Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was sure you would remember.
I am pleased to have this opportunity to finish my speech. I was about to explain that the government lumped together the five justice bills it had introduced previously to produce the new Bill C-2, which the parliamentary committee studied very thoroughly.
As I said, even though the Bloc supports Bill C-2, we wanted to make a few changes. Before I was interrupted by question period, I told the House that the Bloc Québécois has, in the past, expressed significant reservations about imposing mandatory minimum sentences.
Bloc Québécois members have long argued that this is not an effective way to fight poverty. We are convinced that we must instead provide police with the means to conclude investigations. The issue here is more the effectiveness of legislation and the fear it inspires. We believe that some offenders, some people who might find themselves on the wrong side of the law, will be deterred more by the possibility of going to court than by the mandatory minimum sentences they could receive. In fact, the witnesses we heard in committee explained that people do not necessarily read the Criminal Code before they commit an offence. That is why, historically, we have been extremely wary of mandatory minimum sentences.
We also analyzed the whole issue of the age of consent, which has now become the age of protection. My colleague from Châteauguay—Saint-Constant was responsible for this issue. Very early in this debate, the leader of the Bloc Québécois and member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, in cooperation with his caucus, wanted to include a close in age clause to make sure school-aged children engaging in non-exploitative sexual activity would not be liable to be arrested.
We also looked at the whole issue of reverse onus, not at the trial stage, but at the judicial interim release stage, as provided for in section 515 of the Criminal Code. The government was proposing reverse onus, which we were told was already common practice. In fact, according to the experts who came to talk to us in committee, people who committed offences involving firearms were not subject to release at the hearing stage.
Naturally, when we studied Bill C-2 in committee, we examined the whole issue of impaired driving. I am not talking about a particular departmental policy here, but about Bill C-2, which introduces three main innovations.
The bill will make it mandatory to stop and submit to tests. Previously, this was optional under the Criminal Code. There will be two main types of tests. An individual may first undergo standard field sobriety tests at the roadside. Then, he or she may be examined at the police station by a drug recognition expert. We were told that this practice existed in some American states and that some people in Quebec had even received this training.
Of course, we are not minimizing the seriousness of impaired driving. Just this morning, the Bloc Québécois lent its support—enlightened support, I might add—to a motion introduced by the parliamentary secretary to study a number of important issues, because we know our fellow citizens are worried about them.
Indeed, the bill that raised the most questions for us, even though we support Bill C-2, was the bill dealing with reverse onus for dangerous offenders.
As we all know, the Criminal Code has had provisions concerning dangerous offenders since 1947. Our seniors, for instance, sometimes used the expression “habitual criminal”. My mother said that, although never in reference to any of her own children, of course. But she talked about habitual criminals in general terms. I was able to make a link between that expression, which has passed on to the vocabulary of another generation, and a provision in the Criminal Code.
We had some questions. Of course, in matters of law, a reverse onus of proof is always very serious. The main offences are: weapons trafficking, possession of a firearm, unauthorized import and export, discharging a firearm, attempted murder, sexual assault with a weapon, aggravated sexual assault with a weapon, kidnapping, hostage taking, robbery committed with violence and a weapon and extortion.
It seems I am out of time. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask for the consent of the House to continue speaking for another five minutes. I would then be able to deliver my conclusion.