Françoise Boivin

[Committees of the House, March 26th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak to Bill C-273 in the name of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank her for introducing the bill and giving us a chance to talk a little more about the scourge of cyberbullying.

All forms of bullying are unacceptable, including for instance, the bullying that we are often subjected to, as mentioned by the member who spoke before me. We realize that violence is not only physical, but it can also be verbal.

I would like to put this debate in context, because the committee on which I sit adopted a report. As justice critic, I have gone through Bill C-273 very carefully. In fact, I always try to do so, for every bill that is introduced in the House and that comes before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

Whether a bill introduced by my colleagues that will affect the justice system, a private member's bill from the government side, a government bill, a bill from the Senate, or one introduced by the Liberals, I examine them all the same way. When someone wants to change one or more sections of the Criminal Code, I consider whether the change is necessary, whether it really does what it is supposed to do, and so on. Anyone who is a member of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights with me knows this. That is how I express myself. That is how I examine each and every issue.

I cannot give preferential treatment under the pretext that the proposed bill comes from my party, the Liberals, the Green Party or the Bloc Québécois. It is important to remain unbiased.

To begin with, clearly, no one in this House would ever say they are in favour of cyberbullying—absolutely not. However, since the devil is always in the details, we had to look carefully at what was in this bill.

I give the member for Vancouver Centre full marks for her interest in this issue and her dedication to the cause. Her passion was obvious when she appeared before the committee.

The problem is that from a legal standpoint, in terms of the Criminal Code, it was redundant. Originally, Bill C-273 targeted certain sections. In order to provide a bit of context, the member sent out a letter. In it, she suggested that some sections of the Criminal Code be clarified by including “communications by means of computer” in section 264, which addresses criminal harassment; “false messages” in subsections 372(1), 372(2) and 372(3); and “defamatory libel” in section 298.

In the current Criminal Code, the section addresses all forms of communication by telephone, radio, newspaper and so on. The Criminal Code already contains a very general provision. Adding cyberbullying as such or as an offence by means of computer—defining how it happens—is like talking about murder. It does not matter if I commit murder with a gun or a knife; it is still murder. That is the problem we faced with this bill, which changed nothing. In fact, it simply added the word “computer” in its strictest sense.

I listened closely to the speech before mine. It is clear that when we talk about cyberbullying, we are all aware of the tragic cases of Marjorie Raymond, Amanda Todd, Jamie Hubley, Mitchell Wilson and Jenna Bowers-Bryanton.

However, we cannot let people believe that the situation would be different or that people who should have been charged were not because the Criminal Code is what it is today. That is not the case.

The member had no case to submit to the committee to prove that without this amendment, there would be no way to prosecute someone.

On the contrary, witnesses who have no connection to this file, such as police officers or others, explained that the provisions are there. Sometimes charges are not laid because people do not necessarily want to take matters further. That is one of the points I wanted to address.

Some people in committee suggested that other cases could have been added.

Why simply focus on issues involving criminal harassment, false messages and defamatory libel, when we could have added—as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice said—cases of bullying included in section 423 of the Criminal Code and cases of identity theft included in section 403? There was a list of Criminal Code provisions.

The risk remains the same, even with the Conservatives. By making piecemeal changes to the Criminal Code, we might create situations in which decision-makers, crown attorneys and defence attorneys, will use the discrepancies that exist in the Criminal Code when they are before the courts.

We received amendments in committee, and the Liberals tried somehow to make up for these deficiencies by adding clauses. Nonetheless, when we have just one hour to do our work and amendments are proposed to seven different criminal offences, it starts to feel like improvisation. We knew that all these criminal provisions would not stop charges from being laid.

In one of her rulings, Justice L'Heureux-Dubé clearly said that the people who drafted the Criminal Code did a fine job of it. Perhaps we should stop butchering it, as the Conservatives so freely do. The people who drafted it realized that society would evolve and that at some point we might have different technologies. To prevent these sections from becoming ineffective, little catch-all phrases were added to allow computer-related offences to be added.

I do not want the people watching us to think that cutting the analysis of Bill C-273 short is a setback in dealing with cyberbullying. That is absolutely not the case. This will never prevent a crown prosecutor from laying charges, if the facts are there to back the charges.

I think my colleague from Chicoutimi—Le Fjord did a very good job of proving the other point that was extremely important in committee, and that is the fact that the vast majority of witnesses heard during the two sitting days were not at all of the view that criminalizing this behaviour was the way to go.

Yes, bullying hurts. Anyone who has ever been bullied in any way, even by colleagues in the House who are not of the same opinion, knows that we owe each other respect.

Some words used may be harsh. Sometimes we see certain behaviour on the Internet or on Facebook. Yesterday I read that some young people got involved in a fight on Facebook. That shows how far it can go and how much it can hurt. However, we must not think that not proceeding represents a step backward.

I think other approaches will be used. All the members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights who took part in the study of the bill agreed that there would definitely be action to recommend.

I will simply tell my colleague who introduced the bill that even her critic, who serves on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights and who made a considerable effort to have the bill amended, understood. I do not want to offer her any tips, but if she ever went back to the idea of considering aggravating factors at sentencing, where the case really concerns cyberbullying or any form of bullying, looking at sentences more specifically is part of the arsenal. That might be more appropriate. Even her colleague came to the conclusion that much more work would have been needed on the amendments and that it would virtually have been necessary to rewrite the bill in order to do what she was trying to do.

I will say no more about it, except that this is a question of logic for us and that we in this House will not change our logic regarding criminal law, regarding criminal justice, regardless of the party concerned.

[The Budget, March 26th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I get the sense that we just witnessed history in the making by listening to the speech by the hon. member for Toronto Centre for whom I have a great deal of sympathy. We have taken similar paths.

We are like two sides of the same coin, in the sense that he was an NDP member who went to the Liberal Party and helped it become the third party of opposition, and I was a Liberal who became a member of the NDP, which is now the official opposition.

I always enjoy listening to any speech that the hon. member for Toronto Centre makes, because he is definitely an inspiring and inspired person.

I am tempted to ask him a question, but I would rather end on an extremely positive note. It would be too easy to go back to the infamous 1990s. The member for Peterborough asked what the federal-provincial conferences were like at the time. I was a radio host at the time and if memory serves me correctly, it was not easy to have such collaborative conversations.

That being said, I will leave it up to my colleague from Toronto Centre to continue, if he wants to add anything to his speech.

I simply want to thank him for often making the debate in the House so interesting.

[Taxation, March 22nd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, what people will remember is that this government has given us its seventh deficit budget.

The best idea the Minister of Finance could come up with was to impose a $10-million tax on Canadian members of credit unions. That is indefensible. No wonder he ran off to Malaysia. Desjardins alone will have to pay $75 million, or 6% of its profits. That means members will get less back from their credit unions.

The Conservatives did their worst with workers' money, and now they are targeting a successful economic model that got its start in Quebec—

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, March 21st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, he contradicted himself a bit in his question. He started by saying that he listened to my speech, but that is clearly not the case.

Perhaps he wants me to talk about the two motions moved by the hon. member for Saanich—Gulf Islands. The first motion proposes that clause 4 of Bill C-15 be amended by replacing lines 11 to 13 with the proposed amendment. Perhaps he wants me to talk about the second amendment as well. We have already said it and I will say it again. This time, he should listen carefully.

We did better. Even the member for Scarborough—Guildwood said that in committee, the NDP did more than just propose amendments such as the ones proposed by the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands. The NDP called for the clause to be removed completely. That would be a very smart amendment to make.

However, the amendment was not in order because it went beyond the scope of the bill. It could have been accepted by the government opposite. Just because an amendment is not procedurally in order does not mean that we cannot continue. It makes no sense.

I argued before the commission about this clause. The commission feels that it would be best to remove the clause. That is what should have been done. The member should not say that I have not spoken about the amendments. We were not about to ask for anything less than what should be done. That is what the parliamentary secretary is accusing us of. That is ridiculous.

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, March 21st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue has already mainly explained this nuance. She is one of the people I would like to sincerely commend for the patience she showed on the Standing Committee on National Defence. In all seriousness, despite my almost respectable age, I would not have had such patience and I might no longer be an MP because I might have said some really disgraceful things. I will avoid doing that.

Since my colleague has presented me with the opportunity, I would like to quote the commission. The commission said that it does not take issue with the general supervisory role of the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff—the VCDS—vis-à-vis the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal—the CFPM—set out in subsection 18.5(1), nor with the authority of the VCDS to issue general instructions to the CFPM in respect of the discharge of his responsibilities. The problem arises when those instructions start to interfere in cases. Then it comes dangerously close to interference.

The government's problem is that it did not make a distinction. The government is not detail-oriented, which is not a compliment. This is a bad habit that would be in the government's best interest to break, particularly when it comes to such important portfolios that affect our men and women in the Canadian Forces. These people give of themselves to serve our country and I think that we should try to stick as closely as possible to the principles of justice, fair play, natural justice and equality before the law. There is not necessarily any evidence of that in Bill C-15, at least not as much as there should be.

[Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act, March 21st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, sometimes we wonder why we do certain things in life. Minutes, days or weeks go by and we wonder if we were struck by lightning or something. I must have dreamt about the parliamentary secretary last night, and I mean nothing untoward by that. I do not want to start any rumours.

After a crazy day filled with justice issues, I knew that I still had to prepare a speech on Bill C-15. I do not believe that there are many military justice experts in the House, and I do not claim to be one myself. Some members have some military experience that must surely help them.

Still, I did as I always do and I began by reading the bill. Then, I enjoyed reading what happened in committee, because we are at report stage and we are looking at the amendments proposed by the Green Party member.

Since this morning, the parliamentary secretary has been rising, proudly bringing us to order and trying to convince the Speaker that we are breaking the rules because we are not talking about the amendments or the business at hand. It is as though I were reliving my nightmare from last night.

After reading what happened in committee, I was not surprised to see that they took this path, which does not do justice to the file we are debating. The majority of those who have spoken in the House have said that this is not the first time this has been studied during a parliament. However, it could be said that this is being used as an aggravating factor.

It is clear that, on a number of occasions, federal parliaments have decided that changes needed to be made to military justice. There is nothing inherently wrong with pushing for amendments that are fully warranted for a sector of the Canadian public.

We need to move beyond slogans about how great the army is and how wonderful our men and women in uniform are. We need to move beyond words. We need to do more than what this government constantly does. No matter what the topic, they focus on photo ops and headlines. However, when it comes time to act, nothing happens.

Yesterday evening, I was definitely having a nightmare, but I was very happy to be reconciled with the fact that I am a member of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. I sometimes find it tedious to have to convince my colleagues to propose certain amendments to various bills, however well-meaning they may be. I got a glimpse of another committee, of which, thank God, I am not a member.

I considered the file before us and the proposed amendments. The official opposition is not proposing those amendments like some sort of crude magic trick, like pulling a rabbit out of a hat. These amendments are being proposed as a result of testimony heard from people who have experienced military justice first-hand within our armed forces.

Just for fun, I decided to dig up some of the testimony that was particularly relevant to the amendment proposed by the member from the Green Party. Here is some of what Colonel Drapeau had to say:

At the end of the day, I hold a firm belief that we owe our soldiers an immeasurable debt of gratitude for bringing glory to the Canadian flag, for bringing unflinching solidarity to our allies, and for impeding a global threat to national security.

In deploying to Afghanistan, our soldiers carried with them our rights and values....they put their lives at risk so as to give the Afghan people a taste of democracy and the rule of law. Sadly, many did not return.

I believe that Bill C-15 should in many ways be in recognition of, and be the incarnation of, their courage, their commitment, and their sacrifices. Out of gratitude as well as justice to these soldiers, Bill C-15 should be first aimed at protecting their rights, not creating more bureaucracy, military lawyers, and military judges. It should be written from the perspective of soldiers and their commanders, not the military legal staff serving in the safe enclave of National Defence Headquarters.

I will spare the House some of his other comments, for he had some criticisms of various aspects of the bill.

We are at report stage, looking at the amendments proposed by the hon. member from the Green Party.

I have been hearing a bitter undertone to these criticisms even though the debate should touch on as many aspects as possible out of respect for the men and women who sacrifice themselves, dedicate themselves and do things on a daily basis that very few of us would do. They risk their lives in defence of our values. They deserve more than a petty debate that cannot seem to get past the comments and insults that I have read about people who gave their lives. I am astounded at how some Conservative members treated some of the witnesses, including Colonel Drapeau, by accusing them of just trying to sell books.

Back to the amendments. I would like to go off on a tangent because even though I am not an expert on the subject, this issue is important to me. Many of the people who live in the riding of Gatineau work for the armed forces. I would like to take this opportunity to thank them.

Yesterday evening, I was reading testimony to prepare for this and become more informed about the subject, knowing full well that I would be hearing the outraged and sometimes outrageous remarks of my colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence. Life is full of coincidences. I realized that one of the witnesses who appeared before the committee was a former law school classmate, Lieutenant-Colonel Jean-Marie Dugas. I would like to give him my regards. He came to talk about his experience as a lawyer and as the director of the Canadian Forces Defence Lawyers. I would also like to congratulate him on the work he has done defending the rights of these people.

The Green Party amendments were not pulled out of thin air. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence may have been ignorant of the facts or may have failed to understand, when he said that the NDP never suggested any amendments. That is false and insulting and not the case at all. My colleague from Scarborough—Guildwood was absolutely right.

The good thing about the NDP's proposed amendment is that it was based on something even better than what the Green Party amendment attempts to do. It was based on the recommendation of the Military Police Complaints Commission. That is exactly what the NDP suggested. The commission recommended removing the section in question.

However, as we know, and I see it all the time at the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, government bills are often so badly written and fundamentally flawed that we know they will wind up in court one day. We would like to be able to delete clauses, but we all know that we cannot. They cannot be deleted simply because they go beyond the scope of the bill.

When these kinds of amendments are proposed, we are told that they cannot be presented. We have to proceed as our Green Party colleague did and introduce an amendment that makes the bill a little more palatable, although not perfect.

I probably will not have time to repeat everything that the Military Police Complaints Commission had to say about the famous new subsection 18.5(3) in clause 4, the subject of the Green Party member's amendments. Basically, the Commission believes that there is a problem in the clause related to the independence of operations and accountability. We would have preferred that the clause be deleted.

I highly commend the NDP members who sit on the Standing Committee on National Defence. I commend them for their patience. They were subjected to a number of unpleasant and mean-spirited comments. My colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie mentioned this earlier. This sometimes surprises me coming from people with diplomatic experience. I just cannot fathom it.

Therefore, I congratulate the team that did its utmost to make this a fair law that respects our charters. I am saying that for our men and women in the Canadian Forces. Unfortunately, because we have a closed government that does not want to listen to anyone, the bill is the way it is. It improves on what we had in the past, but it could have been so much better.

[Justice, March 20th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the PBO will be happy that they agree with one of his reports.

I prefer not to be on the side of people like Bruce Carson, Peter Penashue, Patrick Brazeau, Pamela Wallin and Mike Duffy. Those are examples of people who do not respect the law.

The crime rate is dropping steadily, a trend that started long before the Conservatives came to power. Yet the cost of the Conservatives' law and order agenda has been steadily rising since 2006. What is worse, the Conservatives are not the ones footing the bill; it is the provinces and territories. They are the ones getting stuck with three-quarters of the justice costs—

[Justice, March 20th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, more Conservative mismanagement was exposed today in a new report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Crime and justice costs are skyrocketing, while the crime rate was already dropping. This report proves that the Conservative crime agenda is more about photo ops and partisanship than about getting results. One does not draft laws just because one likes the photo ops.

Why is the government putting PR ahead of sound public safety policy?

[Public Safety, March 19th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, ah yes, everyone in Canada is trembling.

Following the Prime Minister's rebuff, we can expect to see changes within their Canadian Firearms Advisory Committee. However, the Conservatives were happy to just shuffle the deck and keep the same leaders with ties to the Canadian Shooting Sports Association, an association that, in passing, is now lobbying to abolish all offices of provincial chief firearms officers.

Will the Minister of Public Safety explicitly reject the exaggerated demands of that group?

[Response to the Supreme Court of Canada Decision in R. v. Tse Act, March 19th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to pick up on that. The hon. member for Terrebonne—Blainville is hoping that the government has learned its lesson. I would like her to take that a bit further.

Is that hope realistic? Is the government making amends because Easter is just weeks away? The government is not truly making amends. It is not being sincere; this is just a matter of circumstance.