Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue for a very enlightened and passionate speech. Clearly, he is coming from an informed point of view, from his personal background in the criminal justice system in the province of Quebec. I am sure that his reasoning applies to all regions of Quebec.
He had very strongly held views that simply applying longer prison sentences in and of itself is not a sufficient deterrent. What would be a deterrent then because we have been wrestling with every aspect of the criminal justice system to make our streets safer? It was only in the catastrophic event that led my party to agree in theory at least with mandatory minimum sentences in cases where a violent crime has taken place with the use of a gun.
However, the shock of the incidents to which I am referring has been such that the Canadian public is demanding some extraordinary measures. They are seized by this issue in a way that I have never seen before. Overwhelmingly, when I canvassed the constituents of my riding, by a factor of five to one, the number one top of mind issue is to make our streets safe. They told me to go to Ottawa and do whatever I can, so that they can send their children to the corner store to buy a quart of milk without worrying about their safety. That is how extreme it is in the inner city, in the core area of the city in which I live.
I loath the idea of the heavy-handed enforcement crime and punishment model that would contemplate locking up more people and throwing away the key, but I am convinced that we are doing a disservice to Canadians if we do not at least acknowledge the severity. The severity of the crime deserves a serious enough punishment to be a genuine deterrent.
I am proud that in the province of Manitoba we have a multi-faceted approach, a very sympathetic approach to the causes of crime. I believe that chronic long term poverty is surely one of the most obvious root causes of crime, but also the cause and effect situation. If longer sentences are not a deterrent, what does my colleague propose would be a proper deterrent?