Randy White

[Supply, October 28th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad my colleague brought that up because truth in sentencing is exactly what most of the victims of crime see as a big problem. The government comes in and says that it will give a maximum, let us say nine years, for some of the things that I read in the House. An individual would get nine years but he is guaranteed to be out in six years. He is very likely to be out walking the streets on escorted temporary absences or unescorted temporary absences within two years, and so on and so forth.

The further difficulty with that is sex offenders, who have about a 40% recidivism rate, are put into facilities based on nine year sentences, knowing the offenders will get out in likely three or four years. They are cascaded down so fast that they do not get enough rehabilitation to prepare for the street again.

What we are doing is turning sex offenders back out in the street unprepared for society because the sentence that society thought the offenders had in the first place was a lot less than what they actually got.

[Supply, October 28th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, for those who are listening, we are having one of those but discussions in the House of Commons; that is, I agree but something else is changing my mind.

It is a wonder Canadians can listen to this. It must be frustrating for them. What is wrong with this philosophy is that members on both sides agree and yet the government stands up and says that it agrees but that it cannot do that right now for some reason. The difference between this side and that side is that we want to see some action, not just words.

I have long felt that the country is into a moral and ethical crisis on a number of issues, some of which were mentioned. Even on the issue of prostitution, which the government says should not be legalized, the Liberals have a bill in the House right now that would anticipate legalizing prostitution under the name of harm reduction. We have heard that before on drugs.

I am here to say that prostitution is not a form of harm reduction. It is a form of abuse of women. The difficulty I have is that on that side the members say that they do not feel that prostitution should be put into legislation, and yet they are working on it. That is one of those but discussions.

It is the same with the age of sexual consent. I just heard the parliamentary secretary say that the age of sexual consent was too low and that she was more than prepared to raise it but that we could not do it right now because we have to work on that one. The Liberals have had 10 years in government. If they are prepared to raise it, why can they not raise it?

I could give a litany of the issues I have dealt with concerning younger kids under the age of sexual consent who are living with four or five men over the age of 30 and 40 who are using them to sell drugs, using them for sex and using them to sell themselves. Does the House know why they do it? They do it because 14, 15 and 16 year olds are young offenders.

The government says that the age of 14 and over is the age of sexual consent. That is the problem with it. We have been explaining that for 10 years. Yes, the Liberals agree with it but they will not change it.

We have seen a litany of other issues in the House. Drugs is one of the issues in which I have been involved from day one. The government says that it does not agree with drugs and that it does not want to promote that idea, and yet it promotes the idea of an injection site, not just in Vancouver but in Toronto and Montreal as well.

What the government is saying is that it disagrees with people using drugs but then it promotes the idea of having a place to shoot up in a bubble zone around that place. What kind of contradiction of terms is the Government of Canada presenting to us? These are contradictions.

I want to talk about pornography but I also want to mention the sex offender registry, the legislation that I actually wrote three and a half years ago. When we as an opposition party introduced it in the House of Commons all we heard was that we do not need it because we already have it. Guess what the Liberals did? They created a sex offender registry, after being dragged through the knot hole by every victim's rights groups, police associations and the Canadian Alliance. It is unbelievable that they can stand there and say that we can have this, but.

I want to talk about pornography which is the topic of the motion introduced by my colleague. One of the interesting things in Bill C-20, the bill on pornography, is the issuance of maximum sentencing. The government did the very same thing with the marijuana legislation; maximum sentencing.

By the way, Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar.

Maximum sentences are okay. However it is minimum sentences that are the problem. When we bring up issues in child pornography legislation and say that we will toughen it up and give maximum sentences, that is the upper limit.

I want to bring forward a case, and although I do not like reading it I ask the House to consider it. If the government were to give maximum sentences for child pornography and not minimum sentences, then why on earth would a judge hand out such a sentence. Let me read this case to the House.

Members of the OPP child pornography unit are outraged that the Ontario Court of Appeal shot down the crown's attempt to appeal a house arrest given to a Newmarket man convicted of possession and distribution of vile and disgusting child pornography.

Randy Weber, the man who had the pornography, was convicted last February of possession and distribution of images of little children being bound, gagged and forced to have sex with men. He was given a conditional sentence of 14 months, otherwise known as house arrest. He was basically told to go home and think about what he had done.

The government has been telling us that it is going to give maximum sentences. What is the good of a maximum sentence if the judge will not apply it? A conditional sentence for something of this nature is unacceptable.

To continue on, among the images viewed in court by the justice was one that revealed a four year old child, weeping and struggling, with her hands bound and her neck leashed with a dog collar while an adult male sexually assaulted her. Another image revealed an eight year old girl, tied, gagged, blindfolded and hung upside down. The video clip with sound revealed a toddler who could be heard weeping and yelling “stop, stop, stop”. The judge on that case gave the minimum sentence: a conditional sentence. The man was told to go home and think about what he had done.

If the government really believes that child pornography is a bad thing, then it must do something constructive about it. It should not talk about giving maximum sentences if the courtrooms of Canada are only giving minimums.

What I just read to the House is totally unacceptable. The government should be doing something about this. It should raise the floor on the sentences. People with this kind of disgusting behaviour should not be let off with conditional sentences.

What is wrong is that there are many of these cases. The government has said that Bill C-20 would provide maximum sentences but that is not good enough. That is just a charade.

The government has talked about providing maximum sentences in drug cases. The Prime Minister has agreed to maximum sentences but that an individual can have a joint in one hand, a fine in the other and pay that fine any time he wants and nobody will pay any attention to the drugs. Maximum sentences are not good enough. Minimums are the order of the day.

A control room operator at the Bruce nuclear plant was sentenced to one year in jail yesterday for possession and distribution of disgusting, degrading and haunting computer images of child pornography and nude women who appear to have been hideously murdered. The court heard that computer images showing children being raped by adults were among some of the things that had actually happened. The fellow received a year in jail and will be out within six to seven months. That is all the time he has received for that crime, and yet the government has said it is looking after this issue and will give maximum sentences.

The problem is that our society has a moral and an ethical crisis on its hands and the legislation being delivered into the House of Commons is not adequate.

I will give members one last situation.

I visit prisons on fairly frequent occasions. I walked into a maximum security prison the other day where sex offenders are imprisoned. On the floors, the ceilings and the walls of these cells were very explicit pictures of women and children. I asked the warden why this was so. After all, they have rules that say they cannot have these on the cell walls. He apologized and said that they would be taken down. Where are the rules from the government?

I know my time is over. I can only say, that these bills, which come through the House, are so much drivel unless they actually mean something to the average Canadian and victims on the street, and they do not.

[Contraventions Act, October 9th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I want to respond to the minister's speech regarding the decriminalization of marijuana.

Any drug legislation must be comprehensive in our country. For the government to just narrow it all down to decriminalization of marijuana is indeed irresponsible and reckless.

For four years I have been making every attempt to get the government to move toward a national drug strategy that works at the street level. In fact, the government followed a motion that we proposed in the House of Commons to establish a parliamentary committee to look at this issue of drugs.

We made a number of recommendations and lo and behold, at the time that the recommendations came forward, the government, rather than introduce a drug strategy, decided to throw a few million dollars at the two departments that were not doing a good job, namely, the Department of the Solicitor General and Health Canada.

The committee found that they did a deplorable job with the drug issue in this country. The government put a few million dollars into that and said that we had a drug strategy. Now it wants to decriminalize marijuana. That is not the way to go.

We are going to deal with the decriminalization bill, but we are still looking for that drug strategy. It is the responsibility of the government to at least acknowledge that there is a need for a drug strategy in the country. Merely dealing with the decriminalization of marijuana and not dealing with ecstasy, shrooms, or any other drug is reckless.

I want to put our position before the House which will be presented in committee.

We could agree to decriminalize five grams as minor possession of marijuana--five grams is equal to about seven joints of marijuana--providing the following conditions are met.

I must say that any member who stands in the House and says that it could be 10, 15 or 30 grams must understand that that is not minor possession. Individuals holding 15 grams of marijuana on them, which is probably up to 22 or 23 joints, is not minor possession. No one needs to carry 15, 20 or 23 joints with them.

The conditions that we want to see are as follows. We want to see 5 grams not 30 grams because it is 30. The minister says that it is really only 15 because there is a fine and then there is an option of a fine or a conviction from 15 grams to 30 grams. The fact is that it is really decriminalization up to 30 grams. That is the plan.

We must have an understanding with provincial governments and the legal industry that they must deal consistently with criminal offences for amounts over the decriminalization amount. We do not want to see, as soon as the bill is brought into play, someone getting caught with 18 grams or 32 grams and having the judge say that a criminal conviction will not be given for an extra two grams, and that something will be worked out.

If we start that all over again, we will be right back to where we started. We want a commitment that amounts over the decriminalization amount will be dealt with in the courts consistently throughout the country.

We want a progressive fine schedule to be in place. Fines and penalties will have to increase with the number of convictions.

I found it quite deplorable that the Prime Minister the other day basically said that he could have a joint in one hand and the amount to pay the fine in the other. That is the wrong message.

The fact is that if one is caught once there is a fine. If one is caught a second time there is a bigger fine. If one is caught a third time something else happens. It has to be progressive.

A consequence to non-payment of fines must be in place, the point being that if fines are not paid, what happens? Do we just let it go as the communities do in the case of speeding tickets or parking tickets? We want to see something done about that.

We want to see a national drug strategy put in place, not something merely dealing with the decriminalization of marijuana.

We want assurances that growing and trafficking marijuana will be criminal offences. We are glad to see that in the bill, and it must remain in the bill when it leaves the committee.

I was glad to hear the minister talk about drug driving laws and roadside assessments being in place, but he talked about a consultative document. We want assurances that those things will be in place, not just a consultative document that may be in place at some point.

In addition, we want to talk to the Americans on this issue in committee. We do not need any particular approval from the Americans to do this, but we have to understand that this is a touchy issue at the borders. We want some assurances in committee that a dialogue will happen. We will be inviting the Americans to talk to us because we want to hear their point of view.

There is little point in developing a process in this country if we are going to offend everybody south of us. I live in a border community and I see the traffic every day and the harm that is done by the inequity of the drug laws in our country.

There is a problem with the fine schedule in terms of charging youth less for possession. That is the wrong message to be sending to our youth. We must be consistent with the kind of fines we are going to assess.

There is work to do. My colleagues will support five grams, but the conditions have to be met. We will vigorously discuss this in committee. Members should not look for the committee to rush this through because we have no intention of doing that. We have lots of witnesses to hear from in committee. We have many amendments already prepared for the committee.

We do not intend to stall the process of the committee, but the Canadian Alliance will thoroughly analyze and discuss this with young people and others. We will thoroughly review the whole process before we give our consent to go ahead.

[Government Loans, October 9th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, he forgot to mention the investment in the Liberal Party of Canada.

Let us review the situation. Western Star Trucks will likely not repay a thing. Shire and BioChem Pharma will likely not repay a thing. Bombardier, no repayments and Pratt & Whitney, no repayments.

Less than 2% of the billions of dollars given away through TPC have been repaid.

Will the minister table a schedule of repayments owed to TPC and be a little more responsible for a change?

[Government Loans, October 9th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, here comes another due diligence problem.

Yesterday the Minister of Industry admitted that last year he received only $19 million in Technology Partnerships Canada repayments. That is a mere fraction of the billion-plus dollars that have been doled out.

Corporate welfare is alive and well in Canada, is it not?

What is the minister doing to accelerate the TPC repayments, or is it true that he does not really expect any of these repayments to occur anyway?

[Petitions, October 2nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I present a petition signed by many members of my riding. Their concerns are that sexual predators are devastating the lives of Canadian families and undermining the very fibre of Canadian society. The petitioners ask Parliament to disallow conditional sentencing for sexual offences against children, to mandate consecutive sentences in cases where violent acts against children are committed, to promote measures of early identification and behaviour modification of potential sexual predators, and to undertake a complete review of the entire issue of sexual exploitation of children. I present the petition on behalf of my constituents.

[Criminal Code, October 2nd, 2003]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-453, an act to amend the Criminal Code (failure to stop at scene of accident).

Mr. Speaker, in honour of Carley Regan, a 13 year old child who lost her life unnecessarily at the hands of a hit and run driver, I am tabling this bill in the House of Commons so that we can help to prevent such catastrophes in the future.

The bill equates the penalty of hit and run with death to one that is slightly higher than the penalty for manslaughter, seven years minimum to life, and for hit and run with injury to that for attempted murder, four years minimum to life.

The bill also prevents, for the first time in Canada, Crown counsel from plea bargaining the charge of hit and run, so that those who hit and run must face the charge.

Too many of our citizens suffer the deaths of loved ones or are injured, like David Slack in Aldergrove, British Columbia, only to find injustice in the courtroom. We will vote on the bill in the House of Commons and I want all Canadians to know that Carley's name will live on in this amendment to the criminal code so that others may be spared the anguish of irresponsible behaviour.

This bill, when it becomes law, shall be forever known as Carley's law.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Correctional Service of Canada, October 1st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, that certainly sounds tight. We just found more child pornography on some of the computers. In addition to that, another inmate had a sophisticated tool used to capture a system's passwords and then break into it. One official in CSC said the discovery is a potentially serious threat to CSC.

What is more important to the government, the right of offenders, inmates, to possess any material they want to, or the protection of the public?

[Correctional Service of Canada, October 1st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, talk about computer problems. Recently at Ferndale prison the following items were found on computers: instructions on sending letter bombs and making tennis ball explosives; lessons on picking locks; and instructions on how to tap telephone lines.

Where is the Solicitor General's boundary on what is and what is not acceptable material for inmates in prisons to have?

[Supply, September 16th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I proudly represent people in Langley and Abbotsford in British Columbia and I can assure you that the vast majority of people in my riding believe that the institution of marriage is an integral part of our society. The legal definition of marriage as the voluntary union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others has existed in Canada since Confederation and the vast majority of people in my riding firmly and earnestly believe that.

The minister talked about how much he had talked to Canadians across the country and how much he believed in what they were saying. He certainly did not talk to people in my riding about this issue. I have now heard from the member and the minister himself. They both talked about respect, but the people in my riding are asking why it is that the government will not respect them for what they are but for what the government wants them to be.

I would like to ask the member a question about the intent of the legislation that the minister talked about, that is, the union of any two persons. What many people in my riding are asking is what is next. Does that include any two persons, for instance any two persons in a family? Does that include a brother and a sister, a brother and a brother, a sister and a sister? It is not defined in the legislation as the minister put it. Is there an age differential that is intended? I would like to know what the member's opinion is on both of those items.