Mr. Speaker, nine years of the Liberal government has turned Canada into a country where mothers kiss their children goodbye in the morning and pray they come home at night. Last month, Savannah Kulla, a 29-year-old mother of four, was shot dead in broad daylight in a Brampton strip mall. Her killer was a man who had already been charged with firearms offences and intimate partner violence, a man the Liberal justice system let walk free on bail.
This summer, Bailey McCourt stood in a courtroom and begged a judge to keep her violent ex-husband behind bars. He had already choked her unconscious. The judge released him anyway on $500 bail. Hours later, James Plover hunted her down and murdered her. Bailey's last words to the court had been that he would kill her. The Liberal system said that it would take a chance.
These were two women, and there were two killers who never should have been on our streets. That is the human cost of Liberal catch-and-release.
Since 2015, violent crime is up 55%, gun crime is up 130%, extortion is up 330%, sexual assault is up 76% and homicide is up 29%. This is not random; it is the direct, predictable and preventable result of the Liberals' Bill C-75 and Bill C-5. Bill C-75 codified the toxic principle of restraint, a directive that forces police and judges to release accused persons at the earliest possible moment and under the least onerous conditions, no matter how dangerous they are. Bill C-5 gutted mandatory minimums and handed out house arrest for serious sexual assault, robbery, firearms trafficking and kidnapping.
For four long years, Conservatives have stood in the House and demanded one thing: jail not bail, repealing the principle of restraint and restoring mandatory minimums and presumed detention for repeat violent offenders. All the while, the members opposite blocked us, voted against us and mocked us.
Now, after heartbreaking murders, with families having paid the ultimate price, the Liberals finally copy us with Bill C-14 and call it sweeping reform. This is surgical PR, a patchwork of press releases and photo ops that nibble at the edges while the revolving door keeps spinning.
Let us be crystal clear about what Bill C-14 would not do. It would not repeal the principle of restraint. It keeps the very words that created catch-and-release; it merely adds a redundant sentence saying that restraint would not require release. That sentence is already in the Criminal Code twice, in sections 498 and 501. The bill is not reform but press release footnotes. It would expand reverse onus for some offences: violent car theft, home invasion, choking assaults and extortion. That is good, but reverse onus would still be just a procedural speed bump. The accused could still talk their way out.
What Canadians need is a brick wall. They need presumptive detention for every serious violent offence and every repeat offender.
The bill would add aggravating factors and a few consecutive sentences, but only in narrow combinations. Break and enter would count only if it is paired with gang-related auto theft, and only on the sentence offence. Extortion would run consecutive to arson only from the exact same event. Meanwhile, mass murderers like Alexandre Bissonnette would still get to stack parole eligibility because the government will not touch the Supreme Court's rulings.
The bill would ban house arrest for major sexual assault under two years. That sounds tough, until we remember that the Liberals were the ones who made house arrest possible, in Bill C-5. They fixed one hole that they punched in the boat, while robbery, firearms trafficking, kidnapping and chronic violent offenders would still get to serve their time in their living room.
The bill would do nothing to restore the mandatory minimums the Liberals repealed. Sentencing would remain a judicial lottery: uneven, uncertain and unsafe. It would add no new judges, no new courtrooms and no funding to clear the backlogs.
We see 50% of charges in the Waterloo region dropped because the system is clogged. Waterloo Regional Police told us personally that one in five people on Liberal release orders is caught breaching conditions. More than half of those breachers are repeat violent offenders caught multiple times on the same toothless conditions, and because of the Liberal backlog, half of the charges those officers lay never see a courtroom. In one in five breaches, half the charges are dropped. This is not justice. This is a subscription service for crime.
Just last month in Richmond Hill, a 53-year-old predator allegedly groomed a child online, arranged a meeting at Lake Wilcox and sexually assaulted them. Bill C-14 would do nothing for that child. There would be no reverse onus, and house arrest would still be on the table if the sentence is under two years. That is playing Russian roulette with our children's lives.
Bill C-14 is a half measure dressed up as a victory. Canadians deserve the full Conservative plan, the real jail not bail plan we have been fighting for since day one.
Here is what real reform looks like. We should repeal the Liberal principle of restraint and replace it with a public safety clause. Public and community safety should be the governing principle in every bail decision. We should presume detention, not just reverse the onus, for every major violent offence, such as the use of firearms, sexual assault, kidnapping, human trafficking, home invasion, robbery, extortion with a firearm and arson, and for every repeat violent offender. We should restore mandatory minimums for those exact crimes, the ones the Liberals repealed with Bill C-5. We should end house arrest for robbery, firearms offences, trafficking and chronic violent offenders, with no more living room sentences. We should mandate judges to consider the full criminal record, every conviction, every breach and every outstanding charge, and lower the risk threshold from “substantial likelihood” to “reasonably foreseeable”. We should bar anyone with an indictable conviction from acting as a surety, with no more criminals vouching for criminals, and require non-residents to surrender their passports. We should also fund courts, hire judges and clear backlogs so officers' work is not wasted and victims see justice.
This is what police chiefs from coast to coast are begging for. This is what victims' families are pleading for. This is what Savannah Kulla and Bailey McCourt deserved but never got.
We will move amendments to make Bill C-14 live up to its promises. We will fight to turn Liberal redundancy into Conservative reality. However, if the government refuses, if it clings to its failed ideology, then Bill C-14 will fail the only test that matters: keeping Canadians safe tonight, tomorrow night and every night after.
Canadians have had enough of Liberal clarifications and half measures. They want Conservative convictions. It is past time to jail, not give bail, and keep our streets safe.