Debates of Jan. 31st, 2011

Criminal Code

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Windsor West is absolutely right. Before I was elected to Parliament, I was a financial administrator. As it is with most New Democrats, the way ordinary Canadians manage their households is by being careful to spend money on the essentials. That is why one wants to put a budget in the hands of ordinary Canadians to be managed best, not by the high-flying, elite Conservatives, and certainly not by what we saw from the Liberals in the past. It is simply a matter of making the crucial decision the way Canadian families do every day and putting the money into essentials.

A $650,000 vase is not an essential and nor is it a priority to have $2 billion for a 72-hour meeting, because the Prime Minister got carried away and decided to build fake lakes here and cover over other lakes there, and nor are the tens of billions of dollars shovelled out the back of a truck for corporate tax cuts.

That money is going offshore because the Conservatives have not even put any valuation mechanism in place for them to know whether the money is actually being used for job creation. That is why 600,000 full-time jobs were lost and we got back 400,000 part-time, low-paying jobs, and yet they say it is a wonderful thing. They lost 200,000 jobs generally and the quality of the jobs they have created is much poorer than the quality of the jobs they have lost.

What is essential is putting in place programs for youth. The member for Windsor West identified the record levels of student debt and that we need programs in place for youth to make sure they are given alternatives. What have the Conservatives done? The member for Vancouver Kingsway will address this in a moment as well, but they have gutted the youth gang strategy and crime prevention programs and the supports for our nation's youth. They are simply incapable of putting in place a strategy that is effective. It is all about partisan politics. If they really want the election they are pushing so badly for, I think their time of judgment by the Canadian public will come.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up with the member for Burnaby—New Westminster not only in terms of investing in summer employment for youth but also the issue with regard to the cut in the gang file. Once again, Conservatives have money for a vase but no money for gang-related prevention work.

We have seen that being proactive and having police resources is a real advantage. Ironically, the government talked about how it was going to increase the number of police officers out on the street and never did so. It failed on that promise. Making sure it lives up to its promise of putting more police officers on the street has been very frustrating. At the same time, if they cannot do that, those funds could go to prevention. Gang projects are very important. Organized crime is a very serious issue. Why does the government not take organized crime seriously, as it says it does with its other types of initiatives?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very good question. In fact, one could almost say that through the Conservatives' trade strategy they are fueling organized crime through the laundering of dirty drug money in Panama. They signed a reward cheque, a privileged trade agreement with Panama. It is the same situation in Colombia. The gangs there are affiliated with the government, and the government gets a reward from the Canadian government. It is absolutely appalling in both cases.

When we talk about youth employment strategies, anti-gang strategies and crime prevention, these are all priorities. They must priorities in the justice system. What is the government doing instead? Because it is so fiscally irresponsible, it is throwing away $9 billion for prisons that, according to the President of the Treasury Board, are being built so that people who commit unreported crimes can be put into jail. There have been enough jokes around the country about that idea, the phantom prisons, the prisons for unreported crime. It is absolutely absurd.

If the government spent a fraction of that money responsibly and prudently, the way Canadian families do, it would be putting that money into the programs the member for Windsor West just mentioned, the summer employment programs, the crime prevention programs and anti-youth gang strategies. Those are the prudent and smart investments that an NDP government, if it were the will of the Canadian people, would make. The Conservatives are simply a hollow shell as far as concrete and practical approaches on crime are concerned. That is becoming very evident from their actions over the last few months.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to express a warm welcome back to you and to all members of the House. I hope everyone had a chance to spend time with their families and communities over the last six weeks as we broke from our activities in the House in mid-December and are now back to resume the people's business here.

The reason I start off that way is because today is January 31. This is an important day because it is the very first day that parliamentarians have returned to the House of Commons here in Ottawa after the break. We have been away for over a month, back in our communities talking to our neighbours, community groups and organizations, meeting with business people, talking to our constituents and getting what I think all parliamentarians would agree, is a thorough exposure to the fundamental issues facing Canadians from coast to coast to coast. Here we are back in Parliament on January 31, the first day back, and we are debating the very first bill that the Conservative government has chosen to put before this chamber.

Over the last month and a half I have heard, as have my NDP colleagues, of the pressing and important issues facing Canadians across this country. New Democrats represent ridings from the east coast to the west coast, from the Canadian border on the south to the high Arctic. We heard the same serious priorities of Canadians.

Canadians tell us they are having problems housing themselves. They are worried about their pensions, many of whom have pensions that are in crisis. They are worried about health care. Our seniors are wondering how they are going to pay their bills and whether or not they will get access to home care. Parents are worried about the cost of education. Students are worried about how they are going to pay their skyrocketing tuition and their mounting student debts, that is if they can get into post-secondary education at all.

People are concerned about the disappearance of good middle-class jobs in this country. They are concerned about how they are going to raise their families in the same manner they were raised by their parents and grandparents before them

Families across this country are worried about child care and how they can get quality, affordable, accessible care for their children while they go to work and try to sustain their families.

Victims across this country are worried about how their needs are going to be met. People experienced with crime prevention issues are wondering where their funding will come from. Organizations across this country that deliver social needs for every gamut of issue in this country are wondering how they will survive.

What is the Conservatives' number one priority in the face of all of these priorities, in the face of all of these issues? They bring forward a bill that since 1987 affects 187 people. In the last 25 years, a quarter century, about 187 people have applied under the faint hope clause in the Criminal Code to have their life sentence commuted to 15 years because they have rehabilitated themselves. The government is taking up valuable legislative time in this chamber to get rid of that.

The government does not want to deal with housing, education or home care. It does not want to talk about crime prevention or community safety. It wants to go after people in prison to make sure that the tiny, minute, infinitesimal number of people affected by this legislation are stripped of any opportunity to rehabilitate themselves at all.

Governing is about choosing priorities. I do not think we are going to get a more stark reminder than this of what the Conservative government's priorities are and how incredibly divergent those priorities are from the very real priorities facing Canadians and their families today.

My hon. colleague from Burnaby—New Westminster made several references to me speaking about the youth gang prevention fund. I am going to speak about that because it also reflects a sense of priorities.

The Conservative government stakes a lot of political weight on its reputation as being tough on crime. The Conservatives claim they are the party that stands up for victims of crime, that they want to make our communities safer. Let us examine a few facts about that.

The youth gang prevention fund is a program that is funded by the federal government. That funding goes to dozens of organizations across this country, with one goal in mind: to help keep youth out of gangs. In Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal and many other communities, dozens of programs are being run on a shoestring budget to try to divert troubled kids and kids who are at risk from going into gangs and going into a life of crime. The amount of money that is invested in this program: $33 million over five years. That is about $6.5 million a year. Our research indicates that about 1,000 youth have been in these programs; that is, 1,000 people who are being exposed to positive role models and who are being identified and worked with to help keep them out of a life of crime. Those programs, I am told, are oversubscribed and full.

That funding runs out in March. What do we hear? That the Conservative government is going to allow that funding to lapse. It can spend, by its own admission, $2 billion to $4 billion on building more prison cells, and of course we all know that those costs are vastly underestimated. Probably a more likely amount is at least $10 billion will be spent by the government over the next five years for building more prison cells, but it will not spend $6 million a year to keep our youth out of prisons. That is a striking sense of the priorities of the Conservative government. It prefers to talk tough, to have show, to play politics and prefers to issue propaganda and go after programs that do not affect anybody across this country but a small amount of people to try to display its toughness while millions of people's real problems remain unaddressed.

While the government is bringing forward legislation on ending the faint hope clause, let us talk about what people and Canadians really want us to address, as parliamentarians, when it comes to crime.

First, they want their communities to be safe.

How do we do that? Do we think communities are safe by keeping 180 people over the last 25 years from applying for a faint hope provision? Absolutely not.

Canadians would tell us they want more community policing. They want more cops walking the beat in their neighbourhoods. Community policing means a police presence in our communities, where we have small neighbourhood police offices.

They want, in rural areas, access to RCMP detachments where, if they phone a 9-1-1 number, they can actually get a response in an appropriate amount of time; unlike what the government has done by closing and allowing the closure of single-member police RCMP detachments in British Columbia.

They want crime prevention programs. Canadians want better lighting in our streets. They want more prosecutors and judges in our courts so that we can actually speed up the administration of our justice system. They want more diversion programs, where people who come into conflict with the law get actual help for the problems that are really causing them to act in a deviant manner to begin with; more mental health programs, more addiction treatment.

We need an anti-gun strategy that would stop the inflow of illegal guns across the border into our country.

Canadians want us to understand and acknowledge the obvious, which is that we have to address the social determinants of crime, which the government has never said a word on in the time I have been in the House. I have never heard a single Conservative stand and say, “I think that poverty, lack of opportunity, lack of educational opportunities, lack of resources in our communities for our young people are the breeding grounds for crime and criminal activity in at least some cases”. I have never heard one Conservative say that. Conservatives are actually wrong about that, because the data displays that fact unbelievably.

We need more community facilities. Canadians want community centres, where they have recreational, cultural and social facilities where they can gather in their communities, particularly our young people, where they can come and play basketball, or they can learn a musical instrument, or they can take a language lesson, or they can pursue arts and cultural activities. These are the kind of enriched activities that our youth need to be exposed to, as opposed to being lured to perhaps illicit activities on the street.

But again, what do they get from the Conservative government? It brings forth legislation that would eliminate the faint hope provision from the Criminal Code. That is its response to those very real problems and concerns of Canadians.

Not only is that a factually unwise approach, but it is actually economically insane. We have already heard that no less figures than Newt Gingrich and Pat Nolan, hardly left-wing liberals from the United States, have brought up examples from that bastion of left-wingism, Texas, and in the United States they are actually acknowledging what we New Democrats have been saying, year after year, which is that increasing spending on prisons, putting more people in prisons for longer periods of time under harsher conditions, not only does not reduce the crime rate but it bankrupts the treasury. They are actually withdrawing on that.

States, from Pennsylvania all the way to the Carolinas to Texas, are all actually putting more money into diversion programs and rehabilitation programs. They have found that half of the prisoners released in a year under the old programs are back in prison within three years. They recognize that what they are doing does not work. They are recognizing the approach they took over the last 25 years, having their prison population growing 13 times faster than the general population, by spending $68 billion in 2010 alone on corrections, 300% more than 25 years ago, has not done a darn thing for community safety except for bankrupting the taxpayer which is what the government will do if its policies continue going in the direction they are going.

Bill S-6, the faint hope clause, would, if passed, eliminate section 754.6 of the Criminal Code. This section allows for those serving a life sentence for murder or high treason the possibility of applying for parole after 15 years.

This faint hope provision was initially introduced in 1976, and the criteria for release and parole have been amended several times since. Presently the eligibility requirements are very stringent and include an appeal before a judge and jury, and unanimous approval of that jury before an appeal can even be heard by the National Parole Board.

According to the commissioner of the Correctional Service of Canada, Mr. Don Head, as of October 10, 2010, there were 1,508 offenders with cases applicable for judicial review. Since the first judicial review hearing in 1987 began, there have been a total of 181 court decisions. That is right, in 25 years there have been 181 court decisions.

Of those decisions, 146 resulted in a reduction of the period that must be served before parole eligibility, and 35 resulted in a refusal. Why were those 146 decisions positive in terms of the application? It is because the system worked in those cases. The purpose of corrections is multifaceted. It is to remove a person from society. It is to punish them when they have transgressed against our rules of society. It is also to give them the services and functions that they require in order to attempt to rehabilitate themselves. That is what we want.

In some cases some of those people have taken that to heart, and some of those offenders have actually rehabilitated themselves. I am going to talk about why that is positive. When a person goes to prison in Canada, they are going to come out at some point. Just about everybody will anyway, 95% will. Of course people like Clifford Olson, Russell Williams and Mr. Pickton, in my home province, will never get out of prison nor should they.

There is a gamut of offences even under the conviction of murder. There could be crimes of passion, people who have committed crimes while under the influence of drugs and alcohol, and crimes committed when people are very young. We believe, at least on this side of the House, in the power of redemption, that sometimes people can rehabilitate themselves and change themselves.

If that is the case, if people can correct themselves after serving long sentences—and nobody is talking about these people not serving long sentences. These are people serving 25-year sentences who after 15 years can apply and maybe have their parole eligibility reduced by a few years. Those people can change and the law recognizes that. In the Conservatives' simple world I suppose they would argue nobody changes, but that is false because people do change.

I have been to 25 federal institutions in this country in the last year and a half. Correctional officers will say that the faint hope clause helps maintain order and safety in prison because when hope is taken away from people in prison, they are left with absolutely no incentive to act appropriately. For some people that is important. Guards will say that they like the faint hope clause even for people serving life sentences because it gives them an incentive, a potential reward if they act appropriately, and the government wants to take that away.

Friedrich Nietzsche said, “Beware of those in whom the urge to punish is strong”. There is some wisdom in that. The government is playing politics with the crime agenda and Canadians are starting to have its number on this by the millions. They know that the government is pursuing U.S.-style politics and approaches to prison and crime that do not work, that will bankrupt us and that will not make our communities safer. That is the bottom line.

Seeing the priority of this bill before Parliament on the first day of the session illustrates that better than anything that I could say. Do the Conservatives bring a bill forward that would actually help victims of crime? Do they bring a bill forward that would actually build sexual assault centres for victims of sexual assault? Are they bringing forth bills that would actually build community centres that would give our youth hope? Are they funding education and making educational opportunities wider for our young people? Are they building mental health facilities and addiction treatment facilities so that we can deal with some of the most important underlying causes of criminal behaviour?

It has been estimated by all sources that 80% of people in our federal system have addictions or alcohol problems. Does the government address that problem? Does it say that it will put $100 million, $200 million or $300 million into mental health and addictions treatment? That would help make our communities safer. If people in prison got the kind of treatment they needed, when they get out they would be less likely to offend. Does the government bring forth that legislation? No, it does not.

Instead, it wants a showpiece. It wants to look like it is tough. By being tough, it wants to remove a faint hope clause that is a carefully considered part of our criminal justice system that was negotiated at a time when we abolished capital punishment.

Maybe that is what this is really about. We heard the Prime Minister muse about being in favour of capital punishment, but the Conservatives do not have the courage to bring that bill forward because they know Canadians would not support it. They know Canadians would reject any party that sought to bring in a system in this country where the state started murdering people.

What does the government do? It goes after people in prison by removing the faint hope provision, one of the few things that might give someone who committed a murder when he or she was young the possibility of perhaps redeeming his or her life, maybe making things right for the victim and living his or her life in the manner that we all would want the offender to live. That is atrocious. In fact, there are stronger words to describe people who would pursue that as a criminal justice agenda. I will leave it as being uninformed, mean-spirited, insufficient, deficient and it will be unsuccessful at making any Canadian's life any better.

I would urge the government, if it is serious about crime, to work with the New Democrats and all members of the House to bring forth legislation that would address the social determinants of crime, that would make our communities safer, that would help our young people and anyone who has any contact with the criminal justice system and to work with the professionals in this country to actually make a difference in people's lives.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things that will happen if the bill continues and one of the things I am most concerned about is the lack of discretion, the discretion that will disappear in terms of judges and juries to make the kinds of decisions that they know they should be making. For me that is a real concern.

I wonder if the hon. member would like to make a comment about that.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think Canadians are seeing, as they see the government stay in power longer and longer, that it does not believe in judicial discretion. The Conservatives do not trust judges. They do not trust prosecutors. They do not trust our justice system. They are trying to dispense justice from the politicians box. That is not only despicable but actually extremely ineffective and dangerous for our justice system where we depend on having an independent judiciary, where politicians are supposed to set the rules, carefully deliberate and pass laws to keep everybody safe, to govern our relations between each other and then trust others who are independent of politics to dispense justice.

Outside of the Supreme Court of Canada building, which is just down the street, is a statue of the traditional symbol of justice. It is the goddess of justice with a blindfold on her eyes and a balance in her hand. That is to symbolize two very important things: that justice must be independent, it must be measured and it must be judicious. The government is not interested in that.

The New Democrats trust in our judicial system. We know there are hard-working prosecutors. We know there are learned, astute judges who are sensitive and sympathetic to the community standards and who are subjected to rigorous appeal and scrutiny in everything they do. They dispense justice every day in this country. However, the Conservatives do not trust those people at all and that is why they want to take away discretion from our judges.

The essence of any justice system is built on discretion, because if people in this country were before a judge, they would want that judge to be addressing his or her mind to their specific situation with their specific conditions and what happened in their case. That is the essence of justice. We would not want ourselves and our life determined by some arbitrary standard set by a bunch of politicians in Ottawa.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans]

Mr. Speaker, I have one question for the member for Vancouver Kingsway. Has he, in his riding or on his travels, met with an individual who has had a loved one murdered and the murderer has gone through the judicial process a number of times to seek a hearing for early parole? If he has, did he actually listen to the individual?

I have person in my riding whose son was killed by Clifford Olson. He has talked to me a number of times about the incredible pain that he goes through for every one of these opportunities that this individuals takes knowing that he will never be successful but does it for all kinds of evil reasons, in my opinion.

I wonder if the hon. member has spoken personally to any of these people and what he thinks about what they have to say.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think that could have been the case because I have been told that multiple murderers are excluded from the faint hope provision. It is my understanding that it could never have been the case that Clifford Olson applied under the faint hope provision. However, the member still makes a good point.

Every member of this House, including members of the New Democratic Party, I argue most of all, are truly concerned about victims of crime and about the impact that any exposure to the criminal justice system has on them. Victims of crime do not choose to be the victims and, in many cases, they are the people who have suffered the harm. They are an important voice in the criminal justice system and we need to pay attention to their needs.

I would like to see legislation in which victims are given a greater voice in the justice system. I would like to see legislation that expands the concept of restorative justice, where healing becomes a better part of our system and where victims can sit face to face with their offenders. when that is appropriate and where they want to, where we can actually hear the pain of the victims. Of course, in any kind of process, it is important that we understand that victims will be sometimes traumatized by the process again and again.

In the case of the faint hope clause, if an application for early parole were dismissed for a lack of reasonable prospect of success, under the current system the chief justice or a judge may set a time for another application not earlier than two years after the dismissal. In fact, the judge may declare that the inmate will never be entitled to make another application.

The law already recognizes that victims should not be traumatized by repeat application and there are provisions in the law to deal with that. I think the member's very well-founded concern is more than adequately met by the law as it presently stands.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I have two questions for the member.

First, what are some of the potential problems that could occur if this were removed? I am thinking of people in the jail system, in particular, by someone who has lost hope completely?

Second, could he just remind the House of the low recidivism or offence rate of those who have been released under these provisions?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will deal with the recidivism rates first. I do not have the number right in front of me but I have seen figures that show that the recidivism rate for those who have been released under the faint hope provision are very low. In fact, I think it is two cases if my memory serves correctly and, in both cases, I think one person committed an assault. I am not sure what the other person committed but I do not believe it was a murder.

The application process that someone in a federal institution must go through to access the faint hope provisions is extremely layered and controlled. It has to pass a lot of sets of eyes before a person can even be considered for early release.

This is because the law recognizes that people change. People who commit murder when they are 17, 18, or 19 years old may be totally different when they are 31 or 32. To simply have a law that allows them the possibility of at least making an application before a judge and a jury and then a national parole board, go through all those sets of eyes and minds with data from their doctors, psychologists, social workers and from prison administrators so we get a full picture of that person, is something that benefits our society. It is the hallmark of any civilized society as well. We do not lock up people in dungeons and throw away the key, as is done in some countries. I think that is something that we as a society have to deal with.

Dealing with prison and crime is not a pleasant affair. Prisons are extremely complicated places. I have been in 25 of them, as I said. They are places of pathos, sadness and destruction. They are places of depression and unhappiness but they can also be places of redemption, growth and hope. We as a society need to decide what we want our prisons to be. I as a Canadian want my prisons to be a place where there is the possibility of growth and redemption. The government and this legislation would take that away. I think it is bad legislation and every thinking parliamentarian should vote against it for that reason.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to have this opportunity to participate in the debate on Bill S-6 on the elimination of the faint hope clause.

I want to start where my colleague ended on the importance of having a place in our criminal justice system where redemption and hope are possible, even for those who have committed the most serious crimes that we deal with in our society. The member put it very well and I do not think I could say it better or more clearly than he has. This has to be an important part of our criminal justice system and our corrections system. The bill would go some way in eliminating that possibility from our system.

Bill S-6 is back in the House. The last time I spoke on this issue was back on June 18, 2009, when we debated Bill C-36, essentially the same bill. The bill died when the Prime Minister decided to prorogue the House, once again short-circuiting the government's agenda on criminal justice issues. It was not the House that has slowed down the Conservatives' agenda. They have slowed down their agenda by using prorogation and calling early elections. They have not put forth the effort that it takes to get legislation through this place and this is an excellent example of one of those bills. They like to blame the opposition, but the reality is they have done more harm to the timing of their own agenda than the opposition could ever hope to do.

Bill S-6 is an act to amend the Criminal Code on the right of persons convicted of murder or high treason to be eligible for early parole. One of the good amendments that has come out of the committee process this time around is to eliminate the silly subtitle that the Conservatives chose to give the legislation. I am glad that is gone.

At the outset, this legislation, which eliminates the possibility of revision to parole for people who have committed murder or who are sentenced to life for high treason, is completely wrong. I am opposed to the basic principle of the legislation that claims we are not well served by this process of judicial review, in fact of citizen review, and that the faint hope clause should not be part of our criminal justice system.

I really believe we have been well served by the legislation and by the process. I believe it has encouraged rehabilitation in our prison system and made our prisons safer for both other prisoners as well as the prison guards and other professionals who work in our correctional service. It gives people the possibility of hope that they might be released early from a life sentence.

It has a very important positive effect within the institutions of the correctional system. It has also allowed for a measure of discretion to review the parole eligibility of people who have been sentenced to life in prison and it has encouraged a strong measure of citizen involvement in making the decisions on that very important process. However, in my opinion this legislation would seek to undo all of those things.

The current legislation and section 745.6 of the Criminal Code, which deals with judicial review, enables offenders serving life in prison with parole ineligibility periods of more than 15 years to apply for a reduction of that period. The review is not intended as a forum for retrial of the original offence. The focus is instead on the progress of the offender after having served at least 15 years of his or her sentence. That is how the Department of Justice describes the current process on its website. It is how it describes the intent of the current legislation.

It is important to review the process involved when the faint hope clause is engaged by someone serving a life sentence in prison. It is a very rigorous one. It is one that involves several stages. It is not easy to accomplish and everyone needs to appreciate the fact that there is rigour involved in this process.

The first stage is an application to the chief justice of the province in which the person was convicted. The chief justice or a designated superior court judge reviews the written materials presented from the Crown and the applicant. Then that judge determines on the basis of the written materials whether the applicant has shown on a balance of probabilities that there is a reasonable prospect that the application will succeed. If the judge decides that, a jury is impanelled to hear the case. If the judge decides there is no reason to proceed further, the appeal process stops at this point and there is no further follow-up. The judge, the Crown, the applicant all have a key role in this first stage.

The next stage is the jury. When the jury is constituted and impanelled, it then considers a number of issues when it looks at the application from the person in prison. When determining whether there should be a reduction of parole ineligibility, the jury determines the character of the applicant, his or her conduct while serving the sentence, the nature of the offence, information provided by the victim's family members about how the crime has affected them and any other matters the judge has considered relevant in the circumstances. The jury looks at a very broad scope at this point.

This is a panel of 12 citizens and the panel considers those factors and makes a decision about the reduction of the period of ineligibility. The decision of that jury to reduce the ineligibility period must be unanimous. We are not talking about a simple majority or anything like that. The jury can reduce the parole ineligibility period immediately, or at a later date or deny any reduction.

This is a pretty important process involving citizens who are engaged in this decision. That is a crucial thing to notice about this process. It is important to protect that point where citizens can engage in the criminal justice system, where they can engage in the corrections system and help make important decisions that affect the community, that affect other citizens, both victims and people in prison. That is a crucial piece of the existing legislation. It is important to have citizens engaged in making decisions.

There are safeguards all through this process. The fact that the jury has to be unanimous is key among those safeguards in the existing process.

When the jury decides unanimously that the number of years to be served should be reduced, it can then decide by a two-thirds majority the number of years that must be served before the inmate can apply to the National Parole Board. If the jury decides that the period of parole ineligibility is not to be reduced, it can set another time at which the prisoner can again apply for judicial review. If no date is set, then the prisoner can reapply after two years for this process to be engaged again.

It is a complex process. The process initially involves a senior judge and then a jury of 12 citizens, two of the most important features of our system. Judicial discretion is involved. There is a strong citizen involvement component. The community is absolutely represented in the decision that someone's parole should be reduced.

That is not the end of the story because then the parole board does its job. The decision about whether the person gets out on parole is made by the parole board in the usual fashion. Here is another group of professionals who serve our communities admirably, who are engaged in this decision-making process, who are then engaged in discovering whether the person will succeed in the community and then help that person if he or she is ultimately released into the community.

This is not just a short-term parole. Anyone who gets out as a result of this process is on parole for life. That parole period never ends. It continues until that person dies. We need to remember again how important that is and how that offers protection to our communities as well.

There is a lot to this complex process. It is one that has served us well over many years. It originally came in during the mid-seventies when we essentially stopped using capital punishment. It was reaffirmed after the last capital punishment debate in the House in 1986. I believe it has been serving us essentially in its current form for about 25 years.

What has happened in that 25 years? What is the exact experience of this faint hope clause, of this possibility for early parole for someone who is sentenced to life for murder or treason?

New information came out during the course of the justice committee hearings on this bill from the Commissioner of the Correctional Service Canada, Mr. Don Head. He presented information that was valid as of October 10, 2010. He noted that there were 1,508 offenders with cases applicable to judicial review. That is the number of people in our system who could potentially apply for early release under the faint hope clause.

In the 25 years since the first judicial review hearing in 1987, there have a total of 181 court decision. In that 25 years, 181 people have applied to engage this process. That is not a significant number when we look at the total number who are eligible to do that.

Of those 181 court decisions, 146 resulted in a reduction of the period that must be served before parole eligibility and 35 resulted in a refusal. Already, the system has been weeding out the potential reductions.

Of the 146 offenders who had their parole eligibility moved earlier, 135 have been granted parole. Again, there is a change in the number. Out of the potential 146, we are down to 135.

Of those 135 who were granted parole, 68 have had no issue during their period of supervisions, 35 received a suspension because of some problem during their parole but their parole was not subsequently revoked and 23 had their parole revoked. Apparently a lot of those cases dealt with issues related to chronic offending against the conditions of parole, things like using drugs, alcohol, being late when there were restrictions on their movements, those kinds of things.

Seven of the one hundred and thirty-five who reoffended did it in a non-violent manner and two offended violently. Therefore, nine people reoffended out of the total number of cases that were looked at, seven in a non-violent manner and two offended violently. I believe a number of the seven offences were also related to drugs.

That is a whole other issue that we could talk about. We could talk about how our criminal legislation around drugs serves our communities, how well it has served us and the problems with that, but that is probably for another debate.

Of the two offenders who offended violently, one was found guilty of two counts of assault with a weapon and one count of assault using force and the other offender was found guilty of one count of robbery.

I am not going to make any bones about it. Those are serious crimes and serious issues, but these people were charged and convicted in court and are back in jail.

To put it succinctly, since 1987, there have been thousands of offenders who were eligible for early parole. Only 181 chose to apply. Out of those 181, only 135 received a reduction in their sentence. Less than 15%, in fact, of those eligible have applied.

Some of the talk about the legislation comes about because there is somehow this impression that we treat people who have committed murder in Canada lightly, that somehow we are soft on that crime in Canada and that people do not serve a lot of time in Canadian prisons for the crime of murder. In fact, it turns out that is absolutely the furthest from the truth.

It has been shown that the average time served in prison for first degree murder in Canada is 28.4 years. That is one of the longest average times in any country in the world. In comparison, in the United States, the average time incarcerated is 23 years. In many other countries, it is even shorter than that. Certainly in countries like New Zealand, Scotland, Switzerland and England, the average time spent incarcerated for murder is under 15 years.

The fact is that Canada does treat this crime far more severely than many of the countries to which we would want to be compared and significantly more when we look at the average time people spend in prison. It is not something that we are being soft on. We are taking advantage of the possibility of incarceration. We are ensuring that people spend a significant time in jail.

There may be problems with that. Perhaps that is something we should be looking at as it may not be serving us well. In terms of the whole argument that somehow we are soft on crime and this is an issue that needs to be addressed by this Parliament, it turns out that is baloney because we are in fact much more severe than almost any other country we would choose to compare ourselves to. That is something that is also crucial to know in this process.

We have a process that we have had long experience with and that has been in place for over 25 years, probably even longer than that because it was in place for probably a decade before that. There were some changes made to it in the late 1980s. We have good experience with this. It is a program that has been successful, that has shown real and positive results for both people who have been incarcerated in our system and for the communities from which they come and to which they often return. It has shown that citizens can be engaged in a meaningful way in making determinations about their safety and the safety of their communities and decisions about who has been successfully rehabilitated. Citizens get to apply those standards that they believe are most important in making that kind of determination.

If there is a reason why we should reject this legislation, it is because it very clearly eliminates the possibility of citizen engagement in this very important process. This is something that has evolved over time and is something that we have shown great leadership in, establishing this kind of process that allows citizens to make important decisions about parole eligibility for people who have committed the most serious crimes possible in our society. It speaks well to our society that we both make that possibility available and that we also engage citizens directly in making the ultimate decisions about who gets out early, about who has been successfully rehabilitated. The process engages judges with discretion and engages a very senior level of judiciary in this decision-making process. That is also very important. It is important to give judges that discretion and that they exercise discretion on our behalf. After all, they are experts in this area. That is something that is also very important and a key aspect of this process.

As well, we must remember that the parole system continues to be engaged, that even the small number of people who do successfully complete this process remain on parole for the remainder of their lives and under strict supervision by the people who run our parole system.

I recently met with representatives of the parole system in my community. I was very impressed by the work that they do on our behalf in Burnaby and in New Westminster where the office is located. It is a very important contribution they make to the safety of our community and to the hopes of our society, that people can turn their lives around and be successfully integrated back into the community. It is important that we acknowledge the work that they do. It is very difficult work. They are often under great scrutiny for the decisions that they make. I am not sure that we always appreciate all that goes into an understanding, a determination of parole and that ongoing supervisory role that people engage when they are released from a correctional institution in Canada. I want to salute parole officers and the people in the parole system for the important work that they do.

All in all, this is a very flawed bill. It eliminates the possibility for hope, for redemption, as my colleague from Vancouver Kingsway so clearly pointed out in his speech a few minutes ago. We should be very cautious about eliminating this from our system. When we eliminate the possibility of hope, even from those who have committed the most serious crimes, we do not make our society any safer, nor do we make it any better and the bill takes us down absolutely the wrong course.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I have three quick questions. I certainly appreciate the member's thoughtful approach to this bill.

In the member's very last sentence, he said that he does not think it makes communities any safer. If in fact there were so few reoccurrences without this bill, maybe he could elaborate a bit on the types of the crimes that actually would be committed by the many people who lost hope or who have actually gone on to lead productive lives.

The second way we could see fewer victims is if the money saved by the huge costs of incarceration were used on more police or machines in hospitals. There are all sorts of ways more lives could be saved with the money that is saved.

Finally, could the member comment on the fact that the government would save a lot more people from becoming victims if it were to reinstate the crime prevention programs it has cancelled?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think there are many ways to make our communities safer.

We have seen clearly, time and time again, that crime prevention programs actually work, better education programs work, more opportunities for citizens work, and better jobs work. There are all kinds of things that make our communities safer that have nothing to do with keeping people in jail longer or putting people in prison longer.

We have seen that rehabilitation programs in prison work, but we do not often give them the kind of importance they need. We have seen that treating people for drug addiction often makes our communities dramatically safer, and yet we do not put nearly enough resources into that.

Instead the government thinks that it can be tough on crime and put more people in jail for longer, and somehow that makes us safer. Even the Americans who were the champions of that kind of policy are turning their back on it. Some of the most outspoken proponents of it are turning their backs on it, because it just does not work.

There is proof, time and time again. There is research, time and time again. Unfortunately, that does not make an impression on the current government.

Those kinds of things are really important to all of us. The cost of incarcerating people could be used in so many other ways that would actually make our communities safer. We could engage citizens in other ways to make our communities safer. Restorative justice that engages people, victims of crime, people who have committed crime, representatives of the community from the get-go is a way of making our communities much safer. The government has no interest in that kind of program.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciated the speech from the member for Burnaby—Douglas.

Would the member comment on Newt Gingrich and Pat Nolan, two Republicans from the United States who, in their article, talk about what happened in Texas where it was decided against building more prisons and opted to enhance proven community corrections approaches, such as drug courts. Money was redirected into community treatment for mentally ill and low level drug addicts.

Not only have these reforms reduced Texas prison populations, but for the first time there is no waiting list for drug treatment in the state and crime has dropped 10% from 2004 through 2009, reaching its lowest annual rate since 1973.

Since even Republicans now understand the good merits of the NDP approach of being smart on crime, I would like to ask the member for Burnaby—Douglas why do the Conservatives not get it?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, if I had been told that I would standing in the House supporting an opinion offered by Newt Gingrich, the Republican to end all Republicans in some of our minds, and Pat Nolan, the Republican leader of the California State Assembly from 1984 to 1988, I would not have believed it.

I would not have believed that it would possible that Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Nolan would release the kind of statement that they have recently that says that they were wrong, that the approach that they championed, to build more prisons, to give tougher sentences, to put people in jail longer, the “three strikes and you're out”, which I am sure Mr. Nolan was around for, that hideous attempt at justice reform. All of those things have only served to make communities poorer and more unsafe.

Here they are, turning their back and calling for the kinds of smart on crime measures the New Democrats have championed for years, generations in fact. It is really hard to believe that I could stand here and be on the same page as Newt Gingrich. My colleagues say that he has come to our page, and that is great. He has seen the light.

It just goes to show that even the strangest people can be rehabilitated in their views of society, and that I am open to that possibility. I look forward to the possibility of somebody actually struggling with the numbers, the research and the experience of this kind of legislation, and then examining it carefully.

Mr. Gingrich deserves some kudos for taking the risk. This is a huge political risk for a Republican in the United States, to write this kind of statement and to re-examine something that he championed so vociferously. I think that is a very—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please.

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on Persons Day last year, I asked the Minister for Status of Women why the government was undermining women's equality in Canada. She did not answer my question and ignored the fact that the government does not believe in women's equality.

The Prime Minister recently gave a speech touting his accomplishments over the past five years. Even though, in his own words, “it is a long list”, none of his so-called accomplishments even mentioned doing anything for women. Of course, it is because the Prime Minister has done nothing for women in Canada. In fact, the Prime Minister has turned back the clock on women's equality.

From the moment the Conservatives were elected, women's equality was threatened. The Prime Minister's agenda was to dismantle the newly negotiated child care agreement with the provinces, and the program was immediately nullified. The court challenges program was cancelled, and then came the restructuring of Status of Women Canada. The independent policy research fund was shut down. Regional offices of Status of Women were closed and women's groups which conducted advocacy and research activities were denied funding. Next came the Conservative attack on pay equity. The government tried to hide new legislation in a budget bill of all things. That particular legislation will destroy pay equity in the federal service.

The term “gender equality” has been struck out of the policy language of the government and replaced with ambivalent and less assertive language. Then of course came the news that CIDA would no longer fund abortions internationally and organizations that conducted gender equality projects abroad were denied funding.

It does not stop there. This fall, women found out that the mandatory census was nixed, and questions regarding women's unpaid labour were eliminated. Now, although promised and highlighted in the Speech from the Throne, funding to the sisters in spirit program has been cancelled despite the successes of the groundbreaking work done by the Native Women's Association of Canada.

Since 2006, Canada has slipped on the World Economic Forum's ranking in global gender equality from 14 in the world to an all-time low of 31 in 2008. When it comes to income gap between men and women, Canada falls to 33rd place, and women are the losers. The Conservative government also has allowed the number of government appointments of women to tribunals, boards, agencies, and crown corporations to slip from about 37% to below 32%.

The list of failures goes on and on. Canada should be a global leader when it comes to women's equality, but instead it is a global embarrassment. The government has purposefully and systematically dismantled programs and policies to undermine women's equality in Canada.

The wage gap between men and women is staggering. Women in Canada still face higher rates of violence because of their gender. Aboriginal women are 3.5 times more likely to be victims in violence than non-aboriginal women. We know now, from the sisters in spirit project, that more than 600 aboriginal women have gone missing or have been murdered. Senior women in Canada face alarming rates of poverty, and immigrant, aboriginal, and racialized women are especially vulnerable.

The government needs to take action now, or generation after generation of women will continue to face the same rates of poverty, violence, and systemic discrimination as our sisters do at this moment.

Besides handing out inadequate piecemeal funding to women's organizations across Canada, what has the government actually done to help improve the lives of women? Does it have any kind of long-term plan to advance women's--

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

The hon. Parliamentary Secretary for the Status of Women.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary for Status of Women]

Mr. Speaker, promoting equality for women and encouraging the full participation of women in the economic, social and democratic life of our country remain priorities on which our government continues to work. That is why we have taken real steps to address issues that directly affect women. The measures we have taken include creating the universal child care benefit; increasing the pension income credit and modifying the guaranteed income supplement, thereby increasing the income of senior women; modernizing federal labour standards; improving business opportunities for women; taking action with regard to pay equity; launching special initiatives for women entrepreneurs; and increasing crime prevention measures, judicial measures and security measures to protect women and children from sexual exploitation and human trafficking.

Our government also supports projects that promote the full participation of women in the economic, social and democratic life of Canada through the women's program at Status of Women Canada. The government has nearly doubled the budget for this program, from $10.8 million in 2006-07 to $19 million in 2010.

What does that mean for Canadian women? Here are a few examples. It means that women in Labrador are participating in a series of seminars on entrepreneurship, preparing business plans, marketing and business management. We know that in Canada, an increasing number of women are now among the best entrepreneurs.

It means that a number of women in Victoria who live in transitional housing are developing financial literacy and acquiring enough self-confidence to become independent.

It means that, through a mentorship program, more than 100 Toronto women who are victims of domestic violence are learning about the legal system, legal aid services, and how to work effectively with lawyers and get the help they need to live a very satisfying life in safety.

It means that 30 women with an intellectual disability living in Peterborough are learning to protect themselves, become leaders and actively participate in the life of their community.

Through a new program to promote diversity on boards of directors, it means that more and more women will be members of boards in our country.

These are but a few examples of the changes we are helping to bring about in Canada's communities. In fact, under this government, the women's program is now working on the advancement of all Canadian girls and women. Our government is promoting gender equality through positive action to deal with long-standing problems such as racial and sexual violence, participation in power and decision-making, as well as access to employment and education opportunities.

We are proud to rise in the House today to celebrate all these measures.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, lots of words and lots of talk but absolutely nothing in terms of real and concrete measures to improve the lives of women in Canada, nor does the government have any sort of long-term plan to advance women's equality.

Today we learned that aboriginal women make up one-third of all federally incarcerated women in the federal prison system. That is a 90% increase since 2001. We know that women in prison are twice as likely as their male counterparts to suffer from mental illness and as many as 80% have been victims of sexual abuse.

Women in Canada are in crisis. Canada needs to recommit itself to women's equality. We have the tools, we have the reports and we have the know-how. What we need is political will. Unfortunately, I can only conclude that the government does not care.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Mr. Speaker, our government has worked closely with aboriginal women. Here are just some of the projects that help aboriginal women across the country.

In the UNiTE to End Violence Against Women campaign, the Government of Canada gave $1 million to address violence against women. And the anti-violence campaign run by the Fédération des femmes acadiennes de la Nouvelle-Écosse was given $180,000 for mentoring.

We are working together with communities—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

I am sorry to interrupt, but you are out of time. The hon. member for Québec.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the court case related to the contaminated water in Shannon, a class action suit against the Attorney General of Canada, is under way. The case is meant to bring justice to several citizens from Shannon who drank TCE-contaminated water as a result of National Defence negligence.

I rise here today to denounce this government's contempt regarding its obligations and responsibilities when it comes to the groundwater contamination in Shannon. On November 24, 2010, I successfully forced a vote in the House of Commons and all opposition parties voted in favour of a motion ordering the government to produce analysis reports from the Valcartier military base's water supply system dating back to 1970, documents that the lawyers representing the class action suit filed by the people of Shannon have been trying to obtain for some time. That motion also received the unanimous support of the Quebec National Assembly. As we know, the Conservative government is an expert at refusing to honour the motions adopted by the National Assembly.

The next day, on November 25, the Minister of National Defence said that he would comply with the House's order to table those documents. He replied yes, and we thought those documents would be tabled in the weeks leading up to the break for the holiday season.

On December 15, since I had my doubts about the minister's willingness to table the documents in the House, I asked him again. The minister was changing his story and used the excuse that the matter was before the courts. As usual, he replied, just as the Liberals did when they were in power, that the documents would be released in due course. They have misled the people of Shannon.

I do not need to point out that we have yet to see these documents. I also sent a written request to the government for these same analysis reports that I mentioned earlier. But once again, the government, led by the minister, has acted in bad faith and almost completely ignored my demands.

Instead of compensating the victims of contaminated water in Shannon, being proactive and helping them track down as many potentially contaminated people as possible, what did the minister do? Nothing. The U.S. Navy did the opposite. When something similar happened at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, the American government helped track down the victims. In this case, what did the government do? Nothing. What contempt for the people of Shannon.

My questions today are clear: when will the Minister of National Defence make public the documents that the House ordered him to produce on November 24, 2010? The class action lawyers are waiting for these documents. In addition, will the government take responsibility for these citizens and try to contact as many people as possible to conduct analyses and obtain a full sample of those who developed a cancer that, in many cases, led to their death?

I have also introduced a private member's bill that is along the same lines. Will the government stop being stubborn and stop forcing the people of Shannon into a class action lawsuit to obtain compensation?

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary for Status of Women]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank you and I would especially like to highlight the kindness of my colleague from Québec; we do respect each other.

I would like to begin by pointing out the priority given by the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces to their environmental programs. The department is fully committed to carrying out its operations in a manner that protects human health and the environment.

Out of concern for proper environmental management, the department is correcting the environmental problems that arose in the past and is continuing to look for means of ensuring environmental health in coming years. That is why the federal government has spent almost $60 million to improve and maintain the drinking water system on the Valcartier base. That is also the reason why the government continues to help the municipality of Shannon to improve its water network and conduct water quality studies in Shannon.

The Government of Canada, in particular, the Department of National Defence, Environment Canada and Health Canada, has been working closely with all interested parties from the outset and it continues to work with all stakeholders, namely, the municipality of Shannon, the City of Quebec, the Province of Quebec, and the residents of Shannon and Quebec City. In fact, an advisory committee was established in 2001 to ensure effective communication among the numerous parties involved, in particular, the residents and federal, provincial and municipal representatives. This committee meets every six months and is a useful forum for members of the community where they can work together to solve problems faced by the region.

The Canadian Forces test the wells on the Valcartier base on a daily basis to ensure that the water meets federal and provincial quality standards. An independent laboratory conducts TCE testing once a month. The results of these tests are sent to the City of Quebec, the municipality of Shannon and other stakeholders on a regular basis. In addition to these efforts, the department is also working diligently to resolve the problem of TCE in the groundwater in the Valcartier region.

We took precautionary measures to prevent any further degradation of the sites on the Valcartier base and we are making considerable progress on the decontamination of those sites. In fact, for quite some time now, the Department of National Defence has had programs in place to identify the contaminated sites. It is taking all necessary steps to mitigate any associated risks.

Identifying and cleaning up all contaminated sites on the Valcartier base illustrate the Canadian Forces' continued commitment to protecting the health and safety of Canadians. We are determined to find solutions to this problem and we plan to implement them in the best interest of all stakeholders, but above all, for the residents of Shannon. We are very concerned about what is happening on the Valcartier base and we have taken significant measures to ensure that nothing like this never happens again. Since the matter is currently before the courts, it would not be appropriate to comment further at this time. However, I would like to reiterate that the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces do have environmental programs. National Defence is fully committed to operating in a way that serves to protect human health and the environment.