Mr. Speaker, I am speaking with respect to the issue regarding the question I posed to the government on the matter of capital punishment.
The Conservative government's decision not to seek clemency for Alberta born Ronald Allen Smith, the only Canadian on death row in the United States, is not only a reversal of longstanding Canadian law and policy, which would be bad enough, but it reflects a mindset where ideology and politics trump principle and policy.
Indeed, an appreciation of the government's decision reveals a government acting in ignorance of or indifference to law and precedent, both domestic and international, and even unaware of what its own departments are otherwise affirming.
For example, the Department of Foreign Affairs had reaffirmed Canada's traditional policy just days before the government's reversal by stating: “there is no death penalty in Canada...It is the policy of the government of Canada to seek clemency, on humanitarian grounds, for Canadians sentenced to death in foreign countries”.
But the unawareness or indifference did not end there. Witness the following: First, Canadian law prohibits the extradition of an American national to a state in the United States where the death penalty is practised. Yet, the Canadian government will not intervene in the case of a Canadian citizen sentenced to death in an American state.
Second, the Supreme Court of Canada in the Burns and Rafay case held that capital punishment was a violation of section 12 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and its protection against “cruel and unusual punishment”.
Accordingly, the court ruled that Canada could not extradite these Canadian citizens back to the United States unless it received an assurance from the requesting state that it would not impose the death penalty.
Is the government aware of this pronouncement, or is it indifferent to the decisions of the Supreme Court and prepared to proceed, notwithstanding the law of the land?
Third, on November 12, 2005, Canada ratified the second optional protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, wherein Canada expressed, among other things, that as a state party to the protocol:
[It is] desirous to undertake hereby an international commitment to abolish the death penalty,
Is the government aware that we ratified this protocol, or in this case as well, is it prepared to act in disregard of or indifference to our international as well as domestic commitments?
Fourth, on November 1, Canada was notably absent from the list of co-sponsors of a UN General Assembly resolution seeking an international moratorium on the death penalty.
Fifth, the supreme court of the United States has stayed an execution by lethal injection in the state of Mississippi pending a review of whether this constitutes cruel and unusual punishment as prohibited by the American bill of rights.
In the case of a Canadian, Ronald Allen Smith, now sentenced to death by lethal injection in the State of Montana, is the government aware of the judicial review of the constitutionality of this practice now before the American supreme court, or is it yet again indifferent to and prepared to turn a blind eye to what is happening in breach once more of Canadian and international law and practice?
Sixth, a recent study by the American Bar Association demonstrates that homicide rates in non-death penalty states are no higher than in states that oppose the death penalty. As well, the study showed that the death penalty has a disproportionate impact on the poor, on people of colour, on those who have ineffective counsel and the like.
The question again, is the government aware of this data or is it indifferent to it if it does not comport with its ideological bent?
Seventh, is the government not aware that there is no appeal from the death penalty in the case of a wrongful conviction? We had a wrongful conviction in the case of Mr. Truscott. Had clemency not been given in that case, there never would have been any subsequent redress in that regard.
Moreover, the litany of reasons offered by the government for its--