Mr. Speaker, on behalf of my constituents of Don Valley East, I am pleased to rise on the subject of criminal justice in Canada and Bill C-9, the conditional sentencing reform bill.
All Canadians value their safety and security. We want communities where we live, work and raise our children without fear and threat of violence. At the same time, we also desire something that Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau called “a just society”; that is a society built upon the principle of justice, fairness and the rule of law.
Throughout the world Canada is envied by other nations because individuals enjoy rights as guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. When the rights and freedoms of an individual are compromised by a criminal act, Canadians expect our criminal justice system to respond accordingly. We are not a vengeful people, but we do want our system of criminal justice to mete out sentences that are proportional to the gravity of the offence. In other words, the more serious the offence, the more serious the consequences will ensure.
That has always been the case since we enacted the Criminal Code over a hundred years ago. As the House is well aware, laws are not static and they must change over time. Over the past century, we have amended the Criminal Code to keep it in pace with changes in technology, changes in society and to develop new ways to deal with criminal offences.
Probation and conditional sentences are relatively new tools in the criminal justice system to prevent people convicted of less serious and non-violent offences from winding up in jail. Certain conditions are set out in the Criminal Code that a convicted offender must live up to or face more serious consequences if those conditions are breached. These tools can be very effective in crime prevention. In fact, these tools provide valuable alternatives to incarceration and allow people who can be safely managed in the community to remain in the community.
Probation and conditional sentences permit non-violent minor offenders the opportunity to continue with their jobs and provide for their families. Contrary to the rhetoric that we often hear in the House, my colleagues and I in the Liberal Party do in fact want serious sentences for serious crimes. Yet, at the same time, we do not want a hastily crafted bill with serious flaws to be rushed through Parliament just to satisfy vague election promises.
I want to share with the House a few statistics that my fellow members may find of use in this debate. Aboriginal people already make up nearly one in five admissions to Canada's correctional services, while they represent only 3% of the population. In Saskatchewan, the province with the highest percentage of aboriginal people, the minister of justice in that province has commented that the use of penalties focused on native traditions rather than simple prison time has had some success.
This form of conditional sentences encourages native communities to find alternatives to jail by, for example, providing restitution to the victim of a crime, volunteering with a charity or attending counselling or addiction programs. By wiping out these alternatives in legislation contained in Bill C-9, many more aboriginal Canadians will find themselves behind bars.
Bill C-9 would adversely affect remote communities especially. In Nunavut, for example, territorial judges handed down 203 conditional sentences in 2005, compared with 189 jail terms.
As my colleague from London West has aptly commented on this legislation, the bill appears to use the equivalent of a legislative sledgehammer where the equivalent of a legislative scalpel is required.
It is widely acknowledged that Bill C-9 covers a wide range of offences, several of which involve non-violence. The bill covers very serious crimes such as hijacking, manslaughter, attempted murder and sexual assault with a weapon. These are all serious offences. I am sure we all agree that they must be dealt with in a serious manner.
However, at the same time the bill was drafted in such great haste that it also includes unauthorized use of computer, cattle theft, mail theft and bestiality. I am not certain that the Minister of Justice had theft of livestock in mind when he considered, for example, what would be an appropriate sentence for sexual assault with a weapon. If he did, then the bill is serious flawed and so too is the logic behind the legislation.
According to David Paciocco, a criminal law professor at the University of Ottawa, not only would Bill C-9 put people behind bars who did not belong there, but lawyers and judges would be forced to find ways to avoid the ban on conditional sentencing. In addition, judges would also be forced to demand higher levels of evidence to secure a conviction while prosecutors may lay lesser charges to ensure conditional sentences are still an option.
Moreover, if the judges are further restricted and unable to assign appropriate sentences for non-violent crimes, we will witness certain increases in the number of people pleading not guilty, thereby our courts will experience more overcrowding and an increased court cost to the taxpayers.
A further problem with Bill C-9 is that it would force judges to arrive at a bleak choice, either choose prison or nothing at all. While this may appeal to sloganeers who would lock everyone up and throw away the key, in reality the stark choice between jail or nothing would more likely benefit the criminal rather than prevent crime in the future.
Judges need alternatives other than simply jail time. Unfortunately, Bill C-9 is a hastily drafted piece of legislation that is deeply flawed and should be seriously reconsidered by the government.
Bill C-9 in effect would affect approximately one-third of more than 15,000 conditional sentences set by courts each year. This number represents about 5% of all the sentences handed down each year. It is therefore estimated that Bill C-9 would result in an additional 3,000 to 5,000 being admitted to provincial jails. In many circumstances these are jail facilities that are already overcrowded, presenting a threat not only to the safety of the offenders, but also safety of the prison guards who we rely on to run these facilities.
In conclusion, Bill C-9 contains a series of unintended consequences that we can already identify. We need to take a careful and more considerate examination of the legislation before it ever becomes law.
