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Crucial Fact

  • His favourite word was air.

Last in Parliament October 2015, as Conservative MP for Port Moody—Westwood—Port Coquitlam (B.C.)

Won his last election, in 2011, with 56% of the vote.

Statements in the House

The Senate March 16th, 2001

Mr. Speaker, British Columbians have six seats in Canada's Senate and, of the six, there is one vacancy. Two of B.C.'s senators have announced that they will resign and run in elections if the Prime Minister will commit to appointing the winner of any future Senate election.

In 1998 Albertans elected two senators in waiting but the Prime Minister did not commit ahead of the election to appointing Alberta's two elected senators. He appointed his choice instead of that of Albertans.

The lesson learned from Alberta's experience is that until the Prime Minister makes the commitment to respect democracy in the Senate, real reform will remain out of the grasp of Canadians.

If the Prime Minister is serious about addressing western alienation, if he is serious about democracy, fairness and openness, he will commit today to allowing the democratization of 50% of B.C.'s Senate delegation today. British Columbians are ready to take a step in the right direction toward a new beginning.

Is the Prime Minister ready to demonstrate that step as well? Let us hope so.

Supply March 13th, 2001

So register them.

Supply March 13th, 2001

Madam Speaker, quite frankly the hon. member is totally missing the point. If a registration is good on one hand and not on the other, the hypocrisy is on the government's side. It is absolute hypocrisy. It would rather register pieces of long—

Supply March 13th, 2001

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from my neighbouring riding of Dewdney—Alouette for his question. This specific story does speak volumes.

Abby Drover was abducted in March of 1976. Three months before I was born she was abducted and here we are, 24 years later, finally seeing an ounce of progress. She was abducted. Halfway through her abduction I was born. She was finally found in September of 1976. I was born in June. Here I am, 24 years later, and finally the House is moving a step closer, in the right direction.

What does it say about the injustice of our laws that it takes that long, 24 years, for the government of this country to show a bit of sanity, compassion and respect for victims of crime, and to put in a mechanism so that people and police services know who the bad guys are and where they are living, so that we can separate those who play by the rules from those who do not?

Finally, I hope that tonight when we vote the government will make the right choice and will, in a good faith effort, take this to committee and establish real laws with real teeth and real foundations so that it can show justice 24 years later, finally, to people like my constituent, Abby Drover.

Supply March 13th, 2001

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Surrey North for the question. This is one of those difficult aspects of law, where a government gives, frankly, awkward explanations for why it is supporting a bill. Why does it not just come out and show leadership? Why does it not just come and say that this might prevent some crimes, that maybe we are right, that maybe it should have supported this a couple of years ago?

The government members say that CPIC already provides this service but it does not. If it did, victims would not be calling our offices and e-mailing and faxing us and asking us to support this motion. I would not have had Abby Drover tell me yesterday that I had her consent to tell her story because Canadians needed to know about it and because she would like to know when Mr. Hay is going to come out of prison so that she and her family can feel safe.

If constituents are calling our offices and telling us all these stories, and if police associations, victims' right groups and CAVEAT are contacting us, then clearly there is something in this motion and something in the potential for a sex offender registry that is not already on the books. However, the government does not seem to recognize this and that is not leadership.

Why does the government not just say that its legislation falls short? The RCMP recognizes that. Canadians recognize that. Abby Drover recognizes that. Organizations and academics recognize that. Everyone recognizes that. Why does the government not admit that and say that it is going to adopt this motion and make some serious reforms because the country and victims deserve it? That is leadership. Leadership is admitting insufficiencies and taking risks, and the government should be doing it.

Supply March 13th, 2001

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak to the Canadian Alliance motion on the establishment of a national sex offender registry by January 1, 2002.

At the outset I should like to wholeheartedly thank my constituents in Port Moody—Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam for having endowed me last November with their trust and confidence to represent their best interests in the House. I also thank the member for Langley—Abbotsford for drafting and raising the issue in the House, because it is a central concern to countless families in my constituency.

This is my maiden speech, and I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the debate on what is the first order of responsibility of the state. What do I mean by that?

Simply put, if the government cannot balance its budget, if it cannot agree on a standard for weights and measures, if it cannot organize its monetary framework or agree on a national anthem, the first principle and responsibility to state, above all else, is to protect law-abiding citizens from law breakers. It is to separate those who play by the rules of civilized behaviour from those who do not. This is reflected in Abraham Maslow's famous hierarchy of needs that many academics speak about.

The Canadian Alliance motion calls for an effective and meaningful national sex offender registry with teeth. It is something which despite declarations from the government side does not yet exist. We are talking about legislation which mirrors laws that currently exist in the province of Ontario and is being considered in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and British Columbia. The United Kingdom has already implemented a sex offender registry and all 50 U.S. states have sex offender registries. There are national governing mechanisms in place to organize it.

Instead of taking bold steps and showing leadership, the government has taken refuge in the Canadian Police Information Centre rather than offer real protection for Canadian families and their children through a new national sex offender registry.

The very fact that provinces have moved to implement registries should compel the government to act on a national basis to avoid differing regional and jurisdictional standards and to prevent sex offenders from wandering from one province to another, avoiding accountability for their actions.

This was the exact problem that Americans faced before former president, Bill Clinton, established a national registry with uniform standards. Different states were using different registration criteria and standards as well as different notification and database logistics. This led to inter-jurisdictional disputes and confusion. Under national laws that were established many of these problems have been ironed out.

Canada has an opportunity to learn from those difficulties and establish a national registry. This is an opportunity for the government to show leadership by setting up a national registry ahead of time and avoiding the pitfalls experienced by the United States. The issue is about more than jurisdictions, amendments, committee work and legislation tightening. It is about victims and the right to live free from fear.

Abby Drover is a constituent of mine. In 1976 she was the victim of a horrendous crime. For 181 days she was sexually assaulted and brutalized by Donald Alexander Hay. From March to September of that year, Mr. Hay kept the then 12 year old Abby in a prison under his Port Moody garage for his sexual pleasure. He lured Abby to his house on the offer of a ride to school and forced her into a 36 square foot room. He handcuffed the young child and secured the handcuffs to the wall of her cell with chains that were bolted into studs anchored into the cell's concrete walls. He fondled, sexually assaulted and raped the young girl repeatedly.

During the final six weeks of her captivity all he brought her to eat was two chocolate bars. He later testified in court that the reason he did this was because he hoped she would just die. On the 181st day of her captivity police found Hay with his pants around his ankles coming up from the entrance to Abby's prison.

He was charged with kidnapping and having sexual intercourse with a female under the age of 14. He was jailed and sentenced to life, but like so many spineless laws we have in the country, Mr. Hay's life sentence allows him to apply for freedom every 24 months.

Parole reports say that Hay has low victim empathy and still needs more insight into his offence. There is every legal possibility that every 24 months Mr. Hay could be released into my constituency and my community.

Will he reoffend if he is released? We do not know. What we do know, according to U.S. department of justice statistics, is that about 50% of rapists and sexual assaulters released into society are rearrested for a new crime and more than one-third are reconvicted. In Canada research from the federal government shows that the longer one tracks a sexual offender, the higher the recidivism rate is. Data indicates that between 42% and 45% of sexual offenders will in fact reoffend.

At issue here is the potential to reoffend and the right of communities to live free from fear. Given the statistics associated with sex offenders and their recidivism rate, there seems to be an obvious responsibility on the House, on our shoulders, to prevent future crimes when and where we can. The registry is a tool to help do precisely that.

Recognizing this reality, some Canadian provinces have already shown leadership in creating sex offender registries, as has been mentioned by the member for Surrey Central and others. In Queen's Park on February 28, 2000, the standing committee on justice and social policy met to debate bill 31, also known as Christopher's Law. The most interesting aspect of the committee's meeting was the cross party support for the bill. It was a cross party consensus that a sex offender registry was needed, appropriate, and would move the province toward greater justice and greater responsibility to victims.

The all party support was not a tongue in cheek, foot dragging type of endorsement like we heard this morning from the solicitor general but a thorough commitment to a registry with teeth. All NDP, Liberal and Conservative MPPs in Queen's Park supported the bill. Not only did Dalton McGuinty's Ontario Liberals support the bill, but in committee the Liberal attorney general critic, Michael Bryant, who is an adjunct law professor from Osgoode Hall Law School, mentioned “We support this bill and this bill should have been passed a long time ago”. All three elected political parties recognized that the government should establish a sex offender registry because public safety should reach beyond partisan slugfests.

Our proposed national sex offender registry would provide our police with something that they have not yet had: a mechanism to keep track of sex offenders from coast to coast to coast. The registry would be a vital investigative tool allowing police to monitor sex offenders in our communities.

Studies from the United States show conclusively that registries have enabled law enforcement agencies to solve crimes quicker and to identify suspects sooner. Convicted sex offenders would be required to register as a condition of release from custody. Any failure to do so would be a violation of a condition of their release and result in an immediate return to custody. The information would be entered into a national sex offender database and made available only to police services.

Ontario's law provides for effective monitoring of the offenders by requiring them to register with police within 15 days of a change of address or within 15 days of coming to or leaving Ontario. The offender must provide the police with his name, address, date of birth and other information deemed necessary by the police, not bureaucrats, not politicians, not posturers, that will best suit the safety of citizens in their communities.

If an offender does not comply, Ontario's legislation mandates a first time penalty of $25,000 or a year in jail and for more than one offence, $25,000 and two years in jail. This is a common sense approach to crime prevention. It provides for safer streets and a sense of security in neighbourhoods like Port Moody for victims of sex offences like one of my constituents, Abby Drover.

In conclusion, a national sex offender registry is long overdue. Safe communities should be a national priority as is the case in the United States, our largest trading partner, and in the United Kingdom. Police deserve every reasonable tool available to protect the innocent from the evil and the depraved.

I urge my colleagues in the House, especially the government members, to think of innocent victims of sexual abuse, rape, torture and torment when they consider supporting the Canadian Alliance motion to establish a meaningful and effective national sex offender registry tonight.

Let us join with other provinces and nations, the real leaders of the world, in taking a solid step forward for a safer future for all Canadians in their communities. Safer families and safer children is the way to go.

Heating Fuel Rebate February 27th, 2001

Mr. Speaker, Canadians deserve a better answer than that. In British Columbia the government is crediting home heating rebates but not handing out flawed cheques like this finance minister. There are better ways to do this. The finance minister is ignoring the truth.

The inefficiency in this is astonishing. The cheque sent to me is dated January 31, 2001, more than two months after I was elected to the House of Commons. This kind of inefficiency drives Canadians insane because it is totally unjust.

Will the finance minister commit today to creating a better system that gives the appropriate money to the appropriate Canadians who truly deserve it?

Heating Fuel Rebate February 27th, 2001

Mr. Speaker, when the finance minister was asked why students, renters, prisoners and even the deceased received heating fuel rebates he told the House “The purpose of the program was to help the needy with a cheque of $125”.

In the last election the NDP leader told Canadians that people earning more than $60,000 a year were rich. As an MP, I earn more than $60,000. To my great surprise, this weekend when I went back to my constituency a cheque from the finance minister was sitting in my mailbox for the home heating fuel rebate.

Will the finance minister admit to the House that his program of handing out cash is fatally flawed and wrong?

Supply February 20th, 2001

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I believe the member for Waterloo—Wellington is steering dramatically far from the issue at hand, which is proportional representation. He is talking about all sorts of issues that have absolutely nothing to do with the motion at hand. Frankly I think it is not showing the due respect that the motion deserves.

Supply February 20th, 2001

Mr. Speaker, that was a truly, legitimate, well thought out and excellent speech as compared to some of the other speeches we heard today. She spoke clearly and honestly. I appreciate that very much and so will Canadians who will be reading this and perhaps viewing this today.

She said the magic word quotas at a certain point in her speech. I am just curious as to why. Having an all-party parliamentary committee looking at some aspects of electoral reform, is it possibly a bridge to the kind of reforms that she is looking at about opening up a system to have more access for women as she described? There is no reason why that could not be included in this exact motion, or that this motion could not be an avenue to precisely that kind of reform that she is concerned about. That could be contained entirely within this motion as well. The fact that she speaks against the motion is unfortunate.

I also notice that, just like some of the previous speakers, she took the issue of proportional representation and grossly oversimplified it. She analysed the issue of proportional representation in the macro level quite well, then tried to apply it vis-a-vis concerns about having more women candidates and a more proportional voice in the House for women. That is fair enough. However, the oversimplification of proportional representation being just this sort of big balloon that she pops from the one angle of having more women in this place does not do this debate justice. It does not do the issue of proportional representation justice.

There are all sorts of models of proportional representation out there. I personally do not happen to be a fan of proportional representation.

I have a couple of questions for the member. She spoke of the need of political parties, maybe her own, to have a quota system for candidates, that 50% of candidates should perhaps be women. Some political parties have that. For example, the NDP in British Columbia has that in its platform.

I am not sure if she thinks that candidacies for political parties should be prorated on some other physical characteristics, for example, income. Should we have candidates of different brackets of income? Some political parties and political scientists have seriously advocated that. Should we have candidates for political parties who represent a wide variety of people with disabilities? Should we have political candidates who represent or are prorated on a wide variety of ages? Different people have advocated that.

If she is willing to bend on this one principle that we ditch equality and prorated candidates based on physical characteristics when it comes to gender, is she willing or interested in doing the same thing with some other characteristics that people have and people are concerned about?

I come to this Chamber having replaced a Liberal member of parliament. Prior to that member of parliament, there was a female candidate who represented my constituency of Port Moody—Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam. Her name is Sharon Hayes. She represented my constituency very well. She is a woman of honour and class.

I asked her what was her greatest frustration as a member of parliament. She said it was her inability to stand up and say what was of concern to her constituents, to have tangible legislative powers at the committee level, to have tangible powers in the House of Commons and to have real reform possibilities in this place. She said those powers are not there because the government, and it is a long entrenched history, does not allow people to stand up for what they believe and that affects everybody, men and women.

Could the member please address the issue of quotas and other aspects? Could she please address the issue of allowing this place to allow more members to have more power and how that affects women?