Mr. Speaker, the hon. member speaks of his expertise as a lawyer. I am not a lawyer, but I will speak of my expertise as a physician.
This bill will harm people who are mentally ill. I have had many mentally ill patients. As an MP, I deal with people in my community who are mentally ill, and they are terrified that anybody would know they are because of the prejudices of various systems against people who are mentally ill.
If we can have early diagnosis before people commit violent crimes, when they become mentally ill and they have the NCR, we are suggesting that the bill is not putting that in place. There is a lot of work being done in Dalhousie and across the country on the effects of early diagnosis.
We are talking about of legislation can put into place good public policy. Legislation is not just a piece of paper.
The important thing to remember is that the recidivism rate is low. If we keep people in an institution for longer than they need, we run the huge risk of creating violence and problems within that system. We heard from Dr. Simpson on this issue.
Why do we not want to listen to the physicians and the mental health advocates who are speaking to this issue and only wanting to look at it through one small, narrow lens? I do not understand it at all.