Madam Speaker, I am hoping to allow the hon. member to extend his comments with my question. Is the hon. member aware of the fact that prior to the introduction of this legislation, by its predecessor last March, the government was involved in the practice of ensuring certain Canadians could not return? In other words, by enacting the transfer of the offender treaty, by subjecting these reviews even though they were signed off by other nations, accepted by other nations, where Canadians served a substantial time of incarceration in another country for a crime they did not commit in Canada I should point out, the then minister of public safety, now Treasury Board, was involved with subjecting some of these transfer of offender requests to CSIS reviews or any type of review which would have the effect of extending the incarceration of Canadians even though they had the right to come home.
I wonder if the hon. member could tell us what it really means when it says keeping Canadians safe when in fact the person is not rehabilitated, and I see here it says “keeping Canadians safe”. When they are not rehabilitated, as some members have said, assuming it was a fair trial to begin with, they may come back unprepared and ill equipped to reintegrate into society.
Does the hon. member believe that the discretion given the minister could lead to abuses of favouritism, choosing individuals because of their money situation, choosing them by how they vote, choosing because of media attention? Does the hon. member believe that kind of discretionary power runs against the rule of law and the very principle of democracy of this Parliament?