Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would ask the members to calm down, since things seem to be getting a little out of hand. We must be calm while doing our work.
I am pleased to speak to Bill C-10.
We must remember that, unlike what some government members have been insinuating, violent crime and the number of homicides are on the decline in Canada. Since 1992, crime rates have been decreasing in Canada, and there is every reason to be happy. Is crime going down because our economy is doing well, because, demographically, there are fewer young people? These are explanations that should be considered.
Let us talk about the solutions put forward by the government. It does not tend to take action in terms of prevention, to trust the judges, and to invest in social programs, but rather to resort to incarceration. It is inclined to go for mandatory minimum penalties, in its push for incarceration.
We in the Bloc Québécois are convinced that there are situations that call for incarceration. Moreover, it was the Bloc Québécois that took the initiative in the mid-1990s to propose measures to combat street gangs and criminal biker gangs. The Liberal government at the time said that the conspiracy provisions were enough to dismantle biker gangs. The Bloc Québécois, together with the police association and a number of other stakeholders, called for a new offence and new legislation. In response, the government introduced Bill C-95, which was amended by Bills C-24 and C-36.
Today, the government is addressing a real problem, compounded by the street gang phenomenon: the use of firearms in the commission of crimes. But the government is taking the wrong approach. It is focussing on certain specific offences, which are admittedly serious, disturbing and reprehensible. I am referring to attempted murder, discharging a firearm with intent, sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault, kidnapping, hostage-taking, robbery and extortion. For each of these offences, the government wants to increase three-year minimum sentences to five, five-year minimums to seven and seven-year minimums to as much as 10. The government is completely ignoring the fact that true deterrence means that a judge who is sentencing someone who has committed an offence involving a firearm, which is reprehensible, must assess the overall context in which the offence was committed. Does the individual have a criminal record? Was the offence premeditated? Did the individual act on behalf of a street gang or organized crime? In light of these factors and using judicial discretion, the judge must hand down the most appropriate sentence. In criminal law and especially in sentencing, the punishment must fit the crime. It is not a question of being soft on crime or saying that individuals should not be convicted.
Why are minimum sentences not the answer to the problem we are trying to solve?
First, let us start with the studies that were provided by the Department of Justice.
When former minister Allan Rock—I do not know if I am conjuring up good memories or bad in this House—had Bill C-68 passed to create the firearms registry—a registry the police want to have and which is consulted 11,000 times every day across Canada and that the Conservatives want to abolish—he created mandatory minimum sentences for a certain number of offences, particularly those involving firearms. Minimum sentences of four years were created. The logic behind minimum sentences is that they are deterrents and studies have been done to determine whether their intended purpose is being achieved. Allow me to read what an expert said at the University of Ottawa, which is a good university. Criminal lawyer Julian Roberts, from the University of Ottawa, conducted a study in 1977 for the Department of Justice of Canada, which the parliamentary secretary should have consulted. He found that, “Although mandatory sentences of imprisonment have been introduced in a number of western nations...the studies that have examined the impact of these laws reported variable effects on prison populations”—he was referring to the rate of recidivism—“and no discernible effect on crime rates”.
In other words, just because some countries, some legislatures, or some justice systems have mandatory minimum sentences that restrict judicial discretion, that does not mean they have lower crime rates. All the studies show that a true deterrent to crime is the real fear criminals have of being caught red-handed and ultimately being charged. Being caught has more to do with our ability to lay charges, with having police in the field, with the ability of crown prosecutors to review the evidence, and so forth.
Furthermore, several witnesses told us about the perverse effects of mandatory minimum sentences. I would like to quote some of the witnesses. André Normandeau, a criminologist at the Université de Montréal—which is also a good university—said:
Minimum sentencing encourages defence lawyers to negotiate plea bargains for their clients in exchange for charges that do not require minimum sentencing. Minimum sentencing can also force a judge to acquit an individual rather than be obliged to sentence that individual to a penalty the judge considers excessive under the circumstances, for cases in which an appropriate penalty would be a conditional sentence, community service or a few weeks in jail.
Obviously, minimum sentencing can have extremely perverse consequences. We are not saying that people who commit offences with firearms should be let go. What we are saying is that there are maximum sentences and that judges have the discretion to impose appropriate sentences somewhere between the maximum sentences and acquittal, sentences that take into consideration the circumstances surrounding the offence. That is why the Bloc Québécois, which has an extremely tough attitude toward criminals when severity is required, does not want to have anything to do with the artificial, ineffective logic underlying mandatory minimum sentencing. That is why we do not support either the bill or the amendments.
We have proposed a whole range of solutions to the government, solutions that include maintaining the gun registry, reviewing the parole issue, reviewing the double time issue, and doubling the budget for the national crime prevention strategy. We think that all of these options are far more appropriate than automatic sentencing, which does not stand up to scrutiny and which makes Bill C-10 a very bad bill.