Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to join in the debate. New Democrats oppose the bill.
I was really looking forward to getting into the meat of this particular issue, because there is so much to say, but with only a couple of minutes, I guess what I will do is reiterate that New Democrats will be opposing the bill. It seems that the bill started with good intentions, but, according to an awful lot of people, for the most part it is useless, ineffective and another one of these bills that is going to be challenged in court.
Bill C-587 would amend the Criminal Code to state that a person convicted of abduction, sexual assault and murder of the same victim in respect of the same event or series of events is to be sentenced to imprisonment for life without eligibility for parole until the person has served a sentence of between 25 and 40 years, as determined by the presiding judge after considering the recommendation, if any, of the jury.
Again, this bill would affect very few offenders. If we listen to the government, if this bill is passed, everybody is going to be safe and nobody will ever need to worry again. There is a funny thing about these kinds of bills. I went through this at Queen's Park, and I see my friend over there from the former Harris government. He will recall that every one of the speeches seemed to indicate that if we just went with Mike Harris' crime bill, the attack on crime, everything would be fine and it would all be solved. That was 20 years ago.