Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to stand tonight and talk about the issue of rural crime. I appreciate my colleague from Lakeland bringing forward Motion No. 167. This is an important issue, and we have already heard several of my colleagues speak to it tonight.
Rural MPs from Alberta started talking about this issue in the last couple of years as they heard about it from their constituents. We held many town hall meetings in our ridings over the last year. We visited with staff sergeants and their detachments. We visited with RCMP commanding officers for the province. We talked to a lot of people. It was not hard to get people to come to town halls to talk about rural crime.
My riding, Bow River, is about the size of New Brunswick. It has 60 large and small rural communities. These are not city people who expect the RCMP or the metropolitan police to show up quickly. These people do not expect to see the RCMP very quickly because of the distance. It is very hard to get to them.
There are two groups I am very concerned about: the rural residents and the fear they are living with, and the RCMP members and the professional job they do. RCMP officers know that it is hard to get to reported crimes because of the distance. They want to get there, but there are some issues that are really creating problems.
We are glad that RCMP members have sick leave, maternity leave, and paternity leave. These are rights they should have. However, there is a strong shortage of staff, and they cannot backfill these positions. One detachment has seven members, but it really has only four because the positions cannot be filled, so the detachment is left short. If a detachment that supposedly has seven members but really has only four provides 24-7 coverage and has many miles to cover, that leaves the officers very much at risk. It is not only the stress of the job and the long hours, but the risk they may face being out in places far removed from any backup or support. The RCMP is caught in a vicious cycle.
The province did respond, in a sense, to this growing concern by saying that it would hire 59 more RCMP officers for rural detachments, but the soonest it can possibly get those is in two years, if it gets them at all.
We really have a problem with our professional police service, a service we really appreciate. The RCMP has a long-standing history of service to our country, but barriers are being put up in front of them and the work they need to do to respond to crimes. Upholding the law in our constituencies has become very difficult for them.
Then we get to the justice system. When the RCMP officers go out to investigate crimes, the people are often long gone before the officers can get there. When they do catch them, they appear in court, receive bail hearings, and are gone. The joke among RCMP officers is that they need to watch their vehicles when individuals are released on bail because they will probably steal one to go home. They know it is a slap on the wrist. The RCMP officers are very frustrated when doing their jobs because they will probably catch the repeat offenders another time doing the same crime. It is very hard for the RCMP.
They coach people at town hall meetings to get the citizens on patrol, on active crime watch. They are asking people to go out and help them in the middle of the night. We are talking about seniors on their properties in rural communities. They want them to go out and try to secure their property in the evening, and that is a challenging task.
This leads me to the second thing I am going to talk about, the fear among the citizens. I heard from a mother with a three-year-old child. At three o'clock in the morning, she heard people in her yard, and before long they were banging on her door. She locked herself in a room and phoned the RCMP. There was no chance the RCMP would get there.
In a community, two nights ago, two people attempted to steal a truck, and the resident came out. He is now in critical condition in the hospital, as he was severely beaten by them. They were long gone before somebody discovered this person, who was severely beaten, and called the police. The distances make it very tough.
Living in fear is a severe problem for our people in rural areas. The RCMP cannot get there. As other people have mentioned, reporting crimes is really important, yet people are giving up on reporting crimes because the RCMP cannot get there. Sometimes it has been days later when the RCMP can get there to try to investigate what is occurring. The dissatisfaction that is growing among residents toward their police force makes no sense. The frustration that is occurring among the residents in rural areas because of fear is wrong. We need to be able to provide better service in our rural communities.
We need to fundamentally restructure how we look at the RCMP and its service. Because of the way it is structured, there need to be more officers. They need more support. They should not fear going out at two in the morning on a call 30 miles out from where they live or where their detachment is, because they will be out there on their own with no backup from the unit behind them. They should not fear for their jobs to be able to do that. There needs to be backup. We need to look at how the RCMP works in rural areas. There is a serious shortage, and it is cyclical in what it causes them.
Someone mentioned Bill C-75. This could make it worse, in the sense that it is a revolving door with lesser penalties and fines for stealing things over $5,000. These are crimes of opportunity. These people know that the police are not going to get there. The vehicles found in rural communities are often very expensive. These are farming communities. They have expensive four-wheel drive trucks. These are $50,000 or $60,000 vehicles, and people are out there stealing them. If they know that under the new legislation they would get a slap on the wrist and maybe a fine, that would really exacerbate the situation in rural areas. Bill C-75 may cause this to become a more severe problem. The RCMP will be more frustrated and less likely to solve crimes if people are only fined for this.
Rural crime is a severe issue. In town halls, I see the fear on people's faces, their anger and frustration about the country they live in and should be safe in. This is not right. They have beautiful homes and great properties.
I am glad that this bill is here. We can collect data and information so that Canadians can feel safe in their homes, no matter where they live. This is a really important piece to do.