JUST Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON JUSTICE AND HUMAN RIGHTS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA JUSTICE ET DES DROITS DE LA PERSONNE

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, April 11, 2000

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[English]

The Chair (Hon. Andy Scott (Fredericton, Lib.)): I'd like to call the meeting to order. We'll be considering Bill C-3, an act in respect of criminal justice for young persons and to amend and repeal other acts.

I give the floor to Monsieur Bellehumeur.

[Translation]

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur (Berthier—Montcalm, BQ): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I gave notice of a motion on April 5, 2000. I would now like to move it and read it to you. The motion is drafted as follows:

That the clause-by-clause study of Bill C-3, entitled an Act in respect of criminal justice for young persons and to amend and repeal other Acts, be postponed until Tuesday, May 2, 2000 at 9:30AM.

Mr. Chairman, I have seen the stack of government amendments. I think everyone agrees that the Young Offenders Act is an extremely important piece of legislation. The Minister herself even said that it is probably the most important bill to be studied during this Parliament. The bill before us is extremely complicated and the amendments tabled by the Minister do nothing to simplify it; rather, I think they complicate it even more.

What I am asking for is some time. I am asking for an extension until May 2, 2000, to allow the committee to review the entire issue of young offenders and to allow the Minister to find the time in her schedule to come back before the committee to answer some of the questions we have for her.

Several times during her testimony, she told us to wait until we saw the amendments. She said she was prepared to make amendments to deal with the issues raised by the opposition, and some of Quebec's demands, and so on. This would seem to be the response to Quebec's demands regarding the youth criminal justice system.

I must say at the outset that I do not claim to be an expert on the subject. However, I have studied the amendments in detail. I think they are like trying to put a little make-up and lipstick on Frankenstein. They change very little about the bill itself. I think they change absolutely nothing in the bill we have before us.

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I am sure the Easter break will be enlightening for the Minister. She may come back to life and become a Minister of Justice more in tune with what people are saying. There are some things missing here. There are certain things the Minister or her staff are disregarding, or are simply not looking at. There are problems in this department. I don't know exactly what they are, Mr. Chairman, but there is something wrong somewhere. The government definitively does not have all the information I have. The government has definitively not been reading the right documents.

I have practically reread all the notes of the witnesses we heard from, Mr. Chairman. I think the best day was the one when the judges came to testify and were somewhat less reserved about partisan comments, or whatever, and actually came here to talk about the bill. I'm thinking of Mr. Justice Michel Jasmin, whose reputation and expertise in this field are well-known—you have to meet him to realize how much he loves young people and how much he believes in them as well—and also the other judges whom I did not know, including a retired judge whom I would very much like to meet someday, Judge Allard. They all raised very vast questions, excellent questions.

I sincerely think, Mr. Chairman, that the Committee needs time to study these questions and to review the whole matter properly.

I would just like to quote a brief excerpt from Judge Allard's testimony on Tuesday, February 22, 2000, around 4:15 p.m., according to my notes. He said:

The dialogue we've had in Canada about these issues has been driven by persons who do not have the right information.

I think he is right.

For example, why would we want to emulate the adult system? Everybody says it has failed, so why should we now be applying to children the same measures we use for adults? Surely we can do better than that for the children of this country.

I think Judge Allard, with his vast experience in this field, makes a very good point at the end of this quotation.

Mr. Justice Jasmin, the Assistant Chief Justice of the Quebec Youth Court, is an excellent lawyer whose reputation goes beyond Quebec and even Canada, because he was saying that a number of European justice departments have consulted him. Some Americans have come to spend weeks in his centre in Montreal to see how he operated. Mr. Justice Jasmin said this on February 22, 2000: “You are not focussing on the real problem now. If I were a federal law- maker...” Unfortunately for him, he is not. It is unfortunate for Quebeckers as well that he is not, because things would be very different if he were. However, we are the federal lawmakers, Mr. Chairman, and I think we have a responsibility. He said:

If I were a federal lawmaker, I would suspend my bill for the time being and I would ask the provinces how they apply the existing legislation and what youth policies they have in their jurisdictions.

How does he go about reaching this conclusion, Mr. Chairman? He continued as follows:

What our working group did was to consult with the government of Quebec and ask it about its youth policies. We asked it how it dealt with young people.

We asked the police how they dealt with young people and what their youth policies were.

Yes, this bill is very complicated, Mr. Chairman. Yes, it is important because young people in trouble are the leaders of tomorrow. Murderers are not the only people who will have to deal with this bill. So, Mr. Justice Jasmin's group asked police officers how they dealt with young people and what their youth policies were. They asked the Quebec Bar how its lawyers dealt with young people and if it had a youth policy.

You see where I am heading with this. As you can see, the problem has to do with youth policies. Does a province have any policies on youth? It is not up to us in the federal government to dictate youth policies.

It is up to us to see what youth policies the provinces have and to ask questions of the provincial legislatures. It's all very well to build prisons and invest in bricks and mortar, but you have to go to the heart of the problem: young people. The question is: Do you have any youth policies?

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Mr. Justice Jasmin said:

We asked the Quebec Bar how its lawyers dealt with young people and whether or not it had youth policies. It did not have any youth policies at that time, but it does now. A lawyer representing a young person now must follow ethical guidelines, for example, with regard to plea bargaining. Young people learn that justice involves bargaining. We tried to raise people's awareness. Crown prosecutors now have a greater awareness of the needs of young people. In their arguments, they think in terms of the Young Offenders Act, rather than the Criminal Code.

The comment was made by one of the judges.

The bill we have before us is like the Criminal Code. It is a mini Criminal Code. Now we have only one criminal justice system. We make no distinction between young people in conflict with the law and adults.

I have been saying this for a very long time. I even said that when we were studying the bill, when your predecessor was the Chair, and I think I convinced her. My contention was that we needed two separate systems. I can say that and you may not believe me—that's one thing. It's not the first time that I have said something in this committee and no one believed me. That's part of the game. I am a member of the opposition, and nothing I say is any good. But we heard from judges who regularly enforce the Act, and I think you should listen to what they have to say, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Justice Jasmin completed his remarks by saying: “If there is no youth policy in place, it won't work, no matter what the law says”. And this particular judge, Mr. Justice Michel Jasmin, has spent a lot of time studying this whole issue in Quebec.

There is an excellent report entitled: Les jeunes contrevenants: au nom et au-delà de la loi. We have all studied the Young Offenders Act. I see you are frowning, Mr. Chairman. I am sure you have not read this report, which is excellent. I am not saying that because it was done in Quebec, but it is excellent. I think it is a comprehensive review of the issue. It examines the Young Offenders Act as it is implemented in Quebec. Yes, Mr. Chairman, it took time. It took time to produce this document.

As I said earlier, the authors of the report spoke to everyone involved directly or indirectly in enforcing the Young Offenders Act, and they draw some extremely significant conclusions. The report makes some very important points, and I am sure that no one has read this document, at least definitely not the Minister of Justice of Canada. So I am asking that we give her the time to read it. She is not here, but I would like to speak to her. I will certainly see her when she comes back to testify again.

However, the members of the Justice Committee: the Liberals, the Canadian Alliance, the Conservatives and the NDP have definitely not read this document. I am sure they have not read it, Mr. Chairman. It contains some extremely important passages. I may not have too much trouble with the NDP. I think I could convince my colleague from that party that this is not a good bill.

This report contains some fantastic material about the enforcement of the Act, and you should familiarize yourselves with this document. I will try to summarize parts of it, but I trust that I will encourage you to learn more about the way things are done in Quebec. I hope to encourage you somewhat to apply the Quebec approach in the other provinces of Canada.

As you know, we enforce the YOA differently. And I really don't understand why we have to argue in this way with you, particularly the Liberals, given the fact that you even passed a regulation in the House saying that Quebec was distinct and that in the future, all legislation you pass would take into account that Quebec is distinct.

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Not a single Quebecker told us that this was a good bill and that we should pass it. Some Quebeckers did come here, and finally, they were worn down through their efforts.... They spoke for months. They were so-called secret meetings, because really everything is known, involving committee members and certain individuals I see here. Ms. Lafontaine and Penella were involved. I don't know who she is, but she was in a corner with someone from the Privy Council Office. They met with people from the coalition to try to convince them that it was a good bill. They did not succeed, because it is not a good bill, Mr. Chairman, and because we in Quebec are distinct.

We have enforced the YOA differently from the other provinces. We have been investing for young people for 30 years, not only in the legal field, but in all sorts of fields. We have been very much in the forefront in this respect. Today, what we would like, and this is a nasty sovereignist speaking, is that the other provinces adopt Quebec's approach. However, to do that, they must start by asking themselves some questions. They have to see what is done or not done in the province. The provinces have to ask themselves some extremely important questions.

I know they won't have time to do that by May 2, 2000, as I'm asking, but I dare hope that the comments I am making this morning will instil enough doubt in them for them to say: “Yes, actually, that does take time.” Before doing anything irreparable, before changing legislation that works in Quebec, before doing anything at all, they should look at what we are doing in our province and they should try to do the same. They should take the time, not as much time as we had to take, because this is work that was done over many years, but they should take some time. There is no rush. There is a legislation at this point in time. The statistics the Minister tabled show that the crime rate is dropping as we speak, even in the area of violent crime.

Many witnesses have even pointed the finger at political parties, but I won't do that. They said that certain political parties exaggerated the problem and emphasized what should not be emphasized. Only the bad aspects of the legislation were addressed. The good parts of the legislation were not addressed. The success stories were forgotten.

In Quebec, I met someone who committed a double murder. He killed his neighbour for all kinds of reasons I won't reveal here for confidentiality purposes. Today, this fellow is an anonymous citizen. He has a child, he's married and he is a butcher in a supermarket. He was taken in hand on time and his reintegration was a success. He would have liked to come here as a witness, but he did not because his employer did not know that he committed murder in the past. He would have come here as a witness to tell us not to change the legislation because this legislation was his salvation. The people close to him that I spoke to, the judges, the people from the coalition and the people from the Philippe Pinel Institute, because he went through there, tell me that this bill is dangerous. If I had done the same thing at the same age, if this present bill were in force, maybe I would have been stigmatized for a life, amongst other things, by the names being published and the way we want to treat young people who commit homicide. He could have come, but he unfortunately did not.

Judge Jasmin also met these individuals, not only those who apply the law but also those to whom we want the law applied. He asked what they needed for their reintegration and readaptation.

You can't get that simply by changing paragraphs, as you are trying to do with the proposed amendments. It is not because in Bill C-3 the third paragraph becomes the first paragraph of the preamble that I am impressed in any way and that I'll think you have answered Quebec's demands. It is not because you put the word “needs” in the bill that all my comments will become useless. The word “needs” is still subordinate to the same paragraph. What does that change, Mr. Chairman? The people just probably didn't read it. The people probably don't know what's being done in Quebec. Otherwise, they would have suggested more serious amendments than those.

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It is provocation, Mr. Chairman. This kind of amendment is provocation. It is true that I made comments on the term “infliger” and that you understood the message. You replaced it by the word “imposer”. However, you did not understand everything that's found behind the word “infliger” that you did not change. Maybe you just cut to the chase to answer a request from goodness knows whom to respond to these requirements, not political ones, but requirements other than those having to do with the seriousness of the whole thing. This kind of bill is serious, very serious.

When I saw the amendments, I noticed there were at least five or six whose only purpose was to introduce commas, Mr. Chairman. I am supposed to be happy with commas? You can be sure that they don't know what's being done in Quebec. Justice Jasmin and a lot of others have examined this matter. Justice Michel Jasmin, who is the Assistant Chief Justice at Quebec's Youth Court, chaired the working group. There was also Normand Bastien, who is the director of the Youth Division of the Montreal Community Legal Centre who studied this whole question. There was also Maurice Boisvert, Deputy Minister, Famille et Enfance (family and youth). As you see, it's a complex problem. It's not just a matter of law, but also a social question. That's an approach that the Department has totally neglected. They are suggesting something totally juridical, that's it, that's all.

They want to get rid of it. This bill should be entitled: “Let's deal with the kids once and for all”. If I were asked to find a title for that bill, that's the one I would use. That's not how you solve the problems of our youth.

Pierre Lamarche, the Director General of the Association des centres jeunesse du Québec (Quebec youth centres association) also sat on that committee as well as Jean Turmel, Director of the Direction du droit de la jeunesse (youth law division) and he is now at the Quebec Justice Department. That just goes to show that there is follow-up. In Quebec, we have found people who understand the problem of young offenders.

I don't mean that the people working for the Federal Justice Department don't understand. On the contrary, I think they understand the problem full well. However, did they find out what has to be done to solve it adequately? That's another story. I think that the people from Quebec met enough people who tried to convince them that Bill C-3 was such a good piece of legislation that they convinced themselves that Bill C-3 was not a good piece of legislation.

I am sure that all those who, amongst others, work at the Department of Justice and come from Quebec can't support this kind of bill. It is a denial of everything done in Quebec. It means setting aside one's origins. To put to rest the matter of the distinct society, I would say that I don't understand that I have to convince you today that this is not good legislation for Quebec.

Mr. Saada, you are going to try to get this bill passed clause by clause. What a promotion! You are with the people from Justice. I am sure that if we have any questions, you are the one who is going to defend the Minister's amendments. Quite sincerely, Mr. Saada, as a member from Quebec, I have problems. I know that I am not here to convince you, but you will have to live with the consequences of what you do.

I sincerely believe that this is not good legislation. The people from Quebec have said this loud and clear and they are at one with the Quebec consensus where you will even find Jean Charest, head of the Liberal Party at the National Assembly. When Jean Charest was in the federal arena, his position was quite different from what it is today concerning the approach to young offenders and that's normal. He has adapted to the Quebec situation. He might have problems with other aspects, but as far as the approach to the Young Offenders Act is concerned, he can do no less than support what's been done in Quebec over the last 30 years and understand that the Quebec approach is the best in view of the results we have achieved. Quebeckers do not wish us to change that legislation.

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Of course, if you are perpetually crying wolf, wolf, somebody, somewhere, will see a wolf even though there is none. Sincerely, since 1994, that is what I have been hearing from the members, especially the ones from Reform and even some Liberals who have been crying wolf! wolf! without having the least about how this legislation is being applied in the province where things are working well.

Which one of the members of this committee has met Michel Jasmin, Chief Justice of the Quebec Court? You, Ms. Lafortune; did you convince him that Bill C-3 is a good bill? No, you did not convince him. Ms. Lafortune, if you visited the centre, if you saw Mr. Jasmin and he explained how things work, from the moment the youth has a problem with justice until his trial, if he explained the whole matter of time frames and taking the youth in hand as soon as possible, if he explained all that to you, Ms. Lafortune, you should be sitting beside me saying that this bill is not a good bill.

I am convinced that when your visit with Mr. Jasmin ended, you were convinced, deep down inside, that this was not a good bill. You were probably one of the people who tried to change some things, but you can't grow good legislation out of something that is no good to begin with, something that goes contrary to the principles of Quebeckers.

I am talking about Quebec principles, but I would also like to talk about another province. I know that British Columbia is trying more and more to take an approach similar to Quebec's. I can't say as much about Ontario. I am sure that there are members from Ontario, from the Liberal party, who feel very ill at ease with Bill C-3 because it basically is a blessing for the Mike Harris approach. I am sure that some of you, deep down inside, can't support Bill C-3 in its present form. I am talking about its present form, but you can't actually amend a bill that is totally wrong. You can't amend a bill like C-3 with all the directions we are trying to give it and with all the approaches that we now want to apply to young offenders. It is impossible. You mustn't touch the Young Offenders Act.

Maybe there are provisions in that legislation that should be changed to help our youth even more. Maybe there is the whole matter of delays. I think that's one of the problems in the Young Offenders Act: there is not enough said about deadlines. It's urgent that we intervene quickly. To my knowledge, time frames are not being compressed with C-3. On the contrary, I think they will just get longer.

In Quebec, when more than 30 days go by between the appearance and the trial, a little alarm bell starts ringing and there is an emergency situation. You can't have more than 30 days between appearance and trial. Justice Jasmin and others from the coalition told us that they visited some places in Canada—I don't remember which ones—where everything is very modern. There was a classification system with red and blue and yellow and green file cards and nice numbers and everything was nicely lined up. There was a nice well-polished floor, a beautiful counter and all that. The Chief Justice was very very proud of his courthouse and how everything worked. Justice Jasmin asked him: “Could you tell me how long it takes between the time the young offender appears for the offence and the time he is brought to trial?” The judge was quite proud to answer: “Listen, with the system we have here, a very sophisticated one...”. They were in November. He said: “With the system we have, he will probably be brought to his trial in June or September of next year.” The wait was seven months in the best of cases and 10 in the worst. They were quite proud of their system and it must be said that it was very speedy, to them.

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I think you have understood, from the witnesses, that the longer you delay the trial, the more the young offender gets the impression that the offence he committed is less serious. If it was really serious, I would have been sent for treatment right away or something would have been done immediately, is what he figures. When the young offender waits for six or 10 months, his attitude towards his crime hardens. I don't know if you have children. I have two young ones. If I don't get on their case immediately when they have made the slightest fault or mistake, they figure that it is not serious because daddy did not say anything, and they just try doing the same thing over again. Whether you are dealing with five or ten-year-olds or 14-or 15-year-olds, it is the same thing. When the young offender appears very quickly and goes to his trial very quickly, he is still mindful of the offence. He lives with it daily and he is dealt with quickly.

So in the Young Offenders Act, you could have simply changed everything about the time frame. I know very well that this won't please the provinces, but I can tell you that you have a weapon that I don't and the provinces don't have either: you have the checkbook. Why don't you simply change the programs?

I think you are the one, Mr. Saada, who told Justice Jasmin.... One of the witnesses we heard around this table, a few days ago, told us that Ontario had decided to put 80% of the justice money the federal government sends it for young offenders into building jails and custody. You know what the figures are. You know that Ontario and other provinces put over 50% of the money the federal government sends them into concrete while you are not sending Quebec enough money to implement the Young Offenders Act. There is a 77 or 80-million-dollar unpaid bill that has been around since 1994. Besides, we even agreed with the other Minister of Justice, Mr. Allan Rock, during a federal-provincial conference, to say that Quebec was right when it complained it was not being given enough money to implement the legislation as it was. Unfortunately, there was a change. If he were still there, maybe Quebec would have 77 million dollars more in its coffers because the Minister seemed to say that Quebec was right.

So you know what the figures are. You know that in the other provinces, the program is not being applied correctly. You have a fantastic weapon in your hands. Instead of trying to impose legislation no one in Quebec wants.... Your only ally in the approach to young offenders is Quebec. Quebec is the only one that implements the legislation correctly as the Minister of Justice said. The only province to correctly apply all the criteria to get proper results is Quebec. And now, you want to penalize it by passing a bill that no one wants in Quebec. There is a consensus in Quebec: nobody wants this kind of legislation; nobody wants the Young Offenders Act to be touched. They did not start talking about this overnight in Quebec. This is not a new issue. Since then, you don't seem to want to understand or you don't understand. You haven't even looked at what already exists.

In the document Les jeunes contrevenants: au nom et au-delà de loi (young offenders: in the name of the law and beyond), the Quebec committee did a fantastic summary of the situation of young offenders. The document that summarizes the situation so well was produced in 1995. Sincerely, this should be the starting point for the federal Department of Justice. No other province has invested to find out what was happening with young offenders under its jurisdiction. If any other province has undertaken this kind of study and arrived at a different conclusion, please tell me. I have not read it yet and I will hurry up and read it.

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To my knowledge, no other province has looked at this matter in any way approaching Quebec's in the 90s. It came to a conclusion that should not surprise us. Quebec came to a very thought-out conclusion that garnered a broad consensus in Quebec: don't touch the Young Offenders Act.

With that approach, Mr. Chairman, we studied the whole matter of delinquency and protection of society. We looked at all the offences, the responsibility of teenagers, the rights of adolescents—because they have rights that we must recognize—and their needs.

If you had read the chapter on the needs of teenagers, you would not be introducing amendments like these. I am telling you honestly that you are going down the wrong road and I hope that today, I will be able to convince you of that. I have no illusions, but I will keep on going anyway.

I hope you are conscious of the fact that studying a matter as important as this one deserves having the committee give it all the necessary time. That is why I am asking you, Mr. Chairman, to postpone the clause-by-clause until May 2. I dare hope you will have time to read the documents I have quoted and that I will be quoting and that you will do this while keeping in mind the idea of protecting society, yes, but before that, the needs of individuals. There is a whole philosophy surrounding the bill on young offenders which, quite clearly, you have not understood.

I will review some useful thoughts we heard in this committee before undertaking our in-depth review of this bill. We looked at the needs of adolescents and victims. There is nothing new in the study we did. Some Canadian Alliance members said a lot about victims and we recognize how important they are. The Quebec approach also considers the victim. We also looked at the problems concerning the victims and the victims' families. This matter is dealt with in our document.

Even though nothing like this has happened in Canada in the past years, seven or eight-year olds kidnapped a young child in a shopping center in Great Britain and killed him. This is an extremely serious thing, Mr. Chairman, but I think there is something even more serious yet. What about the parents? What kind of world do we live in when seven or eight-year olds kill another person? What kind of education did they get?

We are not sheltered from this kind of thing in Canada either. Just go and see what is happening in our schools. Maybe I am lucky to have young children and deal with people in the sphere of education, including the people on school boards. I also had the opportunity of discussing these things with one of my friends, Mr. François Legault, the Minister of Education, to get a handle on the problems. I have also spoken with Ms. Linda Goupil, the Minister of Justice. There are serious problems in society: parents don't play the role they should or the role they could if they had better support.

After conducting this study during which we looked at those elements, we changed the education system to get parents more involved and support us with prevention. I think a good starting point in terms of justice for teenagers is to work with them even before they do something wrong. You have to try to give them a proper education and this role falls, amongst others, on the parents. Yes, I recognize that it is also a role that falls on society and governments, but I fear that we perhaps expect too much of governments. Everyone around this table agrees that you have to involve the parents. Mr. Chairman, that matter was examined in the report written by Justice Jasmin.

I briefly addressed the speed of interventions a bit earlier. We have to act quickly if we want our interventions to be fruitful. Consistency is a responsibility of all those involved. It is also important that the left hand not be unaware of what the right hand is doing in a justice system. What are the police officers going to do when they arrest a young offender who has just committed an offence?

What will the justice system do when it deals with the whole social side? How does the government treat those people? How do the people taking care of our youth treat them when they have just committed a robbery or a murder?

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Perhaps you are dealing with a youth who is living practically alone, who comes from a single-parent family under the poverty line, whose father has a record as long as your arm. You also have to know what context the youth is living in.

Judge Jasmin and the coalition presented a table and percentages to you. They told you that in the light of their experience, these three criteria apply to a very specific category: youth living under the poverty line, who have problems at school and major problems in another area. When there is a problem, better-off families have the means to get advice, meet with a lawyer, go out with their children and register them for all kinds of activities like hockey and karate to get them out of an environment where there are certain harmful and criminal tendencies.

You could complete the title of the bill the way I was telling you before. You could deal once and for all with the problems of young people below the poverty line if the department wanted to be serious and really say what the whole thing is about. I know you also have those problems in good families and in better-off families, but the major part of the population the Young Offenders Act focusses on are young people from families who have financial, social and other problems. This bill seems to be quite adequate for those families.

In order to intervene efficaciously, you have to be able to deal with this whole set of problems, Mr. Chairman, and that's why the whole matter of consistency and responsibility of the interveners dealing with young people was examined. When you make a decision, it is very important to take in the whole situation. When the Minister came before us, I tried in every way I could to get her to understand how important the needs of our young people are as well as the defects of Bill C-3. This examination of the whole situation the young offender was in was the greatest strength of the Young Offenders Act. Nothing was said about any need that was subordinate to other criteria of proportionality or all kinds of other factors; it dealt only with the needs of the youth. Nothing else was considered in rehabilitating and reintegrating the young offender. That's not a principle that is found in Bill C-3 nor in the version of Bill C-3 that will contain the amendments proposed by the Minister.

It seems to me you have not understood the approach I have been presenting nor the objections put forth by the 20 or so members of the coalition, lawyers, judges, Crowns, people from youth centres and the Philippe Pinel Institute, all those people who apply the Young Offenders Act on a daily basis.

I would not want to displease anyone or provoke anyone, but we must recognize that we, and this includes me, are not experts in implementing the Young Offenders Act or the provisions of Bill C-3 when compared to the members of the Quebec Coalition for justice for minors or to judges Jasmin, Allard or Heino Lilles who apply the Young Offenders Act every day. We can repeat what we heard, examine a text and have our own family and professional experiences. I practiced as a lawyer for eight or nine years and defended cases in criminal court. So I know the machinery and all that.

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But I could say that there are people around this table who have not even had that chance. They may have had opportunities in other areas, but with respect to the Young Offenders Act, I think that I have had the chance to gain a good understanding of the legal field and that I am in a better position to appreciate the proposed amendments.

I think we need to go by testimony like the comments made by the members of the coalition or the judges who continually enforce the Act, Mr. Chairman. They are right in saying that we are on the wrong track by proposing this approach as well as these cosmetic amendments, which seem to be in response to what Quebeckers want. I can tell you that is not the case. I have not consulted everyone, but to date, everyone to whom I have sent these amendments and who has examined them has drawn the same conclusion: these are cosmetic amendments.

I am not saying that the amendments have been analyzed in detail and in all contexts. You are aware that 100 amendments cannot be analyzed in five or six days. But simply reading the amendments, and disregarding the ones that deal with punctuation, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand. The same is true for substituting the word “imposed” for the word “inflict”. There are perhaps two or three clauses that are more laborious. There is the whole issue of complexity; some clauses are even more complex than what currently exists.

For other clauses, you have gone to great lengths; you added the word “needs” in the clause, to take into account young people's needs. I never thought we would ever hear you say that word. But then you wrote it down. You added the word “needs” somewhere. I do not think that you are aware that it does not mean anything in the context of clause 3, where it comes under another subclause that eliminates everything.

I do not understand your logic. Acting that way and trying to lead us to believe that you are meeting young people's needs can be seen only as arrogance with regard to Quebec. That is why I am eager to hear the Minister come and defend her amendments, which are as complex as the bill. The Minster is tabling almost more amendments than there are clauses in the Bill. It is one of two things: either she was totally off base and she now has a problem- ridden bill that she is trying to fix, or she drafted a bill without even taking five minutes to think about its consequences, which worries me even more.

I think that if the Minister and her staff had taken even a few minutes to examine the useful comments I made on this topic, and if they had looked at what is happening in Quebec, if she had gone to Quebec to see for herself.... It is all fine and well for members of her department to have gone to meet with Quebeckers to see what is happening there, but nothing beats seeing for oneself how something works.

In summary, as good as it might be, any report by an official on the situation in Quebec cannot replace a visit where you see with your own eyes what is happening, where you discuss the issue directly with the people involved. That is also something I criticized the Minister for. I want to give her a little bit of time to do that.

I also criticize her for the way Bill C-3 is drafted. Several provinces, including Quebec, stated that they had not been consulted on the text or that they had hardly been consulted at all. I can affirm that, with respect to the amendments, Quebec was not consulted at all.

When you say that you want to meet Quebec's needs, I find it strange that you did not even take the time to send the amendments to the people who requested them to ensure that the amendments satisfy their requests. I think there is some bad faith somewhere.

Normally, I get along very well with the Department of Justice, especially with Mr. Yvan Roy. We tend to agree on bills. However, in this case, I do not know if it is because of political intervention, I do not know if it is because the point of view is too political, but you do not seem to understand. We are hitting a wall and there is something quite illogical here.

• 1040

Normally you are more logical than that. Either politics is at play, or you don't have all of the data you need. I am going to try to give it to you while you are here before me. We are going to try and examine some of the points that have already been analyzed in Quebec.

Chapter 2 of the report covers prevention. I mentioned that earlier on; it is important to start as early as possible to try to identify with the young person what his problem is, why he is acting out as he is, why people in a certain societal category behave that way. It is important to step in and try to prevent these incidents from occurring. To do so, you need a youth-oriented policy; there must be a prevention policy. It is also important to be aware of the various types of prevention. I do not think that many people around this table have stopped to examine the issue, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: I just want to commend Monsieur Saada on a job well done.

[Translation]

Voices: Oh, oh!

Mr. Jacques Saada (Brossard—La Prairies, Lib.): [Editor's note: inaudible]

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur: Mr. Saada, you will surely have a chance to comment later.

This is very serious; let's wait until the Parliamentary Secretary is sitting down. Does he have to sit down? Because I would like him to hear me, I would like the person who will have to answer my questions to have an opportunity to listen to me.

The Chair: [Editor's note: inaudible]

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur: Oh, he hears me, but maybe he does not want to listen to me. Maybe that is it.

Sincerely, Mr. DeVillers, since 1994, with the Liberal Party in power, people have been hearing me, but do not want to listen to me.

A Voice: That is possible.

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur: Of course it is possible.

Prevention is a very important topic that I would like to go back to. We can perhaps examine it lightly and look at it from another perspective, but it is a very serious issue. Perhaps I did not cover it adequately in the past, that must be why I did not succeed in convincing you. That is why this morning, I want to cover the issue from A to Z. That way, I will be able to tell myself that I did my best to try to convince you and above all, to help you understand the Quebec approach, the Quebec model, which is not a formula, but something extremely important.

Once again, I should not even have to explain this approach to you, since you did recognize in a resolution which, it seems, in your opinion, is very important and worthwhile, that Quebec is a distinct society. If that is true, it should cover the entire legal field and should be taken into account in legislation. I think that you could give Quebeckers proof or a good example of your wanting to take that resolution into account in Bill C-3, by excluding Quebec from its application or by withdrawing Bill C-3. I would be the first to congratulate you on that.

If the minister withdraws Bill C-3, I will make the commitment today to accompany you on the same platform, in the same forum and to congratulate you on it. You will not be able to say that I am being partisan. I would thank the minister for having understood Quebec and I would recognize that, after all, the federal system is not all that bad.

I suggest that you should be practising what you preach. And the best example could be Bill C-3. Withdraw Bill C-3. Go and do your homework. Read this document, because what I am going to share with you this morning is just a tiny part of it. I could never explain its content as eloquently as it is written. I am going to try, but I will never be able to explain it to you as well as if you were to read it yourself or were to pick up the phone and call one of the five people who wrote it to obtain some clarification.

Before being interrupted by the arrival of the Parliamentary Secretary and the officials, I was saying that prevention had to be taken into account, that it was very important and that we need to be aware of the various types of prevention. When you are aware of them, you can perhaps see police intervention in a different light. You can perhaps have a different perception of alternative measures, the measures that must be used when a young person is in difficulty. In addition, Mr. Chairman, you do not have the same view of the way the procedures and the trial work when you know that there are different types of prevention and that such and such a thing should have been done before the inevitable happened. We must put and end to that.

• 1045

So, Mr. Chairman, there are different types of prevention that are in keeping with different situations. Later on, I will have an opportunity to share more details with you. There are different types of prevention for different individuals. You know that. You make a distinction between prevention that revolves around a situation and prevention that revolves around an individual.

As I was saying earlier, there are some higher-risk situations, like single-parent families, families living belong the poverty line, families where parents are not concerned if their 12- year-old child comes home at midnight, families where people are always coming and going. These situations pose a higher risk. We must,—mainly the provinces, and I am speaking specifically of a report from Quebec,—be aware of that to understand what we can do as the Department of Justice or federal legislators, as Justice Jasmin told us.

So the situation that I have just explained is very problematic for a young person. Some incidents must be prevented, there must be a preventative approach in cases like that.

There are types of prevention that focus on individuals. In my opinion, some people are simply born with a mean streak. That is not in the report, that is my opinion. However, once we admit that there are people who are malicious from birth, there is a preventative approach to adopt. I will also have an opportunity later on to discuss that in greater detail.

There are also categories of primary prevention—I will explain them to you later because they are more complex—, secondary prevention and tertiary prevention. Each of these categories includes options. It is important to take into account before amending legislation that is enforced and enforceable, and that is successful in Quebec.

Earlier on, I briefly mentioned police intervention. Personally, I think that in other provinces the police do not play a large enough role. There are categories of people we have to work on. When I say “we”, I include the provinces. Police have an important role to play with respect to young offenders. Police have a primary role to play in the youth justice system. I sincerely believe that federal legislators, but also the provinces, do not get them involved enough in the justice system. Personally, I am not sure that the Department of Justice has told the provinces the entire truth about the police.

As for me, I think that the one who writes out the cheque for the application of the Young Offenders Act should at least be able to say that the cheque will be used for the application of the current Young Offenders Act, which states at the outset, namely in section 3, that young people and police have a role to play. The declaration of principle, which talks about needs and which states that young people are developing, that this fact is important and must be addressed, includes all stakeholders, including the police.

So police intervention is very important, and the people who write out the cheque for enforcing the Young Offenders Act should be able to tell the province, the Department of Public Security or whatever the department is called in other provinces: you are not doing a good enough job of enforcing the Young Offenders Act; you should approach it using method X, Y or Z, if you want to succeed. That is what we are paying you to do.

• 1050

I understand that it is very complex, Mr. Chairman, and that the simplest solution would be for the federal government to withdraw completely from the area of young offenders, like in the United States where each state looks after its young people. The federal government does not tell the states what they have to do. That might be a solution we could adopt here in Canada, by allowing each province to do what they want with young offenders.

By way of an aside, in Florida, a 14 year old can receive a death sentence, whereas in the New England states that is forbidden; they have adopted an approach that is much closer to Canada's. Each American state has its own young offenders act. Each state is, however, part of the United States. Why wouldn't this solution be applicable in Canada? Why couldn't the Maritimes, provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island have their own act? Why couldn't Quebec have its own act?

I can tell you now that Quebec would adopt the Young Offenders Act and would not draft one that is different. It would be enforced as is, only some of the deadlines would be modified, as I pointed out earlier, so that we could step in as quickly as possible.

Ontario could do as it sees fit and build big warehouses to house its young offenders, round them up as they want to and get rid of them for 5, 10 or 15 years. However, Ontario will have another problem when these young people get out because it will have to build bigger prisons, since it will have to put them in adult prisons. Let them do what they want. Personally, I will never move to Ontario. The other provinces that so desire could do the same thing.

Allowing each province to have its own young offenders act might be the easiest solution. I already proposed that solution, although it seems to have gone in one ear and out the other. If you had accepted that solution, you would not be here listening to me today. I know that you greatly appreciate my remarks, but I know that everyone has other things to do.

When I leave this committee, I want to be able to say that I made a 150-percent effort to try to convince you. I know that it is difficult to convince a guy like Mr. Alcock, but I hope that one day, I will be able to convince him that in Quebec we do things differently, that we would like to continue to do things differently and that you should allow us to do things differently if, among other things, the resolution on distinct society means something. Western Canada is very Americanized; you follow the American example. The American states do what they want. Why couldn't we do that here?

I'd like to get back to my starting point on the subject of police intervention. We could tell our police forces that they're not doing their job well because we would be the ones paying 100% of the bill. We would not need the federal Big Brother. There would simply be the transfer payments and everything would be fine. We would do what we want with our share of the federal taxes to enforce the Young Offenders Act.

After this meeting, I'm sure you are all going to run to get a copy of this report that I invite you to read. The report deals with, among other things, police intervention and the taking of statements. In reading the bill that we have before us, it is quite clear that you did not understand or that you did not consider the whole issue of statements by young people. Some of the provisions are quite unacceptable and I do not at all look forward to this being enforced if, as I fear, you don't have any intention of modifying anything in this bill or of dropping it. The provisions on statements even go against some of the rights that adults benefit from. Quite obviously you do not understand the issue.

Police discretion is also part of primary prevention, if I may call it that, at the beginning of the whole process. There are some things that should remain with the police station, other things that should remain with the social workers and things that should remain with the courts, in order to help youth reintegrate into society, and to avoid their being stigmatized, being branded with the label “delinquent”, “young offender”, or “youth criminal”, because at the end of the day, this is what is going to happen. They are branded with this label just like cattle from Western Canada. This must be an approach from Western Canada, where the minister comes from. We seem to want to permanently label these young people who are young offenders, young people who have problems. Is this going to help improve our safety? Is our society going to benefit from this? Of course not, Mr. Chairman.

• 1055

We need to look at the whole approach and go and see what's happening in Quebec, which, quite obviously, you have not done. Our approach when it comes to police intervention, to the taking of statements, to police discretion, to release and detention before a court appearance is quite different from that of other provinces. Our statistics demonstrate that. One of the Liberal members asked a witness to explain why in Quebec there were fewer people detained before appearing in court than elsewhere. The answer was that there was a whole system that deals with individuals who are in trouble with the law, a system which unfortunately does not exist in other provinces.

The role the parents play in police intervention is also quite important. This comes back to what I was saying earlier about the role of parents. I understand that it is not up to federal legislators to intervene in this area. However, if you want to have a good law, you need to know what is going on.

We have also taken into consideration the victims of crime with respect to police intervention. This responds to questions brought up by the Canadian Alliance about victims. I know that victim's rights are one of Peter's favourite themes. I too believe that victims' rights are important and that we should try to involve victims in the process, in order to consider what they really want and to try to meet their needs. They do not have it easy. There are some things which we can do, but others which we cannot do. We need to study all of these aspects before proposing amendments and drawing up provisions similar to those that are found in this bill.

The rate of successful police investigations, the information to be shared and the time frame, which includes police action, are important factors. In some cases it takes six months to complete a police investigation, two or three months before a court appearance, six months or even longer before a trial begins, as is sometimes the case out west. When a year or a year and a half goes by since a young person committed an offence, they start to forget the seriousness of their offence and they say to themselves that the system doesn't take it too seriously. Even the delays when it comes to police action are considerable.

I would now like to talk about the Alternative Measures Program. Incidentally, I would like to know why you changed the name to “extrajudicial sanctions”. I admit that this is the language found in the Criminal Code and the approach used there. However, I think it's a change which will provoke a reaction when it comes to what's happening in Quebec, given what all of this jargon means.

I studied the amendments that the minister is proposing and I have noticed that there is a certain amount of freedom given to the provincial directors—I don't recall exactly what they are called—. Since some provinces don't have these programs, it seems pointless that the bill should stipulate that the judge must consider them. How is the department going to force the provinces to implement such programs? They have no power to do so.

In Quebec, a series of programs have been established. Judge Jasmin gave me this very important little book as a gift. This is a book that is given to all judges and which contains all of the important documents, including the Alternative Measures Program authorized by the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Social Services. It contains all sorts of alternative measures and information on different programs.

As federal legislators, perhaps we should find out how many provinces have adopted this approach and have these types of programs. It is not unconstitutional, nor is it against the law to do this. It is under the Young Offenders Act, the law that is currently in place, that we have this opportunity. In Quebec, it has been done.

• 1100

I would like to go around the room and ask the members what province they're from and if they know if such programs exist in their home province. I am sure that there are some who do not know; however, I am also sure that there are some who are aware that they do not exist. Before passing a bill to change things, it may be good to look at what is being done in each of the provinces. We should give the benefit of doubt to the provinces where things are working well. We should not be pulling everything at risk, we should not be taking an axe to what exists. We are not sure of anything. We run the risk of disrupting a system which is working well to please Lord knows who. Find out if your own provinces have alternative measures and programs to reintegrate young offenders into society.

I know that some exist. I have heard about them. People appeared before us and said that they existed. However, there are provinces who do not have them. And it's these same provinces that are crying wolf the loudest. Before doing anything, I think we need to have a look at these alternative measures and at these programs. So, back home, the working group headed by Judge Jasmin took stock of what there was in Quebec in terms of alternative measures programs. He looked into how these programs were being applied and put together figures to understand what is happening. At the very least, we need to have figures to see if they are working or if they are not working. I'll get back to this a little later.

In Quebec, the Crown prosecutor has a much more interventionist role, I believe, than in other jurisdictions. But in the end, this seems to produce good results, because that's what our figures demonstrate. Quebec has a lower crime rate than the provinces that enforce the Young Offenders Act more harshly or that do not enforce it at all, or that treat youth as though they were adults, as though young people were big bad criminals and so they should be treated as such. In Quebec, we have assessed the situation. That is why, Mr. Chairman, I am asking for more time.

I sincerely hope that during the Easter break, the members of this committee will consider these matters, that they will think of me and say to themselves: Bellehumeur was right. I hope that at 9:30 on May 2, they will arrive and say, first of all, that the minister must appear before us to explain the changes, and that, secondly, they have read Justice Jasmin's report and that, in fact, they were wrong. I'd like to think that my speech will at least have this effect: that you think about this and that you consider Quebec's approach.

I will be talking about all kinds of things this morning and know that you will take this all with a grain of salt, but go ahead and read it. Go ahead and have a look at what people wrote in this report. Incidentally, you may think that this is a PQ approach and that these are all a bunch of péquistes, as a member from Quebec, Maurice Bellemare said in 1976—I know nobody knows him. However, when Judge Jasmin was asked to conduct this study, it was the Liberals who were in power in the National Assembly. So much for that excuse, right? Even the Liberals could see the trend, at the federal level, to toughen the Young Offenders Act. Even the Liberals sounded the alarm back then. They established a committee to look into this issue in order to wake up their federal big brothers in Ottawa.

The report was published in 1995. There was a PQ government in office then. It supported the report 100% and has improved some things since then, so it is not surprising that today the National Assembly passed a unanimous resolution telling the federal government to withdraw their bill, to go back and do their homework, to consult with the provinces and to go and see what is being done in the provinces. That is the message.

This is the same message that we heard from Judge Jasmin who said, when he testified before us, that if he were a federal legislator, he would suspend consideration of the bill and ask the provinces how they were currently enforcing the law and what their policy was in dealing with youth. This is what I want you to understand. This is what I want you to do. This is what I want you to think about during the Easter break.

• 1105

I am impatiently awaiting your answer, at 9:30 on Tuesday the 2^nd of May, 2000. I hope that you will say yes. I hope that you will understand that we need time, that we need to prove the National Assembly right in their way of enforcing the Young Offenders Act. This time that you have will allow you to look into what is being done, as we did in Quebec in the 1990s.

So, when it comes to alternative measures programs, the actions of the Crown prosecutor of Quebec are very important. He's not shy about intervening. Everyone knows this.

In order for the provincial director to be able to intervene, these programs have to exist. The tools have to be in place in order to intervene. I'm not talking about simply including the provincial director in a bill, but the first thing we have to ask ourselves is whether or not the provincial director has anything to say in any of the provinces. We need to see if any of the provinces have programs that have been adapted, or that can be adapted, or any programs at all for young offenders.

In your bill, you mention the provincial director. I would like to know what there is in Bill C-3 that does not exist in the Young Offenders Act and that will allow these provinces who are crying wolf to do the job correctly? The provinces that are experiencing problems now will be the same provinces that are going to have problems later, even if this bill is passed. I predict that the provinces who adopt this bill, once it comes into force, will still be having problems and will still be asking for changes because it doesn't meet their needs, or because it doesn't allow them to indulge their zeal for incarcerating youth. It will be the very same provinces. They are going to continue to demand that the law be toughened. They are going to ask that the age be lowered again, among other things. While we are at it, why don't we throw six and seven year olds in jail. I'm exaggerating: they will probably stop at ten. But it will be the same provinces asking to get even tougher. Why? Because they won't have taken the time to look into the issue.

Why will you be listening attentively? For the same political and mercenary reasons that the minister now gives in response to demands made by Western Canadians. The same questions will be brought up. The same approaches will be proposed and they will be given the same consideration by the minister of justice of the day.

I repeat, we need to start by learning what is being done in different provinces in order to be able to make changes. If I were the federal minister of justice and one of the provinces were to tell me that it was dissatisfied with the bill, I would ask for examples and an explanation of it didn't work. I would try to find out why the same provision worked in Quebec, but did not work in Alberta, for example, or in Ontario.

If I were the federal minister of justice, I would try to convince my provincial counterpart that the Young Offenders Act was not being properly enforced or was not being enforced at all. I would try to convince him that in order to do so, Mr. Chairman, I would need to have an in-depth study of the Young Offenders Act. I would need to know specifically what is happening in that province. There aren't 36 solutions. We need to undertake the type of study that Quebec did to know what they are, in terms of alternative measures programs, among other things.

The other extremely important point, once police intervention and alternative measures programs have been studied, is the role of the courts. I spoke about that briefly earlier. It is by far the most important aspect, in my opinion. As we move into the role of the courts, we get closer to the jurisdiction of this committee, the act that is being amended and the bill that is being studied.

The whole issue of the pre-sentence report is quite significant because it will influence the judge and the sentence imposed. However, such a report must truly outline the youth's needs. It must outline his or her living situation. It must consider the individual. We have to take the time to ensure that the pre-sentence report is appropriate, that it respects the act, but also that it is in line with the approach recommended in Quebec.

• 1110

Quebec's pre-sentence reports are different from those of other provinces. It's no wonder that the reports are different in Quebec, because the other provinces do not have the same concerns and know nothing of prevention measures or the role the police can play, often the file contains no background information on the youth, on the different approaches that have been taken, on decisions regarding the youth that have already been made, and no attempt has been made to understand the youth's actions. The other provinces do not take the approach which allows the law to dictate that the needs of the youth come first when deciding on sentencing for an offence. This will be the case under Bill C-3. We need to look at what is being done in our province.

Judge Jasmin could have come here to testify on February 22 and utter a two-line sentence that would summarize my thoughts on the matter very, very well: we have to ask the provinces how they apply the current legislation and what kinds of policies on youth they have. That's the starting point that no one at the department raised. It's surprising, and no member here raised this issue regarding what the provinces do. I've listed a whole range of things that we have examined in Quebec and there are others as well.

Therefore, the pre-sentence report is very important. To have a good report, you also have to have good sources. It's the source of information that will make a report sound. This is where all the stakeholders and the coalition who came to testify have a role to play. There's a fantastic source of information there.

When a young person has just killed someone and spends time the Philippe Pinel Institute, the report that the institute will draft is extremely important. It's extremely important to know what happened, what the young person's motivation was, why it happened, where he comes from, where he lives, what he's going to do, etc. I'm not sure that many provinces spend a great deal of time on this. In a way, it's like a chain. The chain is the Young Offenders Act, and the links are important. If one link is weak or missing, the law is like a chain, it will be incomplete. It has no rigidity, no application. It can't work. Thus, each of the stakeholders or each of the individuals who look after the young person make up one link in this chain and all the links have to be strong.

To find out whether or not there is a weak link, we have to examine or consider what is done in a given province, and I'm not sure that we've done that. Therefore, the source of information is crucial. It is very important.

In Quebec, we have this co-operation between various stakeholders. It's not by accident that we have the coalition in Quebec. It's not by accident or an open secret that people talk to one another, that they discuss matters, in a spontaneous way, and that these people practically revolted against the federal government's approach with this bill. It's not by accident that all the members of this coalition produced a brief in which they're unanimous in saying that we must not change the Young Offenders Act, and that we're on the wrong track. We have a different approach in Quebec and we feel it's the right one. If there's a better way, prove it, but it's not this bill that's going to improve the way we operate in Quebec. We feel we have the right way. If there is a better way, show us the evidence. But it's not this bill that's going to improve the way things are done in Quebec; on the contrary, it will be more complex than ever.

• 1115

This is a law that should make me rejoice as a member of the Quebec bar. It's a gold mine for lawyers. Everyone says so; it's so complex that only expert lawyers will be able to find their way through it. There will be nice long trials, all sorts of dilatory tactics and other measures to set out certain things specifically. It's complicated.

I remember full well that I asked the minister to explain one clause, clause 42. She simply said—after having trouble finding it, because it's difficult to find clauses in a bill like this—that if I had an easier way to word things, a way that would make the text more readable, I should let her know. She didn't even attempt to explain it to me.

I can understand why; this clause refers to three or four other statutes. It's so complex that one would need tables and graphs to understand it. It's a bit like the Sentence calculation guide that the federal government published for judges, lawyers and Correctional Service officials. It contains nice tables that indicate one year, two years, three years, etc. I'm absolutely certain the federal government is preparing something similar for judges who will have to apply the Young Offenders Act, so that they can find their way through it, or rather so that they all apply it the same way. Indeed, these clauses could be interpreted in many different ways.

The whole chapter on sentencing is a nightmare. The intent was to take the Criminal Code and adapt it to young offenders. But this just produced a big hash that never came together and that will never come together, which is incomprehensible, inedible and indigestible. Judges are going to be asked to apply this. There's no doubt that they're going to need some sort of document like this to understand the legislation and they're going to have to be provided with various scenarios such as Mr. so and so, a young person, committed such and such an offence and should therefore be sentenced to such and such, consecutive or concurrent sentences, etc. Is that really what we want to apply to young offenders?

I don't think that's what I heard from the witnesses we had here, even from those who thought that the bill wasn't so bad. I didn't hear a single one state that this is the law we needed. At least, if they came, they didn't say that too loud. Those from Quebec were all against this bill. Is this really what we want, to further complicate things in order to confuse everyone, particularly judges with regard to sentence calculation and all that? This may be what they want in the West, but that's not what we want in Quebec.

So the procedure for specific sentences is very important. The pre-sentence report, the source of information, the content of the report—all that must answer the judge's questions. The filing, the distribution, the comments, the disclosure of the report are all very important. If a young person has psychiatric problems, experts in that field have to be made available to him. The judge needs to have there who examined the young person, who verified whether or not he had psychiatric disorders and therefore produced psychiatric reports. We need psychiatrists who are used to applying the Young Offenders Act, who are familiar with its philosophy and basic principles, who are aware of its orientation and the way judges will apply it.

There has to be co-operation among all these people. Will this bill foster such concerted effort? Quite sincerely, will this bill help Ontario have better co-operation and collaboration among stakeholders? Personally, I would say no, because they are not able to apply 97 highly applicable provisions.

We'll never agree on clarity; for a long time now, Liberals and Bloc members have been unable to agree on clarity. To my knowledge, the Young Offenders Act was much clearer than Bill C-3 or at least far less complex. It's not only the big bad separatists who are saying this. There are judges and experts who have said so, people who are not in politics and who stay far from away from politics, and who do not want to get involved in any kind of political debate.

Quite sincerely, I don't believe that the debate on Bill C-3 is a political one. In the long run, it could become so. I think that from the outset, it had been stated clearly, we'd often worked with Mr. Saada on other bills without getting into politics. On this bill, I did not want to do that and I still don't, because the issue is too important. It's not an issue with which we should play politics.

• 1120

The question we have to ask, now that we have it in front of us, is whether Bill C-3 will help foster the partnership among all the stakeholders and experts that is needed to help them make good decisions in light of a good report, first and foremost, a psychiatric report, a pre-sentence report—one influences the other, of course—and especially, reach a decision on the measures to be taken in order to adequately respond to the needs of the young person who has fallen into the justice system. I can never repeat this often enough, because right now, the needs of the child are the cornerstone of the entire system in Quebec. After that, I think the judge has to examine all this and make a decision in light of all the reports in the file.

One of the problems they examined, and quite rightly so because it's very important, as I said earlier, is that of the trial process. How will Bill C-3 improve the Young Offenders Act in any way with regard to the trial process? If the Minister had testified longer, I would have asked her that question. I would have asked her many more as well, but the rules being as they are, I was only able to ask her two or three questions and she refused to come back and to testify today.

Perhaps if she had come, I'd have less to say this morning. She would have answered more questions and she would have shed light on this for me, she might have reassured me or worried me even more about Bill C-3. She was fully entitled to refuse to come and that's what she did. I hope that she will hear my call and be available starting Tuesday May 2, 2000, to explain how her amendments respond to Quebec needs and those of all stakeholders, including the members of the coalition.

I believe that we're on the wrong track regarding the whole problem of trial process. Nothing is said about it. The trial period is referred to even less often than in the Young Offenders Act, whereas this should have been one of the points to be improved in the current bill. Thus, the bill completely sidesteps that entire problem.

Now with regard to trial scheduling, I do understand that this is more a provincial problem, but if we have legislation that's difficult to interpret, if we have a law that increases the number of judicial interventions, if we have a law that further complicates the files of a young offender, this will have a direct effect on organizing the court schedules. Make the law as complex as possible and you will directly influence what happens in the courtrooms of Quebec and other provincial jurisdictions, because the administration of justice is a provincial matter.

We can close our eyes and live in our glass bubble here and say that what we do is our business and we couldn't care less whether or not it affects the provinces. We produce laws to respond politically to the demands of Western Canada and all the dinosaurs in the field of youth justice. We can do that. I think that's what the minister has done here.

I hope that the Minister and the members of the committee will examine the issue during the Easter break, in order to see all the repercussions that Bill C-3 will have on the provinces if it's passed as is. That's what we have to bear in mind. Among other things, I know from experience—and you can ask anyone in the court system—that it's very important to take into account trial periods and that this is a major problem. If the legislation is made more complex as is done in Bill C-3, instead of improving scheduling in our court houses, we will make their task even more difficult, which will also lead to increased costs related to scheduling in provincial courts.

• 1125

I think everyone can agree that decorum during hearings is important, but it's not the most important thing. With regard to the rules of court, here again, there may have been some things that needed improvement, which is what we've done. But to do that, you have to check what is done in the provinces. There are certain rules of court that have been improved.

Let's now move on to the role of certain players in court: parents and victims. Once again, we're talking about victims and once again we're talking about parents. I think that the Quebec approach or model responds adequately to the demands, or rather the comments of the Canadian Alliance and the Conservative Party regarding the rights of victims, parental obligations and, conversely, the rights of the parents and the obligations of the victims. The Quebec approach responds to those issues. Does the Ontario approach do the same? Do the approaches of Alberta and Manitoba respond to those criteria? Quite humbly, I would say no.

If they think that it's the law that prevents that, it's not surprising that the Western provinces want changes. But it's at the federal level, it's the role of the Minister of Justice to tell the provinces that parents and victims have rights and obligations.

There are things you can do with the Young Offenders Act. There are things we did in Quebec. There are programs that allow you to do certain things. There can be pilot projects. There can be all sorts of things to try to improve the approach or improve the role that certain players can or should have before the courts. To achieve that, once again, you have to have given the issue some thought. You have to have answered Judge Jasmin's question about what kind of youth policies there are in a province.

You can't just pop this out of a hat like a rabbit. You have to consider it carefully, and quite sincerely, I don't think the Minister has done so. I hope she will take advantage of the time I want to give her to see what's going on in the other provinces and especially to ask them what kind of youth policies they have. I'm convinced that many provinces won't know what to say. This may encourage them to try to examine what exists in their province so that we have something a little more coherent and a bill that will satisfy everyone.

If, after this exhaustive and very serious study by each one of the provinces, we come to the conclusion that we can never agree, why can't the minister simply propose the entire issue of young offenders should become a matter of provincial jurisdiction? That could be done. It's quite possible that she will come to that conclusion. On the road to Damascus, there are many who fall and see the light. Perhaps the minister will understand something she has trouble with right now, because she may not have asked the right questions. I repeat, what kind of youth policies do the provinces have? That's the crucial question.

With regard to measures, there's an in-depth study contained in this document that I invite you to read during the Easter break, despite the fact that I'm going to list all these things in the course of the week, to cover all the whys and wherefores of these comments which are extremely important.

Among the measures in chapter 6, there is placement in custody. This is a question that many Liberals have asked. How come there are fewer young people placed in custody in Quebec? How come the statistics are different in Quebec? How come? How come? How Come? Although they answered all these questions adequately, I think that there's still some doubt in your minds; otherwise we would not be here this morning. I would invite you to carefully examine this entire issue of custody, with supporting statistics—there are many statistics available—to see what kinds of custody exist in Quebec. Perhaps you will learn something. Maybe there are things that are not necessarily done in your home province.

With regard to the method of designation of open or closed youth custody facilities, I'm sure that there are some people who are hearing this jargon for the first time. It might be interesting for you to find out how this is done in Quebec.

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There are also mixed orders. There's intermittent custody as well. It might be interesting to find out how come that's part of the reason why the statistics are lower in Quebec with regard to placement in custody. Perhaps with intermittent custody, the young person has to report to authorities at certain points and benefits from a certain degree of freedom.

There may be things about this that you should check. I hope you will do so. According to the Minister, this bill is extremely important, undoubtedly the most important bill we will have to consider during this Parliament. I'm giving you an opportunity to decide, deep in your soul and conscience, about the future of this bill with the full knowledge of the whys and wherefores of each of the clauses on which you will vote.

To do that, you have to read. You have to get information. You have to see what goes on elsewhere. Today, I'm attempting to provide my slim contribution to the in-depth examination you're going to do, and I hope I will motivate you to want to know more. The whole issue of custody is an extremely important one.

Later, I will further discuss the distinction between closed custody and shelter under the Youth Protection Act. I will further examine the comments the committee made because I think once you've understood all that, you will understand many more things as a result. You may see the whole philosophy behind the Quebec approach.

In a sense, control of behaviour during custody is a form of prevention. You understand that the overarching notions that apply in the Quebec approach are intertwined. It's not a matter of talking about prevention and once it's over, you turn the page and go on to other measures and once those other measures have been exhausted, you turn the page and go on to trial process and once that is over, you turn the page again. That's not what we do.

Everything is interrelated. We didn't achieve these results overnight. After having conducted in-depth studies, important studies by each of the stakeholders, we came to certain conclusions, certain orientations for a youth justice system. This is not improvisation.

The position we have in Quebec, the Quebec model that I'm defending or that I'm doing my best to defend, is nonetheless a fragile one because everything is interrelated. As I said earlier with my analogy about the chain, you can't attempt to weaken one link in the chain, otherwise it will break.

What I'm trying to say here is that we didn't come up with all this overnight. In Quebec, we've invested in this for at least the past 30 years and we have a very specific approach surrounding the whole problem of youth offenders. We owed it to ourselves to consult all these people to come up with an approach or a model that we now call the Quebec model.

Obviously, during the week that I'm asking you to examine this issue you're not going to come up with an approach for Alberta that resembles the Quebec approach. That's quite obvious. However, it might make you want to pursue your examination further.

If I succeed in that this morning, I will have achieved great things, as a certain Premier of Quebec used to say. All the stakeholders involved in custody are interrelated and they talk to one another to come up with the best approach for the young offender. Here again, we're talking about the needs of the young person.

We take a close look at violent behaviour. There are youngsters who behave violently and they may be the ones who need more attention and experts may have to work more closely with them. We do have success stories. I was telling you earlier that I know someone who killed two people and who is an anonymous citizen today. He's a butcher. He has a job. He's no longer dependent on the rest of society. He has a wife, he has a child. Everything's going well for him. So much the better. I'm not going to say that he didn't exhibit violent behaviour before, but with the tools we had at our disposal, with the Young Offenders Act, we managed to do something so that that young person has straightened himself out today. I'm talking about youngsters, but he's not young anymore; he's older than I am. He's become a private citizen, but when he committed his crime, when he exhibited this violent behaviour, he was young. He was under 18. He was exactly 16 years old.

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There are also young people for whom incarceration is just a big game. They want to get out as soon as possible and they will come up with all sorts of schemes to escape. One also has to have the reflex to understand that, have the expertise necessary to diagnose or rather understand that young person who likes to escape because it raises his self-esteem; it makes him feel like he's putting one over on the system. So you also need specialists and it's during behavioural control in custody that we see and observe that.

There are some young people for whom disciplinary action is truly necessary. There are some who need to be told no. There are young people who need to be told: “Look, this is not how things work. Here are the rules. You'd better follow them, otherwise this is what's going to happen to you.” But to do that, a province has to have a youth policy. The province has to know what to do with a young person in difficulty. It's not enough to just incarcerate him and solve the problem for the five or six years he'll spend behind bars. To achieve this, you need a youth policy.

It is my hope that during the Easter break and until Tuesday May 2, 2000, at 9:30 a.m. you, the Liberals opposite, will ask yourselves all these questions and, above all, that in your home provinces you will contact the authorities, the minister of justice or the solicitor general and ask them what their policies on youth are, ask them what they do with a young person in difficulty. And on Tuesday May 2, we'll be able to discuss these things and everyone will understand, everyone will know what I'm talking about, what the approach advocated by Quebec is all about, what Quebec's position is and what the Quebec model for young offenders is.

If I were to put that question today to the members of Parliament around this table, I'm not sure there would be any members who know what the Quebec model is. I understand that, it's very complex. We needed 30 years to come up with the Quebec model for young offenders. You can't gain an understanding of something like that overnight.

I must add, because I was going to forget—I will surely forget some things, but as I keep on talking they will come to me—that Bill C-3 amends the Young Offenders Act before we've even obtained the statistics on the last amendments that were made regarding presumptive transfer. You keep amending the Young Offenders Act and every time, it's in response to demands from the West, in response to certain demands by English Canada, without even evaluating the consequences of the amendments you've made.

The issue of transfer was the subject of the last amendment. We all know that in Quebec there are very few transfers. The situation is different in Western Canada. Do you have any statistics? Do you have the results of this issue of transfer? Has this helped the youth justice system in those provinces? Have you improved the youth justice system by amending the act as you have in recent years? Many witnesses have said that you are amending the act and that you have not even stopped to determine if the most recent legislative amendments to the Young Offenders Act have borne fruit, or if the objectives had been reached. But no, you are turning your ear to Western Canada and you are hearing calls to toughen up the system.

So it seems an election is in the air. According to the Prime Minister, there will be an election in 12 or 15 months. So you are saying that it would be important to harshen the tone with respect to the Young Offenders Act, or follow up on the famous Red Book. I clearly remember that the Liberal Party's Red Book accused young offenders of all evils. It is easy to create a problem that does not exist and come up with an imaginary solution, which is Bill C- 3, to attempt to resolve it.

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The problem of young people exists and we must continue to try to solve it. It is not, however, as serious as seem to suggest the Minister of Justice and the people of Western Canada who are trying to use Bill C-3 as a miracle solution. I do not know who will be able to enforce its extremely complex provisions.

It is all fine and well to amend an act, but look, you have to stop at some point and examine what has been done to date. When I hear via the grapevine that the Justice Committee studied the issue of young offenders when Ms. Cohen was chair, I am forced to say yes. There is, however, a point on which we do not agree. Before we even started our study, the conclusions had been dictated by the Liberal Party of Canada's Red Book. Things are not going well, are they? We busted our butts for several weeks studying the Young Offenders Act, while up someone's sleeve, somewhere in the Department of Justice, and more specifically in the Office of the Liberal Minister of Justice of Canada, were the conclusions of the study already prepared in accordance, quite coincidentally, with the Red Book that was published in the last federal election.

Our study was bogus. This is not the first time I have said it and I repeat it; the dice were loaded. We have not listened to what the witnesses, namely the ones from Quebec, have told us about Bill C-3. I understand that all you had in mind was the Red Book and its objective to toughen the Young Offenders Act. Although a large part of the electorate buys that, it is not the case in Quebec. The fix was in on the study right from the beginning. I can tell you that you do not understand all of the repercussions of the amendments you are proposing. You cannot give us any guarantees or assurances because you don't know the answer either.

I am sure that deep down inside you know that you are jeopardizing the Quebec approach, but you hope that, given the resourcefulness and the way legislation is enforced in Quebec, we will be able to maintain our social component and work it out so that we have something that resembles what currently exists.

You hope that Western Canada will enforce a few of the provisions in Bill C-3. As Mr. Rock indicated during a meeting, it would be so easy to do the opposite and sell the Quebec approach to the other provinces. I understand, however, that Mr. Rock comes from Ontario, whereas the current minister comes from Western Canada, where the electorate has adopted a very different position with respect to young offenders.

Mr. Chairman, what I am offering with my motion this morning is the possibility for everyone around this table to learn about the Quebec model, to see what is happening and to take an in-depth look at the approach that we have been defending for so long in Quebec. I hope that the other provinces recognize what we are doing in Quebec and that they want to align themselves with it as much as possible. Some members around this table have said on several occasions that in Quebec things are done differently. I invite them to take their logic a step further, to respect what they have said and to be logical by voting in favour of my motion. We could take advantage of the two-week Easter break to re-examine the Quebec approach and try to see why we have been fighting for it so hard since the beginning, why we say it is so important for Quebec, why we are defending the importance of maintaining our different approach and why we say that the Quebec model is unique.

We could go and meet with workers in this field, including the ones who work at the Institut Philippe Pinel and in the courts, to see how it works from A to Z. We could meet with police officers and hear them explain their specific approach. We could go and see the people who are enforcing alternative measures, which has not been done yet. We could go and hear what we have not heard enough about yet and try to understand what we missed. If you had understood, you would not have introduced Bill C-3. You would be opposed to such a bill. You would support my position and defend the same point of view if you knew what Quebec was doing with young offenders.

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I will now talk about custody. I was saying at the beginning that there was a relationship between the various workers, which is very much the case. I agree that it is very complex. If we are acting in good faith and truly believe that in Quebec some things are done differently—as the Department of Justice indicated through Mr. Allan Rock—we would want Quebec to influence the approach used in other provinces. We could go and see what is really being done in Quebec, and then go and see what the other provinces are doing and ask them which youth policies they have adopted. We could give them Quebec's case as an example and invite them to follow this model.

Do other parts of the country have rehabilitation centres that oversee the enforcement of these measures, centres that have truly taken into account young people's needs and examined their family, social and personal lives? I would like to know that. If that is the case, I would like someone to tell me what they are doing and if they administer youth policies that are different or similar to those in Quebec. Could we influence them? Could we help them have an approach that resembles Quebec's as much as possible? I don't know. But we have to know whether or not they exist, Mr. Chairman.

Reintegrating young people in custody is an important issue. We try to impose reintegration programs on them. If they are in custody, it is because they have committed a rather serious offence. We have reintegration measures so that they can become anonymous citizens, taxpayers, so that they can start a family, contribute to the economy and no longer live off society. Is this approach not preferable to putting them behind bars in a nice, modern, concrete building where they would serve their sentence, so that they can do their time as people say in prison jargon? What will they have learned when they get out? That is something we must look into. We have to ask the other provinces about their youth policies. We know that in some provinces young adolescents are incarcerated in the same penitentiaries as adults.

Besides, the amendments as proposed in Bill C-3 mean that a 16-year old facing a five or six-year sentence will spend a part of this in a Quebec rehabilitation centre and the rest in an adult jail. Although we'll have started investing in this youth for his rehabilitation and reintegration, when he reaches 18, we'll transfer him into an adult jail. That is the wonderful logic behind Bill C-3.

What does it serve us to invest in a young person who, once he's in adult jail, will be influenced by adults who have committed serious crimes? Why should we graduate him to these small universities of crime so that he can learn how to rob a bank or a caisse populaire or a convenience store, or commit any other kind of crime without getting caught? There is the wonderful logic behind Bill C-3. Do you think that's what we want in Quebec? Do you think that's the kind of influence we're looking for? No. You have to understand the whole problem.

Besides measures having to do with custody, there is also the matter of probation. Even though I'll address this here very quickly, I'll be able to address it more at length a bit later so that you can understand and want to learn more. My goal today is to raise question marks.

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I want to encourage you to do in your ridings what we've been doing for a long time in Quebec. You have to compare what's done in Quebec to what's being done in the other provinces. We have to examine the measures that exist in the provinces we come from, those we could use and adapt for elsewhere, for the provinces where the people we represent live. Whether we're from the Maritimes or the West, we represent our constituents and we're trying to get the best for them. In any case, that's my own philosophy. I'll never defend a bill if I'm afraid it might infringe upon the rights of my constituents and my voters.

On the contrary, I'll rend my garment and argue as long as I can to try and convince you that you're going down the wrong path. After my discussions with the Liberal members for Quebec and Ontario, I know full well that the approach taken in Bill C-3 is not the best nor the one you wish for. I know very well that if this were submitted to a free vote, some of these members would vote against Bill C-3.

I'm asking them today to review the whole matter and to try to find out whether the game is worth the candle. Should we play politics with that? I think I know some Liberal members enough to know that despite our opposition on many broad national questions, some Liberal members do have a backbone, are intelligent and see all the consequences that will flow from this bill. I dare hope that when they rise, they will say loud and clear what they've told me and what they've told members of the coalition in the lobbies of Parliament and justice halls in Quebec, in other words that this is not good legislation and that they will vote against it.

You will support the motion that I presented this morning to have it passed and to get the department to do its homework. The department and the Minister must see that the amendments that are being suggested are just a slap in the face. They're laughing at the Quebec approach. They're acting like we're dimwits and they expect us to swallow everything they give us. That's taking us for a bunch of naive twits, Mr. Chairman, and I don't see that this changes anything in the whole philosophy behind this new approach in Bill C-3. They just don't see that these amendments together with the complexity of the bill mean that the Young Offenders Act and the approach we've defended over the last 30 years are in danger.

They seem to think, Mr. Chairman, that we're real twits and that we'll say yes to those amendments just because paragraphs have been changed, commas have been added or a word or two replaced. The question is far more complex than that and they know it. Mr. Mancini, you can stay here; I was just about to convince you. Well, he's gone. I dare hope that the Liberal members from Quebec and Ontario will vote in favour of the motion I introduced this morning so that we'll be able to use the 10 days of our Easter break to examine all this matter and evaluate the importance and consequences of the changes we'll eventually be studying, goodness knows when, but which we'll be looking at some day sooner or later, I'm sure.

I do sincerely hope we'll be able to study.... Well, Mr. Peter MacKay has just left also. I dare hope he'll be reading the record of our deliberations this morning and that he'll get himself a copy of the publication Les jeunes contrevenants: au nom et au-delà de la loi (Young offenders: in the name of the law and beyond) published in 1995 by the Government of Quebec. This will help him understand that the approach taken by Bill C-3 is not adequate, for different reasons, including some that I mentioned this morning in the areas of prevention, police intervention, the alternative measures program and intervention of the judiciary. Right now, Mr. Chairman, I'm talking about the different measures and there are many other elements that enter into account here, probation being one of them.

I must emphasize that I'm in the presence of a chairman who is quite the ideal one to understand my point of view as he was once upon a time Canada's solicitor general. He understands the whole problem and the importance of the question of probation. You know about the whole problem and the importance of the probation question. I'm sure that you know it's important and that in Quebec, once again in that area, we have an approach that's different from that of the other provinces. Once again, if I were to ask the members around the table, I'm not sure, Mr. Chairman, that I'd be getting meaningful answers to my question.

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The context of the decision in the area of probation is very important. How will Bill C-3 help us in that area, Mr. Chairman? How? If we really want to improve the system, at some point we're going to have to answer the questions I've just put. How is Bill C-3 going to help the police agents, further the measures to be taken, the alternative measures programs, judicial intervention and probation? How is Bill C-3 going to help us? In no way. No one has come before us to tell us it would help them.

Probation-wise, the whole context surrounding the decision, there are all kinds of conditions in the order where judges have a certain discretionary leeway but even at that, the legislation will influence them strongly. Once again, I think it's Justice Jasmin who told us this, besides telling us there were contradictions in the legislation. But that's another story. I'll get back to that a little later.

Again, on February 22, 2000, at 5:15 p.m. on page 3241, Justice Jasmin says:

If the legislation says that the offence is the most important thing, that our first criterion is the seriousness of the offence, we will have to change our approach.

But our approach is going to be influenced at all stages including the stage of alternative measures or probation. Mr. Chairman, I have a sixth sense today and I can hear the rumour coming from the department side in front of me that there are amendments in Bill C-3, amendments that will answer all my criteria and all my question marks and that I don't have to have any concern. I'm strangely concerned with the amendments that are being suggested. They have chocolate-coated the peanut to get us to swallow it, but if you're allergic to peanuts, you are still going to be sick. Nothing has changed, Mr. Chairman.

It is not because someday we will be seeing in-depth amendments—I'll be able to plead something else at that point—that the amendments that are being suggested will answer Justice Jasmin's concerns, or the concerns of other judges or coalitions. It's the whole philosophy, Mr. Chairman, that is going to orient the application of the legislation. It is the philosophy that is going to be influenced and I hope that I'll have managed to get people to understand that it is not by changing a word here or there or adding a comma or two or five as the Minister is suggesting in her bill that we will change that philosophy. Nothing is being changed.

This philosophy is different, simply different in the Young Offenders Act and in the bill that's being presented here, an Act in respect of criminal justice for young persons and to amend and repeal other Acts. The philosophy is different. It's going to be applied differently. That's simply all it is but that's exactly all it is, Mr. Chairman, and it's going to be applied differently in all circumstances, at all stages, including probation. And that is something we must be aware of before we pass this bill.

My motion addresses exactly that point, Mr. Chairman. My motion is to save the model, not just the Quebec model but the Canadian model because, in a way, we're part of this system and if we can influence the other provinces in any way, that's all the better. If we can leave you a legacy of good things when we leave, all the better. If we can serve as a model when we're not here anymore, all the better. But for that, Bill C-3 must not pass, Mr. Chairman, and I will fight with all the energy I have left, Mr. Chairman, and I still have a lot left.

I want to get back to probation and discuss it very seriously because it is important. There is the whole matter of probation follow-up. You can't have probation without follow-up. You can have very tightly followed-up probation, but once again, Mr. Chairman, it depends on the pre-sentence report. It depends on whether there were specialists' reports in the file. It depends on a lot of things. You can also have intensive probation, Mr. Chairman. You can have all kinds of things in that area.

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The important thing, even with probation, is to know what resources are available for the young person. You're putting him on probation, fine. There will be certain criteria determined, fine. What resources are made available to the young offender? What resources does the province have to ensure follow-up? It's always exactly the same question; we always come back to my first premise, the first point of my motion. We have to have the time for the provinces to answer the question that Justice Jasmin put on February 22: what youth policy do you have? That's the question, Mr. Chairman.

What resources are there to attain the objective, to have an approach to youth policies. For that, you need time. Mr. Chairman, I know that you'll be the first to ask me on May 2 if I agree that clause-by-clause be postponed until September in order that we may examine this important bill in depth. I'm telling you in advance that if you ask me to postpone the clause-by-clause until September, I will accept. I'll be pleased and I'll make the whole QQuebec coalition available to you. I'll ask them to work with you to have the Quebec approach understood and try to influence the other provinces as much as possible. Actually, it would be desirable, Mr. Chairman, that you move a motion to postpone the clause-by-clause until September. We'd have the time to elucidate all this and examine the whole system of juvenile justice—which is an extremely important system—quite carefully, in the cold light of day.

The residency condition is also important. I wonder if in the provinces, people think about that. The management tools for probation and the interrelation that exists between the pre- sentence report and probation are things that we have to look at. To my knowledge, that has not been examined, Mr. Chairman, during this study. I was there in 1993, 1994 and 1995 when, with Ms. Cohen, we undertook the great and glorious study that was skewed at the outset because the conclusions were already drawn up, as I was saying before. We didn't really look at any one of those points.

I think we attacked the problem from the wrong end. Strange to say, we showed up in the House of Commons with a solution and we tried to find a problem to fit it. But as the solution isn't the right one, we never actually did find the real problem and that is a concern. It's a concern because, in my opinion, we could have saved enormous amounts of energy if we had simply taken one simple thing into account which is that the Young Offenders Act is a good piece of legislation. There is one aspect that could be improved as I was saying before and that is the matter of time frames but that is the only one. Anyway, we will address the report more specifically later.

Mr. Chairman, do we have a quorum?

The Chair: No.

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur: No; could we have a quorum?

[English]

The Chair: We call quorum.

[Translation]

Mr. Michel Bellehumeur: What I'm saying is just so fascinating.

[English]

The Chair: It's up to you.

Seeing no quorum, I will adjourn the committee until 3.30 p.m. today.

The meeting is adjourned.