EXCLUSIVE： Charest announces policies to build safer communities.
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Summary
In this episode, we discuss the recent shooting death of a mother of five in Calgary and the need for tougher sentences for repeat offenders. We also discuss the issue of illegal handguns and gang involvement in violent crime in Canada.
Transcript
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Thank you very much for coming back to the show, Mr. Sherey. I saw the release this morning with
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you putting out your policy on justice issues, and it was just quite the timing. I don't know
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if you've been watching Calgary Issues much lately, but we've had a lot of crime issues
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going on and a recent event where a mother of five was unfortunately killed in an incident
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with a couple of cars that had been chasing each other and shots were fired. And it turns
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out that the suspect had been charged with six previous attempted murders, gangland involvement.
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He'd played it down, got recently released, and now we've found ourselves with a woman
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who's lost her life and left five children without a mother. So to see the timing on with
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where your release is going, I guess, on justice reform and really targeting the violent crimes
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and the inappropriate firearms use, I just wanted to get you on to expand on that because
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this race really hasn't gone into the justice system yet, and it's a very important one.
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And Corey, what you're describing, which is a terrible tragedy in Calgary, is also happening
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in other cities, including Montreal, where in the last few days we've had shootings in broad
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daylight and murders, gang crime. And Toronto, of course, is also another city that's under
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pressure and more of a reason to be very firm on crime. And I would bring back an opportunity
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for Crown prosecutors to ask for minimum sentences on gun crimes. I would also increase sentences
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for those who assault police officers or first responders, firemen, or those who are healthcare
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workers or social workers. Also stronger sentences on hate crimes. And a special RCMP unit to deal
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with this issue of all these illegal handguns coming into Canada. That's the real issue on guns in Canada.
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It's these handguns that are coming in from the United States and to stop that as much as possible.
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Also more policing on transit routes because we've had incidents there. But Canada needs to get up its
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game on security in all the cities of Canada, including Calgary.
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Well, and that's a good conservative approach. And that's where some people get a lot of concern,
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you know, with the long guns. People who hunt or target shoot and things like that often feel like
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we're being, you know, picked on or targeted in these. You know, statistically, that's not where
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the issues are coming from. As you said, it's predominantly illegal handguns or people with gang
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involvement where these issues are happening. And we're not going to address them properly if we don't
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target them. And, Corey, I am a hunter, you know, and I know hunters well. I know farmers also well
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enough to tell you that if we have limited resources, which we always do. I mean, it's never been
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unlimited. But all the energy and money and resources that we have should be put into fighting crime in
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cities and these gangs and these organized crime in cities who are using handguns. And handguns that are
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coming in from the United States. That's where the effort needs to be. That's where the threat is.
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And it breaks my heart to see that this what happened in Calgary over the last few days.
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But I'm sorry to report the same kind of things and crimes are happening in Montreal, which used to
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be, you know, Montreal used to say, oh, we're not Toronto and we don't have a crime problem. Well,
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you know what? They do now. And so we need to get serious about this and have tougher sentences
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and be very firm in dealing with the handguns, illegal handguns.
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Well, that's it. And it's frustrating. As I said, we see that these are people that we've had in
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custody that have already indicated that they're quite dangerous individuals, yet somehow we seem
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lapsed. But then just to play devil's advocate, mandatory minimums can be pretty dicey in the
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justice system and often don't withstand court challenges down the road. Can legislation be crafted
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that would be able to withstand those sorts of challenges if it came about?
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I think the way of dealing with that, Corey, is what we're proposing to make it optional for Crown
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attorneys to either press that charge or not press that charge. Now, that means that they have to
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think this through. They have to justify it. They have to invoke the special circumstances that would
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justify them laying a charge that for a minimum sentence, which I think will meet the test of a
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charter challenge that will inevitably come down the road. The problem in the previous format is that
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the courts looked at this and said, well, you just can't blanket charges in the same way on everybody
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in every circumstances. Okay. So we listened to what they have to say. This is an approach that
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will give the Crown attorneys, though, real tools to work with so that we are dealing with repeat
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offenders and make sure that we keep them behind bars and keep our communities secure.
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And I didn't see it necessarily in that release, but it's all justice related. It's one of a larger
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problems. You mentioned transit and emergency workers and people who put themselves at a lot of
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risk. Often, it's connected with, you know, we've got a very bad opioid problem and addiction
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epidemic going on. I mean, that's part of what brings the gangs, of course, too. When they see a means
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of making money, unfortunately, the unprincipled and organized crime always follows. Are there measures
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perhaps to try and see how we could address that aspect of things? I mean, if it's not profitable for
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organized crime, that could reduce some of the impacts. It's a big, complicated issue, I know.
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Well, the opioid crisis in the country right now is a terrible tragedy also. It's more concentrated,
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actually, in British Columbia than what we've seen in Eastern Canada. And I guess that means the
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droops, the drug roots, are probably more organized in certain parts of the country than they are in
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other places. Fentanyl. And these are drugs that are often coming in from Asia and other places. That means
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much tighter border controls and policing to make sure that these drugs don't come in,
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and then treating those who are victims of opioid abuse and who are victims to that. We also need to
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find ways to help them out so that they can kick their addiction and return to some normalcy in their
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own lives. So hate-motivated crimes you had in there as well, which again, you know,
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as with any, it's an odious thing. So you're not talking about bringing new laws on the books,
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though? Your policy is just talking about increasing the potential sentences for that sort of crime?
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Well, actually, Corey, it would demand that we legislate. If we want to bring in legislation,
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if we want to have the ability to give Crown attorneys an option to lay down minimum sentencing,
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then we have to bring in legislation. The same would be true for tougher sentences for those
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who attack or who aggress either police officers or firemen or first responders or nurses or health
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caregivers or even social workers. So yes, we would have to bring in legislation. I'm hoping that the
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other opposition parties would, because we'll be in government at that point, would cooperate to make
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this happen as rapidly as possible. So if we were to increase incarceration times for people
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upon conviction, quite often we have a lot of our correctional facilities are already full or
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overloaded. I imagine that would have to be coupled with some sort of means of either
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bringing up space or increasing space in our facilities to take in more people for longer.
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Well, we have to look at that on a regular basis on how we're organized. Do we have to expand space?
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If we hopefully we, you know, we're not in a world in which we're actually just jailing more people
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because there's more crime. But if we have to do that, we'll do that. But we'll do it on a needs basis.
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And we'll do it in a context where we're not trying to jail more people. I mean, let's be clear.
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That's not the idea. The idea is to deal with criminals and hardened criminals who are a threat to our
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community and make sure that we always observe the cardinal rule, Corey. And the cardinal rule is
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security of our communities first and foremost. Everything else comes second. And that's the way
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that my government would approach this. Yeah. Well, and it's likewise, I think most
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people with common sense realize we don't want to pack our prisons full of car thieves over extended
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long sentences, though, I mean, it's still a crime. It's of concern we want to get the people who've
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been committing violent crimes and seeing a pattern of that. I think the California three strikes law
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when they tried that some years ago failed dramatically because of that, because people
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with very minor offenses found themselves with very long sentences, and then they didn't have space
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for the very serious offenders when the time came. But it's just, you know, asking because,
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of course, when you do justice reform, it has a ripple effect all the way around throughout
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the entire system. And being smart about it means that you have to trust the judgment of the
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Crown attorneys who are laying these charges, who have the information about individuals,
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about their prior convictions, about their behavior, about their releases,
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and who are in the best position to say, well, this is a person who deserves a minimum sentence
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because they obviously they're not getting the message and we need to protect our communities.
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So if we trust that we can trust the right people to make those calls, we just need to give them the
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tools so that they can actually do the right thing. Sure. And likewise, as you said, you know,
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setting up a police task force to target the smuggled firearms and handguns in particular,
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would there perhaps be examining giving more resources to Canada Border Services Agency as
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well? I mean, they're on the front line trying to prevent that. Definitely. Canada Border Services
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is a key role to play and to allow them to do the work they need to do to be able to find these
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firearms where they come in or patrol in areas that are vulnerable. We have a very long undefended border
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with the United States. And that means there's a lot of ways for criminals to be able to make
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their way through. And so the Border Services have a key role to play in this respect.
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Great. Well, I guess, you know, it's a big issue. I'm just happy to see it come up. Crime and justice
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have always been big ones with me and we often don't hear about them. They don't hit the top of the
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polls with the public often at election time. It seems to be more like incident by incident when we get
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upset with it. But we've always got to look at these things. So hopefully the other candidates
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will respond now that you've broached the issue. It's important to hear from everybody on it. And
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I appreciate where you're coming from with it. Is there more you'd like to add before I let you go?
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Well, conservatives are about law and order. This is a core value of the conservative party and one
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that I believe in. So this policy is about our value of respecting law and order and the role of law.
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Thank you, Corey. Great. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Sherey. And well, we look forward to
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watching and hopefully speaking again as the campaign continues to unfold.