Justice committee  That's correct. The range in sentences for that offence across the country in courts of appeal is in the multiple single digits and sometimes, depending on the circumstances, double digits. It's not uncommon to see six-, eight-, 10-year sentences. Of course, there was the famous Humboldt case that resulted in an eight-year sentence, for example.

Justice committee  The conditional sentence order was an elegant solution introduced by Parliament in the 1990s to address the problem of overincarceration. Why it was elegant is that it was a scalpel instead of the sledgehammer of jail. What it did is tailor a sentencing option to people who were, first of all, non-dangerous; second of all, who could be properly managed in the community; third of all, who had committed an offence deserving of less than two years in jail that was, fourth of all, an offence for which the deterrence and denunciation requirement could be addressed by a community sentence.

Justice committee  You see two important knock-on effects as a result of CSOs not being available. The first is the obvious one, which you've heard a lot about today. People who would otherwise properly serve their sentence in the community and rehabilitate are forced into the jail system. I don't think there's any real debate that they are not going to rehabilitate there to the extent that they would in the community.

Justice committee  This is one of the great ironies of Bill C-10 in taking away conditional sentences. The conditional sentence was introduced primarily in response to the problem over incarceration in the 1990s of indigenous and other marginalized communities. In the 25 years since, that problem has only become worse with these restrictions being put on CSOs.

Justice committee  It will significantly expand the eligibility of offences that we don't really think about when we think about violent offenders. The scope of offences that is captured by the current prohibitions against CSOs is staggering. It includes things like forging a passport, contraventions of the Competition Act and other offences that one does not associate with the serious offending that it was said to be targeted towards.

Justice committee  I'll take this question, Chair. One of the problems that I think surrounds this debate is that the focus remains on the black-letter wording of an offence, as opposed to the circumstances in which it is committed. For example, take “robbery with a firearm”. When people say that, what comes to mind immediately is the person with the gun in their hand holding up the bank.

Justice committee  Thank you, Chair. My name is Tony Paisana. I am the chair of the CBA's criminal justice section. I am joined by my colleague Jody Berkes, the immediate past chair. The CBA represents approximately 36,000 lawyers, students and jurists across Canada. The criminal justice section, in particular, comprises a mix of both Crown counsel and defence counsel, and it's from this unique, balanced perspective that we appear today and offer our commentary on Bill C-5.