Mr. Speaker, there seems to be a lot of confusion about the factors that can and cannot be considered in developing deferred prosecution agreements.
First, the member for Carleton said that one cannot consider economic factors. Indeed, the prosecutor must not consider the national economic interest. However, under “Purpose”, as per the law, remediation agreements are:
to reduce the negative consequences of the wrongdoing for persons—employees, customers, pensioners and others—who did not engage in the wrongdoing, while holding responsible those individuals who did engage in that wrongdoing.
Therefore, one can consider the financial costs for employees, whether they be pensioners or current employees.
Second, the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley said that the current government has not done anything to fight white-collar crime. Actually, deferred prosecution agreements are a way of fighting white-collar crime, because they, and I am quoting Lawrence Ritchie, from Osler, “encourage the voluntary disclosure of misconduct by corporations for criminal activities that may otherwise have remained unknown to regulators”.
Therefore, I think there still needs to be a lot of clarification so that the opposition really understands what we are talking about here.