Madam Speaker, I thank my distinguished colleague. It is always a pleasure to work with her.
The problem we have, that she rightly raised, is the following. There are people serving intermittent sentences on weekends who are being told to go home because there is no more room. We can increase the number of inmates, but how are we going to deal with this in practical terms? I do not know. As I said earlier, we have a problem with underfunding of the justice system, and we will have to address it at some point.
Currently, there is a shortage of special education teachers in schools, a shortage of doctors, and a shortage of nurses in hospitals. Infrastructure is falling apart. There is not enough money. Funding will have to be aligned with mandates. I think we need federal money to strengthen the judicial system. It is true that we are short on judges, but we are also short on court clerks, bailiffs, and courtrooms. It all goes hand in hand. This needs to be taken seriously.
I have already suggested to the Minister of Justice that he set himself a six-month time limit for filling judicial vacancies. Six months seems reasonable to me. If he says that nine months or three months is better, I am all ears. At some point, we might have to set maximum time limits for filling vacancies. It may be necessary to appoint new judges and transfer funds to the provinces and to Quebec in order to manage the justice system properly.