44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 2, 2023 10:00AM
- Feb/2/23 10:24:24 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I do not know if the member from Winnipeg spent any time speaking with police, but my remarks are fuelled by facts and police officers I have spoken to in Winnipeg and across the country. If he does not believe me, we can talk about Stats Canada. I do believe he believes in the institutions and the researchers in government, so I am going to assume he is going to take me at face value, but I am happy to share this with him afterwards.
In the 10 years Stephen Harper was Prime Minister, there was a decrease of 25.86% in crime per capita. A 26% decrease is a statistical fact. In those same stats, one can see a 32% increase in violent crimes since the member's leader has been Prime Minister. Those are the facts. The women who are concerned about riding public transit in Toronto, I do not think it is all in their head. Perhaps he does, but the stats show they are more at risk today than eight years ago, before the Liberal Prime Minister brought in all of his soft-on-crime policies and ensured that violent repeat offenders were let out on bail in our communities. We will stand up for them, unlike the Liberals.
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- Feb/2/23 10:26:56 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have two quick points. The member said a factually incorrect statement. Under Stephen Harper, the days spent in prison by an average individual in prison went from 126 days to 105 days, so he is factually incorrect on that part.
I am disappointed in the Bloc Québécois, actually, because in Quebec a woman was violently raped. She fought her rapist. She was violently raped by a man. How many days in prison did that rapist get for violently raping that woman? Because of Bill C-5 from the Liberal government, it was zero days. The Bloc Québécois party supported Bill C-5. Now her rapist will see zero days in prison because they allowed conditional sentencing for rapists. He is going to serve his sentence for violently raping that woman from the comfort of his home, so I will take no lectures from that member about being tough on crime and the results we are going to see.
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- Feb/2/23 11:57:59 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I cannot help but reflect on the fact that there have been at least three pieces of legislation brought in by the former Harper government with mandatory minimum sentences that have been struck down by the court. I guess the only way to go around that is either to rewrite the charter or use the notwithstanding clause. It seems that the Conservatives keep bringing forward legislation that is clearly infringing upon people's charter rights. Would the member be willing to share his thoughts on what a charter of rights developed by the Conservative Party would look like?
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- Feb/2/23 11:58:47 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for that question, which I will not take seriously. However, I think he raises a concern. We have seen this rhetoric about “tough on crime”, and we saw it implemented in Canada under the Harper government. Two things resulted from that. One was that, as the Supreme Court pointed out, most of the measures on the tough on crime agenda were unconstitutional and violated the charter. The second was that they were in place for a time in this country. What was the result of them being in place? Did crime rates plummet? No, they did not. Did the costs of the justice system and correction system skyrocket because of those measures? Yes, they did.
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- Feb/2/23 12:21:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we know that denying bail and using pretrial detention disproportionately impacts black and indigenous people and it makes it more likely that people will reoffend, not that he cares about indigenous peoples or colonization after meeting with the Frontier Centre leading residential school denialists. Just like his opposition to harm reduction, the member ignores the evidence when it conflicts with his ideology, including evidence coming out of the Canadian Public Health Association.
Instead of going back to Harper's tough on crime, which we know does not work, will the member support investing in crime prevention, like outreach, like a guaranteed livable income, like mental health—
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- Feb/2/23 1:05:22 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, one of the things the House has consensus on is wanting to stop illegal guns coming into Canada, especially from the United States, whether at my border point in Windsor, or other places in Ontario and across the entire country. In the past we saw the Harper administration cut out the integrated teams we had with the United States that were doing pre-investigations, joint task force analysis, and so forth.
The reason I am referencing that is, although it will always be partisan, the current Liberal administration has not actually graduated enough CBSA officers during the pandemic.
We want to have a solution. We are short about 800 officers from the pandemic alone. What is the government going to do to increase our officers?
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- Feb/2/23 1:06:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I had a conversation with the minister just this morning specifically about CBSA officers, and my belief is that we need to ramp them up.
However, I will go back to the member's original comment. Not only did Stephen Harper's government not move forward with laws, it actually cut the CBSA's budget significantly, reducing the number of officers, yet now they seem to be the ones standing here complaining about guns coming across the border. They were literally taking resources away from the CBSA at the time.
I believe that it is important to continue to see the graduation of those officers come through. As the member indicated, it has slowed down since COVID.
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- Feb/2/23 1:26:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, things always get emotional when we talk about crime, but facts are facts.
The streets of Montreal would be safer had Bill C-5 not been passed, for example.
Last week, we saw one of the harmful effects of Bill C‑5, which was passed before Christmas. An individual who committed aggravated sexual assault eight years ago was sentenced last week. There were many delays related to the court process, and Bill C‑5 was passed in the midst of all that. The sentence that the judge handed down was 20 months to be served in the community, whereas, in the past, that individual would have been jailed. Seeing what the judge had done, the Crown prosecutor said that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice had a lot to answer for to the victims.
Ever since this government took office eight years ago, I have been astounded by its total lack of sympathy for victims.
The Canadian Victims Bill of Rights was enacted during the Conservative era. My colleague, Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, then prime minister Stephen Harper, then minister of justice Peter MacKay, and Steven Blaney, who was also a minister, created the Canadian Victims Bill of Rights as a way to give victims of crime the right to be protected and informed. We know victims have been totally overlooked in recent years. Criminals are laughing at the justice system because they know that justice is much weaker now and they can commit crimes over and over without fear of prison time. It is victims who are living in fear, too scared to even file a complaint anymore because they know that nothing will come of it. The Liberals can say what they want, but facts are facts.
On this day of debate on our motion, we are not addressing the problem in a partisan way at all. When the premiers of all 13 provinces and territories ask for exactly the same thing and the police associations in Canada all ask for exactly the same thing, I would say it is because there is a problem.
I hope my colleagues in the Bloc Québécois will understand the approach we are taking today. As I said earlier, if anyone reads our motion carefully, they will clearly see that we are specifically targeting firearms offences, among others.
Say a criminal who commits an offence and is charged with a firearms offence is able to get parole easily and goes on to commit another firearms offence. If we asked Canadians if they thought that was okay, they would all say no. One of the problems with Bill C-75 is that it allows criminals to be released too easily. That is what we want to be fixed. We are asking that the situation that was created by passing Bill C‑75 be resolved to prevent recurring crimes.
As I said earlier, in British Columbia, 40 individuals were arrested 6,000 times in one year. That is unbelievable. In Canada, the group we are targeting amounts to a few hundred individuals. We are talking about 1,000 criminals at most. We are not talking about applying a law to every person in Canada who is facing any kind of charges. Rather, we are focusing specifically on the problem of criminals who commit firearms offences and dangerous repeat offenders. That is all we want, and we would like the Liberal government to show some understanding.
After eight years, this Liberal government needs to understand that we need more rules and that what we are talking about right now is a very valid issue. As I said, it is not a partisan issue when 13 provincial and territorial premiers from all parties are saying the same thing. These premiers are Liberals, Conservatives and New Democrats. I think it is perfectly reasonable.
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- Feb/2/23 1:31:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I made reference to a specific quote I put to the member before. It was coming from Statistics Canada, which says, “Following a large decrease in 2020, the property crime rate was the lowest it has been dating back to 1965.”
In fact, if we take a look at the murder rates, the most serious of crimes out there, we can talk about the first three years of Harper. There were 597, 614 and 611 homicides, compared to the first three years of this administration, when there were 611, 616 and 667.
If we listen to the Conservatives, one would think that everything is broken, that everything is falling apart, that people should be aware that crime is on the streets and that it is rampant, yet the facts, the reality, do not reflect what it is that the Conservatives are preaching.
Why is the Conservative Party using such an important issue, when one talks about victims and so forth, in order to raise money?
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- Feb/2/23 1:34:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague why the Conservatives left out illegal firearms and the border in this motion. It is quite shocking, frankly, given the fact we have such a dominance of this type of activity creating victims and problems in our country. I believe there is consensus in trying to work on this problem, maybe not how to get to it, but it is rather shocking the Conservatives did not do that, especially given that Stephen Harper, as the member referenced earlier, his former leader, actually cut the integrated system teams we had. These were men and women who did some of the proactive work to keep guns out and who worked with U.S. law enforcement to keep our streets safe. Why do the Conservatives not at least address what their failings were in the past by including it here and in the future?
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- Feb/2/23 3:43:03 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to make quick reference to a couple of facts that come from Statistics Canada.
In 2021, the violent crime rate did increase by 5%, while the property crime rate decreased by 1%. Following a large decrease in 2020, the property crime rate was the lowest it has been dating back to 1965. If we take a look at the homicide murder rates for the first three years of Stephen Harper's administration, there were 597, 614 and 611. In the first full years of this administration, there were 616, 667 and 662.
One would think, if one listened to the Conservatives, that the whole system is broken. It might need a nice little bumper sticker, but the reality is that there are some concerns, and we are working with the provinces. I will be able to elaborate more on that.
Could the member opposite tell me honestly if he believes that people on probation did not commit crimes when Stephen Harper was prime minister? How ludicrous is the Conservative argument today?
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- Feb/2/23 3:44:16 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what is ludicrous is the proposition that the member put forward.
We are not talking about Stephen Harper. We are talking about the current Prime Minister and the Liberal government. They have broken everything under the sun in the last eight years and are making our communities less safe.
Under former prime minister Harper, we did not have the cry of premiers of every province and territory. We did not hear from police chiefs. We did not hear from police unions. We did not hear from victims crying out for justice reform. If the member for Kingston and the Islands could be quiet for a second since I have the floor, not that member, then I will continue answering the question.
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