Bill C-15 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to provide for minimum penalties for serious drug offences, to increase the maximum penalty for cannabis (marihuana) production and to reschedule certain substances from Schedule III to that Act to Schedule I.
As well, it requires that a review of that Act be undertaken and a report submitted to Parliament.
The enactment also makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

Opposition Motion—Gun Control

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I am rising in this House, on behalf of the Liberal caucus, to support the motion tabled today by the hon. member for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin. That member has a long and distinguished career in the area of public safety. He is one of those people here who really knows what must be done to improve public safety and, for example, to fight organized crime, as he did for so many years during his tenure at the Quebec National Assembly. Today, I salute him and I am telling him that the Liberal caucus will support his motion.

I also want to stress the important work done by many Canadians on the very complex issue of gun control. For example, Suzanne Laplante-Edwards, who is the mother of one of the victims of the tragedy at the École Polytechnique, has done a lot to promote gun control. She is in Ottawa today to remind parliamentarians of the importance of supporting measures that will help control guns and increase public safety, and also to remind us of past tragedies that show the importance of continuing to fight to improve all these measures, which are so critical to ensure public safety. Gun control and the gun registry are undoubtedly two initiatives that help us achieve these goals.

I want to be very clear. Liberals will be supporting this motion tabled by our colleague for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin. We believe gun control and the firearms registry are essential elements in the effort to improve public safety across Canada. However, Liberals also recognize that there are persons across the country and in rural communities such as the ones I represent who legitimately use firearms, non-prohibited weapons, for sporting purposes, hunting and target practice.

We recognize and respect that some Canadians have a legitimate need for firearms, but they must also recognize that the legitimate need to protect public safety and to follow the advice of Canada's front-line police officers and police chiefs across the country requires that all firearms need to be part of an effective firearms registry that serves as an essential element of the police officers' work to protect public safety.

In a question a few moments ago, I think my colleague for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine reminded the House of a very important document that was sent to our leader by the Canadian Police Association, a group that represents 57,000 front-line police officers. The elected president of this association wrote to the leader of the Liberal Party on April 7 and asked the Liberal Party to continue to support the firearms registry. He asked members of our party and members of Parliament in other parties to oppose Bill S-5, currently sitting in the Senate, and to oppose Bill C-301, a very irresponsible private member's bill that sits on the order paper of the House.

I want to quote from the letter from the Canadian Police Association, where the elected president said:

It would be irresponsible to suspend or abandon any element of [Canada's firearms program]

In 2008, police services used the firearms registry, on average, 9,400 times a day. They consulted the firearms registry over 3.4 million times last year alone. In that year, 2008, they conducted an inquiry of the firearms registry on over 2 million individuals and did over 900,000 address checks at the firearms registry.

Another organization that in our view is eminently qualified, more so than government members of Parliament, to speak on the issue of public safety is the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. In a letter sent to our leader on March 9, they also said they were asking members of Parliament to oppose Bill C-301 and to maintain the registration of all firearms.

That is precisely the thrust of the motion tabled today in this House. It is important to maintain the integrity of the gun registry and to end the amnesty which, in our opinion, has watered down the integrity of the registry, something which certainly does not help public safety.

The government across the way claims to be interested in public safety. Mr. Speaker, I am sure that you have often seen cabinet ministers and government members wanting to be photographed with police officers. These people make announcement on various bills, or on amendments to the Criminal Code. We often see police officers standing behind the minister announcing such changes to the Criminal Code.

It is obvious that Conservative members view the support of police officers as something symbolic, but also very important for their so-called improvements to the Criminal Code. However, when these same officers, through the duly elected officials representing their associations, ask them to put a stop to a policy which, in their opinion, is irresponsible and goes against the goal shared—I hope—by all members in this House, namely to improve public safety, government members do not agree with the people with whom they had their picture taken just weeks earlier.

There is no doubt, in our view, that extending the amnesty poses a threat to public safety. That is why we will oppose the idea of extending or renewing the amnesty.

If we think about the whole idea of an amnesty with respect to a Criminal Code provision, it is a rather bizarre way to make criminal law in the country. For a government to simply decide that it will suspend the application of a particular section of the Criminal Code or another criminal law is, to me, not a very courageous or legitimate way to make public law in Canada.

If the government had the courage to table a bill in this House that would do what so many government members in their speeches or in their questions and comments claim they want it to do, it knows very well that the bill would be defeated. What does the government do? It signs an order in council or a minister simply directs crown prosecutors that, for this or that reason, for a period of time they should not enforce the criminal legislation.

That is as irresponsible as deciding that the sections of the Criminal Code, for example, that apply to impaired driving would be suspended for two weeks around Christmas. It is the same sort of notion that the government can tell prosecutors or justice officials that we are going to provide an amnesty.

Earlier we heard members claiming that this was only so that firearms owners would come forward and voluntarily choose to register their firearms. If that were the original intention of the one year amnesty when it was announced almost three years ago, why was there a need to continually renew it? The reason the amnesty was renewed is because the Prime Minister has made it very clear that he does not support effective gun control in Canada and he wants to find a way to do what he cannot do legislatively in this House, which is to weaken the firearms registry that is so important for public safety.

The government's true agenda with respect to gun control and public safety is found in two measures. It is found in private member's Bill C-301. The government likes to say that it is a private member's bill but it is the first time I have seen the Prime Minister address a large gathering of persons in front of the media and urge members of Parliament to support a private member's bill, as the Prime Minister did in support of Bill C-301.

However, when the Prime Minister's office realized that it was an irresponsible and appalling piece of legislation, which, for example, as my colleagues have identified, would allow people to transport automatic weapons such as machine guns through neighbourhoods on their way to a target range, it then said that the government would not support the bill on the same day the Prime Minister publicly called upon members of Parliament to vote for it. However, as a way to sort of recoup the embarrassment, the government then presented in the other place Bill S-5.

It is pretty transparent why the government did that. It is because it does not have the courage to move legislation in this House of Commons that would weaken public safety and compromise the safety of police officers and Canadians by weakening gun control measures across the country.

The government likes to use this issue to try to drive a wedge between rural and urban Canada and has done so on many occasions.

I have been fortunate enough to be elected four times in a rural riding in New Brunswick. The largest town in my riding is probably Sackville, which has about 5,000 people. The rest of my riding consists of small towns or unincorporated areas that do not have a municipal government.

So I have been elected four times in a rural riding and I have visited hunting and fishing clubs there. Where I live, in the Grande-Digue area of New Brunswick, the local hunting and fishing club organizes a community lunch once a month on Sunday morning. I have gone to it many times.

It is not true that our position in favour of registering all firearms means we are against the legitimate use of hunting rifles in parts of the country where hunting is a common sport.

The Prime Minister tries to use this issue to divide people. I can assure the House that the Liberal Party fully respects the legitimate use of firearms, whether for sport or by people who simply collect guns. We also value the lives of the people who are responsible for ensuring the safety of Canadians all across the country, including in rural areas, and who want us to keep the firearms registry.

The idea that rural areas are safe from threats to public safety and tragedies involving guns is also not realistic. Just a few months ago in the town in Shediac, where I have my riding office, someone died as a result of a crime. Three people entered a house and killed a young man with a hunting rifle. Criminal charges were laid a few weeks ago and the case is now before the New Brunswick courts.

Public safety definitely matters to people in the town of Shediac, New Brunswick, on the banks of the Northumberland Strait, just as it interests people in such big Canadian cities as Vancouver, Toronto, Winnipeg or Montreal. We are all affected by measures to improve public safety, but it is in the interests of us all to preserve a balance between the legitimate use of firearms and the need to have a full and complete registry that is used more than 9,400 times a day by Canadian police officers who need to consult the registry for their own protection and to conduct criminal investigations.

The Liberals are interested and will always be interested in ways to improve the registration process for firearms. We acknowledge that over a number of years there have been some improvements but there can continue to be ways to make registration easier and simpler for those who legitimately have firearms that are not prohibited weapons for legitimate purposes.

To have an interest in seeing how we can improve the firearms registry for those who apply to have firearms registered is as legitimate as the desire to want to preserve the integrity of the firearms registry and not allow an amnesty, which is an irresponsible back door measure to do what the government does not have the courage to do legislatively, which is weaken the firearms registry across the country.

We spend a lot of time in the House talking about public safety and about ways improve criminal legislation. We have seen a number of examples where Liberals have worked with other parties in the House and the government to make amendments to the Criminal Code that will improve public safety.

Yesterday, the House passed Bill C-25 at second reading and it will now go before the justice committee. That was important because it would reduce the two for one remand credit which will improve public confidence in the justice system. We also supported Bills C-14 and C-15. Yesterday evening, I, along with my colleague who chairs the justice committee and committee members, passed Bill C-14 without amendment and it will be referred back to the House. That bill attacks some of the difficult problems of organized crime. It would the police increased ability to lay criminal charges to deal with some of the tragedies in some of the difficult situations that we have seen in places like Vancouver.

On this side of the House, the Liberals are very interested in working in ways that are responsible, balanced and recognize the importance of Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms but we also recognize that the Criminal Code needs to be modernized and strengthened and to give police officers and prosecutors the tools they need to preserve and improve public safety.

One of those tools is a national system of gun control. Canadians across the country support the idea that there should be effective gun control measures in the country. Much to the chagrin of Conservative members, that includes, in the opinion of police officers and police chiefs, the registration of all firearms in Canada as an essential tool in the pursuit of improved public safety.

Our hon. colleague from Marc-Aurèle-Fortin was right to introduce this motion and we intend to support it.

We will be supporting this motion when it comes before the House for a vote because we will not play the games that the Conservative Party wants to play in pretending that this is a great divide between rural and urban Canada.

I stand before the House, as a member elected in a rural riding, as living proof that the people in my riding support effective gun control measures and understand that when the police officers across the country say to us that this is one of many tools they need to improve public safety, we should be careful before acting in an irresponsible way that would diminish and reduce something that I think we all share as a desire to have safer communities, safer homes and safer streets all across the country.

Truth in Sentencing Act

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for St. Catharines.

It is a privilege for me to speak to Bill C-25, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (limiting credit for time spent in pre-sentencing custody).

As members may know, my riding of South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale has been directly affected by the shootings and gang war that has erupted in the Lower Mainland. My constituents are extremely concerned about the ongoing violence and complete disregard gang members have in our community. As the police have clearly indicated, much of this gang warfare is directly related to the drug trade. The guns being used are often smuggled across the border and purchased with the profits from the drug trade, or traded for drugs. Ensuring truth in sentencing, as Bill C-25 would help do, is an important step in ending British Columbia's gang war.

Every member of Parliament brings some experience in other professions and trades to his or her job here. Before I was elected, I served as an attorney for the B.C. legal services. I saw firsthand the impact drugs are having on our young people. I saw firsthand how many young people would turn to a life of crime to feed their drug habits and addictions. Drugs are often the gateway to crime for many career criminals. That is why I feel so strongly that we need to crack down on those who attempt to profit at the expense of our young people. Ensuring that drug pushers and gangsters serve a sentence that matches the seriousness of their crime is an important part of combatting the drug trade.

Upon taking office, our government committed itself to tackling crime and making our streets safer. Our commitment included preventing courts from giving extra credit for pretrial custody for persons denied bail because of their criminal record or for having violated bail.

Under the current system, courts typically take into account certain factors, such as overcrowding in remand centres, lack of rehabilitative programs commonly available in sentence custody, and the fact that time spent in remand does not count toward parole eligibility. This has resulted in courts traditionally awarding a two-for-one credit for time served in pretrial custody.

Now, on rare occasions, the credit awarded has been as high as three for one, especially where the conditions of detention were poor, for example, because of extreme crowding. Although also rare, credit has sometimes been less than two for one where offenders were unlikely to obtain early parole because of their criminal record or because of time spent in remand as a result of a breach of bail conditions.

The general practice of awarding generous credit for time spent in pre-sentencing has resulted in correctional authorities straining to cope with the growing number of people who are held in remand. In many cases, the population in remand centres now exceeds the population found in sentence custody in Canada's provincial and territorial jails.

Provincial attorneys general and correctional ministers have expressed concerns about the growing number of people being held in custody prior to sentencing. They strongly support limiting credit for time served as a way to help reduce the growing size of their remand population. Concerns have also been expressed that this practice has been abused by some accused who delay their trials and sentencing to earn double credit for the time spent in pretrial custody, thereby reducing their sentence.

Canadians have told us loud and clear that they would like to see more truth in sentencing.

I want to refer to a case that happened just last month in Toronto. A man convicted of manslaughter in the death of a nearly one-year-old baby found with 38 wounds was sentenced to six and a half years in prison. However, given that he has already served three years in pretrial detention since he was arrested for this killing, the two-for-one credit will guarantee that he is out on the streets within six months of his conviction.

One way of achieving truth in sentencing is to bring the practice of giving double time credit for pretrial custody to an end.

We are listening to the Canadian public in proposing this legislation. It would provide the courts with greater guidance in sentencing by limiting the amount of credit that courts may grant to convicted criminals for the time they served in custody prior to their sentencing. Bill C-25 would limit the credit ratio to two for one in all cases. However, where circumstances justify it, courts would be able to award a credit of up to one and a half days for every day spent in pre-sentencing custody. In such cases, the court would be required to provide an explanation for those circumstances. These circumstances are not defined in the bill. This is so the courts would have the discretion to consider on a case-by-case basis whether the credit to be awarded for the time spent in pre-sentencing custody should be more than one for one.

For example, we would expect a credit ratio of up to 1.5 to one would be considered where the conditions of detention and remand are extremely poor, or there is a complete absence of programming, or when the trial is unduly delayed by factors not attributable to the accused. However, where accused are remanded for having violated bail or because of their criminal record, the credit would be limited to one day for every day spent in pre-sentencing custody no matter what the remand conditions are.

As a result of this initiative, more offenders would now have a federal sentence of two years or more, and an increased number of offenders who would likely have been sentenced to a federal penitentiary would be spending longer time in federal custody. From a rehabilitation perspective, this time in the federal system would present the opportunity for longer term programming that may have a positive impact on the offender.

Bill C-25 also proposes to require courts to note the sentence that would have been imposed without the credit, the amount of credit awarded and the actual sentence imposed. This requirement would result in greater transparency and consistency and would improve public confidence in the administration of justice.

The proposed legislation is part of a series of criminal justice bills that has been introduced since we took office to help ensure the safety of Canadians. To make Canada safer, we have enacted legislation to get violent and dangerous criminals off our streets. We have cracked down on sexual predators, dangerous offenders and those who use guns to commit crimes. We have given the police more tools and resources to combat crime and to deal with those who drive while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

In the current session we have introduced Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (organized crime and protection of justice system participants), which will provide law enforcement officials and the justice system a better means to address organized crime related activities, in particular, gang members and drive-by shootings.

Bill C-15, An Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts, was introduced on February 27. It would provide for mandatory jail time for those who produce and sell illegal drugs. The reforms would, however, allow a drug treatment court to suspend a sentence while an addicted accused took an approved treatment program.

We have also introduced legislation in Bill S-4 to provide law enforcement officials with the tools they need to protect Canadian families and businesses from identity theft.

We will continue to introduce legislation to strengthen the justice system. Bill C-25 is an important contribution to this objective.

I appreciate the support of our provincial and territorial partners for this legislative amendment to provide greater truth in sentencing. I can only hope that we can also count on the support of the opposition parties, who have so often stood in the way of any bill that would actually reflect truth in sentencing.

I note the Liberal member for Vancouver South, who has been a loud critic of this government on law and order issues, recently criticized our approach to the issue of sentencing. In the Vancouver Sun on March 26 he is quoted as saying:

If they were genuinely concerned about public safety, they would have actually gone through the system, including corrections and parole board, and attempted to deal with the issue of organized crime. I believe they have not done their job in that regard.

I have three things to say in response to the member, who is a lawyer and a former attorney general of British Columbia.

First, we have introduced four separate bills in the past two months that will help police and prosecutors to crack down on organized crime, and gang and gun war is being waged in the Lower Mainland right now. Will he and his party support those bills?

Second, since forming government in 2006, we have continually introduced legislation to better achieve truth in sentencing. His party opposed these bills in the House and in the Senate. It was not until the Prime Minister threatened an election that the Liberals finally agreed to allow this measure to pass. Why did his party oppose truth in sentencing for so long?

Finally, let us remember that the member for Vancouver South was elected in 2004 and appointed to cabinet. He said that he is concerned about organized crime. He said that he is serious about stopping gun and gang violence. Why was the legislation we are debating today not passed while he was still in power?

I would call on the member and all parties in Parliament to put aside the partisan rhetoric and join us in supporting this common sense legislation.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

moved that Bill C-25, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (limiting credit for time spent in pre-sentencing custody), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the government House leader for seconding this bill. It is very important legislation and is an important part of this government's agenda. We are opening debate on the truth in sentencing act. The amendments to the Criminal Code proposed in this bill will limit the credit that a court may grant a convicted criminal for time served in pre-sentence custody.

As some in the House may be aware, section 719(3) of the Criminal Code allows a court to take account of the time a convicted criminal has spent in pre-sentencing custody in determining the sentence to be imposed. The code does not set out any formula for calculating this credit, but the courts routinely give credit on a two-for-one basis. In many cases the courts give credit on a three-to-one basis. In other words, for every day a convicted offender has spent in remand, the court will deduct from the sentence it otherwise would impose, two or three days.

Explanations for the length of a sentence are usually provided in open court at the time of sentencing. However, judges are not required to explain the basis for their decision to award pre-sentence credit. As a result, they do not always do so and this deprives the public of information about the extent of the pre-sentence detention. It leaves people in the dark about why the detention should allow a convicted criminal to receive what is most often considered to be a discounted sentence. This creates the impression that offenders are getting more lenient sentences than they deserve.

There is a concern that the current practice of awarding generous credit for pre-sentence custody may be encouraging some of those accused to abuse the court process by deliberately choosing to stay in remand in the hope of getting a shorter term of imprisonment once they have been awarded credit for time served.

For ordinary Canadians, it is hard to understand how such sentences comply with the fundamental purposes of sentencing, which is to denounce unlawful conduct, deter the offender from committing other offences and protect society by keeping convicted criminals off the streets.

The practice of awarding generous credit erodes public confidence in the integrity of the justice system. It also undermines the commitment of the government to enhance the safety and security of Canadians by keeping violent or repeat offenders in custody for longer periods.

Those who defend the current practice note that credit for pre-sentence custody compensates for the fact that the time a convicted criminal has spent in remand does not count toward eligibility for full parole or statutory release.

At present, a prison inmate is eligible for full parole after one-third of the sentence has been served. If parole is not granted, that same inmate will likely be set free on statutory release at the two-thirds point in the sentence. What this means in practice is that if someone is released on full parole at the one-third point in the sentence, every day he or she has served in prison will have counted, in effect, for three days.

If parole is denied and at the same time a person is set free on statutory release at the two-thirds point in the sentence, every day he or she has served in prison will have counted, in effect, as a day and a half.

The current system of presumptive release that currently underpins Canada's approach to corrections has recently been the subject of an exhaustive review by an independent panel. This panel's report entitled “A Roadmap to Strengthening Public Safety” was delivered by my colleague, the former minister of public safety, in October 2007.

Among other things, the independent review panel recommended that statutory release be entirely eliminated and that Canada move toward a system of earned parole. The goal is to encourage prison inmates to sincerely apply themselves to the rehabilitative programs available to them in prison.

The practice of awarding generous credit for pre-sentence custody cannot rest on the foundation of a statutory release and parole system that has itself been subject to strong and impartial criticism and that may therefore be significantly changed in the future. However, those who defend the current practice note that the generous credit for pre-sentencing custody is also designed to take into account such factors as overcrowding and lack of rehabilitative programming for inmates in remand centres.

I have received many letters and representations from concerned Canadians on the issue of pre-sentencing custody credit. All too often they cite situations where violent offenders are set free after having served a relatively short prison term because a court has awarded them two or three to one credit for pre-sentence custody. One writer commented that if one of the purposes of incarceration is to reform criminals, then the current practice of awarding two for one is a dismal failure. He writes:

The rationale is that the criminal has been deprived of the benefits of programs that would be made available to him in a regular penitentiary. So, in addition to releasing him back into society without these rehabilitating programs, we send him out twice as fast.

It is hard to disagree with that.

Not only does the current practice deprive offenders of the prison programs that might help to keep them out of jail in the future, it also fails to punish them adequately for the deeds that led to their convictions in the first place. This is especially the case of those offenders who have been denied bail and sent to a remand centre because of their past criminal records or because they have violated their bail conditions.

Bad behaviour should not be rewarded.

This government is on record as having pledged to address this issue, something that the bill would do. We have tabled Bill C-25 to strictly limit the amount of credit the courts may grant to convicted criminals for the time they have served in custody prior to their sentencing.

Our government is following through on its commitment to ensure that individuals found guilty of crimes serve a sentence that reflects the severity of those crimes.

This bill would accomplish a number of important objectives. It would deliver on our promise to provide truth in sentencing. It would help to unclog our court system and avoid costly delays and would do this by providing the courts with clear guidance and limits for granting credit for time served.

The Criminal Code amendments tabled on March 27 clearly stipulate that the general rule should be one day credit for each day served in pre-sentence custody. If circumstances justify it, credit may be given at a ratio of up to one and a half days for each day served. In such cases, however, the courts would be required to explain the circumstances that warrant departing from the general rule of one to one credit. This would allow the judge the discretion to award credit of up to one and half to one in appropriate cases. That being said, when it comes to offenders who have violated bail or who have been denied bail because of their criminal record, credit for time served would be strictly limited to a one to one ratio without exception.

I want to repeat that no extra credit would be granted under any circumstances for repeat offenders or those who have violated their bail conditions.

The proposed amendments would provide greater certainty and clarity in sentencing. It would require the courts to provide written justification for any credit granted beyond the one to one ratio. The courts would also be required to state in the record the amount of time spent in custody, the term of imprisonment that would be imposed before any credit is granted, the amount of time credited and the sentence imposed. Canadians would no longer be left wondering about how a particular sentence has been arrived at in a particular case.

Although sentencing issues are complex, they are issues of utmost importance to this government. We need to work closely with our provincial and territorial partners to deal with the many issues associated with sentencing reform.

Extra credit for time spent in pre-sentence custody is widely seen as one of several factors that have contributed to significant increases in the remand population in the last few years. This significant growth has put provincial and territorial institutions under considerable pressure.

Since 2007, more people have been held in provincial and territorial remand centres than were serving sentences in provincial and territorial jails. Overall, remanded accused now represent about 60% of admissions to provincial and territorial jails.

Several factors are at work that may contribute to the fact that the remand population is rising. Across Canada, court cases are becoming more complex due partly to the rise in the number of complex drug and organized crime related prosecutions. Many cases now involve 10 and 20 appearances before the courts. Longer processing times mean longer stays in remand.

For example, in 1994-95 about one-third of those in remand were being held for more than a week. Ten years later, however, those held for more than a week had grown to almost half of the remand population. This is a significant drain on resources at a time when the justice system is already under strain with an increasingly heavy workload.

Trials are becoming longer which also increases the amount of time an accused is remanded. All of this adds up to an increase in the remand population. The result is that offenders spend less time in sentenced custody because they spend too long in remand, which is why the provinces and territories welcome the reforms contained in Bill C-25.

Many of my colleagues and I stood with provincial attorneys general and solicitors general when our government announced the introduction of Bill C-25 on March 25. I was in British Columbia with the attorney general, Wally Oppal; the mayor of Surrey, Dianne Watts; the Vancouver police chief, Jim Chu; and other police representatives, including a member of the Canadian Police Association. This all took place at the Surrey remand centre. I was so pleased to be joined by a number of my colleagues who have been very supportive of this initiative and all of the initiatives that this government has taken to combat crime.

I hope I am not embarrassing him when I say that I was pleased to be there with the member for North Vancouver, and I thank him for his support. I thank the chairman of the justice committee, the member for Abbotsford, and one of the women who has been pushing this issue for quite some time, the member for Fleetwood—Port Kells. Mr. Speaker, you know of her commitment.

I was also pleased to be joined on that date by the member for Surrey North who has been very supportive of our criminal law agenda. Members will remember a number of occasions when she has posed questions to me during question period all related to getting tough on crime and sending out the right message. I thanked her on that day and I am pleased that she has joined with me again today. I know of her commitment in this area.

Since the day we made that announcement, we have had overwhelming support from attorneys general and solicitors general because they believe that Bill C-25 will help them cope with the growing number of accused who are awaiting sentencing while housed in their jails. They believe it will help them stem the tide of increased costs due to a growing demand, which is why the truth in sentencing bill is very important to them.

At a meeting of federal, provincial and territorial ministers held last September, my counterparts unanimously encouraged us to proceed with amendments similar to those seen in the truth and sentencing bill and they indicated that this was a top priority for them.

These are important reforms. Canadians have been waiting for a long time. Many say that offenders too often slip through the fingers of out justice system without serving adequate time. As a result, Canadians have been demanding change. They believe there must be more truth in sentencing and that the sentence one gets is the sentence one should serve. This approach set out in Bill C-25 would help restore the people's confidence in the criminal justice system. In the oft-repeated phrase, justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done.

This approach is also more consistent with the situation found in other common-law countries where awarding a credit for pre-sentence custody is far less generous than in Canada. One concern expressed by some critics is that Bill C-25 is unfair because it does not adequately recognize the pre-sentence custody that often occurs in overcrowded institutions that lack opportunities for education and treatment. It is not our intention that accused persons be encouraged to remain in remand any longer than is absolutely necessary. Rather, it is our intention that accused persons proceed to trial with as little delay as possible and, if convicted and given a custodial sentence, that they may be sent to prisons that are not overcrowded and offer more opportunities for education and treatment.

In that regard, my department has been working closely with provinces, territories and members of the bench and the bar to identify practical and effective ways to improve the efficiency of the courts to ensure they are able to meet the challenges now confronting them.

The approach taken in the truth in sentencing bill should encourage good conduct by accused persons while on bail and should encourage them to seek an early trial where possible and where appropriate to enter an early guilty plea. Above all, it would lead to greater clarity across Canada regarding the relationship between the sentencing posed on an offender and the credit for pre-sentence custody.

These changes are long overdue but late is better than never. Time and time again, Canadians have said that they want a strong criminal justice system. They want us to move quickly and decisively to tackle violent crime.

Our government is committed to protecting Canada's citizens and making those streets safer. We will continue doing what Canadians expect and deserve and that is making laws that will keep our communities and streets safer. We promised to tackle crime and strengthen security when we formed the government and we have kept our word.

Since we took office, we have brought forward several key pieces of legislation, including the Tackling Violent Crime Act, which, among other things, signals an end to lenient penalties for those who commit serious or violent gun crimes. Our government has a long list of accomplishments in tackling crime over the last two years. We passed legislation to increase penalties for those convicted of street racing. We passed legislation that ends house arrest for serious personal injury and violent offences, including sexual assault.

As members know, we recently brought in reforms to address the problems of organized crime, Bill C-14, and introduced Bill C-15 to provide mandatory sentencing for serious drug offences. On March 31, we introduced in the Senate Bill S-4, the bill to protect Canadians against the rapidly increasing crime of identity theft.

We are proud of those changes. We are standing up for Canadians who have urged us to get tough on crime. Canadians across the country have told us that they want us to take action on crime and, with this legislation, we are delivering. We cannot do this job alone. I greatly appreciate the support I have received from my provincial and territorial counterparts but more is needed. I call on all members of the House of Commons and members of the Senate to expedite the passage of this bill, indeed all the bills that are part of our ambitious justice agenda. Canadians are watching this and this is what they expect. I hope all members will agree that this is what Canadians deserve.

Criminal Code

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Party actually proposed that this bill and Bill C-15 go through all stages in the House and committee with no debate whatsoever. We found that quite incredulous. They were even trying to one-up the government on this one.

I find it quite outrageous that there is some kind of competition going on as to who can march this legislation forward more quickly, without any debate. These changes in the law are very serious. They warrant debate, both in the House and in committee.

On the question of gangs alone, there are many different perspectives out there in terms of what causes gangs, how they are manifested and whether changes in the law will be any kind of deterrent. There are real experts out there who have studied this kind of thing.

Does the Conservative government want to hear from those people? I do not believe so. Do the Liberals want to hear from those people? They wanted to rush it through committee.

We have an interest in hearing what some of those perspectives are and have genuine due diligence in dealing with this legislation. We think it is very important. We have signified our support for it. We are willing to have it go to committee. In fact, we knew all along that the bill would end today and go to committee.

All the theatrics we saw earlier today from the Minister of Justice were just that, theatrics, trying to score political points. It was going to committee anyway.

I think everybody should take it down a notch and get back to our real job, which is debating the legislation, making intelligent debate and ensuring there is a proper process at committee as well.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, first, the member is entirely incorrect. The fact is the government rolled back a negotiated, agreed upon collective agreement. We have laws in our country where we have free collective bargaining. The government has rolled back the time clock and labour rights that have affected the RCMP. We find that reprehensible.

The Conservatives also made a promise to put 2,500 more officers on the street. This is a promise on which they have yet to deliver.

After a while, year after year of hearing these kinds of promises, is it any wonder that people become very cynical in what they hear from the Conservative government and the fact that they do not trust the Conservatives any more?

The bill he referred to in his question has not yet come to the House. We are debating Bill C-14. We will be debating Bill C-15 next. If the member wants to know our position on a bill that has yet to come into the House, maybe he should stick around and he can hear that debate. We would be happy to participate in it.

Business of the House

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague, the House leader for the official opposition, for his multitude of questions.

First of all, as he indicated, today we will continue debate on Bill C-14, the organized crime bill. I would point out that it is thanks to the Minister of Justice, whose leadership this morning overcame an opposition tactic aimed at delaying Bill C-14 that we do have an agreement to move that bill forward. As a result of the minister's intervention, Bill C-14 will in fact be sent to committee at the end of today, pursuant to a special order of the House.

Tonight the House will consider a take note debate on the international conference on Afghanistan hosted by The Hague.

As I mentioned earlier, we adopted a special order for Bill C-14. Unfortunately that special order did not cover the second justice bill that is slated for debate today. In fact it is conceivable we would have already been into that debate had it not been for the delaying tactics of the opposition earlier this morning.

This is the bill that the hon. member referred to, Bill C-15, the drug offences bill. It is another key piece of our government legislation that will help curb gang violence, yet we do not see it moving quickly through the House. That said, I am hopeful we can complete the bill today or have it completed at the latest tomorrow, provided the NDP does not invoke another delaying tactic as it did this morning.

Following the drug offences bill, we have scheduled for debate Bill C-7, marine liability; Bill S-3, energy efficiency; and Bill C-13, the Canada Grain Act. All of these bills are at second reading.

On Monday, pursuant to a special order adopted yesterday, we will complete the third reading stage of Bill C-2, the Canada-EFTA free trade agreement bill. After considerable delay in this chamber, it will be nice to move that bill over to our colleagues down the hall in the Senate.

We will continue next week with any uncompleted business from this week, with the addition of Bill C-5 regarding the Indian Oil and Gas Act, which is at report stage and third reading stage, and Bill C-18 regarding RCMP pensions, which is at second reading. We will add to the list any bills that are reported back from the various committees.

Tuesday, March 31 shall be an allotted day.

In reference to the upcoming justice bills that the member might be referring to when he referred to the remand legislation, he is going to have to stay tuned. We will be bringing that forward very soon. I am sure he will be very pleased with the result and will want to move very quickly once it hits the floor of the chamber.

As he knows, the government is very transparent when it comes to government expenditures, including the upcoming expenditures of the accelerated economic stimulus contained in the $3 billion under vote 35. All of that of course will be revealed to the Canadian public and to Parliament in good time as we make those investments on behalf of Canadians from coast to coast.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the House was pleased earlier today to deal very efficiently with Bill C-14, and by the end of government orders today, that bill will be deemed carried at second reading and referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, a very good illustration of how the opposition is tangibly moving forward an agenda with respect to public safety.

I wonder if the government House leader in his remarks about the agenda for the rest of this week and next week would indicate what timing he has in mind for that other piece of legislation, Bill C-15, dealing with other portions of the government's justice plan.

I wonder if he could also tell us when we will see the details of the legislation on remand. That was expected either today or yesterday, but I do not believe it has yet been tabled or introduced, and it would be important to know when that bill will be coming forward.

One final matter. According to an opposition resolution duly adopted by the House, the government should table, by April 3, next week, a list of departments and programs, not projects, I hasten to add, which are likely to require access to Treasury Board vote 35 in the main estimates.

The government has a draft list of the programs and departments. The Auditor General says that this request from the House of Commons is perfectly reasonable, and I wonder when the government would be prepared to table that list in response to the motion which was adopted by the House of Commons.

Criminal Code

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Madam Speaker, this is the first time I have had an opportunity to speak to the House when you have been in the chair. I congratulate you on your appointment as Acting Speaker.

I am very happy to speak on behalf of the Liberal opposition on Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (organized crime and protection of justice system participants).

Let me be very clear at the outset: the Liberal Party will be supporting Bill C-14. In fact, the Liberal Party offered to work with the government to expedite the passage not only of Bill C-14, but of the companion Bill C-15, which amends the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. We see this debate as important, but we also see a need to be expeditious and to ensure that these measures are adopted in due course, without undue obstruction or delay.

The Liberal Party views the improvements brought in Bill C-14 as modest measures. We see them as needed to address the real concern for public safety, particularly in communities that have seen the devastating effects and associated violence of organized crime, most recently in Vancouver. We think the government could have gone further in a number of measures. I will be addressing those in a few minutes.

Basically, Bill C-14 seeks to make four changes. It changes the sentencing provisions of the Criminal Code so that every murder committed in connection with a criminal organization is to be considered first-degree murder, regardless of whether there was premeditation. It creates a separate drive-by shooting offence, with a minimum mandatory sentence of four years.

The minister likes to talk about creating this important drive-by shooting offence. If he is honest, he will hardly be able to say that it is a glaring hole in the Criminal Code at present. Anybody who engages in such reckless criminal behaviour as a drive-by shooting surely would be facing severe criminal penalties now. However, if the bill provides a measure of assurance to the public that there would be a separate offence with a four-year mandatory minimum sentence, the Liberal Party sees that as reasonable.

Bill C-14 also creates mandatory minimum sentences for the offences of assault with a weapon and aggravated assault on a peace officer, and it seeks to protect others who work in the criminal justice system, including prosecutors and judges. It extends the duration of recognizance by two years for a person who has previously been convicted of a gang-related or terrorism offence or who is suspected of planning a similar offence.

We in the Liberal Party recognize that the measures in Bill C-14 are modest, but necessary to reassure the public, which is increasingly concerned about public safety in certain communities. Vancouver, recently, and, in the past, Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg and even Halifax, in the Maritimes, where I come from, have had problems with gangsterism and organized crime. This is a real concern for people.

To some degree, the Prime Minister and the minister himself, in their discussions on changes to the Criminal Code are always looking for confrontation. They try to turn the dicussions into partisan matters. They say the government supports these measures but that we in opposition keep trying to block, delay or prevent the passage of them. That is why I am pleased to be able to say the Liberal Party offered to fast-track passage of Bill C-14 and Bill C-15, two bills we will support.

It is often useful to examine a bill from the standpoint of what is not in it.

What specific items might the government have included in Bill C-14 that it did not put in?

We are particularly worried about the three requests the Government of British Columbia made. The Attorney General and the Solicitor General of British Columbia made these requests when they were in Ottawa a couple of weeks ago.

They met with opposition parties and members of the government. They asked Parliament to amend the Criminal Code to reduce the two-for-one remand credit. When somebody is incarcerated before a trial or a conviction because the person has been denied bail or chooses to waive bail and in fact is in a detention centre prior to a trial, often the courts will count the time spent in pre-trial custody as two days for every one day of a sentence, which leads to certain public consternation. When a sentence is ultimately imposed by the judge, the judge often reduces the sentence by a large factor for pre-trial custody.

In the view of the Government of British Columbia and in our view, that can be reduced. We can legislatively restrict the ability of the courts to allow for that two-for-one credit. We are told that in some jurisdictions, it can be as high as three for one, and we think it has become an abuse of the justice system.

The Government of British Columbia also asked for improvements to lawful access and to modernize investigative techniques. Often members of organized crime have the latest communications equipment and the most sophisticated electronic communications. Our laws with respect to search warrants and electronic surveillance have not kept up with this new technology. Improvements can be made to criminal legislation to allow police, when they get a search warrant, to be able to gain access to communications on cellphones, in emails or on wireless communication devices such as BlackBerrys.

My colleague, the Liberal member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, has a private member's bill that seeks to do exactly this. A Liberal bill introduced by the previous Liberal government in 2005 sought to modernize investigative techniques. There again the government chose not to move on that.

The government may decide to introduce legislation to deal with the remand credit, to deal with modernizing investigative techniques, and to look at the issue of disclosure, which has become a huge burden on provincial justice systems. These are the three things we heard the Attorney General of British Columbia cite as being priorities to deal with the crisis there. If the government decides to move on those issues, we would work with it to expeditiously pass reasonable measures to deal with those issues as well.

We were somewhat disappointed by Bill C-14 and have described its measures as modest, because the bill is silent on these improvements.

One of the difficulties we have also with the Conservatives' approach to criminal justice is that they obsessively focus on the back end of the problem. They like to talk about more severe punishment. They like to talk about stiffer sentences.

Those improvements have their place in a criminal justice system, and we acknowledge that if they are balanced and reasonable, we can in fact improve criminal legislation to deal with the worst offenders and the most serious crimes.

However, what they never talk about is the other part of the criminal justice system: prevention.

The Conservatives like to have a policy that punishes the offender once there is already a victim, instead of taking increased steps to work with police, community groups, provincial governments and not-for-profit groups that want to do things in the community to try to reduce and prevent crime before there is a victim. In cases of organized crime, victims often face tragic consequences, including serious violence or loss of life.

If one talks about getting tough on crime, one has to accept that we also need, for example, to work with provincial governments on difficult issues such as mental health and addictions. If there is a great shortage of in-patient addiction facilities in my province of New Brunswick and an inadequate mental health system to deal with criminal justice circumstances, then communities are not as safe as they could be if the Government of Canada worked with the Province of New Brunswick and other provinces to meet their specific needs.

The Province of New Brunswick is looking at setting up a drug court. In certain cases involving drug addicts who have not participated in organized crime or violent offences, such a court may offer a sentencing regime that will deal with the root cause of their criminal activity, their addiction, and thus make the community safer by bringing about treatment and, hopefully, a cure for somebody who faces something as difficult as a serious drug addiction.

These are important elements of a criminal justice plan as well, but the government consistently fails to advocate in favour of greater resources for police or greater resources to help provinces with a shortage of crown prosecutors, or to work with provinces to improve mental health services, addiction services or youth programs, which are often essential in improving the security of a community.

We consider these matters just as important as the legitimate desire of the public to have teeth added not only to the Criminal Code but particularly to the sentences given criminals who commit the most serious crimes.

Instead of introducing a number of measures at once, the minister insists on bringing us his bills one at a time. Is it because the Conservatives have nothing else on their legislative agenda? Is it because they are still trying to make criminal justice announcements to override the bad economic news Canadians now read and hear about almost daily? We do not know, but if the Conservatives insist on turning these matters into partisan debates, they will end up undermining their own idea of passing bills to improve public safety.

I will conclude by saying every member of the House must accept the responsibility to improve the safety of all our communities. I represent a rural community in New Brunswick. The largest town is probably Sackville, New Brunswick, where Mount Allison University is located. It has a population of around 5,000 people. Other members in the House represent some very large metropolitan areas, some of Canada's largest and most dynamic cities, and they are seeing very difficult challenges around organized crime and violent crime.

I say that if we work together cooperatively in a balanced and measured way, we can collectively make improvements to criminal legislation that will make communities safer. At the same time, we can respect the individual rights of Canadians and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. We can also do a lot more around preventing crime, as well as around preventing victims from being created and thus having to punish an accused person.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, if I took all 18 minutes, I am still not sure it would be enough. I get so excited when I talk about this subject.

Before the break I was talking about how difficult the challenges are when gangs get into fights with each other and the resulting human loss. The impact goes beyond the criminal subculture. In recent years there have been too many incidents where innocent Canadians have been killed as a result of gang activity. We have come to know their stories very well. For the most part, these victims lived and worked in our major cities, in Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto and Montreal. These tragedies remind us that the threats we face are very real.

During my visit to Vancouver a couple of weeks ago, I met with law enforcement agencies. They were very supportive of this organized crime legislation, as well as its companion piece, Bill C-15, the mandatory minimum prison sentences for drug offences. However, the officials did ask me to continue to do more. I have heard their requests. As a response, I have indicated to them that once we get these pieces of legislation passed, we have more. Indeed, today I introduced amendments to the Anti-terrorism Act to give law enforcement agencies the tools they have demanded over the years to combat terrorism in this country.

We must remain vigilant to ensure our citizens are protected from the full range of activities engaged in by organized crime. We take these threats seriously and view ensuring the safety and security of our people as one of the highest responsibilities of our government. Canadians are rightly concerned and they want action. In a 2007 survey on this issue, Canadians indicated that they believed organized crime is as serious a threat to Canada as terrorism. Nearly half of those surveyed indicated that they felt they were personally affected by organized crime. Approximately 89% of those surveyed know that organized crime is linked to drug trafficking. Just over half indicated that the new legislation was required to more effectively address organized crime.

Canadians are also voicing their concerns with their actions and their pens. Very recently, concerned citizens in British Columbia came together to publicly express their outrage with the gang violence that is impacting their lives. In short, they said that enough is enough. So, too, have the residents of the Hobbema reserve in Alberta. I have received letters from concerned residents there urging me and our government to take decisive action to address the threats that gangs are posing to their communities.

This government agrees that enough is enough and believes it is time to strengthen the criminal justice system so that offenders are properly held to account. Broadly speaking, this bill focuses on four areas: making gang murders automatically first degree; creating a new offence to target drive-by and other reckless shootings; fortifying the scheme for responding to assaults against police and other peace and public officers; and strengthening the gang peace bond provisions.

Taken together, these improvements to our criminal law will provide powerful new tools for law enforcement to respond to the destructive impacts that organized crime has on our communities. How will they do this? With respect to murders that can be linked to organized crime, we are proposing amendments that would automatically treat these cases as first degree murder regardless of whether they were planned and deliberate. These are, in my opinion, extremely important amendments.

I have already spoken of some of the innocent victims of gang violence, but I also want to provide some additional context on the seriousness of the issue. According to the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, in 2007 there were 117 gang-related homicides in Canada. In fact, gang-related homicides now account for approximately 20% of all murders in Canada. In British Columbia, I was told that that number is approximately 40%. This is to be contrasted with the fact that, for the most part, the homicide rate is decreasing in Canada. This troubling trend of gang-related homicides demands immediate attention.

Our proposed amendments provide two separate tests to address murders that are connected to organized crime.

First, if it can be established that the murder itself was committed for the benefit of, at the direction of, or in association with a criminal organization, then it will be classified as first degree murder even in the absence of planning or deliberation.

Second, if it can be established that the murder occurred while the person was committing or attempting to commit another indictable offence for the benefit of, or at the direction of, or in association with a criminal organization, then it will be classified as first degree murder. The person would have to be guilty of murder, of course, in the circumstances. I want to emphasize we are not talking about some form of constructive murder or raising manslaughter to murder in these circumstances. Rather, the effect of the provision would be to make any murder committed in the course of another criminal organization offence first degree rather than second degree.

A person found guilty of first degree murder is sentenced to a mandatory term of life imprisonment without eligibility for parole for 25 years.

These amendments to section 231 of our Criminal Code mean that police officers and prosecutors have another set of tools to treat gang murders as the extremely serious cases that they are.

We also are proposing that a new offence be added to the Criminal Code which would target drive-by and other intentional shootings involving reckless disregard for the life or safety of others.

I believe this new offence will be of immense benefit to those on the front line investigating and prosecuting many of these public shooting cases.

Currently offences available to prosecute these kinds of cases include careless use of a firearm or discharge of a firearm with intent to cause bodily harm. The negligence based offences do not appropriately capture the severity of a drive-by scenario which involves consciously reckless conduct.

Section 244 on the other hand requires proof that the firearm was discharged at a particular person with a specific intent to cause bodily harm, and this is not good enough. While more appropriate if the shooter does have a particular target, it can sometimes be difficult to prove a drive-by shooting scenario where the intent is to intimidate a rival gang, or in many cases the shooter may just be firing wildly without any particular target.

Our proposed offence will fill a gap in the Criminal Code and provide a tailored response to this behaviour. This new offence requires proof that the accused specifically turned his or her mind to the fact that discharging his or her firearm would jeopardize the life or safety of another person, and appreciating this fact, the accused still went ahead. Quite simply, these individuals just do not care.

Canadians should rightly feel outrage at the wanton disregard that is shown for their safety when members of organized criminal groups, such as street gangs, carry out drive-by or other reckless shootings. This kind of criminal behaviour is deserving of more serious penalties and we are prepared to accommodate that.

The proposed penalty scheme mirrors that of similar serious offences involving the use of firearms, such as section 244. This offence would be punishable by a mandatory prison term of four years, up to a maximum of fourteen years. The mandatory sentence would increase to five years if the offence was committed for the benefit of, or at the direction of, or in association with a criminal organization, or involved the use of a prohibited or restricted firearm, such as a handgun or automatic firearm.

In addition, repeat offenders in these circumstances would be subject to a higher mandatory penalty of seven years' imprisonment. It sends the message: five years the first time, but understanding that some people do not always get the message the first time, they get seven years in the hope that this will impress upon them the seriousness of their actions.

As is already the case in the Criminal Code, there is a listed class of serious offences involving the use of firearms. Under our legislation these serious offences would qualify as a previous offence for the purposes of the increased mandatory jail term. As is clear, this new offence would provide a powerful new tool to target not only drive-by shootings but any shooting which involves consciously reckless behaviour.

The third area of reform relates to assaults committed against police, peace and public officers and those who are entrusted with maintaining law and order and preserving public peace.

The Criminal Code currently treats some acts of violence committed against peace officers separately from the same acts committed against the general public. For example, section 270 of the Criminal Code makes it an offence to assault a police officer in the execution of his or her duties.

At the other end of the spectrum, section 231 of the Criminal Code automatically classifies the murder of a peace officer acting in the course of his or her duties as first degree murder, regardless of whether it was planned and deliberate. However, there are no offences covering the middle range of behaviour, which are assaults that involve weapons or cause bodily harm or aggravated assaults directed at these individuals. We are proposing to fill that gap in the Criminal Code's treatment of violent acts committed against police and peace officers by creating these two new offences. It is time that these changes be made.

The first offence would prohibit the assault of a peace officer involving a weapon or which causes bodily harm. This would be a hybrid offence punishable by a maximum of 10 years' imprisonment on indictment. The second offence would prohibit the aggravated assault of a peace officer. This would be a straight indictable offence punishable by a maximum of 14 years.

Taken together, these two offences along with the existing offences would create a complete and separate scheme within the Criminal Code to respond to violence committed against peace officers carrying out their duties. These amendments will address assaults not only on police officers, but on prison guards, wardens, border and coast guards to name just a few.

These amendments send out a clear message: assaults committed against law enforcement officers will not be tolerated. These attacks not only put the lives or safety of the individual officers at risk, they also attack and undermine the justice system more broadly.

In order to ensure that these offences are adequately punished, we have proposed amendments that would require a court, when sentencing an offender for any of the specific offences targeting assaults against police officers, to give primary consideration to the principles of denunciation and deterrence.

The same principle would also apply to cases involving the intimidation of justice system participants, including judges, prosecutors, jurors, and many others who play an important role in the criminal justice system. This conduct is expressly designed to undermine the rule of law and the justice system more broadly and must be strongly denounced and punished.

The fourth issue that is being addressed in this bill relates to the use of the recognizance order that is specifically aimed at preventing the commission of an organized crime offence, terrorist offence or intimidation of a justice system participant offence. Section 810.01 was first added to the Criminal Code in 1998 and its purpose, as with other recognizance orders, is the prevention of future harm.

Ten years later, in 2008, our government's Tackling Violent Crime Act was passed. Among other things, that legislation made changes to strengthen the recognizance provisions that address serious personal injury offences and certain sexual offences against children.

We are now proposing similar amendments to the gang peace bond provisions. Specifically, we are making changes to clarify that when imposing conditions as part of the order, a judge has very broad discretion to order any reasonable conditions that are desirable in order to secure the good conduct of the person before the court. This flexibility is extremely important because it provides those dealing with these persons with the framework they need to craft the most appropriate response to address the particular facts and circumstances of the case at hand. This helps avoid a cookie cutter approach and will result in more effective conditions being ordered. Any breaches of the conditions imposed will make the person subject to prosecution for the breach.

The second significant change we are proposing in this area relates to the length of the peace bond. Like the Tackling Violent Crime Act, we are proposing that the duration of the peace bonds be up to two years when it is established that the defendant has been previously convicted of an organized crime offence, a terrorism offence, or an intimidation of a justice system participant offence.

In the case of repeat offenders, 12 months was often not enough time and this would necessitate a prosecutor having to go back to court to seek a new order. This change will assist in that regard and thereby ease some of the burdens faced by those responsible for the administration of justice.

This bill includes a number of other supporting provisions that I will briefly highlight.

We are proposing to add the offences created by this bill and existing offence to section 183 of the Criminal Code in order to give police officers the ability to seek a wiretap authorization when investigating these crimes.

The bill would apply this to the two new peace officer assault offences, the new offence targeting drive-by and other reckless shootings, and the existing offence of discharging a firearm with intent to cause bodily harm. This will be welcome by police agencies across this country.

In addition, we are proposing to add new offences to the list of offences that are considered to be primary designated offences for the purposes of the DNA data bank.

I would be remiss in discussing these proposals if I did not acknowledge the tremendous level of co-operation between myself, my provincial and territorial counterparts, and the members of my own caucus. I have to say that the dialogue that I have had with them, the support that I have received from them and the encouragement they have received from their constituents to get behind these pieces of legislation has been very edifying and gratifying for me. A number of organizations, such as the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs, have supported a number of the recommendations.

Again, this is exactly what this country needs. These are steps in the right direction. As I indicated during question period and in the brief time I had prior to question period, this is just one of a number of measures that we are taking as a government. We also have the bill, which I call a companion piece to this, on drugs that sends out the right message to people who want to get involved with the drug trade. This is an important component of it.

When people ask me about this and about that, I always tell them that we have a lot more to do in this area and we are just the group of individuals who are prepared to do that.

Business of the House

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. House leader for the official opposition has many questions for the Thursday question and I will try to get to all of them.

Today we will continue debate on Bill C-14 on organized crime, which he mentioned. Following Bill C-14, we will consider Bill C-15, drug offences, and Bill C-16, the environmental enforcement act in that order.

Tonight we will complete the debate on the first report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

Tomorrow we will begin debate at third reading of Bill C-2, the Canada-European free trade agreement and continue with any unfinished business that carried over from today.

When the House returns from the constituency week, we will continue with the business from this week, with the addition of Bill C-9, transportation of dangerous goods, which was reported back from committee.

You can add to the list for the week we return, Mr. Speaker, Bill C-7, marine liability, Bill S-3, energy efficiency, and Bill C-13, Canada grains, which are all at second reading and any bills that have been reported back from committee by then.

As to one of the questions that the member specifically mentioned, the last day in this supply period shall be on Tuesday, March 24, when the House will vote on supplementary estimates C, interim supply and the interim supply bill. As he noted, it is a very important day as these are the resources necessary to provide the stimulus to which we have all been looking forward and which Canadians are greatly anticipating.

Hopefully, the Senate will have passed the budget bill, Bill C-10 by then. In fact, as my colleague mentioned, my understanding is the opposition has suddenly discovered the parts of the budget bill that pertain specifically to the extension of employment insurance benefits, which will come into effect immediately upon royal assent of Bill C-10, the budget implementation act. Therefore, rather belatedly, the Liberal senators have decided to work with the Conservative senators in the other place and get the bill passed expeditiously. I hope that takes place this afternoon. It would be therefore my hope as well that royal assent could take place as early as this evening and we would see that bill enacted as quickly as possible.

As to the reiteration of my colleague's support for Bill C-14 and Bill C-15, our two latest justice bills, I welcome his support and I appreciate that. We are open to moving these bills through all stages as quickly as possible. Failing that, we would look to put up a minimum number of speakers, as we have done on many pieces of legislation already in this session, to move legislation through as quickly as possible. The problem, as my hon. colleague well knows, is not with the official opposition on or of the Conservative Party, the Conservative government, but with the other two parties, which are unwilling to do so.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I have the usual Thursday question about House procedure for the next couple of weeks. We all know that next week is scheduled to be a week to work in constituencies.

Therefore, I would like to ask the government House leader specifically what he has in mind for tomorrow and then the week following the constituency work week. Specifically in that week, which day will he officially designate as the final allotted day in this supply period? That would be the day not just to deal with an opposition motion, but also the supplementary estimates and the appropriations act, dealing with interim supply. It is very important for the House to know in advance which day that will be.

Second, I would ask the hon. gentleman, again, if there would be a mood in the House, apropos some of the subjects dealt with in question period, to move expeditiously on Bills C-14 and C-15. It was over a week ago that the official opposition offered co-operation to expedite those two pieces of legislation dealing with gangs and drugs. We renew that offer today in order to move those items forward quickly.

Finally, with respect to Bill C-10, which is in the other place, as we understand the developments as of today, it is possible that the other place will today finish its deliberations with respect to the bill, at the initiative of the Leader of the Opposition. I would ask the government House leader if he could indicate when there will be royal assent arranged for Bill C-10. Would he expect that to happen tonight or tomorrow?

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for those questions. It just seems like every Thursday, the Thursday question becomes the Thursday questions and becomes a longer and longer list.

Yesterday, the House adopted the budget implementation bill, which is now before the Senate. I would take this opportunity to urge all senators to deal with the bill quickly so that the funds that are provided by it will begin to flow and to help our country and Canadian families weather this economic storm as quickly as possible.

Today, we are continuing debate on the opposition motion.

Tomorrow, we will begin debate on report stage of Bill C-2, the Canada-European free trade agreement, followed by Bill C-13, the Canada grains, and Bill C-7, marine liability.

Monday, March 9 and Tuesday, March 10 shall be allotted days. As to the last day in this cycle, I am pleased to announce that it will be sometime during that week after our constituency week when members return to their ridings.

On Wednesday, we will continue with the Canada-European free trade bill. It will either be at report stage or third reading, depending on the progress that we make tomorrow.

When the debate on Bill C-2 is complete, we will call for second reading debate on Bill C-14, the organized crime bill, and Bill C-15, the drug offensive bill.

As my hon. colleague knows, the official opposition House leader, there have been discussions with all parties and, at this point in time, despite the acceptance and, indeed, the willingness of the government to move forward with these two crime bills as expeditiously as possible, unfortunately that is not the case with all parties and therefore we will not be able to proceed as quickly as possible.

However, on behalf of all Canadians who are worried about their safety and who want to move forward with this type of legislation, I do thank the hon. member and his party, the Liberal Party, for their support to try to move these bills very quickly through the process.

Following the justice bills, we will continue with the uncompleted business schedule for tomorrow, plus the new bill that was tabled this morning, Bill C-17, An Act to recognize Beechwood Cemetery as the national cemetery of Canada. I understand there may be interest in expediting this bill. I would hope, unlike the justice bills, that perhaps we can get agreement from all four parties to move very quickly with this bill at all stages and move it through.

As to private member's Bill C-285, I am always interested in discussing ways in which we can move quickly with legislation. This government certainly is interested in getting action on behalf of Canadians as fast as possible on all legislation that will positively impact on their lives. I am always open to those types of discussions.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Mr. Speaker, as usual on a Thursday, I would like to ask the government House leader about his work plan for the coming week and for the week following the regular mid-March break.

In particular, the House is anxious to know when the minister will designate all three of the remaining supply days. The last supply day, as the House knows, is especially important because that will be the day upon which any interim supply bill, including the Prime Minister's request for an extraordinary $3 billion, will be dealt with. Therefore, we would like to know when that supply bill is coming.

Of course, five sitting days before the final supply day is the date upon which the government must table its first report to Parliament accounting for its fight against the recession. That last supply day date, therefore, is an important date for the House to know.

Secondly, would the minister commit today that his government will consider fast-tracking Bill C-285 standing on the order paper in the name of the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine? The bill deals with the modernization of investigative techniques in the fight against drugs, gangs and other criminal matters. It is one of the measures specifically requested urgently by the province of British Columbia. Therefore, is the government ready to expedite that bill?

Finally, could I ask if there is general consent in the House today to fast-track the government's bills, Bill C-14 and Bill C-15, also dealing with gangs and drugs so that they both could be passed here and sent to the Senate before the end of next week? Would there be unanimous consent to move these two bills quickly? If there is, the official opposition would be prepared to move the appropriate motion right now.