Madam Speaker, again, I go back to what Canadians expect us to do here and I think they expect us to be guided by evidence, to be legislating with wisdom and passion, and to be coming up with good public policy.
The fundamental question for us in the House is this. We either fundamentally believe that drug use and addiction are health issues or we do not. If we do believe it, then they have no place in the Criminal Code. On tinkering with the sentencing, it might be preferable to have non-mandatory sentences, but it is still in the Criminal Code and we still use the sanction of criminality on something that fundamentally is inappropriate to do so.
As it says in the big book of AA, “Half measures availed us nothing.” This is a half measure and it will avail us nothing.