I’m honoured to be able to speak to this today. Many in this House who have been around here for a little bit would know that in my prior career, I practised law and spent a lot of time practising specifically criminal law. In fact, back in 2005, after being called to the bar, my first-ever position as a lawyer was as a staff duty counsel at Sault Ste. Marie courthouse, and I held that job for just shy of two years. I represented, from Monday to Friday, every single morning, every individual in bail court as the staff duty counsel. Every offender who got arrested and ended up in custody would be brought before the justice of the peace that following morning. I would speak to that individual and try to assist in the bail process.

My next position was as a crown attorney, and I spent a lot of time in the bail courts as well, but for that year I spent my time trying to have individuals held where it was in the interest of justice to do so. So I feel that I can come into this conversation with a bit of a different lens, having experienced bail with a very significant volume of cases, and certainly an appreciation of the process. I think one of the great challenges that I’ve seen specifically in the debate of this motion is that these are sometimes difficult legal concepts. Without having a great background in terminology like reverse onus; crown onus; primary, secondary, tertiary grounds for detention; and judicial interim release proceedings, sometimes things can get a little bit confusing.

I feel like, as members who have been elected by our communities representing specific political parties, sometimes we come into this arena—in fact, most times—and we’re wearing our jerseys, if you will. We take approaches for lots of different reasons. And when we have opportunities—and I have seen it; it’s a beautiful thing in this House when it does happen, when everybody can join hands together, and agree that we park politics. We park our politics because there is a common goal that we’re all after. I certainly have been an individual who has worn the stripes, and we all have. But I genuinely do believe, Madam Speaker, that this motion, this particular subject matter, is not a political one. This is really a tremendous—I hear the comments being made in the room, and I genuinely, for whatever it’s worth, with the greatest respect, don’t agree. I believe that this is not a political matter. When you look at what has happened in our judicial interim release provisions, specifically over the course of the last few years since Bill C-75 was enacted by the federal government back in 2018, what were already very difficult grounds to hold an offender in custody from a crown’s perspective—what was already hard became tremendously harder.

Interjection.

The bail provisions we have under section 515 of the Criminal Code outline the whole process of how an individual who appears before the courts can be released. And when you hear the term “crown onus,” virtually every offence—not all—is a crown onus situation, which means it is up to the crown in that particular instance to justify why the accused should be detained in custody. It is not up to the accused to demonstrate why they should be released. That’s what the reverse onus provisions are. If an accused comes before the court on a crown onus situation, which again is the vast majority of the cases, the justice of the peace, based on the written form of the law, must release the accused unless the crown has demonstrated that there are serious concerns on three grounds: primary, secondary and tertiary grounds.

Primary grounds are: Is there a concern that this person is not going to come back to court? One of the main things evaluated in that case is, do they have a fixed address in the community? Do they actually live there? Do they have roots?

The secondary grounds are the most common grounds where an offender is detained, and that is whether or not it is more likely the offender would commit another offence. Under those provisions of the Criminal Code, that is where usually you would see a detention and a justice of the peace, or a judge, in certain cases of capital offences or murder, must give a written decision that outlines why that person would be detained if there was to be a detention, because it is subject to a bail review process. That is at the Superior Court of Justice level.

I can tell you, Madam Speaker, from probably thousands of bail hearings I conducted from both sides of the dais that every—“every” is a bad way to put that; that’s an unfair statement. The vast majority of those cases where there was a detention order made, the detention was premised on secondary grounds, meaning risk of re-offense.

Tertiary grounds are a public interest ground, and there was an amendment that one of the members opposite yesterday brought forward and a lot of what was being referenced in that amendment was something that spoke to these tertiary grounds, public interest grounds.

One of the things that, as a little bit of a legal nerd I can be—my community of Sault Ste. Marie has the landmark case for determining tertiary grounds. It was R. v. David Hall. I actually spent a lot of time watching that murder trial when I was just a young student and I wanted to become a lawyer. I would go into the courthouse and watch proceedings, and that case was being dealt with at the time. Justice Gladys Pardu of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, one of Sault Ste. Marie’s own, wrote the Superior Court of Justice decision. She is presently a member of the Ontario Court of Appeal, something that in our legal community in Sault Ste. Marie we take great pride in—the only member of our bench who ever went on to the Court of Appeal. She was the one who wrote that decision in David Hall’s case. That essentially established that in certain cases, the public interest requires that a person be detained.

Now, why do I say all this? What’s the point? It’s because, as I said earlier, I think it’s important that we have some context of what it all means, what we’re here really talking about.

These provisions of the Criminal Code—and it is the Criminal Code of Canada. It’s right there in the name: “Canada.” It’s federal jurisdiction. It’s entirely up to the federal government to make changes to the Criminal Code so that we are, as provinces and the courts within these provinces, able to interpret that legislation, that law in order to deal with whatever the issue may be. Of course, right now, we’re talking about bail, judicial interim release.

When Bill C-75 was put in place by the federal government back in 2018, they made changes to the provisions of bail whereby they created a much more watered-down version of the code, specifically on that secondary grounds, where most people were captured because of a high propensity of reoffence.

Now, those provisions have been watered down so much so whereby the principle of restraint—a lot of people have referenced the principle of restraint here—says that an accused should almost always be released unless there’s clear evidence that they had committed a serious violent offence or that they would be at risk of committing a serious violent offence.

The “catch and release” verbiage that is now being used is really an accurate depiction, because for a police officer who would at one time arrest an individual—even if it was just a series of repeated property offences, they would often arrest that individual, bring them into custody and bring them to a bail court justice of the peace to make the decision as to what to do with this particular accused. In that setting, that accused would have a lot of work to do in a bail hearing context to establish that they had a plan. A plan could be, “You could release me on the deposit of a large sum of money on my own recognizance, and I forfeit my money if I don’t come back,” or a pledge of a lot of money. The most common thing you’ll see is where a surety is brought before the court. Most of the time, people would bring their mom or their dad, some close loved one, because that loved one has to now establish—because we don’t have that US system here. We don’t have Dog the Bounty Hunter or anything like that. We have sureties. Sureties pledge money before the courts. They make promises. They put plans before the courts, and then a court can determine whether or not, in weighing that plan, to release that accused.

What does it all mean? Under the current provisions of the Criminal Code, that police officer at that first instance, if it’s just a property-related offence and there is no serious violent offender allegations within that particular charge, must release that accused on an undertaking, meaning a promise to come back to court, and maybe an undertaking with conditions—where you’re alleged to have stolen from the mall, therefore you’re not going to be allowed to go back to that mall, or you had a domestic disturbance and you’re not allowed to speak to that individual or go to their residence anymore.

Those were the nature of conditions that now are the most a police officer can do, hence where the terminology “catch and release” comes from. It’s very immediate. It’s not bringing them before a court. Oftentimes, an individual isn’t even making it to a court because the police have no tools left to detain an individual and even bring them before a judge so that that judge or justice of the peace can make the decision. It doesn’t exist anymore.

If you look at what has happened here, this motion—and it’s a motion. Those of us who have served in this House for more than just this past—and quite frankly, even if you’ve been here just since the 2022 election, I still think you’ve had enough exposure at this point. All of us have. Those of us certainly who have been here longer than that can all appreciate that a motion is an action taken by us as elected officials to say something that we believe, to say something that we want to see done. If you look at the specific words used in this motion—and I would like to read it: “This House calls on the federal government to immediately reform the Criminal Code of Canada to address the dangers facing our communities and implement meaningful bail reform to prevent violent and repeat offenders from being released back into our communities.” It’s a sentence that is asking the federal government to help, to take control of that book that they are responsible for, the Criminal Code of Canada, that governs how judicial interim release happens, and to edit it accordingly so that incidents like the tragic death of Gabriel Magalhaes—it’s not going to be impossible that it would ever happen again, no, but we have to take measures to try. We have to take measures to try to protect people. That is our job. That’s all of our jobs.

If one Premier can call upon all Premiers and get them all to sign a letter in the expedited fashion that was done in this case—again, politics aside, the fact is what we are trying to do with the spirit of these words on this page I just read—the spirit is that we are all joining hands here in this House, we’re putting aside political stripes and we’re calling on the body that is responsible in this case to deal with the particular issue and asking them for help. We’re asking them to do the job that they were elected to do. It’s not politics, in my humble and respectful opinion.

If we don’t take some actions, these types of offences, these extremely egregious, deplorable acts, will continue to escalate, will continue to rise; and they have only done so since 2018. You haven’t seen an increase and a decrease, an increase and a decrease. You’ve seen a consistent increase in the nature of offences that are appearing before our courts. Because it takes a little bit of time—I was having a chat with our chief of police in Sault Ste. Marie, Chief Hugh Stevenson, and you could see that. It’s like a graph just gradually moving up because offenders are starting to understand that they can’t be detained. A lot of offenders are completely appreciating that if I commit an offence of property, and I do it as many times as I want, that police officer can’t do anything about it. He must release me.

They talk, Madam Speaker. Individuals in that world talk a lot. It’s quite incredible. I remember speaking with—especially when I was a duty counsel and I’d speak to every accused, sometimes they could tell me more about provisions of the bail court than I would already know, especially when I was new. They would often be able to give me an education in those early days because they get it. The more and more they come in and out of those courts and they hear what’s happening in the room and they’re talking to the other people in the cells, they come to learn a lot and they come to know what they can get away with. What is imperative is that they know when they’re talking, they’re going to come to realize that things have changed and that their chances of release are going to be minimized, that they’re going to be restricted. And then they’re going to think a little bit differently about certain offences they might commit.

The seriousness of a lot of the offences that are occurring today, police officers being ambushed, being murdered, people being killed—the amount of serious violent offences and the increase in them is terrifying, quite frankly. The fact that people are afraid to take public transit, the way things have been happening, it’s certainly something that needs rectification, but there are also offences that a lot of people would still be really happy to know are not going to be okay either, like property offences. For anybody who’s ever had their car broken into so someone could take change out of the vehicle, that’s also something that’s very, very difficult as well.

But at the end of the day—I have mere seconds to go—I really hope that my words have imparted some kind of demonstration that this isn’t about politics. This is about doing the right thing.

I’m pleased to join the debate. I’ve been sitting here for the last day and a half, listening to the debate very carefully, and I’d like to thank the members on the government side who are here from the committee, MPP Hogarth and MPP Kusendova, and earlier this afternoon—he made a good presentation—was MPP Saunderson.

I join you today, Speaker, as the Chair of the justice policy committee, and I take myself back to the day the committee was considering the recommendations, 12 recommendations in that report I had the pleasure of tabling in the Legislature approximately two weeks ago. At that time, I read out all the names of the members of the committee, including the official opposition and a representative from the independents. In fact, it was the House leader from the opposition.

We went through all the recommendations. Members of the committee spoke to the context of each recommendation and then we voted. All the hands went up on each recommendation, including the official opposition’s and the independent’s. All hands went up on the 12 recommendations. So here we are today discussing an amendment to the amendment to the motion that the member from Durham put forward, going forward.

The report that I tabled highlighted a number of reforms that needed to take place. The committee heard from a number of witnesses who talked about a number of aspects, including mental health. We can debate that as much as we want; we can debate housing, we can debate other aspects, but clearly the report that was issued approximately two weeks ago by the standing committee was a unanimous report. The committee all put their hands up, including the official opposition and the independent, allowing me, as the Chair of the committee, to bring forward that report. Speaker, it did not contain the motion that was brought forward by the member from Toronto Centre. It did not.

Let’s talk about the motion, as the House leader, the Honourable Paul Calandra, did yesterday. I’m going to quote him from Hansard, if I may:

“The amendment” from the member from Toronto Centre “says the following: ‘Delete everything after “implement”‘—so if we had agreed with this motion, we would be deleting ‘meaningful bail reform to prevent violent and repeat offenders from being released back into our communities.’ The NDP, the official opposition,”—who supported the report—“want us to delete that. Then they go one step further in also wanting us to delete any message to the federal government through the House and the Senate. They want us to delete that and then replace it with the following: ‘meaningful bail reform to more appropriately evaluate’”—stay with me, Speaker—“‘evaluate.’”

Who needs to evaluate any more whether a violent repeat offender should be denied bail and left in jail?

All the hands went up. All the recommendations were adopted. “Take the report and report it,” which I did—adopted absolutely unanimously.

Speaker, nothing is more important than public safety. We understand that our police services are the front line that keeps Ontario safe. As MPPs, and in my case as a former municipal politician for 13 years, that is the main underpinning of what we do as representatives of our community. Make no mistake, Speaker, on this side of the House, we have one message: We have the backs of everyone who keeps us safe, today and every day, and we will do absolutely everything we need to do to help keep Ontario safe.

Speaker, too many innocent people have lost their lives at the hands of dangerous criminals who should have been behind bars, not on our streets. Led by Premier Ford, all provincial and territorial governments have joined the call of countless law enforcement officials to write a letter asking the federal government to take immediate action to strengthen Canada’s bail system to better protect the public and Canada’s first responders.

Speaker, OPP Commissioner Carrique appeared before the Standing Committee on Justice Policy which, as I said at the beginning, I chair. He had this to say about bail reform, and he referred to the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, who passed a resolution in 2008 calling on the federal government to strengthen bail laws to protect the public “from those offenders who have clearly demonstrated their unrelenting willingness to engage in criminal behaviour that directly harms our citizens. This resolution called on the federal government to change bail and sentencing laws so chronic offenders are more effectively dealt with by considering their persistent criminal behaviour. As highlighted in the resolution, a minority of offenders commit most of the violent crime in Canada, and yet the dangerous nature of reoffending by these individuals is not adequately recognized in the current bail and sentencing practices. It is not acceptable that there has been no meaningful action taken to address the troubling and dangerous issues raised since 2008, and unfortunately, many innocent people have been victimized since....

“I strongly believe that Canadians deserve to live free from fear and protected from harm experienced at the hands of repeat violent offenders. Change needs to happen.”

Change, Speaker, needs to happen.

The commissioner concluded by saying, “As police officers, we understand the risks involved in going to work each and every day, but we do expect that the judicial and public safety framework will be in place to support us. Our officers and the public they protect deserve nothing less from their judicial system. Our officers, our community members and visitors to our province deserve to be safeguarded against repeat, known and violent offenders who are charged with violent and weapons-related offences while they are awaiting trial.” Our motion does that. We stand behind our police officers today and every day.

We also heard, as my committee members on the government side will attest, from the police associations representing thousands of police officers across the province who expressed their members’ frustration of what they see as a catch-and-release approach to bail.

The president of the Ontario Provincial Police Association read the following excerpt from an email he received from a retired sergeant who worked in northern Ontario, and it’s material to what we’re talking about today:

“Catch and release is a very appropriate phrase describing what is happening” out there.

“Over the many years, many of my officers have complained bitterly to me about having to apprehend the same criminals time after time when the criminals were once again released rather than being held in custody until their charges were dealt with.”

According to the president of the Police Association of Ontario, not only does the catch-and-release approach to bail place inadequate emphasis on protection of the public, it encourages escalating violent behaviour: “Our members are frustrated to work within a system that is not prioritizing community safety. They are frustrated by apprehending a known offender one day and being called on their next shift to the same place, for the same reason, to arrest the same person.... Too often, with each release, the offender’s behaviour is worsened and their negative choices emboldened, until the day comes that the individual becomes violent, or more violent, and the result is that someone in our community is injured or killed.”

Similarly, Speaker, Jon Reid, the president of the Toronto Police Association said that the members of the association are “beyond frustrated.” He related an incident from 2021 in which an armed bank robber seriously injured two plainclothes police officers during the arrest of suspects. One of the accused was released on bail within 24 hours, before both officers were released from hospital.

Commenting on this incident in an op-ed piece, Mr. Reid concluded, “‘If our bail system is designed and/or interpreted to justify releasing individuals in these circumstances, what message does this send to the community’ that they’re serving? The simple answer is this: It sends the wrong message to the people who protect our communities and those who seek to live in a peaceful and just society.” This immense and proven threat to public safety will continue to grow out of control without drastic and immediate reform to the Criminal Code of Canada.

Speaker, we’ve seen in communities across Ontario, across Canada, police officers come under threat. But, Speaker, you’ll know—and I know the committee members from the justice policy committee will attest to this as they speak later this afternoon—it’s not just about police officers. It’s about families, hard-working families here in Ontario. It’s about students. Speaker, I have two universities, Ontario Tech and Trent Durham, and I have a community college, Durham College. It’s about those students. It’s about new Canadians—the new Canadians who have come to the town of Whitby in five new developments. It’s about all kinds of people, Speaker, and what those people want and what families want. They want to live in a safe province of Ontario. They want to live in a safe Canada. That’s what they aspire to. That’s what they deserve.

I want to go back to what the Honourable Paul Calandra had to say on this debate, because I think it’s really material and I think he hit it right on, and I’m going to again repeat some of those aspects:

“The reason we’re having this debate here is to give them assistance in bringing the reforms”—what he was referring to was our police services. They’re bringing the reforms forward. “The reason why we’ve engrossed it to the Parliament, both the House of Commons and the Senate, is because we wanted them to hear a unified voice from the people of the province of Ontario”—I thought we had one. Speaker, I thought we had one. I think our committee members did. Our lead, the MPP from Etobicoke–Lakeshore, MPP Hogarth and I left that committee room thinking we had one—a unified voice. Well, here we are this afternoon, and we’ve taken a day and a half. Where’s the unified voice? Where is it? The hands went up. On every recommendation, the hands went up. The House leader from the official opposition was there. His hand went up all the time, didn’t it?

Here we are today debating an amendment to the amendment that never came up in the committee. How does that happen? How does that help our front-line providers? How does that help them? How does that help hard-working families in Ontario? It doesn’t. Again, I’m back to what the House leader had to say: “By removing and changing it to ‘evaluate,’ we’re in the exact same spot we’ve been in over the last number of years. We have to evaluate everything. What is there to evaluate?” Are we going to tell the OPP commissioner that we have to evaluate after he spent 20 minutes making a deputation? The police chief of the Toronto Police Service, from York—that we have to evaluate? What does that accomplish? Absolutely nothing.

You know, I think if I walked the streets in the town of Whitby tonight, the downtown core—they talk about it as the “four corners,” but it’s sort of a gathering centre, right? I think that’s true of most municipalities. If I stopped a couple of people and said, “I want to ask you something, should a repeat violent offender be let out on bail?” I know what they’d tell me real quick: “No, they should not be let out on bail.” That’s what we’ve been talking about. That’s what I thought we had consensus about. Did you not think that? I sure did. So then we get this amendment out of—I don’t know where it came from. It was never discussed for two and a half days; it just appeared.

But I want to be very clear. I want to be absolutely clear, Speaker, as was the honourable Paul Calandra, our House leader, who does an exceptional job. Let me be clear also as the Chair of the justice policy committee—and thank you, Minister Calandra, for that appointment. My committee members here on the government side will be equally clear—some of them are getting ready to speak too. We will absolutely not under any circumstances support the motion that would diminish what the people of this great province want.