Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Winnipeg North for sharing her time with me so I too can enter into the debate on Bill C-25 dealing with money laundering and the funding of terrorists, a very pressing issue.
I am glad Parliament is seized of the issue because it is something my constituents and people I know have raised with me, especially stemming from the recent information we have had. We were horrified to learn that research has recently identified that $256 million worth of illegal funds have flowed through Canada to terrorist groups. That is just what we have been able to identify and that we know about for a fact. No one is disputing those facts either, so we can attest to the veracity of those figures. Something has to be done urgently.
Although my colleague has identified some reservations about the bill, I support aspects of the bill, one detail of which I would like to dwell on somewhat, and that is the issue that the proceeds of crime could be seized from someone who has been convicted of a crime. If someone is part of an illegal organization, whether that is an illegal criminal organization or an illegal terrorist organization, the government should have the right to demand to know if the things that person owns are the proceeds of crime. If that person cannot demonstrate by a reverse onus that those items were purchased with other resources, then the government should be able to seize those proceeds of crime and use that money to further resource the criminal investigation of other criminals and terrorists.
That is a good idea and it is a bold idea. The NDP government in my home province of Manitoba is seeking to introduce the very same concept. Somehow we need to make it abundantly clear that crime does not pay. Law enforcement officers have conceded to the fact that under the current regime crime does pay because the burden of proof on the government, the courts and on the police is very onerous at times. Even though we know that some person is up to no good and has no other visible means of support, it is tough to prove that the luxury home in which the person lives or the luxury cars in the driveway are in fact the proceeds of crime.
I say that we should give more tools to the law enforcement agencies and act on the side of the Canadian people in this case and shift that burden of proof onto the crooks. They should be telling us how they bought that luxury home when they have not had a job in 20 years. If a rich uncle died and left it in his will, then they should show us the will. If they cannot show us any other visible means of support, then we want to know how they are able to live in a mansion with all these luxury cars in the garage. We should seize those assets, send the message that crime does not pay, sell those assets and give them back to the law enforcement agencies so they can go out and bust more criminals. That is a good idea.
I should point out that this would be law in Manitoba today were it not for the two solitary members of the Liberal Party in the Manitoba legislature who blocked and opposed the legislation. I do not know what problem the Liberals have with this. I do not think it is any great infringement on civil rights to ask the legitimate question of where a person received the money to pay for the luxury home. If that simple question cannot be answered, then we should seize it.
I have a few other points to raise and I will do so in a way that I hope does not inflame the passions of the Liberals opposite. This idea of offshore tax havens has a broader context than just wholesale tax avoidance. The same logic that allowed these offshore tax havens to flourish gives licence or gives opportunity for people to funnel ill-gotten gains with less ability to track offshore as well.
In the context of the bill, as we go through Bill C-25 and its goals and objectives of limiting money laundering and trying to curb the financing of terrorist activity, we should be revisiting the tax treaties that have allowed Canadian businesses to avoid taxes on a rampant basis. Whatever tax regime we put in place, let us make it fair, let us make it balanced and let us make it favourable to business if we like, but at least let us make businesses pay their fair share once we have established what that rate of taxation shall be.
It is such a contradiction to hear the Conservative government say that it will cut back on $1 billion worth of social spending, but then show this wilful blindness to $7 billion worth of lost tax revenue by allowing, what I call, tax fugitives to avoid paying their fair share of taxes in our country.
There is a polite term for it, and I know my colleague from the Liberal Party is an economist. The polite term is tax motivated expatriation. The street name for it is sleazy, tax cheating loophole. There is only one place we can still do it and it just happens to be where our former prime minister had his companies, his shell companies, his dummy companies, established so he could avoid paying his fair share of taxes in Canada. It is appalling. A Canadian prime minister should be proud to fly the Canadian flag on his ships and to pay his taxes in our country. I cannot understand the thought process that would lead him to believe otherwise. It is beyond comprehension.
My colleague from the Liberal Party is helping me grope for the words to put some kind of definition to this appalling practice of tax avoidance.
The logic, though, about the proceeds of crime element is that any person convicted of an indictable offence at the direction of or in association with any criminal organization must demonstrate that every item of property owned by that person is not the proceeds of crime. That is just common sense to me. That is a burden with which no one in this room would have any difficulty.
If I were driving a luxury car that cost $100,000 and I had no visible means of support for the last X number of years, it is not unreasonable to ask me where I got that car. If I cannot say that I either inherited the money, or I found the money, or I dug it up in the cabbage patch or whatever story, if I am not believed, if I do not meet the test, that should be seized from me. That sends a profound message throughout the community of those who would break the law for their own personal advantage or those who would break the law in order to fund terrorism, which is even worse, that crime does not pay, at least not in Canada. I do not view that as heavy-handed or an infringement of a person's civil rights whatsoever.
Bill C-25 gives us an opportunity to finish a job that was started in previous parliaments. I should recognize and pay tribute to the work done by my colleague from the Bloc Quebecois, Richard Marceau, who is no longer an MP. He managed to get this concept into the House of Commons in the 38th Parliament through a private member's bill. I believe, even prior to that, a Canadian Alliance member, Mr. Paul Forseth, a former colleague of ours, introduced this notion into the 37th Parliament.
It has taken approximately 10 years for us to mature in our thinking about this concept or to be able to embrace this concept and not be threatened or feel afraid of this very worthwhile idea.
When Bill C-25 deals with the proceeds of crime, it also deals with issues pertaining to the Canada Border Services Agency, which permits the new centre of financial transactions and report analysis, FINTRAC, to exchange compliance related information with its foreign counterpart. That, too, is a necessary and commonplace measure if we are to curb the international activity that does threaten our national security. That as well is a concept that we should be able to embrace and not feel threatened by.
My colleague, the member for Winnipeg North, cited some of the reservations NDP members have about Bill C-25. To summarize our view of it, we have to give law enforcement agencies the tools to do their jobs to make the point that crime does not pay in Canada to fund terrorism or self-enrichment.
