Mr. Speaker, often when legislation comes up we hear a lot of argument about why we should support a bill. It is always interesting to find out who is opposed to the bill and what we would say to their assertions about why a bill is not appropriate.
Professor Tim Quigley from the University of Saskatchewan writes that this bill will not make Canada safer. He says:
The denial of bail has nearly doubled over the last decade, to the point where many prisons are extremely overcrowded and have no space or resources to provide programs. The remand conditions in many Canadian prisons now violate the UN standard minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners.
Does the member have a comment with regard to Professor Quigley's statements?
In terms of the problem that we are trying to fix, this is only part of the solution. We really have to look at the conditions of our prisons. I do know that funding of prisons that are provincial institutions is such that the circumstances are much different than maybe most Canadians would understand.