Thank you for joining us today, minister.

This morning The Globe and Mail published an op-ed by Professor Debra Parkes calling on the government to abolish mandatory minimum penalties.

Your government was elected on a platform that promised to restore judges’ discretion regarding mandatory minimum penalties. Bill C-75, the product of the review of the criminal justice process that you were mandated to carry out, does not address mandatory minimum penalties. In fact, Bill C-75, although it also promises to significantly reduce the number of Indigenous peoples in the criminal justice system, does not heed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Call to Action No. 32, which called on the government to depart from mandatory minimum penalties because they are a primary contributor to the over-representation of Indigenous peoples in Canadian prisons.

I’m curious, minister, and I’d appreciate your interventions here in terms of what steps the government is taking and planning to take to address mandatory minimum penalties in light of the July 2018 finding of your own department that 9 out of 10 Canadians in fact want your government to consider giving judges the flexibility to not impose mandatory minimum penalties.

When will your government attempt to implement some provisions to ensure judges have the discretion not to impose mandatory minimum penalties?

Hon. Jody Wilson-Raybould, P.C., M.P., Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada: Thanks to the honourable senator for her question and her decades of advocacy in terms of the criminal justice system and marginalized individuals. Certainly, I recognize the work the honourable senator has done specifically with respect to mandatory minimum penalties in her public member’s bill.

With respect to where the government is in terms of mandatory minimum penalties, I will say from the outset that I believe I’ve been very clear as minister in terms of my position or approach to mandatory minimum penalties. I’ll reiterate — and this has been raised by other honourable senators in this place — that I believe mandatory minimum penalties are appropriate for the most serious of crimes, but there are many other mandatory minimum penalties in the Criminal Code and the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, around 72.

I believe that, with respect to many of the mandatory minimum penalties, we need to continue to do work on them. We are continuing to engage across the board with Canadians and all actors in the criminal justice system. I’m committed to sentencing reform. I recognize that it is in my mandate letter, and I want to ensure that when we move forward with reforms to mandatory minimum penalties, that we get it right, that we make changes in terms of sentencing that will stand the test of time.

I can assure this honourable place that when we do make changes with respect to mandatory minimum penalties, it will be because of the recognition of the necessity for judges to have the necessary discretion to impose the most appropriate sentence based on the individual that presents themselves before that judge.

I have benefited from the expertise of many individuals across the country in terms of the timing around making changes to mandatory minimum penalties. This is something that we’re committed to continuing to do work around and to move forward on. Certainly, there are moments when we would like things to move a little bit quicker, but the honourable senator in this place has my commitment that it is something I’m committed to doing.

There are potentially other tools that could assist in looking at sentencing reform, broadly looking at the principles of sentencing in the Criminal Code and ensuring when we actually do make changes to mandatory minimum penalties that we understand the impacts and the data that comes from those changes to make sure that sentencing is appropriate, balanced and does a service to the criminal justice system.