Laurie Hawn

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, November 22nd, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, again I listened with interest and I agree with a lot of things that the member said about things that need to be done. That is why in fact we are doing many of those things. I want to challenge him on a couple of things though and then I will ask a question.

He talked about StatsCanada saying the reported crime rate in Canada is down. At the same time violent crime is up and youth crime is up. That is why we are talking about Bill C-25, the Youth Criminal Justice Act, to address that situation.

We talked about adding 1,000 RCMP officers and 2,500 other officers and so on. That is great and we are doing that. We are recruiting and training very hard in the RCMP.

Does the hon. member think that there is an RCMP officer store where we can just go and buy a thousand RCMP officers off the shelf? That is not the way it works. They are highly trained. It takes at least a year to train an officer once he has been recruited. It does not happen overnight. A thousand is quite a large number. We are recruiting hard. We are training hard. We cannot just snap our fingers and produce these folks out of thin air, or does he think we can do that?

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, November 22nd, 2007]

It is there.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, November 22nd, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my colleague's remarks. I must point out one thing. He talks about penalties not being a deterrent, but when there are no penalties, clearly there is no deterrent. That is what youth are approaching the justice system with right now. They do not care because they know they are not going to be punished.

The member talks about the Nunn report and says we are not including the principle of “protection of the public”. The whole thing is about protection of the public. He said that a person has to be found guilty, not just charged. I do not think he has read the bill. It states:

--unless

(a) the young person is charged with a violent offence or an offence that otherwise endangered the public....

So clearly it is about public safety. Further on, the bill states:

(c) the young person is charged with an indictable offence....

That means not necessarily convicted. Further, the bill states:

--including any pending charges against the young person, that the young person will, if released from custody, commit a violent offence or an offence that otherwise endangers the public by creating a substantial likelihood of serious bodily harm to another person.

It is all about protection of the public. It is not about only when a young person is found guilty. It is about when he is charged and when he has a record and so on. It is clear. I am not sure why the member says it is not.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, November 22nd, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think there is a member in the House whose constituents have not raised a concern about this. I know justice is the area of most concern to my constituents and, within that, youth criminal justice is the most important part.

Before I get to my colleague from Kitchener—Conestoga, I want to point out to my colleague from Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca that every low level drug dealer dreams of becoming a high level drug dealer.

I want to highlight two cases in my own riding. On Sunday, I will be officiating at a soccer game in memory of a young man named Evan who was cut down on his birthday by youth criminals. There was also a premeditated case in Sherwood Park. Youth obtained weapons, went to a young man's home, called him outside and beat him to death. The three young offenders received a one year suspended sentence, which means a curfew.

I would like my hon. friend's comment on that as a form of deterrence, treatment or anything else.

[Afghanistan, November 20th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, once again that is absolute nonsense. Canada is not contravening the Geneva convention. We handle juvenile prisoners very carefully. They are kept separately from adult prisoners in our facility. When they are transferred to the facility in Kandahar, they are kept separate from adult prisoners there as well.

Canadians are rebuilding Afghanistan with the help of Afghans. We are abiding by every arrangement that we have entered into, whether it is the Geneva convention or the May 2006 arrangement with the Afghan government. We are doing everything we can to help Afghanistan rebuild.

[Afghanistan, November 20th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, we take this very seriously, as we do all allegations, but when there is nothing behind it, we have to question the motivation of the questioner.

When there have been cases brought to our intention, we have taken action immediately. We are taking action with the Afghan government and if the hon. member suggests that Canadians are over there committing war crimes, I think that she should reconsider that.

[Afghanistan, November 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the only thing that is confirmed here is the standing violation of common sense in this House from the member. Again, to suggest that Canada is in violation of the Geneva Convention is absolutely absurd.

It is really easy to be sanctimonious in the warm, cozy comfort of this place or fantasy island off on my right, but there are thousands of Canadian women and men in Afghanistan now helping to rebuild that country, part of which is the judicial system, part of which is the prison system, all the governance systems. We are giving the Afghan people their country back.

[Afghanistan, November 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, and that is more of the same. The challenges highlighted in the recent reports just indicate that Canada is required to be there to continue helping the Afghan authorities to build their judicial system, to build their prison system, to build their governance systems, to rebuild their country and give them back the country that was stolen from them, and to give Afghan women, children and men back their lives.

We are not abusing anybody's rights. We are working together with the Afghan authorities to ensure that those rights are sustained under the Geneva Convention and every other agreement we have entered into.

[Afghanistan, November 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, that question is ridiculous. Canada abides by the Geneva Convention. The primary responsibility rests with the democratically elected government of Afghanistan. It is obliged to abide by the Geneva Convention. We brought forward an arrangement in May of last year that is superior to the one that was in place previous to that. We are abiding by all measures. We are abiding by all requirements.

For the member to suggest that somehow Canada is negligent or criminal in this is absolutely absurd and he ought to be ashamed of himself.

[Afghanistan, November 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, it should come as no surprise that my hon. colleague has his facts completely wrong. In fact, the latest allegation to come up that may prove to be substantiated came up because of the arrangement we put in place in May of last year, an arrangement that was superior to the one in place prior to that.

That brought forward the information we needed and it brought forward our ability to work with the Afghan authorities to get to the bottom of it. We are conducting that investigation. My hon. colleague should stand by. It has been less than a week since that started. We are working very hard with the Afghan authorities. We will get the job done where it was not done before.