My question to the minister will be in three parts.
First, why now? The Liberal Party introduced the idea of ending the accelerated parole in situations for large-scale fraudsters a couple of years ago and has been pushing the government to act on this. The government, in the case of Mr. Lacroix, got caught with its pants down in not acting. Now, all of a sudden, it wants to fix it at 100 miles an hour when we have been pushing it for a couple of years. Why did it take this long for the government to bring something forward?
Second, why does this apply to every single non-violent first-time offender? We would agreed wholeheartedly that we need to go after large-scale fraudsters such as Mr. Lacroix and the Earl Jones case, but why are we now applying this across the full spectrum against every first-time offender who is non-violent? We know this program has been a great success in reducing recidivism and reducing the amount of crime that is committed.
I know the minister often attacks us about victims, but it may come as a surprise to him that if we reduce crime, there are less victims. The objective is to stop crime before it happens. Why on earth would we throw in the whole lot of everybody if the bill is in fact targeted to these individuals? This program has been such a success in non-violent first-time offender cases to ensure they do not become major criminals and that we do not turn our prisons into crime factories.
Third, I ask the government table the cost and its analysis on the impact of recidivism and rehabilitation. If the government is ready to close this debate and not allow Parliament to discuss it, surely the minister would be able to table today the exact costs that are involved with this bill. Surely the minister would be able to table today an analysis of the impact on rehabilitation and the exact impact this would have on public safety. I would ask the minister to submit those things if he would.