Jim Maloway

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the previous speaker, the member for Saint Boniface, admitted that mistakes are made by police officers in the course of duty. It is not perfect legislation. The question I would have, and the member from British Columbia asked the question before, in this member's opinion what crimes related to terrorism are not already covered by the current Criminal Code? He, himself, has mentioned that conspiracy would already exist and would be covered under the Criminal Code as it stands right now.

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I do recall back in 1971 or 1972 when the Americans were planning an atomic test on Amchitka Island. I remember participating in a demonstration in those days. There were 10,000 people in Winnipeg, and it was the biggest demonstration since the 1919 strike. I was one of the organizers. I participated in a lot of anti-Vietnam war demonstrations during that period.

I would like to ask the member whether possible provisions in the bill could be used to target individuals engaged in protest activities of this type, or any other type of activities, for example, labour strike situations. Could those activities be grounds for government action with respect to this particular type of legislation?

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2009]

Madam Speaker, the member has been a long-time member of the House. He was a former Quebec justice minister, and he certainly knows of which he speaks.

The provisions of this bill could be used to target individuals engaged in activities of protest or dissent that do not come close to any reasonable definition of terrorism. I would like to ask the member if he could expand on those comments.

If this bill could possibly be extended to people involved in strike action or other forms of protest, we certainly would not want to see that happen in this country.

[Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act, June 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the member made an excellent presentation. He detailed how Bill S-3 was passed back in 2007 and how the government did not get it right at that time. Then there was the recent exposé. The parliamentary committee reviewed and had a draft report within two weeks of being available and then the government introduced legislation.

The member does have a lot of concerns about the bill, but by the sounds of it, he and members of his party will support the legislation at the end of the day, at least as far as getting it into committee. At that point, hopefully some of his good ideas will find their way into the bill.

He pointed out the strong points of the Ontario statute. I was not aware of the fact that people use the Ontario statute roughly 400 times a day, while the federal system is only used 150 times a year. Clearly, there are some advantages to the Ontario system that merit adoption.

He also mentioned the very important point that 77% of children who had been abducted were dead within three hours. That is astounding. I was not aware of that statistic.

I thank him for that information.

However, I want to ask him a question regarding the expansion of the registry to include those convicted of sexual offences outside Canada. I am assuming that would include places like Thailand and other countries that have sex tourism. How are we to know how these people are going to be included? Are we going to have the Thailand government giving us a list of people who have been convicted? Is there some sort of international registry for us to determine who should be coming to us from that list?

[Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act, June 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Yukon and our member are absolutely correct. When they tried to even suggest that we would study the bill and make improvements, we had members of the Conservative Party chirping from their seats, saying that we were soft on crime. That just points to the political nature of the whole process, where the Conservatives short-circuit the process in committee and bring out the bill. The Conservatives are just dying to get this stuff out in the public so they can run around saying, “We're strong on crime and you are not”. We know that is a bunch of nonsense, and we are going to get our points out there as well.

I want to ask the member a question regarding the DNA database. There must be, at this point, volumes of statistics that relate to how efficient this database is. I would like to ask the member whether he is aware of what types of studies are available and how one goes about gaining access to these studies.

[Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act, June 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I enjoyed the member's presentation. I know he has a long history in the justice system and he understands the system very well. Once again, it was one of many well-presented speeches that I have heard him make.

In terms of the bill, we talk about the ability to access the registry for crime prevention purposes. That is an area that probably needs a lot of thought and development. It was mentioned that suspicion may perhaps be part of the grounds we would use there. I wonder if the member has any thoughts on how expanding the ability of the police to access the registry for crime prevention purposes would in fact play out over time.

[Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act, June 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I do agree with the member that it is a channel-changing exercise. I know the government is obviously concerned that it might be going to the polls fairly soon and it wants to put all its ducks in a row. That is probably why there is this accelerated effort here on the part of the government.

However, I did notice that the member talked about expanding police ability to access the registry for crime prevention purposes. I would like him to expand on that particular aspect of the bill.

[Truth in Sentencing Act, June 8th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure the member would like to know that it was the NDP premier of Manitoba, Gary Doer, and Attorney General Dave Chomiak who came to Ottawa on a mission on September 20, 2007 to push for the very same things that in fact spawned this bill, the elimination of two for one remand credits. She mentioned that Bill C-25 targets punishment and she wanted to know when we were going to be targeting prevention programs. That is exactly the approach the Manitoba NDP has taken over the last number of years.

For example, we have focused on prevention with programs such as lighthouses, friendship centres and education pilot projects, as well as initiatives such as the vehicle immobilizer program, the highly successful turnabout program, and intense supervision for repeat offenders.

With regard to suppression, we have produced targeted funding for police officers, corrections and crown attorneys dealing specifically with auto theft. We have certainly beefed up consequences with the lifetime suspension of driver's licences for repeat offenders. There are provincial initiatives dealing with drinking and driving which helped reduce fatalities and injuries by 25% between 1999 and 2003.

The Manitoba government certainly has been a leader in this whole area. Some of the changes it asks for in addition to the current ones dealing with this bill were to provide stronger penalties for youth involved in serious crimes, especially those involved with auto theft, allowing first degree murder charges for gang-related homicides, classifying auto theft as an indictable violent offence, and making shootings at buildings and drive-by shootings indictable offences.

That initiative from way back on September 20, 2007 has spawned a lot of the initiatives that we see here. This comes from a forward-thinking and acting NDP government in Manitoba.

[Telecommunications, June 5th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, MTS Allstream is an important and essential asset to the Manitoba economy. Right now, it is appealing a decision by the CRTC that unfairly limits its ability to compete via-à-vis Ethernet services in areas currently dominated by the large national networks.

My question is for the Minister of Industry. What is the government doing to ensure that MTS Allstream and other similar enterprises are treated fairly by the CRTC and not pushed aside in favour of giants like Bell and Telus?

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, June 5th, 2009]

Mr. Speaker, that is an absolutely excellent question and certainly well put.

Like him, we agree with proper sentences. They are a positive thing. I refer to the Bloc member who mentioned the other day that if we are letting people out of prison too early, they are not able to finish their treatment programs.

It is up to judges to decide the length of the sentence on a case-by-case basis. Whatever it is, offenders should be kept in for the length of the sentence and they should be taking treatment programs they will finish, as opposed to the system we have now where the programs are either not available or inmates are getting out of prison before they finish the programs.

In terms of offloading to provinces, he is absolutely correct. We are talking about sentences of two years that fall under provincial legislation, so the federal government is neatly transferring the problem over to the provinces. That is hardly a fair situation. The provinces are overloaded. Their systems are overloaded as we speak, to the point where we even had a huge riot in one of our provincial corrections facilities in Manitoba a couple of years ago.

In terms of resourcing police, we certainly are in favour of that. That is something that the Manitoba government, certainly provincially--