Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak in the House on the experience of indigenous peoples within Canada's justice system.
First, I would like to reiterate that our thoughts and prayers continue to go to the members of the Boushie family on the tragic loss of their son, their nephew, their brother. No family should ever have to endure such pain. Our hearts are united with the Boushie family at this most difficult time.
I want to spend a bit of time talking about the Conservative Party's record in supporting victims of crime.
My colleague from Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, who has shown leadership on this issue, pointed out something very important. and that was that our colleague, the Hon. Peter MacKay, introduced the Victims Bill of Rights. Again, this is completely consistent with where the Conservative Party is, has been at in the past and continues to be. It became law in 2015. That was not the only thing we had done.
We passed Bill C-2, the Fair and Efficient Criminal Trials Act, which among other things amended the Criminal Code to allow the swearing in of up to 14 jurors to ensure a trial could be completed. It also had other provisions. One of them was special protections for aboriginal women under the threat of domestic violence. This is known as the Family Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests Rights Act. Again, this is an important step forward to updating Canada's laws.
Another example is that the Human Rights Code in our country did not include indigenous peoples. They did not have the protections that all Canadians deserve. Our government did that. We said that it was important for everyone in the country have those protections.
I want to be clear that the Conservative Party is always interested in ways to improve Canada's justice system.
We talked about Bill C-51, the only bill the government did bring forward, but we supported it. We will not take the position the Liberals took with the previous government when they basically opposed everything we did. We will look at any way to improve Canada's justice system.
This past week, the heartbreaking death of Colten Boushie warrants discussions about the challenges first nations people face. All Canadians want to have fair and equitable treatment for all indigenous people. In fact, if we look at what we did in government over 10 years, they were all consistent with helping to support victims and people in the criminal justice system. One of the significant resources was to expand the aboriginal justice strategy, which enabled aboriginal communities to have increased involvement in the local administration of justice.
During the 2008 fiscal year, as an example, approximately 113 programs were funded and they served nearly 400 indigenous communities. We continued to renew that as part of our economic plan. In fact, in 2014, we renewed it for another two years. Why? Because we believed it was important.
One of my colleagues on the other side said that the native courtroom program had ended. It certainly did not end under our government. It was one of those programs in which I was very interested. It was known as the aboriginal court workers program. It assisted indigenous people to understand their right to speak on their own behalf or to request legal counsel, and to better understand the nature of the charges against them. It was very important. It assisted indigenous people with the administration of the criminal justice system, with special awareness given to the values, customs, languages, socio-economic conditions of indigenous people, and ensured there were no communication barriers between indigenous people and those involved with the administration of the criminal justice system.
Let me be clear. The Conservative Party of Canada has always been interested in hearing from Canadians on ways that we can improve the criminal justice system. Certainly the heartbreaking death of Colten Boushie warrants a discussion about the challenges faced by first nations people. We would welcome and carefully consider proposed legislation that would improve the justice system, while maintaining the independence of our justice system.
Judicial independence is protected in our Constitution, and it guarantees anyone accused of a crime that his or her case will be heard by an independent and impartial tribunal. Independence is necessary for public confidence in the fairness and impartiality of our justice system. It is a cornerstone of Canadian democracy. Fairness for all Canadians includes everyone, indigenous and non-indigenous. We all deserve that protection.
As I have stated, I am in favour of seeing more indigenous jurors and working with the indigenous community with other justice-related issues, including indigenous policing. Just two weeks ago, I was honoured to meet with the Association of Iroquois and Allied Indians on indigenous policing and law-related issues. We discussed how we could support indigenous police services. One way of doing that would be to ensure they would be listed as first responders.
I hope the government will act on the recommendations of this group. It is extremely important that we give it assistance. The government must bring first nation policing in line with other police services. There is nothing wrong with that, and it makes sense. Those forces need to be protected under strong legislative frameworks, and afforded the same resources and support as federal and provincial police forces.
Underfunding jeopardizes the adequacy of policing in indigenous communities, and there have been examples, which I was told about, among the nine first nation police services in Ontario. For instance, I was told that they were not legislated under the Police Services Act and therefore were not required to meet the adequacy standards of other local police services. There have been a couple of articles on how this can work to the disadvantage of people who need the help.
Therefore, if the government is looking for ways to help out indigenous communities, certainly this is one way. Ensure they get the same protection and the same resources as other policing services do. Again, I heard this about a week ago from groups in Ontario that this was what they should have. If the government is looking for ways to do this, this is something on which it could move forward.
We continue to be prepared to encourage more indigenous representation and input into our justice system. That is important. As I have stated already, politicians, regardless of how powerful they are, must also respect the independence of our judicial system. If it is interfered with, it may have the unfortunate effect of impeding the crown's ability to launch an appeal.
On the weekend, I made a statement about the Boushie case. I recognized that the verdict in this case must have been difficult for all those involved, especially for the family members. However, I am pleased they are in Ottawa this week.
Again, we are open to suggestions on these things. I believe you will get more support from us for worthwhile initiatives. You will probably get more support from us than we received from you in the last Parliament. However, we have to work together.