Mr. Speaker, I am splitting my time with the member for St. Catharines.
I am very pleased today to speak to Bill C-27, an act to amend part XXIV of the Criminal Code, dangerous offenders, and sections 810.1 and 810.2, peace bonds.
Few issues trigger more emotion than how the government treats our most dangerous criminals, especially when it comes to sex offences against children. While it is one thing to be convicted of such a crime, it is quite another to see someone commit a child sexual offence who has been convicted three, four, five times or more and is back out reoffending.
As such, I support this legislation. I urge every member of this chamber to do the same. It is time to move forward with tougher legislation that protects Canadians and their families.
Quite simply, the current provisions are not working as well as they should. It saddens me to think of the Canadians whose lives have been changed forever because of a hardened repeat offender. We can and we should do something about this now.
I have looked over the bill and I wonder how anyone can stand against these reforms. I look at the requirement for a crown to stand in open court and declare whether, on a third serious violent conviction where the prior offences received a two year sentence, a dangerous offender designation would be sought, and I ask “why not?” Why we should not require a crown to specifically consider this issue and declare his intention?
I see the proposal to reverse the burden of proof onto the offender convicted for a third time of a third serious sexual offence in a dangerous offender hearing. I look at the reform of the peace bond provisions that seek to extend the duration from 12 months to 24 months for convicted offenders in the community. I note that judges will be called upon to consider more vigorous conditions to ensure the public safety. Again, the question should not be why, but why not.
So far the only real reason given by members opposite as to why the bill should not be supported has been that the rights of the offender have been compromised. I find myself greatly disturbed by the claims of the opposition. In my opinion, the opposition members, who cite the rights of offenders being that more important than the rights of victims and survivors, should be ashamed of themselves.
I listened to the comments of the Minister of Justice. He indicated that these provisions were carefully crafted to ensure constitutionality. He has indicated, for example, that the provision imposing a reverse onus on the offender where there has been a third violent or sexual offence conviction is constitutional.
He indicated it was constitutional because it was narrowly designed, that it reflected the types of convictions that commonly led to a dangerous offender designation. He said that these offences were violent and harmful by their very nature and that they all required intent to harm another person. He spoke of how these qualifying offences were restricted to instances that carried a two year or more sentence. It appears to me, therefore, that the criteria to trigger the reverse onus were not simply drawn from a hat. These were not randomly chosen offences, nor should they be.
As I understand it, the inclusion of any offence on the primary list of offences is based on the following criteria: that there is at least a 10 year maximum sentence allowed; the nature of the offence is such that there is a sufficient element of brutality and harm intended; there is a common occurrence of the offence in the historical application of dangerous offender applications: and, the offence is not so overly broad by its nature so as to possibly allow an absurd result by its inclusion in the primary list of offences.
I looked closely at these offences. I wanted to know what would justify triggering the reverse elements. After checking, I completely support the Minister of Justice.
In the first place, I note that of the 12 primary designated offences that trigger reverse onus, 7 are sexual offences, divided between sexual offences committed against adults and offences against children.
It was 15 years ago that I entered into the rape crisis centre and received training in crisis intervention. I volunteered there for seven and a half years. I want every member of the House to know that the statistics, which were so alarming back then, have not changed. I suggest to the opposition parties that are so opposed to the bill that what we have been doing for the past decade has done nothing. It has not worked. It is time to change the strategy.
I note that according to analysis from Correctional Services Canada, over 80% of all dangerous offenders were designated as a result of a predicate conviction for one or more of the seven listed primary offences. About half of these offenders committed their offences against adults and half against children. Of the remaining 15% to 20% of offenders who were designated as dangerous offenders for other offences, about three-quarters of them were so designated as the result of a conviction for one of the five remaining listed primary offences. The remaining handful of offenders were convicted of a wide variety of offences including, for example, arson and fraud.
This seems to illustrate that there is a clear and precise logic behind the design of the primary offence list. For example, I look at the kidnapping offence. Interestingly, a quick look at existing case law indicates that a large number of non-sexual dangerous offender designations had one or more kidnapping convictions, but also many of them had sexual assault offence histories prior to the dangerous offender application.
A review of case law indicated that a total of 15 individuals were subject to a dangerous offender application since 1997 based on a kidnapping offence. Fourteen were designated as dangerous offenders and one was a long term offender. Again, this illustrates that kidnapping belongs on the list.
Then I looked at the same period for the offence of forcible confinement. I could see only five incidents of a dangerous offender application being sought in those cases. In four of those cases there were one or more of the other primary offences also listed. In addition to the low incidence of such an offence triggering a dangerous offender application, I noted that in half of these cases the dangerous offender designation was denied.
Finally, I note that while there are typically about 1,500 convictions each year for forcible confinement according to Statistics Canada, there are less than 100 per year on average for kidnapping. While forcible confinement offenders receive an average sentence of about six months, the average conviction for kidnapping is about three years. What this tells me is that the offence of kidnapping should be a triggering offence for the reverse onus, but forceable confinement should not. Kidnapping meets the criteria; forceable confinement does not.
The bottom line is the list of triggering offences makes sense. While I am sure there will be much discussion in the chamber and at committee about which offences should be in or out, at least it is clear to me that there has been some consideration in the development of the list.
I have the utmost confidence that these reforms will accomplish what the Minister of Justice has set out to do. A lot of concerns have been expressed by police, by victims, by many volunteers in crisis centres and by provincial ministers of justice that in too many cases individuals were being set loose in the community even though they were clearly uncontrollable.
There was a broad consensus that since 2003 the dangerous offender provisions had become difficult to use even as the shield of last resort against predators who were bound to reoffend if released. I believe these reforms address those problems, but I also belive they do so in a very measured and balanced way that fully respects fundamental principles of justice and human rights.
As such, I fully support these measures that seek to restore to a reasonable level the protection that Canadians want and need against the very worst sexual and violent offenders in the country.