Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands for her contribution to Bill C-75.
She made reference to the limitation of preliminary inquiries only to those cases where the maximum sentence is life behind bars. She is quite right that the evidence before the committee overwhelmingly was that it would not reduce delay and that, in fact, it might increase delay because preliminary inquiries help weed out cases, particularly weak cases.
However, in addition to that, I was wondering if she could speak to this life criteria. It seems to be quite arbitrary, because there are certain offences where the maximum sentence may be life and others where it is not. In terms of the sentencing guidelines of case law, one would expect a similar sentence to be imposed, but yet in one case a preliminary inquiry would be available, in the other case it would not. It seems not to make a lot of sense.