Mr. Speaker, I listened with great fascination to my colleague. He obviously has many years of experience in this matter. The issue of conditional sentences is really important. As he has pointed out, our Conservative colleagues across the way continually use the spectre of criminals to demonize the justice system, and it is completely separate from reality.
I spent many years working with men and women coming out of prison. I lived with them. I helped get them back on their feet. I saw the levels of recidivism. I saw what worked and what did not work. One problem the Conservatives never deal with is people have to be reintroduced to the community at a certain point.
I know some of my colleagues over there believe the glory days will be when we bring back capital punishment for furniture theft and everything else. They will not have to worry about reintroducing people to society. However, this is a major issue of the justice system. It is not just punishment; it is how we reintroduce people. I remind the House that many people have gone through the system again and again and yet they have managed to come back into society because the options and steps were available.
What does my hon. colleague think will happen in terms of social policy if we go down this retrograde road that the Conservatives go down, with their flat tires and their flat earth society? What will happen if we take away the tools we have right now to reintroduce criminals back into society and reintroduce them as citizens as opposed to just the condemned?