Mr. Speaker, in answer to the member's first question, the role of a judge is to interpret constitutionally appropriate law and apply the law. This is the role of the judge. It is the role of Parliament to establish policy, including sentencing policy.
With respect to my colleague's suggestion to simply appeal these cases, quite frankly that has been tried on numerous occasions. In fact, when I was the Attorney General of Manitoba, I sent a number of cases not only to the Court of Appeal, but beyond the Court of Appeal, to the Supreme Court of Canada. On impaired driving causing death or injury, the Supreme Court of Canada said it is appropriate to give conditional sentences or house arrest.
We have seen manslaughter cases now given conditional sentences. We see cocaine traffic dealers regularly getting conditional sentences. These are all at the Court of Appeal level.
As we know, as a general rule, the Supreme Court of Canada does not hear appeals on sentencing. Therefore, in many provinces the bar has been established. Quite frankly, that bar is too low. The responsibility now of this Parliament is to reset that bar.
In respect of the suggestion that somehow all discretion is now taken out of sentencing, this is, quite frankly, wrong. My colleague knows that suspended sentences and probation orders are still available.
I heard one comment that in a probation order a person cannot be told not to drink alcohol. That is a standard condition of a probation order. If we need to work on how to improve probation orders, then that is another issue. Conditional sentences simply are not appropriate for the kinds of matters that the government has brought forward in Bill C-9.