Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to rise to speak to Bill S-203, a bill introduced by Senator Bryden that would amend the animal cruelty provisions in the Criminal Code. Bill S-203 has passed the other place and has been reported back to the House by the justice committee, without amendment, and is now before this House for report stage and third reading.
We have before us a private member's bill that has one simple objective, improving the law's ability to deter, denounce and punish animal cruelty and make offenders take greater responsibility for their crimes.
In stating my support for Bill S-203, I recognize that some hon. members have expressed the view that they cannot support the bill because it does not address some limitations in the current law. It is true that Bill S-203 does not amend current offences or create new ones. However, as members well know, none of the bills introduced by the previous government over the course of about seven years ever pass both chambers.
I would like to take this opportunity to speak to two motions to amend Bill S-203, which were recently tabled by the hon. member for Windsor—Tecumseh.
The first motion proposes to delete the long title of the bill. This motion is irrelevant to the objective of Bill S-203, which is to increase penalties for current offences. Therefore, I will be opposing the motion.
The second motion is to delete clause 1 of the bill. The bill only has one clause and so that obviously is not warranted either.
Thus, the combined effect of both motions would be to completely gut Bill S-203 of its title and substantive provisions. I, for one, support Bill S-203 and anyone who does obviously will not support either motion.
Hon. members are well aware that if Bill S-203 is passed by this House with any amendments, the amended bill will have to go back to the other place for reconsideration. The report stage amendments tabled by the opposition are an obvious tactic to obstruct or delay any progress that we can make in strengthening our animal cruelty laws. I really have to question the logic and intent of this.
Let us face it, Bill S-203 is a step in the right direction, which in no way prevents any future legislation from being brought forward.
Again, I have to question the motives of anyone who would want to prevent us from moving forward and strengthening our animal cruelty provisions today.
Sending the bill back to the other place raises the prospect that it will join a long list of previous formulations of animal cruelty amendments that were not supported by both Houses. This is unproductive and unnecessary.
Some hon. members of the House have voiced criticism of what Bill S-203 does not address. It is important to consider whether the increase in penalties in Bill S-203, coupled with the current animal cruelty provisions in the Criminal Code, would provide more protection to animals than if the bill had not been passed. I believe the answer to this question is a resounding yes. Moreover, increasing penalties with regard to animal cruelty has been one of the issues that all proponents of stronger animal cruelty legislation have been able to agree upon over the years.
Currently, the Criminal Code provides a number of distinct animal cruelty offences. Some offences prohibit very specific forms of conduct and others are more general in nature. The offences are set out in sections 444 to 447 of the Criminal Code. The two most frequently charged offences are those of wilfully causing unnecessary pain, suffering or injury to an animal and causing pain, suffering or injury by neglect.
These types of actions are in fact what most Canadians think about when they think about animal cruelty. Cruelty can be intentional, meaning the result of conduct that a person knows will or would likely cause harm, or it can be the result of gross negligence or severe inadvertence.
With respect to maximum available penalties, all offences, except those concerning cattle, are summary conviction offences only. This means that the maximum sentence an offender can get is six months in prison, a $2,000 fine, or both. This maximum applies no matter how heinous the act of cruelty may be.
By contrast, offences in respect of cattle are pure indictable offences and subject to a ma maximum of five years imprisonment.
One question raised by the law and addressed by Bill S-203 is whether this distinction is still justified. I will return to this point in a moment.
The Criminal Code also contains what is called a prohibition order. This mechanism allows a judge to order a convicted offender to refrain from owning an animal for up to two years.
Prohibition orders are mostly preventive; they actually work to keep animals away from animal abusers. In this way they are aimed primarily at preventing future cruelty toward animals. Prohibition orders are imposed relatively often in animal cruelty cases. The courts clearly feel that the prohibition order is a valuable tool at their disposal in dealing with the people who abuse animals.
Bill S-203 proposes three changes to the current animal cruelty regime, all in the nature of penalty enhancements.
All of the measures address concerns that have been identified with the existing law. There is strong agreement across all sectors that the low maximum penalties for cruelty are inadequate, both to denounce animal cruelty as unacceptable and to punish acts of cruelty when they do occur. Bill S-203 responds to this concern and does so in the following three ways:
First, Bill S-203 would increase maximum terms of imprisonment. It would make all offences hybrid, meaning that the prosecutor may choose to proceed by way of summary conviction procedure or by way of indictment, depending on the seriousness of the case.
Currently, all the offences, except those in relation to cattle, are straight summary conviction offences. These would be hybridized by Bill S-203.
Bill S-203 makes the distinction between penalties for two categories of offences: one for injuring animals intentionally or recklessly; and the second for injuring animals by criminal neglect, to which I have already alluded. This is an important distinction. Some people commit cruelty on purpose. Others commit cruelty by extreme neglect.
Under traditional criminal law principles, knowingly or intentionally doing something is more blameworthy than doing the same thing by gross neglect.
Bill S-203 would introduce a new power to allow the sentencing judge to order the offender to repay the costs of medical care and other forms of care that another person or organization spent caring for the animal that was abused. This new power would be a means of holding the offender financially responsible for the costs of their crime.
Those are the three principal amendments. Unfortunately, I was not able to elaborate on the second major one, but together they constitute a significant improvement to the current law and one with which all Canadians would agree.
I encourage all hon. members to support Bill S-203 and to oppose the two motions currently before the House.
