Jim Maloway

[Child Protection Act (Online Sexual Exploitation), November 25th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I was planning to ask the minister a follow-up question but I did not get up. She mentioned that $42.1 million over five years would be provided to law enforcement to give law enforcement more resources, which I feel is an important part of this, but she could not tell us whether this was new money just being announced right now or whether this was just a re-announcement of existing money.

In addition, she said that in 2007 there were 1,400 police incidents and 440 charges but she could not tell us whether any one of those came from an ISP, and this legislation deals with ISPs.

Does the Liberal member think this legislation is really more about the six o'clock news? It has been on CTV around the clock for the last two days. The member mentioned that it should be in the Criminal Code. It has taken the government four years to bring this bill in--

[Child Protection Act (Online Sexual Exploitation), November 25th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly support the intent of the bill. While I did not hear the entire speech of the minister, I wholeheartedly agree with what I did hear. In addition, my Liberal colleague's comments were on the mark.

It seems to me that police resources are the key to this. Canada's police forces have been very effective in dealing with this issue. We feel they should be given more resources.

The minister mentioned that $42.1 million is being given to the police over five years to provide law enforcement with more resources. Is the $42.1 million announced today new money, or is this simply money that the police had before?

[Petitions, November 25th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, my petition is a call to adopt Canada's first air passengers' bill of rights. The petitioners support Bill C-310, which includes compensation for overbooked flights, cancelled flights and unreasonable tarmac delays. The legislation is inspired by European Union law and, in fact, Air Canada is already operating under the European laws on its flights to Europe. Why should an Air Canada customer see better treatment in Europe than in Canada?

The bill would ensure that passengers are kept informed of flight changes, weather delays or cancellations. The new rules will be posted in the airports and the airlines must inform passengers of their rights and the process to file for compensation. The bill also deals with late and misplaced baggage, and it requires all-inclusive pricing by airline companies in their advertising.

Bill C-310 is not meant to punish the airlines. If the airlines follow the rules, they will not have to pay a dime in compensation to passengers.

The petitioners call on the Government of Canada to support Bill C-310, which would introduce Canada's first air passengers' bill of rights.

[Support Measures for Adoptive Parents, November 24th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to follow the hon. member. I think this is a very important measure that the member for Essex has introduced. In fact, I noted a press release that he sent out on October 30, 2009, where he called on Parliament to examine current federal support measures available to adoptive parents and their children. He said:

Let us agree there is equal value for parenting whether one is biological or adoptive. And let us also agree there is equal value for children whether biological or adopted. And let this fundamental accord ultimately find full expression in the policy choices of government.

I thought that was very well put and a very good introduction to what he wants to do here. The resolution itself reads:

That the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development, and the Status of Persons with Disabilities be instructed to examine current federal support measures that are available to adoptive parents and their adopted children, recognizing and respecting provincial and territorial jurisdictions in this regard and, following completion of its study, report back to the House with its findings.

He is recommending that the committee look at the process and experiences of adopting families within the existing framework with an eye to ensuring that the federal government is providing full support to all Canadian families while recognizing the respective provincial and territorial jurisdictions.

For the 23 years that I was a member of the provincial legislature, I did see many developments in the adoption area. Certainly, many constituents would come to my office to deal with the problems that they had. There was a myriad of problems that people would run into. However, I do want to draw attention to some of the history of adoptions in this country, even in the working lifetime for most people in the House. In Manitoba, we basically had a government-supported policy of encouraging the adoption of aboriginal children not only outside their reserves but outside the country.

Many aboriginal children were adopted into the United States. It was mainly the northern United States. It was only a matter of 15 or 20 years later that an inquiry into the process showed that the results were not the way we wished they would all be. There were some very good success stories, but there were also some very bad stories that came out of this. There were different types of abuse, children being forced to work in slave-type conditions and so on. Of course, that pointed to adopting a more rigorous process for accepting adoptions. That is another complaint that I have heard over and over again.

People think the process is too complicated. On the other hand, it has been admitted that this complicated process is there for a reason. Errors have been made in the past and the results have shown that. While we might have 80% or 90% of cases or higher where people are 100% qualified and above board, there is always going to be a small percentage of people who take advantage of the system and abuse the rules. I guess that is the same with any area of legislation and the law.

We basically set up laws to govern that 5% or 10% who do not follow the rules. All we have to do is look at all the security regulations that we are all having to deal with today at the airports and even in the Parliament Buildings. We find ourselves putting elderly people through radiation scanners, scanning them and making them strip down before they enter buildings. All of this came about because of one example of somebody who got into a building and did some bad things. I suppose there are a certain amount of regulations with which we are always going to have to deal.

With regard to the adoptions that I was referring to in Manitoba, when a number of these people were being repatriated to their birth parents, because that is what happened in some cases, a lot of requests and inquiries came to my office from people trying to find their children and vice versa, people trying to find their birth parents. That became another big issue where I probably think we lost some friends over because the birth mothers did sign off at the time when they gave up the child, but after 10 or 15 years the birth parent wanted to find out what happened to the child so they came to the legislator's office. I am sure all MPs have had people ask them for help in trying to locate their children, or vice versa, people trying to find a parent.

We had a law in Manitoba that said that once parents signed off on the adoption, they had no right to find out where the child was or who adopted them. Just in the last five, six or seven years, the Manitoba government and perhaps other governments have taken measures to make it easier for people to get reunited and to track down their birth mothers or their children. Of course the rule has been put in place that both parties must agree to this before they are allowed to get together.

Sadly, there are examples of where one of the two parties does not want to co-operate and then we find a certain gentleman in my office trying to find his daughter. The searches are made and then it comes back that the birth daughter did not want to find her father. That is even more heartbreak on his part. I have not checked in lately to see how well he is doing with that. It is a very complicated and stressful issue.

The member has taken a great step here and he recognizes that the adoptions are more of a provincial issue, but it is certainly incumbent upon a federal government to look at these issues and to look at all sorts of equality issues.

Our member, the NDP member for Burnaby—New Westminster, has a bill before the House, Bill C-413, which would amend the Employment Insurance Act and the Canada Labour Code to ensure that adoptive parents are entitled to the same number of weeks of paid leave as the biological mother of a newborn child. I have assisted him in introducing some of his petitions supporting his bill in the House.

The member for Burnaby—New Westminster has a very interesting and comprehensive petition that he has passed around and submitted literally hundreds and hundreds of names. We have sent around petitions for signing and, out of a group of eight or ten petitions, the two petitions that seem to be the most popular that people grab are the air passenger bill of rights,which I must say is certainly popular, but the--

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, the reason the member for Windsor—Tecumseh moved the amendment is very straightforward. Today he gave the chronology of events. He explained that Mr. Head appeared before the committee on November 4 and was not prepared. He was asked a series of questions. I have outlined what the questions were, but I can give them again if the member would like.

This information should have been available to the members of the committee from the very beginning. The fact that the information was supposed to be obtained and given at a later date and was given after the fact is definitely an affront to the committee system, an affront to Parliament and an affront to democracy itself.

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, the treatment of victims is extremely important for all of us to consider. I have mentioned many, many times that in my home province of Manitoba, 20 years ago in the case of a break-in to a property, the victim could not get much information from the police, could not get much information about the trial date for the accused, could not find out the disposition of the case. The victim was basically left hung out to dry with no counselling services.

Over the years through successive governments, Manitoba brought in a system of victims' rights so that the victim will now know what is the disposition of the case, where the criminal is, whether the criminal is in prison or out of prison. The victim will get counselling to overcome the psychological damage that was caused by the break-in, the hold-up or whatever the criminal act happened to be.

We are very aware that whatever system we develop, whatever mechanism we have for dealing with the justice system, we have to bend over backwards to be sensitive to the victims and their families. We have to make certain that we take all precautions possible to deal with that issue and make sure that people are not dealt with in a negative manner. Certainly, that has been the case in the past and we want to take steps to improve that in the future.

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I wish to split my time with the member for Halifax.

The amendment moved by the member for Windsor—Tecumseh is a very important one, particularly since the information was available and was obtained. In fact, the member for Windsor—Tecumseh was told that the information was actually mailed to his office and the offices of the other critics just in the last couple of days, but that proved not to be correct.

In terms of the length of the murder sentences in other countries, a 1999 international comparison of average time served in custody by an offender given a life sentence for first degree murder showed the average time served in Canada was 28.4 years. That is greater than all the countries that were surveyed, including the United States.

In fact, in New Zealand, the first country on the list, the time served was 11 years. In Scotland it was 11.2 years. In Sweden it was 12 years. In Belgium it was 12.7 years. In Australia it was 14.8 years. In the United States, life sentence with parole was 18.5 years. We see that Canada already has a higher figure at 28.4 years. The countries with the shortest and longest incarceration periods for people serving murder sentences provide points of comparison with Canada.

In New Zealand, prisoners become eligible for release after seven years if sentenced prior to August 1, 1987, or after ten years of sentence after that date, unless the minimum term was imposed by the court. The most recent published statistics covering the period from July 1, 2002 to June 30, 2003 shows that the average number of years served in custody by this class of inmates was 12.1 years.

In the United States, while every state provides for life sentences, there is a broad range of severity and implementation in the statutes. I mentioned earlier today that in the state of Michigan, the governor, who was in favour of the death penalty, changed his mind after numerous cases of wrongful convictions were found. Time goes fast but I think that was in the last seven or eight years.

In the six states of Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Pennsylvania and South Dakota, and in the federal system, all life sentences are imposed without the possibility of parole. Only Alaska provides the possibility of parole for all life sentences. The remaining 43 states have laws that permit sentencing most defendants to life with or without parole.

In the case of life sentences with the possibility of parole, the time that must be served prior to eligibility for release varies greatly from under 10 years in Utah and California to 40 to 50 years in Colorado and Kansas. The median length of time served prior to parole eligibility nationally is in the range of 25 years. However, eligibility does not mean release and we have dealt with that before.

Bill C-36 consists of seven clauses. This section contains discussion of the most important of the clauses that I am dealing with right now. Clause 2 is an addition of subsection 745.01 to the Criminal Code. We are dealing with the different clauses in the bill which we have dealt with in committee.

The amendment basically asks that the bill go back to committee because there was information that was available and which should have been available before the members made their votes on the different amendments known at the committee. They did not have the benefit of the available information at that time. The amendment is in order. It is time to go back and take a look at some of the information.

There were different pieces of information that the member for Windsor—Tecumseh wanted that would have in some way affected his assessment of the bill. He wanted to know the reoffending rate and no specifics were given on that. He wanted information on the ages of the offenders. He wanted information on how often the faint hope clause was used and how often it was granted on the first application. He wanted to know at what age the offenders went into prison and at what age they got out of prison.

The member for Windsor—Tecumseh wanted several other pieces of information that we subsequently found out were available but were not available when members made the decision on the case.

A number of other pieces of information can be dealt with regarding this bill. The bill will not be retroactive. The faint hope regime will continue to apply to those who are currently serving or awaiting sentencing for murder, but it will not be available to those who commit offences once the bill is in force.

For those who are able to make an application for a judicial review, clause 3 imposes a number of additional restrictions. New applications must be made within 90 days of the day on which the offender has served 15 years of his or her sentence or within 90 days of the coming into force of the bill. Repeat applications must be made within 90 days of the fifth anniversary of the last application or the date set by the judge or jury. If no such application is made, or if an applicant is unsuccessful, five years must pass before a fresh application can be made, an increased length of time from the current two year period. The government's intention is to make it more difficult for the faint hope clause to occur for people who would currently qualify for it. The offender will have to apply within 90 days of that date.

Under the new regime, unsuccessful applicants for judicial review will be able to apply twice, once when they become eligible after serving 15 years of his or her sentence and once more at the 20 year mark. Under the current regime, unsuccessful applicants may apply a total of five times, when they have been incarcerated for 15, 17, 19, 21 and 23 years, as long as the further applications are permitted by a judge or a jury.

Clauses 4 and 5 deal with the words “substantial likelihood” to the judge's decision and changes to time periods.

Section 745.61 of the Criminal Code sets out the procedure to be followed by a chief justice or a designated judge of the superior court in determining whether an applicant for judicial review of his or her sentence has shown, on the balance of probabilities, that there is a reasonable prospect that the application will succeed.

Clause 4 of Bill C-36 changes the words “reasonable prospect of success” to “substantial likelihood of success”. Once again, this is a tightening up of the application and the wording. This change in language sets a more stringent requirement for proving the possible success of the application. The words “reasonable prospect” are replaced with “substantial likelihood” in at least four subsections.

Clause 4 changes the amount of time applicants for judicial review must wait before making a second application should they not succeed the first time around. Currently, if the judge determines there is not a reasonable prospect that the application will succeed, he or she may set a time not earlier than two years at or after which another application may be made, or decide that no other such application may be made. This will be amended to extend the period to five years before which another application may be made. Current subsection 745.61(4) states that if the judge sets no time, the applicant may make another application no earlier than two years after the date of the denied application. This default period will also be extended to five years by the provisions of Bill C-36.

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the member a question, but first I would like to point out to him, and I am sure he knows, that the government is very good at hiding information.

In fact it is even worse than that. On the air passenger bill of rights, we found that the government was actually involving itself, the minister was involving himself, with the airline lobby to develop a campaign against the bill. On the gun bill, which we saw here a couple of weeks ago, we saw the government sitting for almost two months on a report that would have been favourable to the gun registry.

We are seeing a pattern develop with the government, so it should be no surprise to anyone here that the government would be sitting on information, hiding information that would be relevant to the discussions dealing with this particular bill. That just adds to the merits of our member's resolution before the House right now.

I would like to ask the member whether he thinks there may be more incidents like this of the government hiding information from members of this Parliament.

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's comments and his support for my colleague's motion.

The issue is whether or not this attempt to get this information may in fact at the end of the day cause the Liberals to reconsider their position on this bill. Yesterday, the Liberal critic rose in her seat and addressed the bill. Someone indicated yesterday that she had voted against the bill at committee, but that the Liberal Party would in fact be supporting the bill.

I am just wondering whether, in the member's opinion, this new information may be enough to cause Liberal members to change their minds on this particular bill.

[Criminal Code, November 24th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, 20 years ago in Manitoba under the Conservatives there were no victims' rights. People's houses would be broken into and they would try to find out the disposition of the case, but they could get no information as to who did it, when the person was going to jail or what the disposition was.

It was the NDP that stepped in and changed those rules over the years so that the victims would have information as to the disposition of their cases, plus counselling. Counselling was set up for the victims, which was very important. That never existed under the grand old Tory years of the past. This is something that the NDP did.

The Conservatives should be paying more attention to the NDP in certain provinces. They should do what works, not just what is good for their coverage on the six o'clock news.