Morris Bodnar

[Petitions, March 2nd, 1995]

Madam Speaker, the third petition has 37 signators. They request that Parliament continue to give the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly powers in marketing wheat and barley for export.

[Petitions, March 2nd, 1995]

Madam Speaker, the next petition has 32 signators.

The petitioners request that Parliament not amend the human rights code, the Canadian Human Rights Act or the charter of rights and freedoms in any way that would tend to indicate societal approval of same sex relationships or of homosexuality.

[Petitions, March 2nd, 1995]

Madam Speaker, I have three petitions today.

The first with 184 signators is a petition of the mining industry calling on Parliament to take action that will help the mining industry to grow and thus improve employment in this sector, promote exploration, rebuild Canada's mineral reserves, sustain mining communities and keep mining in Canada.

[Grace Pine, February 21st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to bring the attention of the House to the accomplishments of Grace Pine, a constituent of mine. Grace Pine recently received the Saskatoon citizen of the year award for her contributions to Saskatoon.

Grace Pine has had a distinguished career, including the directorship of the laboratory at the Fort Qu'Appelle Tuberculosis Sanatorium and subsequently volunteering with the Saskatchewan Anti-Tuberculosis League. In 1967, Mrs. Pine helped to found the Saskatoon chapter of Save the Children Canada.

The volunteer organizations which have benefited from her time and support include the Saskatchewan Council for International Development, the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace, the Saskatchewan Environmental Society, and the Saskatoon Native Theatre.

A colleague wrote of Grace Pine that she has been a role model for many who believe that we live in a global community and that we have a responsibility to those who have less than we do. These are truly words by which we should all live.

[Supply, February 21st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, reference is made in the Reform Party budget to particular cuts in social security spending. In particular, reference is made to senior citizen benefits being reduced by 15 per cent. In a country where the number of seniors is increasing, there is no recommendation for stable funding in that area but rather a reduction of 15 per cent.

Could the hon. member perhaps elucidate in what manner these particular cuts are proposed to be made to senior citizens?

[Young Offenders Act, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I can facilitate matters for the hon. member since I live about three blocks from the youth detention centre in the city of Saskatoon. If he wishes to come to see it,

contact me and I will arrange matters for him. If he wishes the attorney general's phone number it is in Saskatoon under his wife's name.

[Young Offenders Act, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I rely on that most unreliable authority called the John Howard Society which indicates that the youths charged as a percentage of all persons charged in the period 1986-92 has not increased.

[Young Offenders Act, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I can speak fairly well from personal experience. Rehabilitation does not really function in the province of Saskatchewan. That is because money is not being put into the system to properly rehabilitate individuals.

The whole question indicated by the hon. member for Wild Rose of the number of people young offenders represent being 12 to 14 per cent of the population and therefore committing 12 to 14 per cent of the offences verifies the fact that we do not have this explosion of offences among young offenders. It has not occurred. It is not occurring. I am very pleased the hon. member for Wild Rose has just verified that fact for me.

[Young Offenders Act, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, when we are dealing with repeat offenders who recommit offences over and over again, quite often we are dealing with a very small proportion of the members of the young offenders group who commit these offences.

Of course there is a need for rehabilitation. Quite often the reason they are committing these offences is that there is nothing for them in the institutions in their provinces that prevents them from doing it or rehabilitates them in any way. If nothing is done the only problem and the reason they recommit and get caught is that they were not trained well enough the second time. They are out, caught again, go in again and recommit. That is the problem we have.

Of course people do not want to be just in jail. They do not want to be just in jail for the sake of being incarcerated. That is not what they want, but they have not learned a different way of life. We have to realize this and become realistic in this direction.

[Young Offenders Act, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to stand today to deal with the Young Offenders Act in light of some of the comments that have been made, especially the comments that seem to be based on the premise that in our society youth crime is increasing.

That is not the truth. If the Reform Party is indicating that youth crime is increasing, then the Reform Party is misleading the public. It just is not true. That is the problem. Its arguments are based on a premise that is not true.

When we deal with matters such as lowering the age, what is so magical about the age of 10? If we are going to reduce the age from 12 to 10, why not 8? Why not lower it to the age when they begin to walk? Is there any problem with that?

There lies another problem. No basis is given as to why the age should be lowed to 10. I have a 12-year old child. I cannot see that child being in young offenders court. They are young and immature. Twelve-year-olds may be physically tall, but mentally they are not mature. Putting such people into the criminal justice system is not right.

The bill provides that young offenders can be transferred to adult court. In the proposed amendments, on serious offences, 16 and 17 year olds are to be tried in adult court unless they can convince the court that they should be in youth court. Surely there is no need for change in that area.

Removal of privacy is another factor that has been brought up. What good is it to society to reveal the name of a young offender? It will ostracise the child from the rest of society. It will ostracise the child and will restrict rehabilitation. That is not what the Reform Party wants to do. It wants to know and make it a matter of gossip that a certain child was in youth court.

There is no purpose to be gained by revealing such information. In the proposed amendments we deal with it. The information can go to the essential parties. It can go to school teachers and groups such as that so they can deal with the matter as is required.

Sentencing is the fourth point raised. Rehabilitation is to be emphasized. Unfortunately for the Reform Party they must realize that this is a matter of provincial jurisdiction. Young offenders are sentenced to facilities that are under the control of provincial governments. Some provincial governments deal with the matter differently than others.

In some provinces they simply put the young offender into a holding tank, lock the door, and release him or her four or five or ten months later. Open the door and out comes the young offender, not rehabilitated but simply better trained by prison to commit crime. That is the problem we have.

If the young offender leaves better trained to commit crime, then we have a problem because that young offender in short time becomes an adult and knows how to commit crime better. That young offender just goes through the system again and again.

Rehabilitation may be wonderful and should be emphasized by governments but it is a matter of provincial jurisdiction. They have to deal with it more seriously than they have in the past.

Reform members want parents of young offenders to compensate the victims. One has to distinguish whether we are in a civil court or whether we are in the criminal court when we are dealing with these matters. The mixing of the two does not always mix that well.

In giving the victims legal standing one has to question whether this is an offence of a youth. Is this an offence against the state as it has been traditionally in the criminal justice system, or are we now going to have everyone from a community come in and apply for standing in dealing with matters that are before the courts? This would completely uproot hundreds of years of tradition.

Certain perceptions have been raised by members of the Reform Party. According to them there are indications that crime has been increasing by young offenders, but in reality this is not so. The only area where there has been an increase in crime are those crimes classified as violent offences. However a violent offence involves a common assault, a slapping, et cetera.

The problem we have in those particular areas is that people have been reporting more of these incidents. When two young people are fighting at school, the matter is not resolved by the young people going to the principal's office or calling the parents. The matter is resolved by calling the police and charges are laid. That is how statistics get distorted and that is how statistics show that those crimes have gone up. It has not happened. That is the problem.

Statistics are being used to distort reality. In fact 16 and 17 year olds in our criminal justice system have been treated more harshly than adults. Sixteen and seventeen year olds in youth court who are sentenced to six months of closed custody serve every day of that six months of closed custody. They do not get paroled; they are not released early. That is different from the way adults are treated in our system today.

Another problem that has arisen is the perception that the police cannot properly enforce laws against young offenders. Of course police can. Their rights are the same as they are for adults. If they can use the same rules they use for adult criminals when dealing with young offenders they can deal with them just as easily.

The Young Offenders Act enhanced the authority of police compared to old Juvenile Delinquents Act. The police can fingerprint young persons and maintain records of prior convictions. These matters cause young people to be treated more like adults and simplify enforcement proceedings for police in dealing with young offenders.

Young people can be transferred to adult court. Under the proposed legislation and the proposed changes, 16 and 17 year olds automatically go to adult court for serious offences. The sentences for first degree murder are doubled to 10 years. That is the maximum. Of course there is discretion on the part of the judge sentencing the person.

One has to question what would be served by increasing that sentence to a further term. What would be served by having a young person who is 16 years of age sentenced to life imprisonment? What is served by that? Many of our young people who get into problems come from dysfunctional families. Many of them come from families where the parents are drunks. They are not raised with direction. They go out into the world with the problem of not knowing how to deal with it.

These are the young people that members of the Reform Party would want to throw away, lock the doors and support forever. They want a system similar to that of the state of California where more money is spent on prisons than on education. If that is what we are going to do we have a problem. We cannot let that happen to the youth of this country. We have to help them get rehabilitated. We cannot lose faith in the youth.

Another problem we have is that anyone who tries to show that a system works or has worked over a period of time is immediately accused of being bleeding hearts.

In discussing these matters with prosecutors who have prosecuted in the field they have indicated the Young Offenders Act works well. These prosecutors are Canadians. They are in the system all the time. It is only when Canadians are given misinformation that they have different opinions. When they are given the facts they agree that the Young Offenders Act basically works well.

Most violent offences are not committed by youth. Adults commit 86 per cent of violent crimes. Of the approximate 14 per cent committed by youth, half are what we classify as common assaults: a slap or a punch. Those are the facts. Over 57 per cent of property crimes committed by youth are thefts. The majority of those are theft under $1,000. In other words most of them are offences such as shoplifting.

Let us not distort the facts. These are the facts. With these facts we have to look at the Young Offenders Act to determine whether it was working properly. I suggest the act is working very well.

In the past police often decided that charges should not be laid, especially for first time offences by young offenders. They would take the young offenders home. They would take them to the parents. The young people quite often were more embarrassed than anything. That would end the matter. That is not the way it is dealt with now. The young offender is apprehended on an offence, a charge is laid, the youth is then taken into court and the matter is dealt with in the court system.

I am not criticizing that maybe that is not the way it should be dealt with, but that is how statistics are built up. They are built up in particular areas when they should not be. As well there is an increasing willingness to report offences in the school system instead of schools taking care of matters as they have in the past.

We can all recall years ago when there would be a fight in a school yard and the principal, at least in my school, would take matters into his own hands. He would take the young people to the office. The odd one got the strap. The odd one was kept in detention. The police were not called. The way it is now the police are being called to lay charges, which is distorting the facts.

However the proportion of all persons charged from 1986 until now has remained virtually unchanged. There is not this huge explosion of an increase in crime by young offenders. It just has not happened. It only appears to have happened when distorted facts are given to the public. That has not happened. Since it has not happened we have to inform the public of the facts.

Fourteen per cent of young offenders were charged with violent offences in 1992. Almost half of those offences were equivalent to very minor assault charges. None involved weapons. The offences resulting in the most serious of personal injuries amounted to approximately 2.4 per cent. We are hearing this large furore over the way matters are being dealt with or should be dealt with. The number of youth charged with break and entry has actually decreased. It was lower in 1992 than it was in 1986. These are the facts.

The Young Offenders Act must be doing something right. Something is working. We have to fine tune it in particular areas and that is what we have endeavoured to do by increasing the sentences for teenagers convicted of first and second degree murder in youth court to ten years and seven years respectively. We hope that we have been able to deal with the matter in giving the system flexibility.

Rehabilitation was raised by the member from the Reform Party. Rehabilitation is an important factor. However rehabilitation quite often commences in the jails because the youth never got an earlier chance. They never learned how to get up in the morning. They never learned how to go to work in the morning. They never learned how to take care of their room. They never learned personal hygiene. They never learned basic things like knowing how to work. They never learned how to clean anything. They never learned how to do any basic jobs. These are matters that have to be learned and these are required parts of the rehabilitation scheme. We cannot do this by simply opening a door, throwing youth in, locking the door behind them and forgetting about them until their term is over.

I must admit that it would not hurt if some of the parents were given the same treatment because many of them do not know how to get up in the morning. Many of them have not taught their children because they have not known how. They are going through a vicious cycle. It is going from generation to generation in that direction. It has to be halted. The Young Offenders Act goes as far as we can go in halting it. The provinces have to take over at a particular point.

This is not bleeding at all. This is simply common sense. I wish it was incorporated at times in the comments being made about young offenders. Common sense plays a part and certainly goes a long way in remedying some problems that exist.

Some young offenders who are violent need extended periods of time in incarceration. That is what we are dealing with in the Young Offenders Act. This provides a chance to rehabilitate them in the institutions where they are placed. Once that is done it is up to the provinces and the workers working with them in the institutions to take over rather than advocate the holding of young people for prolonged periods of time.

In the proposals dealing with transfers to adult court we have done what many people in society have wanted. They have wanted young offenders in extremely serious offences to be tried in adult court. If those young offenders can convince a judge and demonstrate that the objectives of the protection of the public and rehabilitation can be met in youth court then they remain in youth court but only then. The young offender who has committed 10 or 15 break-ins will not be in youth court. He will be in adult court. The person who continuously repeats offences will go into adult court.

These are important factors to be dealt with. We have dealt with them in a responsible manner. The amendments are before Parliament so that the courts will eventually have more flexibility in dealing with these matters and dealing better with these matters.

The sharing of information and records is important. We do not demonstrate to the world what the young person's name is. There is no purpose in that. We do give it to the right people to be dealt with for the purpose of protecting the public such as school officials and child welfare agencies. There are people who should have the information. Such information when released is important. We have balanced the interest of the child and the interest of society by doing what we have done.

The amendments we have proposed at this time certainly meet many of the requirements of the Canadian public. The Canadian public has wanted some changes. We have come up with those changes. They are responsible changes in attempting to fine tune portions of the legislation that had to be changed. We have done this.