Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my Bloc Québécois colleague's question.
We are eternally hopeful that members of the government can walk and chew gum at the same time because on this issue they need to be able to do both.
We all agree that appropriate sentencing should occur. My colleague brought up an important point, that the government is not looking at crime prevention and rehabilitation.
I focused on crime prevention in my remarks. This is not esoteric. There are fact-based, scientifically-based interventions that are effective at reducing crime and save taxpayers' money. The government should work with the provinces to adopt these interventions, but it is not.
Conversely, the failure to do that would not have much effect on reducing crime, protecting our citizens, helping victims of crime, or preventing people from being victimized by criminal activities. Therein lies the tragic Achilles heel of the government. The Conservative government is simply not willing and not prepared to do that which has been proven to accomplish the goals that society wants us to achieve. The government has missed that opportunity so far.
We are hopeful that government members will work with us in committee to implement solutions that will work.