Women.
In French, this is Femmes Autochtones du Québec.
Also on the list are: Refugee Law Office, Toronto; Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario.
The list also includes the Regroupement des centres de femmes du Québec; the Regroupement des femmes de l'Abitibi-Témiscamingue; the Regroupement des associations de personnes traumatisées cranio-cérébrales du Québec; the Regroupement provincial des maisons d'hébergement et de transition pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale; and the Regroupement québécois des centres d'aide et de lutte contre les agressions à caractère sexuel.
Also on the list are: Response: A Thousand Voices; Roach, Schwartz and Associates; Saskatchewan Voice of People with Disabilities; and Selkirk College Faculty Association.
Mr. Speaker, I have two other pages of groups that have voiced their support of maintaining the court challenges program and its funding in all its integrity. These are what the member for Kootenay—Columbia calls special interest groups that promote issues not supported by Canadians.
Let us look at that as well. Let us look at the issue of whether or not the cases which are funded in part by the Canadian court challenges program touch on issues which are of interest to the majority of Canadians.
Let us look at the case of R. v. Prosper in 1994. In this case, the Supreme Court of Canada considered whether an impoverished accused upon arrest had a right to state funded counsel. An intervener in the case argued that depriving poor people of access to counsel would result in inequality in access to justice that would be inconsistent with section 15 of the charter. The court held that where an arrested person requests counsel, the police must desist from attempting to obtain a statement until counsel has been provided. Justice McLachlin, who is now the chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, in a concurring judgment noted:
--the Charter right to counsel cannot be denied to some Canadian citizens merely because their financial situation prevents them from being able to afford private legal assistance. The poor are not constitutional castaways.
I ask the member for Kootenay—Columbia who is a parliamentary secretary, I ask the Prime Minister, I ask members of his cabinet, I ask the government which is so proud to call itself the new Canadian government but in fact is a minority Conservative government, how they can deem the right of someone who does not have the financial means to secure counsel upon arrest once that person has been arrested, to state that they are constitutional castaways? The chief justice of the Supreme Court has said they are not constitutional castaways.
I would like to go to another case. This will be a case of great interest for those who know that there still exists bias within our society. Most Canadians abhor bias, bias in our legislation and bias in decisions by government officials who have, in many cases, a great deal of discretionary authority and power under various legislation.
R v. S, 1997 is an important case about judicial bias. At issue were remarks made by a black Nova Scotia judge in considering the credibility of both a police officer and R.D.S., an African-Canadian youth. The police had charged the youth with a number of criminal offences relating to an altercation between the police officer and the boy. The youth and the police officer each gave a very different account of the events leading up to the charges.
Judge Sparks weighed the evidence of the two witnesses. She then determined that the youth should be acquitted as the evidence raised “a reasonable doubt as to the youth's guilt”. In her oral reasons, Judge Sparks observed that in some situations, “Police officers do overreact, particularly when they are dealing with non-white groups”. The Crown challenged her remarks as raising a reasonable apprehension of bias. In the view of the Crown, a reasonable person would think she had prejudged the case without giving proper consideration to all of the evidence.
There was a court challenge on that. The Supreme Court of Canada decided that Judge Sparks had not acted in a biased manner. Moreover, Justices L'Heureux-Dubé and McLachlin, and I remind members of the House and the new minority Conservative government that Beverley McLachlin is now the chief justice, determined that by paying attention to the racial dynamic in the case, Judge Sparks was simply engaging in the process of contextualized judging. As they stated, “It is perfectly acceptable for judges to take into account not only the facts of the case but also the social and psychological context within which the case arises”. They recognize that judges are members of communities, have particular knowledge of such communities and are often guided by this knowledge. Consequently, as a person familiar with the racial dynamic of Halifax, particularly where police are concerned, it was reasonable for Judge Sparks to apply this knowledge.
I conclude in showing--