Myron Thompson

[Sundre Pioneer Village Museum, November 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is my great pleasure to pay tribute to an outstanding central Alberta sportsman, Chester Mjolsness.

Chester has spent the past many decades hunting big game around the entire world. He decided to share his massive collection of wildlife mounts and it is now proudly displayed at the Sundre Pioneer Village Museum.

The collection is made up of more than 150 animals from all the continents in the world. Planning for the museum began about 12 years ago and, through a little grant money, local donations and countless volunteer hours, this is a display not to be missed.

Special recognition must be paid to Lorraine Hughes who painted the background scenes and Povl Munksgaard who prepared the mounts for display.

I was honoured to be part of the official opening of the Chester Mjolsness World of Wildlife Museum in my hometown of Sundre. I would like to invite every Canadian to take a trip to visit this world-class facility. That is Sundre, Alberta, my hometown.

[Criminal Code, November 9th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, what a pleasure to hear a speech that makes sense on this particular issue. It sort of gives one a little more confidence after what has been happening over the past little while.

I wonder if the member could comment on what happened in my riding during the last election. I think most people in this place know that I have been working on a lot of justice issues for quite a few years. Yes, I am pretty passionate about some of them, particularly crimes against children. However, when I was campaigning in the last election we hardly ever entered into any debates on the subject because the Liberal candidate and the NDP candidate could only agree and cheer along with me on everything that I said with regard to getting tough on crime. I thought to myself that this would work out pretty good because, if I and my party went back to Parliament as the government, we would get things done knowing we had the support of the guys on the left. I thought this was looking good for Canada but, from what I am hearing today, it is looking sad for Canada. I wonder if the member would agree with me.

[Criminal Code, November 9th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member failed to address a lot of things. If he thinks for a minute that there are more drugs in Wild Rose than there are in Quebec ridings or that child pornography does not exist in Quebec like it does everywhere else, he is living on a different planet, not a different nation. He does not address that. Why is it that his party is so reluctant to come down hard on these elements that obviously are a real threat to our society because they poison the minds of individuals who would dare carry out a threat of violent crime?

[Criminal Code, November 9th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I listened quite intently to the speech by the Bloc member. I want him to know from the outset that I respect the years that he put into the justice system as a crown prosecutor, as a defence attorney, and probably some other avenues.

I am assuming we are fairly close to the same age. I spent the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and 1990s in the education field, in the schools working with children. I remember in the 1960s and 1970s we allowed kids to go to the parks and play by themselves. We allowed them to go to the corner store to pick up some school supplies. We did not worry about their safety, but as the years progressed, it got worse and worse and less safe and more and more problems developed. All through those years there was a steady increase. I know he is talking about how much crime is really down, but I do not really believe that. I know that a lot of crime does not even get reported any more. And if it does not get reported, it cannot be in the stats and that is too bad.

During our generation, does the member not agree that we sort of let things get out of control with drugs, with pornography, particularly child pornography, where it grew and grew over those years that he talked about when things were really bad?

I am suggesting to the hon. member that today it is extremely bad when our children, and I am talking about babies and little kids, are being attacked, assaulted, raped and murdered by those evil people out there who like doing it. They like doing it because they are fed through the pornography against children, through the avenues that are available.

Our generation let it get completely out of control. I am ashamed of that and I would think that the member would be too. I never could understand why when we work hard to get rid of child pornography which feeds and poisons those minds that we would always end up being blocked and we could not get it done for 13 years. There is always somebody who objects. How could anyone object to getting rid of those kinds of things?

For Pete's sake, let us get serious. Let us clean up this mess. People who attack children should go to jail and never come out again.

[Criminal Code, November 9th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, as usual, the members opposite, in their speeches regarding clamping down on crime and protecting our society, focus on the criminal and his rights, privileges and treatment. I never hear a whole lot from the opposition, particularly the Bloc, about the victims of these people, who are considered to be extremely dangerous because of their proven past.

I do not understand how any human being could think for a moment that extreme, serious consequences should not occur when an adult rapes, murders, or tortures a child. I have a five year old grandchild. If somebody did something like that to my grandchild, I would not care if he ever saw the light of day again. Why should he?

We can look at the root causes all we want, but we have not done very well in the past 13 years with respect to child poverty and all that. We could look at a number of things that could be considered the root cause of a lot of attacks on our children.

For 13 years, I have been trying to get this place to do something serious about child pornography. That group of people on the other side of the House has always balked at getting tough on child pornographers.

Does the member not know that child pornography is a real root cause of a lot of these problems? It affects people's brains. They go out and attack children. They love to attack children. That is their way of life. I do not want to spend one penny trying to rehabilitate somebody with that kind of poisoned mind. I really do not care. I want him off the streets and I want him in a place where he can never hurt another child.

I really get tired of hearing about root causes. I never hear mention of child pornography, a major root cause for attacks on our children. Why do they not grow up, get smart and start to deal with these people the way they ought to be dealt with?

[Heritage Hunting, Trapping and Fishing Protection Act, November 3rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this bill on behalf of our Outdoors Caucus, made up of members of the House from all parties, that has the mission to entrench in law fishing, hunting, trapping and shooting sports as acceptable, traditional, environmentally sustainable outdoor heritage activities with a safety credo and a conservation ethic as our highest priority.

We have 77 members in the caucus, 67 MPs and 10 senators. There are 51 Conservatives, 17 Liberals, 4 NDP members and 5 Bloc members. There are 27 from Ontario, 8 from Quebec, 10 from Alberta, 7 from Saskatchewan, 9 from B.C., 3 from Nova Scotia, 3 from New Brunswick, 5 from Manitoba, 1 from P.E.I., 2 from Newfoundland, 1 from Yukon and 1 from Nunavut.

I want to read an excerpt from a letter to the Outdoors Caucus from Mr. Phil Morlock, chair of the legislative committee of the Canadian Sportfishing Industry Association. He said:

The future health of our industry and related economies is directly tied to the conservation and sustainable wise use of our natural resources, reflecting the fact that the people who fish and hunt donate more volunteer hours and money to the improvement of fish and wildlife habitat than all other groups combined. The very origins of parks, protected areas and natural resource management science can be traced to the efforts of people who came to value wild places through fishing and hunting. These heritage activities are increasingly relevant in today's urban society. People fish and hunt for very profound and personal reasons that reach back across [years and years and years] of human history and continue to bring us together in the outdoors. We come from all ethnic and economic backgrounds, all political views, male and female, young and old. Our outdoor heritage and traditions are not political and should never be politicized.

I encourage all members to ensure that this indeed happens.

[Criminal Code, November 3rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the member, is he aware that there are a number of people in this country being convicted of child pornography, and many of them are receiving conditional sentences?

During the years that we pleaded with the Liberal government to do something about this terrible stuff that exists out there, the only thing the Liberals came up with over the time that I have been here, started with a suggestion from a judge that there could be some artistic merit, so we have to be careful how we construct a bill dealing with child pornography. Then it came back. It did not go over so well, so then they said that there may be some public good. Of course that did not fly very far. Then they came in with more legislation, amendments to change the wording to say that there could be a useful purpose. All of these suggestions came out of a Liberal government. Mr. Speaker, if that is not soft on crime, I will eat your shirt.

I would like to know what the dickens the member thinks being hard on crime is when we are dealing with child pornography. The suggestion we got from the Liberal government was that it was doing its very best to protect by using words like “useful purpose”, and that it could be “public good” based on “artistic merit” from some judge.

When are we going to start getting tough on those people who are directly and indirectly attacking our children through child pornography?

[Criminal Code, November 3rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, having sat on the justice committee for the biggest part of the last 13 years, I will tell members that during the election campaign when I proposed these very measures to the public during campaign speeches, what surprised me was that the Liberal candidate and the NDP candidate in every case supported everything I said. They agreed with everything I proposed, in line with what we are trying to do will Bill C-9. We did not have a Bloc candidate there but I am sure he or she would have objected.

What did not surprise me is that when I got back to the committee, after being there for 13 years, suddenly there was a change. Obviously there was some real soft peddling on how to deal with crime and these issues. They were not believing what they said during the election campaign. That became very obvious. Especially after they made their amendments, it was totally obvious.

I did not expect anything different from the Bloc members, because they have always been soft on crime, but I did expect the Liberals and the NDP to maintain that attitude to support the public, which was calling out loud and clear, “Do something about the crime element. Get rid of house arrest for serious crimes”.

Did the member not hear the same message that I heard during the campaign? Why would he suppose that sudden soft peddling from the Liberals and the NDP took place in the committee during the debate?

[Budget Implementation Act, 2006, No. 2, October 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, just a quick follow up to my colleague's question in regard to getting tough on crime.

I have heard the member speak several times on this issue about problems that he has had in his own riding. He knows very well what I am talking about. I agree that the talk was out there during the election campaign. I heard it. I was on the platform with NDPers and Liberals, and even the Green Party was talking tough on crime.

What amazes me is what happens when we get here. We get to a committee and we have a bill before the committee, Bill C-9, which would get rid of house arrest, quit mollycoddling criminals and would get criminals to pay the penalties for the crimes they commit, which is called getting tough on crime, and yet the member and his party would not support that. They gutted that bill.

Those members listened to every soft on crime witness that came before the committee but they did not listen to the victims of crime or to the police forces. They did not listen to a number of witnesses who testified why we need to stop things like house arrest. What they call petty crimes, it is not a petty crime when someone breaks into a home. It is not a petty crime when there is a home invasion. These kinds of things need to be dealt with right on the ground. This government had a bill to do just what Canadians asked us all to do and something on which we all campaigned.

Could the member tell me why his party is not supporting getting rid of house arrest for certain crimes that should never be even considered?

[Budget Implementation Act, 2006, No. 2, October 27th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I know there will be many questions for this boisterous young fellow, so I will be as short as I possibly can. He is up in years. He is getting up there like me, a little older. He has been around a long time. I have been in this place 13 years and I think he has probably been here longer than that.

Could he tell me why the wonderful Liberal government that we had in charge for 13 years could not get rid of simple things like child pornography, which is destroying our youth and he knows it? Why did we not get that age of consent raised during those 13 years? We begged and pleaded for the sake of children. We should start doing the right things for them. Crimes against children are right out of control today. If members do not believe me, they should dig into it and find out because I have and I have been working on it for 13 years.

I cannot believe that an adult, a man sitting in the House of Commons, would not fight hard to get rid of child pornography, the biggest junk piece we have in this land and it is destroying youth. What is wrong with the Liberals that they would not get on the ball during these last 13 years and even attempt to do it? What are they afraid of?