Mr. Speaker, I would like my colleagues opposite to listen to what I have to say. I hope you will forgive me at once, Mr. Speaker, if, in the course of making my argument, I refer to you as “your honour” because my 25 years of practising criminal law will have shown through and caused me to err in that.
In fact, Mr. Speaker, I would be showing you respect because if I were to call you “your honour”, your salary would increase by nearly $100,000. This is why we have judges who, as a matter of conscience and in the work they do every day, are able to decide the appropriate sentence for any individual appearing before them. There is a fundamental flaw in the bill before us; Bill C-27 is making a big mistake and the party in power must realize that. If we have to, we will defeat it before it even reaches second reading because this bill seeks to punish crimes, not individuals. Allow me to explain.
When an accused person appears before the court, he is accused of an offence and must answer for his actions and, of course, his offence. Let us take, for example, one of the offences this bill seeks to punish: attempt to commit murder or invitation to sexual touching. Actually, take any one of the offences mentioned in the bill. If we take attempt to commit murder, the individual who appears before the court must be sentenced.
The party opposite is forgetting one of the fundamental principles: the sentence must be individualized. I repeat, Mr. Speaker, it must be individualized. This means that the judge addresses the individual and hands down a sentence that takes into account the sentencing criteria established by the courts of appeal and the Supreme Court. For the information of my colleagues opposite, these are called “sentencing principles”.
We humbly believe that this bill is contrary to all those principles, because what the Supreme Court has said over and over, and will say again if this bill has to end up before the Supreme Court, is that a sentence is unique. It must be addressed to the individual who is before the judge. That is not what this bill is trying to do. What this bill is trying to do is make it so that if an individual is convicted of a serious crime for the third time, he or she is then “out” for life. The person is in prison.
That is not what must be done. It is unacceptable to think like this. Yes, there really are dangerous criminals in society. But saying that is not a solution to all our problems. We have to make it so that people who do not deserve to live in society are excluded from society, for as long as possible, when they exhibit such little respect for the laws of this country and continually reoffend.
We have before us a bill that goes even farther, in that it reverses the burden of proof. I am going to provide some further explanation for my colleagues opposite. One of the most important principles, as stated by the Supreme Court and by the Privy Council in London, a principle that is the backbone of the legal system, the criminal justice system, in Canada, is that the Crown has the burden not only of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that an individual is guilty, but also of showing what sentence must be imposed on the individual.
What this bill is trying to do is to reverse the burden of proof. I can tell this House, from experience, that it is unlikely that the Supreme Court will give this bill its approval, for more than one reason. First, and particularly, because of section 16 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which our good Prime Minister prides himself on his respect for. He is not respecting it with this bill. He is placing the burden of proof on the accused.
It seems to me that we did a good job. In fact, the Bloc Québécois was not always opposed to this bill. The evidence of that is that as recently as yesterday I was saying to this House that Bill C-22 was a good bill. The people on the other side of the House can get things right. I will keep saying it: unfortunately, they are trying to punish the crime rather than the individual who committed the crime. That is unfortunate, and it is unacceptable. The Barreau du Québec, the Law Society of Ontario and the Canadian Bar Association have said so repeatedly and will say so again when they appear before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human rights, of which I am a member.
Members will realize from this introduction that the Bloc Québécois is against this bill. I hope that is quite clear. The Bloc is against it for a number of reasons. This bill proposes a harmful and ineffective approach that will not improve public safety. Worse yet, it would allow for automatic sentencing, which is dangerous and irresponsible. I rise in this House to say that reversing the burden of proof is not justified.
If my colleagues opposite had had good lawyers, they would have turned to section 753 of the Criminal Code. Section 753 of the Criminal Code is clear, or at least I think it is. I have relied on it a number of times in court. This is what that section says:
753. (1) The court may, on application made under this Part following the filing of an assessment report under subsection 752.1(2), find the offender to be a dangerous offender if it is satisfied—
The court may find the offender to be a dangerous offender if all the conditions are met. The Criminal Code has all the arguments, all the elements and all the clauses to control dangerous individuals.
Section 753 asks that the following conditions be met:
753. (1)(a) that the offence for which the offender has been convicted is a serious personal injury offence described in paragraph (a) of the definition of that expression in section 752—
I will spare you all these details and focus on the essential point. When arguing before the court, the Crown must show:
753. (1)(a)(i) a pattern of repetitive behaviour by the offender, of which the offence for which he or she has been convicted forms a part, showing a failure to restrain his or her behaviour and a likelihood of causing death or injury to other persons, or inflicting severe psychological damage on other persons, through failure in the future to restrain his or her behaviour—
I did not make this up. It is in the Criminal Code. I repeat, it is in the Criminal Code. We do not need Bill C-27. Paragraph 753(1)(a)(ii) adds:
753. (1)(a)(ii) a pattern of persistent aggressive behaviour by the offender, of which the offence for which he or she has been convicted forms a part, showing a substantial degree of indifference on the part of the offender respecting the reasonably foreseeable consequences to other persons of his or her behaviour—
I will spare the House the rest but will translate it into plain language for my hon. colleagues across the aisle.
This is what is happening now, this very day, before a court somewhere in Canada. I have had to argue cases and can tell the House how it works.
It can happen as early as the first offence or the first charge. An individual is brought before the court accused of attempted murder. He shows no signs of remorse. He even says and repeats that if he is freed, he will take care of a few other people too. That has already happened.
Here is another example. A serial rapist says, “If I get out, don’t get all worked up, but all women are going to get it”. That is totally unacceptable.
So what do we do? What does the crown attorney do? He asks the court to declare the person a “long-term offender”. That is done now. There is no need for evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. Legal precedents and the testimony of people who know the accused are submitted and the court hands down a decision. It is true that this decision can be appealed, but it certainly is not easy. Once a court has handed down a judgment and supported it well, it is virtually unassailable. That is how it is. We have already been through it. This procedure exists and can be implemented as early as the first offence.
So why Bill C-27? In the Bloc Québécois—I am one of those who say it along with my hon. colleague from Hochelaga—we say that justice must be based on a personalized process that is geared to each case and based on the principle of rehabilitation.
I will put that into plain language for my hon. colleagues across the aisle. One of the most important principles established by courts of appeal and supreme courts is that punishments must be just and proportional to the offence but also aimed at rehabilitating the accused. With this bill, the government wants to get rid of rehabilitation. There is no place for rehabilitation in a country with a bill like this, and it does not look as if the government wants reconsider its position.
Let us take this even further. As if that were not enough, we have section 761 of the Criminal Code, which is also clear. It exists. It is still there, just as it was there yesterday when I looked at the Criminal Code. It has not disappeared. Section 761 states, and I quote:
—where a person is in custody under a sentence of detention in a penitentiary for an indeterminate period, the National Parole Board shall, as soon as possible after the expiration of seven years from the day on which that person was taken into custody and not later than every two years after the previous review, review the condition, history and circumstances of that person—
What does that section mean? It means that if we have a dangerous, long-term offender as identified by the court, the court sends that offender to an institution where he is held in custody. After seven years, the National Parole Board will again carefully review that individual's case to determine if that individual can possibly, I repeat possibly, be rehabilitated or if that individual has begun a rehabilitation process. If that is not the case, the National Parole Board must justify its decision.
We already have all the tools we need. We do not need Bill C-27. Neither Quebec nor Canada needs it. I hope this is clear enough. We already have all the tools we need to put away individuals who do not deserve to be and should not be in society.
Only after a fair and equitable trial, after the court has declared an individual to be a dangerous, long-term offender, can this apply. Then, the sentence will be individualized. That is what this bill does not do. We must not forget that this is extremely dangerous.
This bill would make changes to the process of declaring someone a dangerous offender. An accused person would be presumed to meet the criteria for designation as a dangerous offender as soon as he is convicted of a third serious offence. There is no middle ground, it is all or nothing. Rehabilitation is no longer an option.
Even worse, that presumption would shift the burden of proof from the Crown to the accused, who would then have to prove to the judge that he should not be declared a dangerous offender.
With respect, I must say that the Canadian judicial system will never tolerate that. In my opinion, reversing the burden of proof is unfair and would violate section 16 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which entitles us to a full defence. In Canada, it is not up to the accused to defend himself—we will have to explain this again to our colleagues opposite—it is up to the Crown to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused is guilty.
If the Conservatives want to change that, if they want to reverse the burden of proof and take a new approach, let them table a bill, but not one like Bill C-27. This new bill would probably be unacceptable as well because the Bloc Québécois does not believe that Canadian and Quebec societies would accept the reversal of the burden of proof.
If the colleagues opposite, in government, believe that this bill will fight crime, then I have good and bad news for them. The goods news is that is false. The bad news is that it will completely choke the justice system. Before a case is closed, what will happen when an accused discovers that he may be declared a dangerous offender with the reversal of the burden of proof? It is not difficult to see that all proceedings will be taken as far as possible and the court rooms will be overflowing.
We already have this problem. In Quebec City, Toronto, here in Ottawa, Kingston and Vancouver the court rooms are full. It is not this kind of bill that will solve the problem of crime in Quebec and in Canada.
As I only have one more minute I will conclude my speech. Time goes so quickly that I will allow myself to answer the questions.
Based on my 25 years of experience in criminal law, this reversal of the burden of proof is wrong and unacceptable, and I believe that we would be going in a very dangerous direction, to the far right, were we to accept even considering this bill and having it adopted by Parliament. I therefore urge all members of this House to vote against the bill.