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House Hansard - 76

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 20, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 76 - May/20/22
Mr. Tako Van Popta (Langley—Aldergrove, CPC)
  • May/20/22 12:00:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the whole world is starting to see the COVID-19 pandemic in the rear-view mirror. Governments around the world are starting to ease up on gathering and travelling restrictions. Canadian travellers are certainly back in full force. Too bad their government is not. Look at the long lineups at airports and passport offices. When will the government start following the science that the rest of the world is following and allow Canadians to get back to normal?
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Context: House Hansard - 76 - May/20/22
Mr. Tako Van Popta (Langley—Aldergrove, CPC)
Madam Speaker, it is an honour for me to rise today to join the debate on Bill C-216, an act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and to enact the expungement of certain drug-related convictions act and the national strategy on substance use act. The sponsor of this private member's bill is a fellow British Columbian, the member for Courtenay—Alberni, and I want to thank him for introducing this legislation. It is very timely because Canada has been struggling with an opioid overdose crisis. It is Canada's other pandemic. However, there are some stark distinctions. The COVID-19 pandemic will wane. It is waning, and we are seeing it in the rear-view mirror. We have also developed a vaccine to combat COVID-19, and we are developing a community immunity, or a herd immunity, as some people call it. Harm reduction measures for COVID-19 are known, which are simple and generally effective. None of that is true for the opioid crisis. I would like to read something from the government's own website. It states, “The opioid overdose crisis is worsening during the COVID-19 pandemic with many communities across Canada reporting record numbers of opioid-related deaths, emergency calls and hospitalizations.” The website also points out that there has been a 95% increase, which is almost double, of opioid-related deaths in the first year of the pandemic, moving up to 7,200. This is a very large number. It is shocking. These are real people and fellow Canadian citizens. These are moms and dads, brothers and sisters. They are people who are loved by friends and family. These are people who have an opioid addiction or substance addiction and have found themselves unfortunately coming into contact with likely fentanyl-laced opioids. I grieve for a family friend in my riding who, just a little while ago, marked the anniversary of the death of their son to an opioid overdose death. He was loved by his family. He had a lot of friends. He was a popular man. He had a great job. His employer relied on him, and his fellow workers enjoyed working with him. He died at home alone of an alleged opioid overdose. He sadly became part of Canada's statistics. The sponsor of the private member's bill, as I pointed out, is a fellow British Columbian, so I want to look at some British Columbia statistics when it comes to illicit drug toxicity deaths. The number of these deaths in B.C. equates to about five deaths per day. Every day, five people in British Columbia die of an illicit drug toxicity poisoning. In 2022, 74% of those dying were age 30 to 59, and 77% were male. More than half those deaths occurred at home when the person was alone. There was a big increase in illicit toxicity deaths since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, although we were seeing a large increase in 2015 when illicit drug toxicity deaths became the number one cause of unnatural deaths in British Columbia. That is going back to 2015. There was already a big uptick. At that time, fentanyl use spiked to become the number one cause of illicit drug toxicity deaths. We agree that this bill is very timely, and it is a very important discussion. Let us have a closer look at the draft legislation. It will amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to repeal provisions that make it an offence to possess certain substances. It will also enact a new act for the expungement of certain drug-related convictions, as though the conviction never happened. It will also enact the national strategy on substance use act, which would require the Minister of Health to develop a harm reduction strategy. I want to focus on that last part, the national strategy on substance use. The focus of that, according to the draft legislation, is harm caused by criminalization of substance abuse and not on the substance abuse itself. It would also introduce a low-barrier access to safe supply of addictive and harmful substances, focus on supervised consumption sites and overdose prevention, and focus on reducing stigma associated with substance abuse. I believe the intent or hope of this legislation is that it would lead to fewer victims of substance abuse. That is a laudable goal, but I am not sure that these are the correct tools. It is my and the Conservative Party's position that we should always focus on recovery and treatment. If we go back to the proposed national strategy on substance use, it is commendable for promoting universal access to recovery. I would support that. It would focus on relapse prevention programs, which is very supportable, and it would focus on evidence-based prevention programs. Of course, these are all important things, and I would support those initiatives. In the 2021 federal election, the Conservatives presented a plan that included creating 1,000 drug treatment beds, creating 50 recovery community centres, supporting local and culturally appropriate addiction treatment and partnering with provinces for access to Naloxone. As such, we find some common ground. However, we think that people should be given the hope of recovery, not just reduced harm, not just safe supply, not just safe injection sites, but real, long-lasting solutions full of hope for a better life. We believe Canada ought to focus on recovery and treatment as our basic framework for dealing with the opioid crisis. As for the decriminalization of possession, which is part of this private member's bill, I would note that in 2020 the Public Prosecution Service of Canada issued a directive to avoid prosecuting cases of simple possession. That reflects and mirrors what is happening in some European countries, where possession still remains criminal, but police and prosecutors are given instructions not to intervene based on discretionary use of their powers and guidelines. This, I think, gives the criminal justice system the flexibility to treat addiction as a health issue, when and where appropriate, in cases where that is appropriate, but it also retains tools for law enforcement to keep harmful drugs off our streets. I am on the public safety and national security committee, and we have just come off a study on gun control and illegal arms trafficking, focusing on the increase of gun crimes committed by members of street gangs. In that study, we heard evidence from a number of witnesses that showed us an inextricable link between drug trafficking and arms trafficking. The two go hand in hand. I have a couple of quotes here from witnesses. The first is from Mitch Bourbonniere, who works in Winnipeg. He said, “Anyone in Winnipeg can purchase a firearm illegally, much the same way as you [can purchase] illegal drugs.” Here is another quote, from Michael Rowe of the Vancouver police force. In an answer to a question correlating arms smuggling and drug smuggling, he said, “certainly...there's a correlation there that I don't think can be disputed, especially as the manufacturing or sale of fentanyl produces an extremely lucrative drug market. That lucrative drug market typically invites conflict that will then result in gang violence.” There is no doubt that there is a link between drug trafficking and arms trafficking. I do not believe that removing the personal use of these drugs from the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act would solve that problem. Our focus should remain on tackling the source of lethal fentanyl-laced opioids and on those criminals who produce the fentanyl and earn big profits.
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