Branden Leslie
Portage—Lisgar, Manitoba · Conservative · Canada
“Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has said affordability is the best it has been in decades, but normal, hard-working, everyday Canadians know that is simply not true. Meat Loaf famously once sang Two Out of Three Ain't Bad , but, surely, three out of four is not good.”
“Mr. Speaker, we have a new top export out of this country. It is announcements and MOUs. Not that long ago, Canadians used to dream of buying a home. Now, under the Liberal Prime Minister , many are starting GoFundMe pages just to pay for essential items for life.”
“Mr. Speaker, I recognize that the minister was not here during the last Conservative government. There are members across the way who were here, and they may recall the outrage whenever the Harper government used time allocation.”
“Mr. Speaker, I listened closely to my colleague's speech. She talked about unintended consequences a lot, which was a bit strange for somebody who, just months ago, told Canadians that it was the Liberals making her communities less safe and that it was their “bail not jail” policies and legislation that favoured criminals over victims.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals did not drive our economy into the ditch by accident. They took every wrong turn and ignored every warning sign, and now they want to blame everyone else. After more than a decade of inflationary spending, red tape and anti-development laws, Canada is now the only G20 country in a recession.”
“Meanwhile, the Prime Minister spent nearly $1 million on luxury catering over 14 trips, enough to feed a family for 55 years. The Liberals can blame the mud, the road or the weather, but everybody knows that they have been behind the wheel. Canadians deserve a government that stops—”
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“Even worse, they are expected to accept this from some of the biggest and most profitable telecom companies in the country. At some point, we have to stop treating bad cellphone service like bad weather, as if it just happens and there cannot be anything done about it. This is the conversation that Parliament is long overdue to have, and it is why Conservatives believe this bill should go to committee for study. At committee, members should hear from those rural municipalities and from our first responders, who understand the public safety risks. They should hear from industry stakeholders about the barriers to deployment and from the regulators about how coverage is measured and, most importantly, verified. We need to make sure this work leads to the problem being fixed, however.”
“Imagine buying a new truck and it randomly just stops working while driving down certain roads. Imagine ordering home Internet to be told that it works wonderfully, except if someone tries to use it. Nobody would accept these services, yet with cell service, too many people have been trained to just shrug it off as if that it is just the way it is. People know where the call will drop, so they avoid making calls, and if they live in that area, I guess they just do not make calls from their own house without a land line. They know where they cannot send a text, they know what corner of the house gets that service consistently, and they know that stretch of road where they are just out of luck. Simply, they have adapted to bad service, but that does not make it okay.”
“Bill C-268 would require the Minister of Industry to review that framework, report back to Parliament and hear from people who understand the stakes, such as rural municipalities, first responders, the CRTC, telecom providers and spectrum licence-holders, who would all to come to the table to help us understand what the challenges are and how they can be fixed. In plain English, Parliament would finally have to ask whether Canada's public airwaves are being used to connect people or if we are letting an outdated system limp along while rural communities are left buffering and paying full price for next to no service at times. (1830) It is amazing that we have become accustomed to this issue. In any other part of life, people would be furious to pay full price for a service if it only worked half the time at best.”
“That is not just a long time ago; in the world of telecom years, that is ancient history. This framework predates the smart phone in the world we live in. It predates the app economy. It predates connected farms, remote work and the expectation that people should be able to bank, work, run a business and stay connected from almost anywhere in this great nation. Canada's public airwaves are being managed under a framework that has been sitting on the shelf since the flip phone era, thinking back to when we had to press enough characters 14 different times just to say hello and to have the patience of a saint. Since then, the world has changed immensely, as we all know, and the framework governing our public airwaves was written for a very different country than the one we are living in today.”
“What matters is not just the stretch of highway where we know service is awful. We know that people stand outside their houses holding their phones up in the air hoping they might get that one bar. People live there, and despite being told they are served, they know they are not. That is why accurate coverage data matters. Rural folks do not need someone or some big company telling them they are covered when their own experience shows them that is not the case. They need a system that measures service as it actually exists in the real world. This bill would force Parliament to take another look at Canada's spectrum policy framework. That matters because the bill's own preamble makes a pretty remarkable admission that Canada's spectrum policy framework has not been updated since 2007.”
“Bill C-268 would require the CRTC to verify the mobile coverage data it gets from Canadian carriers. That matters because every rural resident knows there can be a huge gap between what the coverage map says and what the phone actually delivers for them. On paper, an area may be completely covered and may appear served, but it is not. In reality, that service may mean one weak bar at best, or a call that drops halfway through, or a signal that disappears the moment the road dips or the weather changes. I bet every single rural member of Parliament in this place knows exactly what I am talking about. We know instinctively where the dead zones are in our ridings. We know where we can make calls on the road, where we simply cannot and where, unless we have downloaded it, an audiobook or podcast is going to cut out, too.”
“That is why this issue matters so much. “Spectrum” may sound like something regulators just talk about, but it is the invisible infrastructure behind every call, text, emergency alert and wireless connection that people rely on. It is also a public resource. The public owns it. Companies are licensed to use it, but government is supposed to manage it in the public interest. When spectrum policy works, people get better service, stronger competition and fewer dead zones. When it fails, families pay full price for half service at best sometimes. Signals drop, towers do not get built, smaller companies get squeezed out, and consumers get fewer choices to purchase from. Worst of all, prices stay high, and the same companies continue to call the shots on how this process works.”
“Mr. Speaker, for many people living in big cities, a dropped call is an irritant, but then they dial again and it works just fine. For rural families, it can be dangerous. It can mean a farmer cannot connect to the equipment that keeps his or her modern operation running or, worse, cannot make a call if the combine starts on fire. It can mean a family driving on a lonely stretch of highway in a snowstorm has no way to call for help if disaster strikes. For a first responder, it can mean the difference between getting there on time and getting there too late, and the trauma that can follow. In Canada, cell service should not be a luxury or simply a perk. It is basic infrastructure in an advanced nation like Canada. When it fails, people notice, and sometimes, particularly in rural Canada, they pay for it.”
“That should set off alarm bells for everyone in our country, and anyone who thinks this can continue should give their head a shake. When interest payments eat up more of the budget, there is less money for health care, defence and infrastructure. Canadians do not need a Prime Minister asking for a higher credit limit. They need a government that remembers that taxpayers are the ones footing the bill.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister needs to understand that the public purse is not his personal travel rewards card. I know that he likes to fly but there are no Aeroplan points when the government spends billions of dollars that it does not have. There is no free checked bag for the next generation. There is no lounge access for taxpayers, and there is definitely no complimentary upgrade when the country is stuck at the back of the plane with a maxed-out credit card. Since taking office, the Prime Minister has added $90 billion in net new spending and the cost of running government is up 9% in under a year. The Liberals are now spending more to service our national debt than the government collects in the GST, or, as it should soon be called, the debt servicing tax.”
“Mr. Speaker, one of my colleagues previously, in delivering a speech on this topic, brought up the idea of the previous removal of the costing regarding the entrance fee, so to speak, to become a candidate. I am very curious whether the member would be willing to incorporate that into the legislation.”
“Mr. Speaker, serious leadership looks like understanding what Canadians are going through. The Prime Minister says affordability has never been better. If that is true, I would hate to see what he thinks expensive looks like. When was the last time he actually went into a grocery store and bought groceries for himself in Canada? I highly doubt it has been in this millennium. Let me remind him of reality. After a decade of Liberal spending, families are paying 42% more for groceries than they were in 2015. Everything costs more. Canadians are struggling to stay afloat. If life is so affordable, why are more Canadians lining up at food banks than ever before?”
“Mr. Speaker, it takes a special kind of spending problem to make Justin Trudeau look fiscally responsible, yet the Prime Minister has done it. His budget 2025 added $90 billion in net new spending, and the government is now paying over $55 billion this year just to service our debt. Canadians are being told to tighten their belt, yet the Prime Minister cannot even find his. Next week's fiscal update is the moment of truth. Will the Prime Minister finally get serious, rein in his out-of-control spending and stop pouring inflationary gasoline on families and seniors who are struggling to survive?”
“That means 25¢ less per litre and over $1,200 back for a family of four. Now the Liberals are celebrating as if they had scored the golden goal at the Olympics, even though they are still down by five. They call it relief. Canadians call it too little, too late.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals want applause for knocking a few cents off at the pump for the next few summer months, yet they keep the rest of their fuel taxes in place. That is not relief. That is a coupon. Canadians have already been getting squeezed by higher oil prices, and then the Liberals pile on with yet more taxes. That is why people in this country are paying far more at the pump than our neighbours to the south are. Families do not fill up their tank with talking points. They fill it up with money, and right now they simply do not have enough of it. However, Conservatives have a real plan. We will axe the fuel excise tax and the GST on gasoline and diesel for the rest of the year. We will also axe the industrial carbon tax and the clean fuel standard permanently.”
“Could the member talk a little about how the priorities of ports and trade-enabling infrastructure, whether that be Vancouver or, rightfully so, Churchill, contrast with other government policies, like a marine protected area and a national park proposal, which would get in the way of any of the infrastructure that, even if we built it, could actually get trade to market?”
“Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my colleague for what was an excellent speech, highlighting the fact that Canada does indeed have what the world wants, but through a suite of Liberal policies over the last 10 years, as he described, we have become an unreliable trading partner and had our port infrastructure and major trade-enabling infrastructure fall apart. In fact, Vancouver was recently ranked 347th out of the 348 most effective ports in the world. We now have a government using the powers under Bill C-5 to name the Alto project, a $90-billion, turning into a how many billions more, boondoggle.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am hoping my colleague can expand upon what is a failure in negotiations. At the time of the announcement, Canada was going to be the first country to pass legislation enabling Britain's accession to the CPTPP. Looking forward, beyond this, we have seen the Prime Minister go and sign a number of agreements. While we support the diversification of trade, what other opportunities, particularly for the livestock sector, are we potentially missing in these negotiations, as we could have enhanced imports from other countries and not have reciprocal exports going back out the door?”
“Mr. Speaker, I have not been in this place as long as my colleague and many others, but in my two and a half years as a member of Parliament, there has never been one single issue on which I have received so much correspondence, whether handwritten letters, emails or phone calls, yes, from my riding but from right across the country. People are concerned. Government members have a lot of gall to sit there and say, “Well, you're all wrong. You just don't understand what we're trying to do. Sure, we haven't laid out why on earth we might need to make this change, but you are all wrong, so please just don't worry about it. Trust us.” People are sick and tired of trusting the Liberal government when it comes to censorship.”
“There is no good reason to move forward with such an amendment to the Criminal Code, which has been upheld by the Supreme Court time and time again while it defended those very charter rights that my colleague rightfully pointed out are the primitive nature of our nation.”
“Mr. Speaker, it absolutely is. I am glad my colleague touched on this. We are censoring a censorship bill. There is limited time for parliamentarians to discuss this particular amendment, although it is not the entirety of the bill itself. As I mentioned in my speech, the bill could have been split between elements that could provide protection for people of faith going to their religious institutions and cultural centres and this removal of a long-standing legal defence. To me, this is an effort to continue to censor what people see and say online and, frankly, what they believe.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is quite the opposite. He should have been prosecuted. People cannot stand up and say things like he said in a public space, talk about exterminating certain types of people or incite specific violence against specific types of people. That is already in the Criminal Code. He most definitely should have been charged. He should be in prison for such vicious language and vicious incitement of violence. That is the problem. This bill would not change that. The government needs to stand up. The prosecutors need to stand up and actually pursue the laws on the books and put people who are spreading hateful language like that behind bars.”
“The question before us today is not simply whether a bill moves forward faster. The question is this: Do we still believe in the purpose of Parliament? The duty of Parliament is not simply to pass laws. It is to guard the freedom of the people who live under them. It is to restrain power, and when those laws touch belief, conscience and expression, that duty becomes even greater. Let us take the time to get this right, because history teaches us a hard truth. Freedom is rarely taken all at once. It disappears gradually, one safeguard at a—”
“When so many Canadians from so many different backgrounds raise the same concern, Parliament should take the time to listen. Instead, the government is choosing to move faster. Strong laws should not and do not fear debate. Good ideas grow stronger when they are tested. When a government limits debate and accelerates legislation, Canadians inevitably begin to ask the simple question, why the rush? They ask this question especially when there are no real examples of why this change is necessary. Parliament is not a rubber stamp. It is the place where the voices of Canadians are heard. It is the place where our laws are tested before they are imposed. It is the place where freedom is protected, not only by the words of legislation but by the care with which they are written.”
“They will say that the charter still protects freedom of religion and freedom of expression, but that misses the point. When Parliament removes an explicit safeguard from the Criminal Code, it narrows the zone of certainty for Canadians. It sends a signal that a protection once considered essential is now considered unnecessary. This is not a decision Parliament should make lightly. Across the country, religious leaders, civil society organizations and all sorts of diverse groups are raising concerns. Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs and those not of faith are saying the same thing, which is to slow down, listen and get it right. These are not radical voices. These are community leaders who care deeply about the freedom of Canadians to live according to their own conscience, to their own values.”
“Parliament is now being asked to accelerate the legislative process before Canadians have had the chance to fully understand the implications. What is striking in this debate is that the government has not provided a single concrete example explaining why this change is necessary. After weeks of discussion, no one has pointed to a prosecution that failed because of this clause. There is not one case, not one failed prosecution, not one real-world example. When Parliament removes a safeguard that has existed in the Criminal Code for more than half a century, Canadians rightfully deserve to know why. They deserve to see the problem the government is supposedly trying to fix. That explanation has so far not been provided. Some will say that other protections remain.”
“Faith leaders begin to wonder what can be safely said. A pastor quoting scripture at a sermon or a priest answering a theological question should not carry the shadow of a potentially criminal liability simply because someone disagrees with the belief being expressed. For more than 50 years, Canadian law has tried to preserve that balance. Removing that safeguard is not merely a minor technical adjustment. It is a significant shift in how the law interacts with freedom of conscience and expression. When Parliament removes a protection that has existed in criminal law for more than half a century, the burden of proof should be clear. The government should be able to show Canadians exactly why such a change is necessary, yet the amendment was not part of the government's original bill. It appeared late in the committee stage.”
“When Parliament created Canada's modern hate propaganda laws in 1970, lawmakers understood a fundamental truth that the power to criminalize speech is one of the most serious powers that a state can exercise. They built safeguards directly into the law. Truth was written into the Criminal Code as a legal defence. Public interest discussion was protected. Good-faith religious expression, grounded in sacred texts, was protected. Those protections were not merely afterthoughts. They were part of the balance that Parliament deliberately created. The problem is not only with what the law could punish but also with what people began to fear saying at all. When criminal law moves into questions of belief, interpretation and moral conviction, the chilling effect spreads far beyond the courtroom.”
“The remaining provisions affecting freedom of expression and the removal of the religious defence could then have been studied separately with the care that they deserve. That approach would have protected religious communities immediately, while still allowing Parliament to carefully examine changes to the Criminal Code. The government, shockingly, rejected this compromise. Instead of co-operation, it chose speed. Instead of scrutiny, it chose closure. Instead of debate, it chose control. (1945) Part of what has raised these concerns is a decision made during committee. The government supported a Bloc Québécois amendment to remove the religious expression defence that has existed in the Criminal Code for more than 50 years. That safeguard was not inserted casually.”
“These Canadians are asking serious questions about freedom of religion, questions about freedom of expression and questions about where the line would be drawn when sincerely held beliefs are discussed in public. Those questions deserve to be heard in Parliament. That is not obstruction; that is representation. It should also be said that there was a constructive path forward. Conservatives proposed splitting the bill. The provisions protecting places of worship and cultural centres could have passed relatively quickly. There is broad agreement across the chamber that Canadians must be able to practice their faith without intimidation or obstruction. Those changes could have become law quickly.”
“Some members have suggested that members raising concerns are simply trying to delay the bill, but there is a difference between delay and diligence. There is a difference between obstruction and representation. Members of Parliament do not arrive in the chamber carrying only their own opinions. We carry the voices of the people who elect us to be here. Over the past weeks, members of Parliament from every party have been contacted by Canadians via emails, letters and phone calls. There have been hundreds if not thousands of them to each of us, all expressing concern about the proposed removal of the religious good-faith clause from Bill C-9 .”
“That safeguard matters even more when Parliament is amending the Criminal Code and touching freedoms protected by the charter. Difficult does not mean dysfunctional. Difficult means careful. Difficult means thoughtful. Difficult means Parliament takes the time to get the law right. However, the motion before us today would do something very different. It would instruct the justice committee to immediately resume clause-by-clause consideration and vote through the remaining clauses and amendments without any debate. It would prevent the committee from adjourning until the bill is finished. It would limit debate in the chamber to a single day at report stage and a single day at third reading. In other words, the motion would sharply compress the opportunity for Parliament to examine the consequences of what we are doing in this place.”
“The founders of our democratic system understood a simple truth that every generation, it seems, eventually has to relearn: When governments can change the laws too easily, the balance of power rarely remains with the people. Our founders therefore built safeguards into the legislative process: multiple readings in the chamber, committee study, witness testimony, and amendments debated line by line. Members raise concerns on behalf of the people who sent them here. We ask whether we have thought this through. Have we heard the arguments? Have we tested the consequences before the law is imposed on millions of Canadians? That process is not a flaw in democracy. It is the safeguard that protects Canadians from bad laws.”
“Mr. Speaker, today we are debating more than a procedural motion. We are debating the principle of how laws in this country are supposed to be made. What the Liberals are asking Parliament to do today is not simply to move a bill along. It is asking Parliament to cut short the process of scrutiny that exists for a reason. It is asking us to do that while amending the Criminal Code of Canada, the law that determines when speech crosses the line into criminal liability, and that matters. Once criminal law becomes regulating speech, the line between protecting Canadians and policing belief becomes dangerously thin. Our parliamentary system was never designed to make passing legislation easy. It was in fact designed to make passing legislation difficult, and it was designed that way deliberately.”
“May his wife Joan, son Murray, daughter Denise and her husband Yuri, his sisters, nieces and nephews, and his grandchildren whom he adored, be blessed with strength from the memories of the way he lived and grateful for the many years they had with him, even through his long battle with cancer. We will miss him. Rest easy, Uncle Ron.”
“Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honour the life of a great man, Ron Russell. Ron was a farmer and a founder of AgWest equipment in Portage la Prairie, building a brand and reputation across western Canada for quality products and great service. He loved agriculture, making deals and supporting his community. More importantly, Ron was a husband, father, grandfather, friend, mentor and a man whose presence left a lasting impression on everyone fortunate enough to know him. He was always quick with a smile, and that booming laugh of his was always just a split second away. People could not help but smile when they were around Ron. Ron saw every interaction as a chance to make a friend, of which he collected an uncountable number across North America who will miss him dearly.”
“Mr. Speaker, I have received more emails, phone calls, and stops in the grocery store than I ever have on any other issue about the amendments to remove the freedom of religious expression, which the Liberals cooked up with the Bloc Québécois. That is the problem. Of course, acts of hate are the problem. We should have a country where our prosecutors and police act on the laws that we have to protect worshippers of all faiths and all Canadians. It has only been during the last 10 years that we have seen this rapid rise in every type of crime, including hate crime, under the Liberal government.”
“Mr. Speaker, no, we have been focusing on strengthening the bill, not weakening the bill, which is why Conservatives put forward so many positive amendments. Thankfully, some that were entertained are now going to become law, should this bill pass through the Senate, but we are going to leave aside bills that would put the priority of convicted criminals above that of victims.”
“Mr. Speaker, not to get too far into the weeds, but the committee is the master of its own domain. The committee members could have decided that Bill C-14 was the priority. Canadians decided that Bill C-14 was the priority. They have been demanding bail reform for eight years, since the initial changes by the former, well the same, Liberal government that caused this entire mess. The Liberals decided to put a divisive issue, the removal of the protections that are inherent to religious expression in Bill C-9 , forward instead of bail reform. Liberals should stop politicizing it, but I am glad we have finally been able to move forward. They should also drop Bill C-9 while they are at it.”
“When there are judges who make decisions that do not make sense, when we talk to our constituents about the fact that they do not make sense, we should be able to overrule and decide that serious, repeat murderers deserve consecutive sentences and should stay behind bars for life, because life should mean life.”
“Mr. Speaker, this is why we repeatedly say the Liberals are soft on crime. We have seen from them, for so many years, this deference to the accused and the convicted instead of their listening to victims. When we get a chance to talk to somebody who went through, in particular, the parole process, or any of the court processes, we hear their stories and their frustration with the lack of information available about releases on specific days and the inability to actually put forward victim impact statements. It is devastating to listen to. At the end of the day, it is Parliament that should reign supreme.”
“Canadians should also know this: Where the government chose to not go further on repeat human traffickers, on mandatory detention for serious repeat offenders and on ending house arrest for major crimes, Conservatives will continue to press for change. This work does not just end with one bill. At the end of the day, the first responsibility of any government is the safety of its citizens. That responsibility does not change with political convenience, and it does not disappear when this specific debate ends. It is the obligation of any government to keep its citizens safe. That is a responsibility that Conservatives will never stop fighting to uphold.”
“That is why we will continue to push for improvements wherever and whenever possible. The amendments demonstrate what can happen when the government actually listens. Transit workers can be better protected. Bail supervision can be more credible. Repeat violent offenders can face stronger scrutiny. Canadians can finally receive clear reporting on how the bail system is performing. These are real improvements, but we must acknowledge that more work remains. I will never stop working to correct the past mistakes and to ensure that repeat offenders face real consequences for the harm they cause to folks not just in my area but across the country. Bill C-14 is stronger today because Conservative members fought to make it stronger, including the tireless work of my colleague from Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations .”
“We should all agree that criminals belong behind bars. That means recognizing when the system needs correction. I believe in a justice system that must hold two truths at once. It must protect the rights of the accused, and it must protect the innocent. It must respect fairness, and it must ensure safety for the communities that we all serve. These goals are not mutually exclusive. In fact, public confidence in the justice system depends on achieving both. When repeat violent offenders are released too easily, confidence erodes, and rightfully so. When serious crimes are met with insufficient consequences, deterrence weakens. When victims feel that their safety ranks second to ideology, trust simply disappears. That is why Conservatives pushed for stronger measures.”
“Canadians watching this debate understand the difference. Conservatives fought for stronger protections because we know what happens when warnings are ignored, while the Liberals chose half measures. This debate does not exist in a vacuum. Across the country, police chiefs and premiers have raised concerns about repeat offenders committing serious crimes while out on bail. Victims' families have spoken about preventable tragedies. Frontline police officers have called on Parliament to act before more people are hurt or killed. Bill C-14 , as amended, moves in the right direction in several respects because of Conservative amendments, but it still reflects the government's failure to confront the consequences of policy choices that weakened confidence in the justice system. Public safety should not be a partisan issue.”
“What else could there be other than public safety as the primary consideration of bail decisions? At a time when we have communities across the country raising concerns about repeat violent offenders cycling through the system, the Liberals refused to enshrine a clear statement that community comes first. They also voted against mandatory detention in cases involving repeat serious offenders who reoffend while already on release. They voted against strengthening passport surrender requirements for high-risk accused individuals even in reverse onus situations. They voted against expanding ineligibility for house arrest for serious offences such as human trafficking, robbery and weapons trafficking. This leaves open the possibility that individuals convicted of major crimes could still serve their sentences in the comfort of their own home.”
“(1220) While Conservatives worked to strengthen the legislation, the Liberals repeatedly voted against measures that would have gone further to protect victims and communities. They voted against requiring consecutive sentences for repeat human traffickers. Let us be clear about what this means. Human trafficking is one of the most heinous, exploitative and devastating crimes that exist in the Criminal Code. When someone commits that offence repeatedly, we believe, the penalty should reflect the gravity and the repetitive nature of that harm, yet the Liberals rejected this proposal, choosing leniency where stronger consequences were absolutely warranted. They voted against making public safety the primary consideration of bail decisions. Members should think about that.”
“To ensure this never happens again and to hold government accountable, our amendment would mandate annual reporting on the bail system performance with transparent data on reoffending and compliance. Simply put, Canadians deserve to know whether these changes are making them safer, and Parliament needs facts, not assumptions, to keep improving the system. Finally, we supported measures that treat serious firearms and weapons offences as violent crimes under youth justice law, because gun crime is violent crime, full stop. A person's age does not lessen the trauma inflicted on victims or the fear that it spreads in our communities. These are not just minor tweaks. They are important changes that would make the bill stronger. Canadians also deserve honesty about what did not happen at committee.”
“We would also strengthen detention rules by establishing a reverse onus for repeat serious violent offenders who commit new crimes while already on release. If someone is given a second chance and they use it to hurt people again, the priority must be public safety. They need to prove they are no longer a risk or they will remain behind bars. Public safety is not negotiable, period. For too long, debates about bail reform have been driven by partial information. It was not that long ago that we saw Liberal MPs and ministers defending the status quo as if it were not broken and everything was okay, but the warning signs were there. However, it took tragedy after tragedy before the Liberals were prepared to admit that they had actually broken the system and that it needed to be fixed.”
“Police officers, prosecutors, transit workers and community advocates told us that the justice system was broken, with too many dangerous repeat offenders cycling through. When they pointed out the gaps, we worked to make this bill stronger. Canadians are exhausted by this revolving door justice system and are just as tired of endless political games. They want results, and rightfully so, and we made real improvements that would restore integrity to the bail system through amendments. One key amendment that we put forward would prevent convicted serious offenders from acting as sureties. Bail supervision is meant to protect the public, not serve as simply a rubber stamp. Allowing those with serious criminal records to act as sureties is ridiculous, and our amendment would end this absurdity once and for all.”