Kevin Lamoureux

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the most important thing is that we recognize that each situation needs to stand on its own merit. There has to be an understanding of the actual situation. In some situations it would be ill-advised for someone even to attempt to make a citizen's arrest. In other situations a citizen's arrest can be executed quite easily. It is the same thing in terms of personal assault. People have to be cognizant of the fact that different situations dictate different responses. I would hope people would use common sense before jumping into something that could get pretty ugly very quickly. I would hope that no one would encourage people to get into such situations where our communities become unsafe or individuals are seriously hurt by inappropriate actions.

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, we do recognize that there have been some significant changes. That is why I am somewhat optimistic with the member's comments in terms of the bill going to committee. We might be able to make it better. We will have to wait and see.

The member said that the government is open to input in general. He will have to excuse me for having a tough time with that comment, especially given such things as the time allocation motion on Bill C-10, which is a crime bill. That bill encompasses eight or nine significant pieces of legislation which could have been separate bills. Very little time was afforded to members for debate.

For members who were first elected a few months back, the chances of having the opportunity to speak to the bill was not there. There was no opportunity for all members to participate fully in the debate. Nor was there an opportunity for governments, such as the governments of Quebec and Ontario, to provide input. British Columbia also has huge concerns in regard to Bill C-10. They did not think the government was doing the job that was needed in answering basic questions such as what the costs will be.

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, with this particular bill, we need to acknowledge that the citizens of our country do have a role to play when it comes to complementing that sense of security in our communities. Community policing is one of the ways in which we try to reach into our communities in a positive way to make people feel safe but there are other aspects to it.

At the beginning of my comments, I spoke to how this particular bill is not there, in any fashion whatsoever, to take away responsibilities from our policing agencies but rather is there to complement the services that we are currently receiving. It is there to provide assurances to those individuals who find themselves in difficult positions where they might require to either defend themselves or to protect their own personal property.

Over the years, we have seen more and more citizens take an interest in assisting and providing that sense of security throughout our communities, whether it is with respect to the community streets on which we walk or drive, or our shopping centres, the small store outlets and so forth. I think we can find ample examples in each one of those different types of situations where we will see the average citizen saying that they want and must play some role and be involved in making our communities a better, safer community in which to live.

I was making reference to some specific examples and I will highlight the one that deals with community streets. We have members of outreach groups who walk along the sidewalks in our communities and look for what would quite often be classified as inappropriate behaviour. We have found that it is very effective when three or four individuals walk around communities, especially around community schools. A lot of these groups will identify blocks of time that they believe are most important for them to go out into the communities. For example, one of those timed walks is after school hours. There is a great deal of interest from many neighbourhoods for them to walk around our schools in and around that time because it discourages any sort of inappropriate activity. Quite often, they will see everything from bullying to minor drug type transactions occurring very close to our school facilities. Therefore, by getting individuals, whether it be one person or a group, who are well-identified and live in or are a part of the community, involved in doing things of that nature, it discourages that sort of activity from taking place in the first place. We have citizens who are prepared to get involved at that level.

I was involved with the justice committee for many years out in the area which I represent. Although I stepped down about a year and a half ago or so, I was involved for over 10 years. When I was a full participant, and in fact at one point I was the chair of the group, we had the opportunity to get a number of volunteers who lived in the community to sit on this committee as honorary probation officers.

In that situation, if we had young offenders who might be stealing from a local store, instead of going through a court they would come before a justice committee. The big push was more toward restorative justice. We would try to bring the victim and the young offender together where the victim would have a role to play in terms of what sort of disposition or consequence should be given to that young offender for the offence that he or she caused. I see this as something that is very positive.

When victims sit down with offenders, they see first-hand that there is some justice coming as a direct result of community involvement and the fact that they are being afforded the opportunity to interact with the people who made victims out of them because of an offence, such as a theft or minor assault. This bill provides the opportunity for individuals to take direct action to protect their property and themselves.

Today more and more women are taking self-defence courses. More and more young people are engaged. Sikaran is a wonderful Filipino martial arts program. Kids as young as three and four years of age and adults are being schooled in this martial art. A good number of parents enrol their children in self-defence classes because they want to know that their children can defend themselves from an assault if they ever need to.

A member said that we need to approach this with an open mind in committee. Because of some of the changes to the wording, some might be somewhat suspicious. If someone looks at me the wrong way, raises a hand and makes an obscene gesture and I feel threatened by that, I may think it gives me the right to enter into a physical fight with the individual because I thought I was going to be assaulted. That is why we have to define such words as “reasonable”.

We have to look at specific situations, whether it is a potential physical assault or an individual protecting his or her store. A store owner who sells widgets sees that as his or her livelihood. If someone attempts to take that property, there needs to be some sort of consequence. The store owner should be able to protect his or her property and livelihood.

The vast majority of Canadians support the principle of what is being said here. I would encourage the government, once the bill gets to the committee stage, to approach it with an open mind so the member for Mount Royal and others can be afforded the opportunity to make amendments—

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the comment by the member for Kitchener—Conestoga. I think his point is this is a bill that he would like to ultimately see passed, even if there is a need to make some changes, and the government is open to some changes at committee. That is the reason why we want to listen to what people might have to say on this. Those are the types of encouraging words that members of the opposition like to hear for the simple reason that if the government is true to those sentiments, it means we have the opportunity to improve the legislation if it is deemed necessary.

We have some concerns with the legislation, but we are very supportive of the principle of it. We talk about individual cases. One member talked about a snow blower that disappeared out of a garage. Another member made reference to golf clubs. True to form, I have had two bicycles disappear from my garage over the years. There are many different crimes and some are less severe. Having a bicycle disappear is disappointing and disheartening. We feel violated in the sense that someone has walked into our garage in broad daylight and has taken our property.

An individual who works for me, Henry Celones, is a wonderful man. He just turned 70 and he does a lot of walking. One day early in the morning he was walking around the area of Sheppard Street and Jefferson Avenue when he was approached by two larger individuals. Now Henry is a small guy. He is no bigger than I am. These two people told him to hand over money or cigarettes and he felt quite intimidated by this. One of them started to reach toward him. It is amazing how Henry was able to respond and defend himself. Both men in their late twenties or early thirties were tall, but they were literally taken to the ground by Henry. We shared the story with a few others who said, “Good for Henry, he did the right thing by defending himself”. There are those different types of extremes where some crimes are petty, but other things could be life threatening. People respond in different ways.

We have talked about a store that is robbed, then a period of time elapses and the individual comes back. This is a person's livelihood. Should people not have the right to protect their property? The vast majority of Canadians would say absolutely, that people have the right to protect their property and livelihood. I do not think anyone would question that right.

There are issues related to what is reasonable and what is not reasonable. We have to look at situations on their individual merits and then make that determination. That is why, in good part, we have our court process.

Bill C-26 in essence complements our law enforcement agencies. It is not there to say that our police forces, whether it is RCMP or local policing units, are not doing their job. They are doing a wonderful job, in terms of protecting and making people feel safe and secure in our communities, given the resources they have.

When I was a bit younger, a number of years ago, and in university, one summer I was employed to canvass the community. I had to go door to door and ask about issues like community safety. I can remember that in older communities, people would say that they remembered when Ralph, an officer of the law, used to walk up and down the streets. He knew the individuals who were causing the problems and he was able to provide a sense of security.

Then we evolved away from the community policing that Canadians respected for many years. We started to get more individual police officers in police cars because of suburban growth and things of that nature. We have seen more of an investment in the number of officers, and in many communities today, we see that more policing is actually being supported through having more police officers and, ultimately, more community police officers

When I look at the future, I think we need to invest more into community policing, because I think that is the best way for us to enable citizens to be more involved in our communities. I would suggest that citizens do want to get involved. There are many examples of citizens' wanting to be involved. The bill today is just one of those examples.

I could talk about concerns raised in the area I represent. Out of the blue, out of goodness, a number of individuals said they wanted to form a group to walk up and down some of our streets in some of our communities. These are citizen action groups. There is nothing wrong with that. Individuals who take that kind of action should be applauded. They wear bright vests and are well identified. They are not vigilantes looking to cause issues or problems. They are just more concerned about our communities. They are watch groups. They all play a role.

What is really encouraging is to see our law enforcement officers supporting those groups. Part of that support is through providing education on what we can or cannot do. When we make a citizen's arrest, we do have to be careful. We have to size up the situation. Is it situation we really want to get directly involved in? Is there a better way? Maybe there might be a community police office nearby; maybe we would recognize a particular individual in a store, identify that person to the local police office and resolve it in that way, as opposed to making a citizen's arrest.

I can tell members the story of what happened to a lady in an office right beside my constituency office. She was robbed and stabbed in the neck by a young offender. She recognized the person who committed the crime. Instead of running out of the store and trying to administer a citizen's arrest, she stayed in the store and contacted the police. After a while the police got to the store; it took them a little while, but they got there. Because she was able to describe the person and even point out the person's house to the police, proper actions were taken. The youth was taken into custody. Hopefully we will see some justice with regard to that particular issue.

I would suggest that this person made a good decision in this instance. It was an appropriate thing to do. That is what people have to look at when they are faced with the necessity of taking action because their property is threatened. In this case it was not only property but, to a certain degree, her life as well. She was stabbed; she had to go to the hospital and have stitches. She had taken a personal assessment of the situation and had made the determination that the best way to deal with it was to contact the police.

However, sometimes that is not the way to go. Sometimes it is necessary for someone to—

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I was encouraged by the question from the member of the Conservative Party. It is always nice when a member stands and indicates that he or she would like to get feedback to get a better understanding.

However, I think most members in the chamber would recognize that the principle of the bill is very supportive. There are some questions and maybe some concerns that need to be dealt with. We need to open up the system in a way in which we can have people come to committee to share their stories and allow them to express their concerns. As I will be the next one up to speak, I will get the chance to share a couple of stories. However, by listening to what the average Canadian has to say on issues such as this, we might be able to ensure we pass the right bill to address the concerns that everyday Canadians have on this issue.

Is that a fair comment?

[Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act, December 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the principle of citizen's arrest has widespread support. I have found that there seems to be a growing interest and members of our community want to be more engaged. There are law officers who go to local communities and encourage responsible behaviour. This will likely grow, for good reason. I wondering if the member might comment on how citizens are taking more responsibility for personal security issues.

[Safe Streets and Communities Act, November 30th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. For clarification, what happened with Motion No. 35?

[Safe Streets and Communities Act, November 30th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, one of the concerns that we in the Liberal Party have expressed is that we want as much as possible to prevent crimes from taking place.

I appreciate the member's comments. I would be interested in hearing what he might have to say in regard to issues such as community policing and investing in resources at local community clubs.

Does he believe that will have more of an impact, as I believe and the Liberal Party believes, on preventing crime from taking place if we put our investments in that as opposed to the mega-jails proposed by the government?

[Safe Streets and Communities Act, November 30th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, the minister needs to have a reality check.

What we are really debating is that the government has brought in an omnibus bill that could have very easily been eight or nine separate pieces of legislation. Now, today, we have a motion that will restrict debate to two days on this very important piece of legislation that could have been eight or nine bills.

It is not good enough for the minister to say that we are going to vote against it anyway, so we do not need the time to debate it. It is about respecting democracy. It is about respecting the procedures of this House to ensure that new members of this chamber, and others, are afforded the opportunity to hold the government accountable for the types of legislation it is bringing through.

This type of legislation is modeled after the Texas megaprisons. Many would suggest, including myself, that they want to fight to prevent crimes from taking place on our streets and in our communities. The bill will not do that, nor will it have the desired impact that the minister is telling the Canadian public.

Why is the minister trying to limit debate and limit questions on this very important issue?

[Employment Insurance Act, November 29th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I would like to get a little more clarity on that issue. Maybe the best way to do that is to give a tangible example.

If John Doe collects employment benefits today and for whatever reason is remanded into custody and it takes two or three months to ultimately go to trial, what specifically happens to his cheques? Does he continue to receive the cheques until he goes to trial and a determination is made?

There might be other financial responsibilities for that individual who is, for all intents and purposes, innocent until proven guilty. Those financial responsibilities could include children, spouse, parents or whatever it might be.

Could the hon. member provide 100% clarity? Does the person continue to receive employment benefits if he is held in custody?