Mr. Speaker, first of all, with respect to the statement that there are no penalties, there are penalties. Of course there are penalties. The member may not be happy with the application of the penalties, but there are penalties. The member may not be happy with the timeliness of the application of penalties, but there are penalties.
With respect to the member's concerns about protection of the public, why not simply adopt Justice Nunn's recommendation? It states:
--the federal government amend the “Declaration of Principle” in section 3 to add a clause indicating that protection of the public is one of the primary goals of the act.
These are the kinds of things that judges refer to continuously when considering sentences.The member may think that these are simply superfluous words, but these are significant words that Justice Nunn, on studying patterns of criminality and studying how judges deal with these things, says are important to incorporate.
Why is it not there?