David Lametti

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I will also refer to the heckle by the hon. member from the other side. With respect to MMP subsection 95(2) of the Criminal Code that was struck down by the Supreme Court of Canada, the Parliamentary Budget Officer has said that taking out the minimum mandatory penalty has had no impact on the overall total amount of sentencing that has been handed out by judges. It is false to say that judges always go to the minimum.

What we are doing is what the hon. member wants us to do, which is help give judges the ability to give appropriate sentences so that we can rehabilitate. This is the point the hon. member is trying to make. We need to look at alternatives to incarceration.

I mentioned I was in Washington. The growing consensus is that we need to massively reduce incarceration rates to get better outcomes for communities, increase public security and rehabilitate victims. That is the belief we have in the criminal justice system. It is the animating belief behind this bill, and it is something that I hope hon. members will share. It is certainly shared across the United States and in many other jurisdictions, like the United Kingdom.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I have had lovely and intellectual exchanges with the hon. member over the course of our time here since 2015, but I reject the premise of his question.

Today, the error is in presuming that a judge would always give the minimum sentence. In the serious set of facts that he is describing or alluding to, a judge would have the power to go to the maximum sentence, according to the circumstances involved. What we are doing with this bill is not what he is referring to. Rather, we are referring to people who are innocently or naively caught up in something and not necessarily the major perpetrator, or who perhaps have a problematic addiction that needs to be dealt with. The bill allows a sentencing judge to take those circumstances into account and fashion a sentence that fits the crime.

Serious crime, I will assure the hon. member, will always be punished seriously in this country.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, we are still studying that bill. Certainly the sentiment behind it is one that speaks well of the hon. member and of all people who would like to attack the opioid crisis and other problematic drug abuse situations in our country.

This current bill is not meant to do that. It is meant to address flexibility in sentencing to reduce the overrepresentation of Black and indigenous people in the criminal justice system. The fundamental challenges that are being attacked by the private member's bill on the other side are wider than that, and I will look at the bill, as will all of my colleagues, with due diligence.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question.

I also thank his colleague from Rivière-du-Nord, who supported Bill C‑22, which was introduced in the House during the previous Parliament. The bill we are debating today is identical, and since the hon. member for Rivière-du-Nord fully supported it last time, I hope he will support it this time for the same reasons.

I think it is very important to work with my colleagues, and I am prepared to work with them on this bill, which has already been thoroughly debated, studied and discussed. We can now move on to the next stage.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I share the hon. member's concern for making the criminal justice system better and for decreasing the systemic overrepresentation and, quite frankly, the systemic racism against Black and indigenous people in the criminal justice system.

This bill is a first step, allowing more flexibility for sentencing judges through conditional sentence orders, removing minimum mandatory penalties and creating a bias toward diverting people from the criminal justice system for simple possession offences. However, it is only a first step. We have invested, as a government, in better Gladue reports and better coverage for Gladue reports. We have begun a pilot project in Nova Scotia, Toronto and British Columbia on impact of race and culture assessments for Black offenders. We are working on funding community justice centres and indigenous community justice centres so we can provide wraparound support, better serving victims and offenders so that we reduce recidivism and provide a more holistic response to criminal justice.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, they do not keep people safe.

The majority of constitutional challenges to pieces of the Criminal Code are about minimum mandatory penalties, and over half of them succeed. They clog up the system and cause delays. Perhaps hon. members of the opposition will take responsibility if and when Jordan rulings come out as a result of the system being clogged up by minimum mandatory penalties.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I reject the premise of the question of the hon. member. Human trafficking is not one of the minimum mandatories. There are a number of different gun offences, a number of different tobacco offences and a number of different drug offences.

Any party that looks at the evidence, the statistics and the reforms that are happening around the world, including in the United States, realizes that minimum mandatory penalties simply do not work. They clog up the criminal justice system.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I think members on all sides of the House know, including many members of the official opposition, that with respect to the parliamentary process and committees, I work in good faith with all sides of the House on amendments. I am always open to the bill being improved. Any amendments brought in good faith are things I will study with my team and with other members of the House with due diligence. If we can make it a better bill, we will make it a better bill.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member and I worked a great deal together, and continue to work a great deal together, on these kinds of issues.

What the bill would do is allow for context to be taken into account. I will give an example. In a ruling, the Supreme Court of Canada has allowed a sentencing judge to take into account factors, for an indigenous person, of how that person's life might have helped to account for the crime and what ought to be taken into account for the sentence. This was the so-called Gladue report.

A minimum mandatory penalty means the judge's hands are tied, with respect to it. With this bill, the judge would be able to look at, first of all, not having a minimum mandatory penalty, but also being able to fashion, using a conditional sentence order, the kind of appropriate treatment that a person might need. Whether it is a health issue or a social welfare issue, people could get the support they need. That better serves the community, it better serves the victim and it certainly costs us less money in the criminal justice system.

[Criminal Code, March 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, the fallacy and the argument that is being brought forth by the hon. member is quite clear. We are eliminating minimum mandatory penalties. There is still a maximum sentencing range that exists for all crimes. In the crime that he described, and in the circumstances that he described, a judge would have the flexibility and the opportunity to give a serious sentence. That is precisely what happens.

What we are doing is taking away the lower end, where a person perhaps has a few too many on a Saturday night and puts a couple of bullets into the side of an empty barn. There are differences in the way these sentences ought to happen. What we are doing is giving power back to the judges.

Judges are the hallmark of our common-law system. I do not know why the other side does not trust them.