Rob Moore

[Petitions, October 26th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to table a petition to prevent passage of LNG tankers through Head Harbour Passage. It is signed by a great number of Canadians, mostly from New Brunswick.

The petitioners urge the Government of Canada to assert its sovereign rights and to declare no rights of passage for LNG tankers through Head Harbour Passage, based on Canadian law and the precedent set in 1976 when oil tankers were refused passage.

[Justice, October 26th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Justice refuses to admit what is abundantly obvious to every other Canadian: that this Liberal government systematically screens judicial applicants for their Liberal credentials and donations.

Only a fraction of a per cent of Canadians donate to the Liberal Party, yet according to a study by the Montreal Gazette , fully 60% of candidates named to the bench by the government after the 2000 election donated to the Liberal Party.

Does the minister honestly expect Canadians to believe that these donations had no connection to these appointments?

[Criminal Code, October 20th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I was particularly interested in my hon. colleague's comments about his rural riding. I have a similar riding in Fundy Royal, New Brunswick, that has many small towns and villages. I hear a lot of the same complaints that he raised about a fear people have in their own homes, which is absolutely unacceptable. I also hear about RCMP detachments that have, for example, six members but only one is on duty because of one circumstance or another. However if that officer should run into, for example, a domestic dispute, he or she will need the next available officer for backup, who is over an hour away, before he or she will even enter a premise to help out if someone is in need.

We did talk a lot recently about justice issues. We are dealing with this bill right now. Who is being served by the Liberal approach to the criminal justice program? To me, there seems to be a distinct lack of compassion. Where is the compassion? My hon. colleague mentioned the young woman who was killed by someone who had 15 to 20 prior offences. Where is the compassion for the victims? Where is the compassion for the families of victims and the compassion for Canadians, in particular, seniors, who fear being alone in their homes?

I am wondering if my hon. colleague can comment on who is being served by this approach to crime.

[Criminal Code, October 20th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with my hon. colleague. The Liberals have a tendency, which we have seen repeated over and over, to respond to public outrage. The public is rightly outraged about carnage on the streets, about property offences and about people who offend against children and most Canadians, from coast to coast, regardless of their province, town or city, when it comes to the protection of children they want that to be a priority.

There is an absolute reluctance on the part of the government to take steps that actually would be effective. However, because it is just politically smart to do so, there is the need to appear to be doing something. I use, for example, the sex offender registry where, in order to appear to do something, the government introduced a registry but when we scratch beneath the surface we realize that it was a blank registry, a blank sheet of paper with no names, so it was absolutely ineffective. The same for our child protection legislation. It has a nice name. We all agree that children should be protected but what is behind the curtain is an empty shell. It does not protect children.

What we need is a government that looks at the needs of Canadians and addresses them, not in a half-measure but goes all the way by adding some teeth to our criminal justice system so that Canadians will be protected.

[Criminal Code, October 20th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague's question is a good question. In the current Criminal Code under the impaired driving provisions that the hon. member has mentioned, there is provision for an increased sentence for serious repeat offenders.

By way of example, let me note that there are situations where someone commits an offence and perhaps learns from their mistake. They do not reoffend. In effect, they have learned their lesson.

But then we hear the horror stories. We are dealing with one now, about repeat sex offenders. Yesterday there was a discussion in this chamber on this very issue. For whatever reason, when people have shown themselves to be an absolute menace to society, to be a danger, or when people have multiple serious offences when it comes to street racing, for example, the party opposite does not want to take it up to the next level and impose a serious consequence.

I think Canadians are left wondering why. In the topic we are dealing with today of street racing, why? When it comes to protection of children, why? When it comes to offences involving property, why?

Why do we not take a more serious approach when people have risen to the top of the class, so to speak, when it comes to criminality and are easily identified as what we would call serious repeat offenders? These people have shown recidivism in their nature. They have shown that they cannot be trusted to honour and respect the safety of their fellow citizens. Yet we will not take a correspondingly serious response. A Criminal Code has to do that. That is an expectation.

The member's point is well taken. If people are showing themselves to be serious repeat offenders, then there should be a correspondingly serious response by our criminal justice system.

[Criminal Code, October 20th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to speak to Bill C-65 on behalf of my constituents of Fundy Royal.

Unfortunately the bill is held out to be an adoption of Mr. Chuck Cadman's previous private member's bills, Bill C-338 and Bill C-230, which he had been trying for years to get through the House. They were common sense legislation that would protect Canadians and innocent bystanders and make our streets safer for everyone.

However, in typical Liberal fashion, the government dragged its heels for too long, and now, insultingly, once again it is offering too little too late.

From the outset, I would like to state that this bill is flawed and inadequate. Countless people have suffered from street racing while the government did nothing. Now the government is responding, but it is responding with a typical Liberal half-baked measure.

It reminds me of a couple of other issues related to the administration of justice, which I will touch on very quickly. One is the sex offender registry. As my colleagues know, victims' groups, the police and the provinces have been calling for a national sex offender registry for years. Unfortunately, the party opposite was ideologically opposed to such a move.

When public pressure became overwhelming in regard to the fact that the protection of children outweighed any privacy rights that sex offenders might have, the government did come up with proposed legislation for a sex offender registry. It was unfortunate and ironic what the bill did in regard to the registry. People were shocked to find out that the registry was not retroactive, which meant that all of the convicted sex offenders and people who had victimized children in the past would not be included in the registry.

It left countless Canadians wondering what was the point of having a registry if it was empty, if it was a blank sheet of paper, if we had to start from scratch when we already had all this information and could protect Canadians. There was a model in Ontario that we could have followed. Ontario had a retroactive registry.

Once again, in a wishy-washy method that was designed to pander to their own ideological bent, the Liberals could not stomach having an effective registry, but because of public pressure they had to come up with something.

The other example is Bill C-2, the child protection legislation. We see this same pattern. They call something “child protection legislation” so that it sounds like a bread and butter issue. It sounds good. We are all interested in protecting children, but what we are left with in Bill C-2 is a hollow shell. We are left with loopholes that people who victimize children could drive a truck through, loopholes that the defence and the bar associations across the country will have a field day with. It is not effective. It is not precise. It does not protect children. It does not go beyond where we are today with our current legislation.

The party opposite suggests that just by throwing a name out there and saying that something is a sex offender registry or child protection legislation or, in this case, a street racing bill, somehow Canadians will be fooled into thinking the government is taking some substantive actions.

Originally Mr. Cadman's bills were tabled to address the rise in street racing. The police tell us that the practice of street racing is becoming increasingly dangerous across the country. It begs the question, then, why now? Why is the government finally wanting to take on the appearance of action? Why was something not done in the past when Mr. Cadman was introducing private member's bills that would have addressed this very issue?

It is important to note the government's earlier response to Mr. Cadman. What was it saying in the past? The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice said:

Unless there is some compelling reason to specify that certain circumstances are aggravating it is better not to multiply the instances where the Criminal Code spells out that a particular way of committing the offence will be an aggravating factor. In my view, we are not seeing any such reason emerging from decisions of the trial courts and the appeal courts with regard to the four offences when street racing is a part of the circumstances of these offences.

There was a reluctance to adopt Mr. Cadman's bill. There was an effort to downplay it, to make it sound like it was not going to be effective. The Minister of Justice said, “Your proposed bill would result in a mandatory driving prohibition”.

That is what the bill called for: a mandatory driving prohibition.

The minister went on to say:

As you are aware, the Canadian criminal justice system is premised on the notion that sentences should be individualized for each offender...Research indicates that mandatory minimum penalties do not work from the point of general deterrence and recidivism.

This is the same line that we hear from the current Minister of Justice. We heard it as recently as yesterday in a response to a question. The Minister of Justice stated that mandatory minimum sentences do not work, yet we see that in other jurisdictions they are effective for serious offences. The Minister of Justice and the government are for some reason ideologically opposed to providing concrete protections for law-abiding citizens and to protecting the innocent in society.

It has been three years since Mr. Cadman first tabled his bills. All along, the government refused to support the legislation because it called for mandatory minimum driving prohibitions and increased the punishment for repeat offenders.

We could ask any Canadian if it makes sense that if someone is a repeat offender there should be an increase in the punishment. If someone is showing signs of recidivism, of being a repeat offender, should there be an increase in the punishment? The average thinking Canadian would say, “Absolutely. That makes sense”. When someone is a more serious offender, there should be a more serious consequence to the offence, yet in the past the government refused to support this legislation. I am pleased to say that the Conservatives have consistently supported these measures.

Bill C-65 proposes to amend the Criminal Code by defining street racing and by specifically identifying involvement in street racing as an aggravating factor during sentencing. That makes sense. The following offences are listed: dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing bodily harm; dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death; criminal negligence causing bodily harm; and criminal negligence causing death.

Bill C-65 also provides for mandatory driving prohibition orders if street racing is found to be involved in one of those offences.

There we go. On the one hand, yesterday the minister stated that mandatory sentences do not work, yet in an effort to appease Canadians when there is public pressure for something, the party on the other side will do whatever it takes to appease people. So what do we see included in this bill? We see a measure that I support. There is the mandatory driving prohibition, but again it is a half measure because there is no increase for repeat offenders.

There is an irony in debating this bill today, which has the mandatory provision, when we remember that the Minister of Justice stood up yesterday and said in a blustery way that he was opposed to mandatory minimum sentences because they do not work. It just does not make sense.

Despite the positives, and there are some positives in this proposed bill, it is important to note, as I mentioned, that without serious penalties for serious crimes those crimes are going to continue. There will be no effect.

It is important to remind Canadians that in this legislation the severity of the punishment does not increase for repeat offenders. That was an essential aspect of the proposals in Mr. Cadman's original private member's bills. His bills proposed that for subsequent serious offenders there would be more serious consequences.

Bill C-65 is a half measure. After years of the government dragging its feet and speaking out against Mr. Cadman's private member's bills, it has introduced a half measure. It is a half measure that I cannot support.

We should honour the original intent of these bills, which would have been effective and would have provided serious consequences for those people who are serious offenders. We need to have some common sense amendments to this bill.

[Home Heating Prices, October 7th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, the government was quick to provide relief for politicians and Ottawa bureaucrats, but it continues to ignore the rest of Canada. The government is experiencing a revenue windfall on the backs of hard working Canadians. Will it do the right thing for once and provide GST relief on the high cost of fuel?

[Home Heating Prices, October 7th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, this week the Liberal government came up with yet another pre-election gimmick. The last time the Liberals tried something like this, criminals in prison and deceased individuals received cheques.

This time the Liberal scheme leaves out 90% of Canadians. All Canadians need relief from the high cost of fuel. Why does this scheme leave most Canadians out in the cold?

[Civil Marriage Act, June 27th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, the committee heard 60 some witnesses though we were not going to hear that many.

I heard the parliamentary secretary say we heard 400 and some witnesses. That was in another Parliament. As the hon. member knows, that committee was basically hijacked as it was hearing general testimony from coast to coast on whether the Canadian government should appeal the Ontario Court of Appeal ruling regarding the definition of marriage.

As we know, members who supported marriage were pulled off that committee and other Liberal members were inserted who opposed traditional marriage. We know the committee did not even render a report. That is of no benefit. We are in a new Parliament. This bill put before us changes what the word marriage means and we are not given ample time to study it.

The member has raised an important question. There are only two other countries in the world that have changed in law what the word marriage means, so we do not know yet the long term effects. We can hypothesize what the impact could be on changing an institution that predates Canada.

The committee heard testimony from many witnesses. On the protection of religious freedom, for example, I will read an excerpt:

The advance of social liberalism necessarily stirs anxieties about cultural and religious freedom. Bill C-38 promises that it won't break into the religious sanctuaries to coerce religious officials to solemnize marriages against their consciences. The fact that this legislation raises the spectre of such draconian action is telling.

I agree with that 100%. We do not know where this is going to lead when it comes to freedoms. We know, in the original B.C. decision on this issue, that Justice Pitfield ruled that marriage predates Canada. It predates Confederation. Not only is it not for a judge to change what the word “marriage” means, it is not for Parliament to change what the word “marriage” means.

It is interesting how this has been framed as an issue of fundamental human rights. A few years ago members on that side overwhelmingly voted to support the traditional definition of marriage and yet those same members come here and have the gall to suggest this is about fundamental human rights. If this is about fundamental human rights, why are those members not championing this cause? They are not because it is not a fundamental human right. It is a social policy decision and there has not been one court from any national or international body or tribunal that has suggested otherwise.

We do not know where this is going to lead, but it is virtually unprecedented. We know that Sweden, Norway, France and Australia are taking a reasonable approach. They recognize that there are equality rights and access issues raised by the issue of same sex couples, but they have not attempted to change what the word “marriage” means in their countries, nor should we.

[Civil Marriage Act, June 27th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise on behalf of my constituents to speak to Bill C-38 at report stage.

It is interesting that over the course of presenting petitions there were a number of petitions where constituents were calling on Parliament to recognize and to affirm marriage as the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others. To put it another way they were calling on Parliament to affirm marriage in the traditional sense or in the sense that it is universally applied across countries, across cultures, across religions. When I attended various events in my riding, people asked, “Why are you going back next week? What is going on? Why the virtually unprecedented extension of the sitting of the House?” There is only one government bill on the projected order, Bill C-38, which in effect will change the legal definition of the word “marriage” in Canada”.

If Canadians are so concerned, so divided and so upset about changing a fundamental basic institution in our country, why is the Liberal government embarking on this approach? Why did it not look for alternatives that could have accomplished some of the concerns that were being raised?

This has not been the approach that other jurisdictions have taken. In France and Australia, for example, there has been a recognition of the rights of other couples but preservation of what the word “marriage” means.

It has been interesting to see over the last couple of years how the language has changed. This takes to me one of the amendments. In 1999 members across the way, including the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, and many members on that side and many members in this House, overwhelmingly assured Canadians that Parliament would not only affirm the traditional definition of marriage but would take all steps necessary to protect that definition of marriage in Canada. It was some time later, in 2000, when in the Modernization of Benefits and Obligations Act, a clause was inserted which stated:

For greater certainty, the amendments made by this Act do not affect the meaning of the word "marriage", that is, the lawful union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others.

The then justice minister and current Deputy Prime Minister spoke at length about the uniqueness of the institution of marriage and that how, as she said, Parliament and the Liberal government had no intention of changing what the word “marriage” meant in Canada.

The reason it is interesting to note that particular clause in the Modernization of Benefits and Obligations Act that was passed by this House 2000 is that in Bill C-38, clause 15 states:

Section 1.1 of the Modernization of Benefits and Obligations Act and the heading before it are repealed.

It is just that simple. Is it any wonder that there is cynicism out there? Those on the other side give assurances that religious freedoms are going to be protected, that freedom of expression is going to be protected, that changing what the word “marriage” means in our country is not going to have any impact on our country, is not going to have any impact on those that come after us. With a bit of revisionist history however, the Liberals in the year 2005, reach back to the year 2000 and pretend that Parliament at that time did not insert that declaratory clause on what the word “marriage” means. This brings me to one of the amendments. Remember, it states that for greater certainty the bill does not impact on the definition of marriage and then sets out what that definition is.

I sat on the legislative committee studying Bill C-38. I have heard the parliamentary secretary say a few things today that I would take issue with. One is that this issue has had a good hearing among Canadians. As members know, we on this side had to fight tooth and nail to get the number of witnesses we did. Theses were witnesses that the parliamentary secretary quoted, witnesses that he now acknowledges were good witnesses. The Liberals fought against including them on the witness list.

It is interesting that, through that committee, one of the amendments to Bill C-38, and this bill can only be described as smoke and mirrors, other than changing what the word “marriage” means in law in Canada, nothing else in the bill is of any legal effect. It does not offer any protection or is of any consequence to Canadians, other than the fact that it changes the definition of marriage.

I would like members to listen to the familiar words and see if this sounds familiar. Clause 3.1 says “For greater certainty”. Again, another assurance using the exact same language. The expression “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me” comes to mind. Once again we have members on that side saying “Don't worry about it; this won't impact on you”.

It is just like a couple of years ago when the Liberals said to Canadians not to worry. They indicated that this would not impact on what the word “marriage” meant and that it would not have that effect. Anyone with any common sense would know that was the ultimate conclusion that they were leading to. Now with the same conviction, those on that side are saying “For greater certainty”. I would like to read this provision. It says:

For greater certainty, no person or organization shall be deprived of any benefit, or be subject to any obligation or sanction, under any law of the Parliament of Canada solely by reason of their exercise, in respect of marriage between persons of the same sex, of the freedom of conscience and religion guaranteed under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the expression of their beliefs in respect of marriage as the union of a man and woman to the exclusion of all others based on that guaranteed freedom.

That sounds pretty good to me. To someone who is perhaps not a lawyer or to the average Canadian who might read this bill would say that sounds good. That sounds like the government has it covered. Canadians should know as well, as I do, that in law this is a declaratory provision that is not only unconstitutional but it does nothing to protect Canadians. That was the evidence we heard in committee.

We heard a justice department lawyer explain to us, and it is obvious if a person takes a close look at the provision, that this is simply restating that we have certain rights under the Canadian charter of rights. We heard where those rights can lead us. I heard witness after witness give testimony that their rights had been impacted because of the definition of marriage.

We heard at length about Bishop Fred Henry. We heard about marriage commissioners whose livelihood is being affected. We heard about the Knights of Columbus. Here is a real life example. The Knights of Columbus are a religious order of the Catholic church. They are being brought before a human rights tribunal in British Columbia because they will not sanction a same sex ceremony because it violates their religious beliefs. This is not some hypothetical down the road. This is happening right now. Bill C-38 does absolutely nothing to protect religious beliefs.

If we look at Bill C-38, the first clause says it is called the civil marriage act. I want to speak and support the amendment put forward by my colleague from Calgary Southeast that this clause be amended. The reason it should be amended is that there is no civil marriage in Canada. There is no distinction between civil marriage and marriage. There is only one definition of marriage. By even raising that concept that there is somehow two kinds of marriage in Canada is misleading to Canadians. It is creating more smoke and mirrors and clouding the issue. I support taking that out.

Motion No. 2 states that clause 2 be deleted. It says:

Marriage, for civil purposes, is the lawful union of two persons to the exclusion of all others.

I have heard sufficient testimony that leads me to the conclusion that if we change the definition of marriage, it will have an impact on other rights. I am also confident that there are ways to address equality concerns without changing the definition of marriage. That is the Canadian way. That is what Canadians support. They support equality, but they also support this basic institution.

Motion No. 3 would delete clause 3 which says:

It is recognized that officials of religious groups are free to refuse to perform marriages that are not in accordance with their religious beliefs.

We know that the Supreme Court of Canada considered this bill and came to two very ironic conclusions. First, it said it would not say the traditional definition of marriage was unconstitutional and did not rule it unconstitutional. Yet the Liberals will lead us to believe it did. Second, it said a provision like that is ultra vires, outside the jurisdiction of Parliament, and it cannot act to protect religious freedoms. I will be opposing this bill. I urge my colleagues to do so and look for a Canadian compromise.