Madam Speaker, it is an absolute honour to rise in support of Bill C-236. I want to take a moment to commend my colleague from Parkland not only for his excellent work on this bill, but also for the way that he approached its development. I know that he went out of his way to talk to victims, victims' rights groups and law enforcement to really make this an evidence-based, common-sense approach to a real problem that is happening in Canada. That approach shows the best of what we can be in this place. For that reason, among many others, I am proud to say that I will be supporting this bill, and I know that many others will be as well.
The bill would make a common-sense, long-overdue change to ensure, when a person is convicted of a crime, such as murder or manslaughter, and the offender refuses to provide information about the location of the victim's body or remains, that would be an aggravating factor at sentencing that could lead to a longer or harsher sentence, a reason to delay parole eligibility and a factor considered in decisions about conditional release, temporary absences or other corrections decisions.
My other colleagues in this place have made very good technical arguments about why this law is in alignment with the charter, but I want to make some arguments about why I think it is necessary.
In this place, we all have a responsibility to protect the most vulnerable people in our community, and we have a responsibility to ensure that our laws rectify deficiencies when we see that people are not being protected. There have been several high-profile cases that have been highlighted in colleagues' speeches speaking to this bill. My colleague from Parkland, after speaking to many victims, has also highlighted some of their cases in which a family has endured an unimaginable situation where their loved ones' lives were taken by somebody else and the perpetrator has been convicted of that crime, but the family does not have closure because the remains of their loved one have not been found. We know, through a lot of psychological research and reports, as well as just common sense, that to not have that closure, that ability to say goodbye and put somebody to rest, which is a very important part of a lot of spiritual practices and faiths, is a situation that continues to revictimize the family. We think about the victimization of people when crimes are perpetrated. In this instance, without the location of the remains or of the body of the victim of a murder, their loved ones, their friends and their family, become ongoing victims of crime.
My colleague from Parkland has also highlighted the fact that there are often trigger points for the family throughout the sentence of an offender in these cases. For example, if the offender comes up for parole and there is a parole eligibility issue, all of a sudden the fact that those remains have never been found is once again thrust into the forefront of the family's lives or their friends' lives. To me, that is an ongoing crime. It is an ongoing problem that we in this place should seek to rectify.
There is also something that did not come up in debate that I want to touch on a bit too. There is the dignity that we afford to somebody when they have passed. There is a dignity that somebody who has passed away is afforded, through many faith traditions and many secular traditions as well. To me, to allow an offender who has been convicted of murder to, for example, be eligible for parole when that dignity has not been afforded to their victim is not just.
What this bill would do is give the judiciary and law enforcement officials more tools to ensure that dignity is provided to the victim, but also that the ongoing victimization of their friends and family does not occur, so there can be a sense of closure and peace. Beyond the technicalities of what my colleague presented in this bill, he is also proposing to colleagues in this place that we look at justice a bit differently. To me, he has really thought about what justice means. I really support this bill for that, and because of the compassion, care and kindness he has inserted into its heart and into how he has modelled it.
I also want to address some colleagues, as I have heard them in debate make some reference to this being an American law. This legislation actually has its roots in the Commonwealth tradition. There are similar terms to the “no body, no parole” laws in Australia, as well as in the U.K. In the U.K., the legislation that went through our peer parliament was called Helen's Law. When our peers in those places were arguing about it, they debated the need to have judges, parole boards and correctional authorities. They needed more tools to address the injustice of withheld information.
Again, we must go back to the concept of giving additional justice and looking at the holistic situation of the impacts of crime. When speaking about murder, we should have no disagreement in this place that we should be looking for ways to correct and give as much justice in those situations as possible. The concept of the injustice of withheld information means that perpetrators should not be rewarded by being granted parole, for example, when we know that justice is still to be served.
Some debate came up about how this affects only a small number of cases in Canada. To me, there are a lot of logical fallacies involved in that argument. Justice should apply to all. A small number of cases should not be just waved away. There is still a requirement for justice there. If justice is not served in those cases, then it actually normalizes not having justice in those situations, which we can often see leading to recidivism, escalation of crime, or more instances happening. We in this place should be doing our job and holding the government to account to know when there are clear instances of justice not being served, so that we close the loopholes in our laws that should be common sense, in order to make sure that the principle that underlies the foundation of the Canadian national identity, the identity of our country, which is respect for the rule of law and justice when justice is required to be served, is actually embedded.
I hope this law quickly passes for all the reasons I have laid out, the compassionate reasons and the reasons for justice, but also because this precedent exists in Commonwealth peer countries as well. I want to extend a great degree of compassion and empathy to those victims who have worked with my colleague, the member for Parkland, and shared their stories. I hope they get closure by our quickly passing this bill as well.
I would just close by saying there are a lot of deficiencies in Canada's ability to deliver justice. We have seen the government over the last decade err on the side of protecting offenders and criminals, as opposed to providing justice for victims and preventing crime by ensuring that commensurate punishment is levelled to people who break the societal norms that are established in our criminal law. I think that needs to end.
There are a lot of people in the country who are looking beyond the chaos they are seeing in a lot of our streets and are starting to question whether or not we here in this place, as well as the government, understand the concept of justice. That is why Conservatives have put forward many justice bills recently, which, unfortunately, the government has voted against. However, this is a common-sense one.
I really hope that the amount of care, effort and research that my colleague from Parkland has put into the bill is supported by other members of the House, that the bill passes quickly and that we can rest assured that we have done our job in the House to stand for the principle of justice and be empathetic and compassionate to the victims of these crimes.