Mr. Speaker, I have listened very closely to the hon. Minister of Justice. I would of course like to ask him a question.
I remind the hon. Minister of Justice that he has been on the other side; he has been a crown attorney and he was the Attorney General of Manitoba until just recently. We had this sort of discussion in committee when he tabled this same bill last year, when he was in opposition. At that time I had asked him a few questions.
First of all, a comment before I ask my question. I am surprised to hear the hon. Minister of Justice being critical of the fact that a person should still be at liberty after stealing hundreds of cars. I am surprised that he is surprised at the conditional sentences being handed out. That is so because crown attorneys, as I would respectfully suggest to the minister, do not have the time or the money to appeal cases. They would have to be given the time and the money to be able to do so. Once these decisions are confirmed by the court of appeal, we can talk about this again.
My question is much more important. What we have here is a societal debate. How can we talk today about sentencing individualization, as we have recently been reminded with such brilliance by the Supreme Court, when the bill tabled by the Minister of Justice would put an end to it or obstruct it by giving the suppression of crime priority over rehabilitation and sentencing individualization? I would very much like the Minister of Justice to explain his conception of the role of judges.
I would add that, recently, the Quebec Court of Appeal reviewed a sentence in the Coffin decision, where the man in question, who was implicated in the sponsorship scandal, had received a sentence of 18 months. In response to public demand and intervention, the court appealed the case and this man was given a prison sentence without possibility of parole. At the moment, that is the best way to proceed, that is, have the court of appeal review decisions that are not in line with the intentions of the crown attorneys.
I would like the Minister of Justice to explain to me how he will go about explaining to the people that this is the end of sentencing individualization and rehabilitation, in favour and to the benefit of repression.