- Member of Parliament
- Member of the Joint Interparliamentary Council
- Conservative
- St. Albert—Edmonton
- Alberta
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $119,185.60
- Government Page
- Feb/16/23 10:08:05 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition initiated by my constituents Mike and Dianne Ilesic, whose son Brian, along with two other victims, was brutally murdered in an armed robbery. A fourth victim survived but sustained permanent head injuries.
Mike and Dianne felt some sense of relief believing that they would never have to face Brian's killer at a parole hearing, after he was the first mass killer to be sentenced under a law passed by the previous Harper Conservative government that gave judges the discretion to impose consecutive parole ineligibility periods for mass killers to take into account each life lost. However, that law was struck down unjustly by the Supreme Court last year. Now Brian's killer could be eligible for parole in just 14 short years. Mike and Dianne were alarmed when the Minister of Justice failed to respond to the decision and even went so far as to say that he respected the decision.
Mike and Dianne, along with petitioners, are calling on the Minister of Justice to, for once, stand up for victims and respond to this decision by invoking the notwithstanding clause so that families like theirs never have to endure a parole hearing, and so that the worst of the worst mass killers in this country remain behind bars, where they belong.
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- Dec/9/22 10:30:58 a.m.
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- Re: Bill C-9
Madam Speaker, this legislation would reform the process by which the Canadian Judicial Council undertakes reviews of complaints brought against judges for alleged misconduct. The judicial complaints review process was established more than 50 years ago, in 1971. It has a number of problems in that it can be timely, cumbersome and costly. These problems have been publicly recognized by the Canadian Judicial Council, which consists of 41 members, including all chief justices and associate chief justices of federally appointed courts. For years, there have been calls to reform the process.
The process, as it currently stands, can involve up to three layers of judicial review: the Federal Court of Canada, the Federal Court of Appeal and, upon leave being granted, the Supreme Court of Canada. That process can take years and, in some cases, even as long as a decade. This bill seeks to address that by streamlining the process, although, I would submit, it does so somewhat imperfectly from the standpoint of ensuring procedural fairness. Nonetheless, the process the government has come up with is supportable, notwithstanding some shortcomings that Conservatives raised at committee.
The bill also seeks to enhance transparency by requiring that the Canadian Judicial Council, in its annual reports, to publish the number of complaints and how those complaints were resolved.
The bill would enhance accountability. Under the current process, where a judge's misconduct is not at a level that would warrant their removal from office, such cases can be settled behind closed doors with really very little transparency. This bill would change that by providing for mandatory sanctions. Those sanctions could range from requiring the judge to issue an apology to requiring the judge to undertake counselling or professional development training with regard for the nature of the misconduct and circumstances of the case.
The bill, on the whole, would protect the independence of the judiciary, which is vital to our democracy and integral to the rule of law, which is something that, unfortunately from time to time, the current government has not respected. In addition, with some imperfections, the bill would maintain procedural fairness, both from the standpoint of the complainant as well as for a judge whose conduct is being questioned by way of a complaint.
It is good that this bill has been brought forward. It is a bill that is the product of consultations that took place in 2016, the substance of which have been incorporated into this bill, on which there is generally consensus. However, I will say that it did take the Liberals five years after those consultations ended to get around to introducing a bill. Moreover, when the government finally got around to introducing a bill in May 2021, it went nowhere because of the Prime Minister, who called a completely unnecessary and opportunistic election. Following the unnecessary election, the Liberals reintroduced the bill in the Senate last November and then suddenly decided one month later to pull the bill from the Senate.
The Liberals then reintroduced the bill, Bill C-9, last December in the House and proceeded to let it languish for months on end. For six months, they sat on their hands only to finally bring it up for debate at second reading in June, just before the House rose for the summer, and here we are at Christmas still dealing with the bill.
I highlight the process to underscore how dysfunctional the Liberal government is. Here, we have a bill around which there is general consensus, and it has taken the Liberals three bills to proceed. While the bill would enhance public confidence in the judicial system, and judges are central to that system, the same cannot be said more broadly about public confidence in our justice system, as a result of the policies of the Liberal government, policies and actions for which the government gets a failing grade.
For the Liberals, it is always about the criminals and never about the victims. This, after all, is a government that allowed the position of victims ombudsman to be left vacant for nine months. Finally, in September, the Liberals got around to filling that vacancy. It was not the first time they left that position vacant, the federal advocate for victims, the ombudsman. They left the position vacant for nearly a year in 2017 and 2018. By contrast, when it came to the prisoners ombudsman, when that position became vacant, the Liberals saw fit to fill it the very next day.
That is quite a contrast. When it comes to an ombudsman for prisoners, the vacancy was filled the next day. When it comes to the ombudsman for the rights of victims, the government has presided over leaving that critical position vacant for nearly two years out of the seven years it has been in office.
This is a government that just passed Bill C-5, the do-no-time, soft-on-crime bill, as it has come to be known, which eliminates mandatory jail time for serious firearms offences and for serious drug offences, including trafficking and production of schedule 1 drugs such as cocaine, fentanyl and crystal meth. This is at a time when we have an opioids crisis. When 21 Canadians a day are dying as a result of that, the government's priority is to let those who put that poison on our streets serve their sentence at home, instead of behind bars where they belong.
That is a government that has failed to engage in that dialogue, which is so critical between Parliament and the courts. The minister failed to respond to the Supreme Court's decision to strike down the very reasonable and just law passed by the previous Harper government to give judges the discretion to apply consecutive parole ineligibility periods for mass murderers, including the mass murderer responsible for the murder of my constituent Brian Ilesic. His parents, Mike and Dianne, are very deeply troubled by the inaction of the minister, and I am glad that today he at least acknowledged he was open to reviewing that decision. That is the first time he has said that.
In closing, I will just say that the bill is a supportable bill, but it is cold comfort for victims and their families who, time and again, have been abandoned by the government.
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Mr. Speaker, the member for North Island—Powell River is absolutely right. Jury service is a mandatory form of civic duty. As Mark Farrant notes, it is the last form of mandatory civic duty since the abolition of conscription.
The former jurors that we heard from I think reflect most former jurors across Canada. They are proud of their jury service. They also believe that they should not suffer from mental health issues, unable to get help, because they performed their civic duty. Jurors undertake work integral to the administration of justice in Canada at a considerable personal cost. We have to recognize that and we have to do more to support them.
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- May/30/22 2:48:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Brian Ilesic and two other victims were murdered in an armed robbery. They were shot point-black in the back of the head. A fourth victim survived with serious brain injuries. Brian's parents, my constituents Mike and Dianne, feel completely betrayed that this cold-blooded killer will be eligible for parole years sooner, along with other mass killers.
What assurance can the Minister of Justice provide, aside from empty words, for Mike and Dianne and other grieving families in the face of this unjust decision by the Supreme Court?
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- May/6/22 12:11:56 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-5
moved:
That it be an instruction to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights that, during its consideration of Bill C-5, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, the committee be granted the power to divide the bill into two pieces of legislation:
(i) Bill C-5A, An Act to amend the Criminal Code, containing clauses 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14,
(ii) Bill C-5B, An Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, containing the remaining clauses of the bill.
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- Mar/4/22 11:11:31 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, once again, the Liberal government is demonstrating that victims of crime are a low priority for it. For the past half year, the position of victims ombudsman has remained vacant. The victims ombudsman is an integral resource for victims, including addressing their complaints and bringing forward recommendations on how to improve laws and programs to better support victims.
After half a year, the justice minister's statement that this position will be filled in due course is unacceptable. This, after all, is the same government that previously left this position vacant for nearly a year.
Victims deserve a voice and they deserve it now. It is time for the government to end this inexcusable delay and forthwith appoint a victims ombudsman.
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